Meat for the Hungry

Ruth 4:1-10
Ruth waited, Boaz confronted, and the nearer kinsman declined.
But why? Why was Boaz, the near kinsman, able to redeem, where the nearer one could not?
Quickly assessing the opportunity, this closer relative realized having Ruth for a wife, would ruin his inheritance. He would be spending his own money to purchase something his children would not inherit. Elimelech’s field would accede to the child he fathered for Mahlon, and he was unable or unwilling to share his inheritance.
Therefore, today we come to the most important lesson of this series.

So it has come to this.
Through sobs of disbelief and anguish, a strong arm supported her. She took one last gaze upward into the sweet face of the baby she cradled, the boy she nurtured, and the incredible man he had become. How can this be? His once pleasant face now swelled, distorted, bruised and bloodied from the beating. Thorns stabbed his head and his body wrenched in pain. Hanging on this cross, wooden shards relentlessly gouged his open wounds. Thick, rusty spikes gored his hands and feet. Sweat and blood-striped agony gripped him. Yet, his eyes were full of love, not anger. He nodded one last goodbye and she felt John’s nudge. She wanted to stay and protest, to scream aloud the injustice of it all, but how could she watch him die? How could God let this happen? Bewildered, she stepped back.

Filled with nervous energy, Ruth could barely eat breakfast. Dare she consider the enormous sack of barley occupying their tiny kitchen an engagement gift? Naomi thinks so.

But, what about the nearer kinsman? How long will it take Boaz to discuss the matter with him? Will he come to inform her of the outcome immediately, or will he delay until tomorrow?
Ruth wanted to marry Boaz and no one else.

Before we can move our thoughts to the city gate and Boaz meeting with the closer relative, we must understand the Law of God in relation to the near kinsman.
In Leviticus 25:25, God gave a close relative the right to redeem or buy back a possession a poor brother or kinsman had sold.
With Deuteronomy 25:5-10, God conveyed His requirement for a man to marry his brother's widow, if they had no child to carry on the family name. When the surviving brother married the widow, the law would consider her firstborn son to be the son of her dead husband. A brother could refuse this familial obligation, but at great cost. The widow would then publicly shame him by spitting in his face and removing his sandal, thus disgracing his name in all Israel.