Redemption Built on Relationship

Readings: Ruth 2:10-12, 15-20, True Christianity 126 (see below)
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Welcome to our second week journeying with the book of Ruth. Today we hear about what happened to Naomi and Ruth as they settled into life in Bethlehem. Without husbands, and more specifically, without ancestral land, they had no way to support themselves other than gleaning from the fields of others, essentially collecting leftovers from the harvest. This is how Ruth meets Boaz, a wealthy landowner. Now, as we had heard two weeks ago, the book of Leviticus stated that provision should be made in this way for widows and foreigners, people exactly like Naomi and Ruth. And it seems that this is what Boaz had been doing and we can imagine that Ruth probably wasn’t the only one gleaning leftovers from the harvest. However, we hear in the text a particular kindness from Boaz: he instructs his workers to leave extra gleanings behind for Ruth to gather.

When Naomi hears about the connection that Ruth made with Boaz, she is happy for more than one reason. Boaz is not some random benevolent landowner. He has a connection to their family, a connection that puts him in a position of responsibility for their welfare. She calls him their “guardian-redeemer.” 

This introduces another important theme in the book of Ruth: redemption. It is a theme that is explored at many levels. On one level, the term “guardian-redeemer” has specific meaning in Israelite law, one that has more to do with property and linage than with spirit or emotion. But we can also see that the book is exploring redemption in a deeper sense: how was Naomi going to be rescued from her bitterness? How might Ruth be rescued from a life of uncertainty and poverty and otherness? How might God be working for the benefit, the redemption, of the Israelite people? Scholars believe that the book of Ruth, while placed narratively in the time between the judges and the kings, was probably written much later in the days following the Israelites exile in Babylon, as commentary on how, and with what values, the Israelites might rebuild their nation. It was a book that spoke into the embodied redemption of beginning a society again.

So I thought today might be a good time to explore the idea of redemption in a theological sense. In several weeks, before we know it really, we will be entering the liturgical season of Advent, where we will hear plenty of “redeemer” language, as we tell the story of how God reached out into the world to be incarnated as a person like you and me. In the gospel of Luke, after meeting the baby Jesus, Zechariah sings “Praise be to the Lord, the God of Israel, because he has come to his people and redeemed them.” (Luke 1:68) A question we might have is: What does it mean to be redeemed? And how does a little baby born millennia ago redeem me now?

To redeem something, in basic everyday terms, means to buy, recover or exchange something, like redeeming a coupon. We give the coupon, and get a discount in return. When that idea is transferred to the world of theology, as in redemption, then we start to explore more existential shades of meaning, as we consider atonement, deliverance or rescue for ourselves personally, and how God might be involved in that.

And so we find that needing to be redeemed, reflects a situation of being or having one thing, and wanting or needing to have another. The process of redemption describes the journey from the first state to the second. The term redeemer describes someone to enables that journey to occur.

In the book of Ruth, we have our two main characters mired in a state of bitterness and poverty, and the story is tracing their journey from this first state into another different state, as we will see, an objectively better one. It tells the story of how they are redeemed physically and emotionally. Boaz helps them on that journey, and so is called their guardian-redeemer.

Likewise, in Advent, we tell a similar story in terms of the whole of humanity. The gospel of John begins with themes of light and darkness. The world was a dark place, and it seemed that people’s hearts were dark as well, and something needed to be done. Jesus, the light of the world, comes to help people on a journey of redemption, a light shining in the darkness, illuminating the possiblity of being different.
But often times, the theology of redemption is presented in very transactional terms.  A lot of traditional Christian theology pictures a God who is angry because the people of the world are so sinful, with hearts so dark that they were not listening to all the ways that God had offered redemption before. According to all kinds of ancient religion, when people transgress there must be a consequence, a price paid to God. So, some Christian theologies say, Jesus stepped in to pay that price for us, for humanity, to pay the price due to God for our sins, then and forever more. The ultimate sacrifice, the ultimate exchange, and the ultimate act of redeeming that will last forever.

So in personal terms, this is like if we do a dine and dash, and eat a meal at a restaurant but leave without paying. Jesus steps in to pay the bill, stopping the police from coming after us. Which certainly seems nice. But as Swedenborg has pointed out, this idea is undergirded by some untenable assumptions, and has some serious loopholes.

Because what Swedenborg was seeing in his own religious circles, was people praising Jesus paying the bill, but continuing to dine and dash, because, you know, Jesus was paying the bill. And Swedenborg wondered how this could ever be what the divine wanted or intended. Where was the room, where was the imperative, for human emotional and spiritual development?

And in addition, for Swedenborg, it was impossible that God should be angry and vengeful. God can only be divinely loving and wise, mourning our evil choices of course but never despising us, and never demanding restitution for God’s own sake, only desiring a holistic accountability anchored in our transformation. And if God is not angry and vengeful, demanding a price for our transgressions, then the whole redemption-as-an-exhange thing falls apart. And if it does, then what was Jesus’ sacrifice all about? How was Jesus redeeming us if not paying our bill?

So Swedenborg offered a different understanding of redemption. God, instead of solving things from outside of the process, entered into the process and life that has been ordained for us, became human, became a form that could actually be tempted by hell and used our common humanity as both a model for living and a way to concretely overcome evil and the love of power. This redeems us not by exchange, but by relationship. By entering into the process with us, God created a connection and a closeness that continues to serve us.

Because, when we consider the complexity of human experience, we see that redemption cannot ever be just about transaction, just about our bill being paid, just about receiving forgiveness, however good that might make us feel, or how grateful we might be for it. We human beings can suffer in a multitude of ways, both of our own creation, and completely not our own fault. And how we make the journey out of that suffering can be complicated. Our need is not always just forgiveness, sometimes our need is one of letting go, reframing, patience, evolution, and so many other things. Obviously then, redemption must be a personal journey, and if God is to effect our redemption, to be our redeemer, God has to be on the journey with us, has to be responsive to what we need in the moment. Paying our bill, or in traditional Christian language the forgiveness of our sins, is indeed be a good and kind thing in many a case, but is not sufficient for the totality of human spiritual development. We need more from our God, and thankfully, God gave it. God gave us a redemption that leads to partnership, that results in the kind of freedom and learning that each one of us really needs. This is a kind of redemption we must live into. Not earn, but live into. It is indeed a gift, and one given fresh every single day, not just Easter Sunday. 

And so, as we return to the book of Ruth, what kind of redemption, do we see, and shall we see, there? Today we see Boaz taking a sustained interest, seeing Ruth for who she really is, imagining what she might need in terms of protection, community, and sustenance, and providing for it. She was rescued from hunger and aloneness by a stranger enfolding her into community, and Naomi begins to be rescued from her cynicism and grief by the prospect of being seen. Next week the story of their redemption continues in both complicated and beautiful ways. The book of Ruth understands that redemption is indeed a journey, with many moving parts, actors and beneficiaries. It speaks to us clearly of redemption that is built on relationship: a more complicated way perhaps, but one that bears so much fruit. Thanks be to God. Amen.


Readings:

Ruth 2:1-12, 15-20

1 Now Naomi had a relative on her husband’s side, a man of standing from the clan of Elimelek, whose name was Boaz. 2 And Ruth the Moabite said to Naomi, “Let me go to the fields and pick up the leftover grain behind anyone in whose eyes I find favor.” Naomi said to her, “Go ahead, my daughter.” 3 So she went out, entered a field and began to glean behind the harvesters. As it turned out, she was working in a field belonging to Boaz, who was from the clan of Elimelek. 4 Just then Boaz arrived from Bethlehem and greeted the harvesters, “The LORD be with you!” “The LORD bless you!” they answered. 5 Boaz asked the overseer of his harvesters, “Who does that young woman belong to?” 6 The overseer replied, “She is the Moabite who came back from Moab with Naomi. 7 She said, ‘Please let me glean and gather among the sheaves behind the harvesters.’ She came into the field and has remained here from morning till now, except for a short rest in the shelter.” 8 So Boaz said to Ruth, “My daughter, listen to me. Don’t go and glean in another field and don’t go away from here. Stay here with the women who work for me. 9 Watch the field where the men are harvesting, and follow along after the women. I have told the men not to lay a hand on you. And whenever you are thirsty, go and get a drink from the water jars the men have filled.” 10 At this, she bowed down with her face to the ground. She asked him, “Why have I found such favor in your eyes that you notice me—a foreigner?” 11 Boaz replied, “I’ve been told all about what you have done for your mother-in-law since the death of your husband—how you left your father and mother and your homeland and came to live with a people you did not know before. 12 May the LORD repay you for what you have done. May you be richly rewarded by the LORD, the God of Israel, under whose wings you have come to take refuge.” 

15 As she got up to glean, Boaz gave orders to his men, “Let her gather among the sheaves and don’t reprimand her. 16 Even pull out some stalks for her from the bundles and leave them for her to pick up, and don’t rebuke her.” 17 So Ruth gleaned in the field until evening. Then she threshed the barley she had gathered, and it amounted to about an ephah. 18 She carried it back to town, and her mother-in-law saw how much she had gathered. Ruth also brought out and gave her what she had left over after she had eaten enough. 19 Her mother-in-law asked her, “Where did you glean today? Where did you work? Blessed be the man who took notice of you!” Then Ruth told her mother-in-law about the one at whose place she had been working. “The name of the man I worked with today is Boaz,” she said. 20 “The LORD bless him!” Naomi said to her daughter-in-law. “He has not stopped showing his kindness to the living and the dead.” She added, “That man is our close relative; he is one of our guardian-redeemers. ”


True Christianity 126

Suffering on the cross was the final trial the Lord underwent as the greatest prophet. It was a means of glorifying his human nature, that is, of uniting that nature to his Father's divine nature. It was not redemption. There are two things for which the Lord came into the world and through which he saved people and angels: redemption, and the glorification of his human aspect. These two things are distinct from each other, but they become one in contributing to salvation. 

In the preceding points we have shown what redemption was: battling the hells, gaining control over them, and then restructuring the heavens. Glorification, however, was the uniting of the Lord's human nature with the divine nature of his Father. This process occurred in successive stages and was completed by the suffering on the cross. 

All of us have to do our part and move closer to God. The closer we come to God, the more God enters us, which is his part…

The union itself [between the Lord's divine and human natures] was completed by the suffering on the cross, because this suffering was the final spiritual test that the Lord went through in the world. Spiritual tests lead to a partnership [with God]. During our spiritual tests, we are apparently left completely alone, although in fact we are not alone - at those times God is most intimately present at our deepest level giving us support. Because of that inner presence, when any of us have success in a spiritual test we form a partnership with God at the deepest level. In the Lord's case, he was then united to God, his Father, at the deepest level.