Thursday, October 28, 2010
God Is At Work - The Story of Ruth Part IV - The Providence of God, Part 2 of 23
TEXT: "Now Boaz went up to the gate and sat down there; and behold, the near-kinsman of whom Boaz had spoken came by" (Ruth 4:1).
IDEA: To understand the biblical story, we need to know the biblical setting.
PURPOSE: To help listeners gain insight into why cultural background is important.
Robert Alter and Frank Kermode: "To most educated modern readers the Bible probably seems both familiar and strange, like the features of an ancestor."
Most people today don't do much reading apart from magazines and newspapers. When they do read, why kind of books do they select?
Most folks do not read the Bible, especially the Old Testament. Why is it difficult?
How old is the story of Ruth?
I. What problems do we face in studying literature that is almost 3,000 years old?
We don't understand the setting in which the story took place.
We read into the story what may not be there.
II. In Ruth 4, we read about matters that were self-evident to the ancient writer and readers, but not to us.
Boaz went to the gate of the town of Bethlehem to get the matter settled about Ruth's husband-to-be (Ruth 4:1). Why go there?
The town gate offered the best place to locate other kinsmen. Everyone had to pass through the gate on the way to their fields, the threshing floor, or to other towns. Boaz didn't have to waste time searching for the nearer kinsman.
The gate was where legal transactions took place. Ancient towns were compactly built along narrow streets. In general the gate consisted of a large area in front of the wall's outer edge, a series of small alcoves lined with stone benches off the main passage through the wall, and another spacious bench-lined open area inside the wall.
Like a modern town square, the gate area was both a marketplace and a civic center. It was the courthouse – the place where officials sat to administer justice and to oversee legal transactions.
Later the gate was the area where prophets addressed both kings and commoners (1 Kings 22:10; Jeremiah 17:19-20).
There is nothing quite comparable to it today in America. It was the mall, the courthouse, the town square all in one.
It was there at the town gate that Boaz went to find the nearer kinsman, the kinsman-redeemer with whom he must do business.
It was the best place to go to locate someone. Everyone had to pass through the gate to go to work.
It was the place where legal transactions took place.
Was the timing coincidental or providential in what seems to be a chance encounter with the very person he went to see (compare it to Ruth 2:3-4)?
