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Dan Wu: Well, a few years ago, my son Liam, asked me for some help with a school assessment analysing the tech. This is water and I got quite excited because I actually heard be like water, which is of course a quote from martial arts legend Bruce Lee, and so I was getting ready to help Liam glean nuggets of lethal wisdom. From the master, but sadly, it was actually a 2005 US College graduation speech by novelist David Foster Wallace, based on the analogy of an older fish swimming past two younger fish and saying, morning boys, how's the water? The younger fish turn and ask each other, what the heck is water?

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It's actually quite a good speech. So it actually was a good exercise and it went viral in mainstream media because it called out arrogant assumptions that have crept into modern western education and thinking. It also went a bit viral in Christian circles because despite being an agnostic, Wallis's Main point sounded almost Augustinian. He said, humans are worshipping beings.

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We all worship something. It's just that something tends to be me. I am the centre and things and people around me. If they don't revolve around me and my interests, I become resentful and angry.

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Here's what Wallace said, reflecting on his judging other drivers while tired and stuck in a traffic jam. My default setting is that situations like this are really all about me, my hungriness, my fatigue, my desire to just get home. How everybody else is just in my way and how deeply and personally unfair on me this is. He then points out education should actually help us realise the world doesn't revolve around just my story because everybody's got a story and so he returns to the traffic jam, but this time empathises

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with the other drivers, imagines their frustrations and problems and how he might be of help to them. He concludes life works best. We are happier, more compassionate, more sacrificial when we don't try to make it all about me, but we fit ourselves into the bigger picture of all our stories combined. Now, like I said, Wallace was an agnostic, and so his vision is ultimately human centred and deeply flawed.

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However, his overall point. Is theologically correct, isn't it? We are part of a bigger story, and we are happier, more compassionate and sacrificial when we see ourselves specifically in service of something, someone for us greater. And Ruth four makes the same point.

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As this beautiful narrative which is focused on these individual characters, Naomi, Ruth, and Boaz ends. It zooms out to show that everything they've done and said has actually been part of a bigger picture, and that is God's plan to redeem the world from sin centred on Jesus. And it also reminds us to see everything we do and say as a vital part. Of that same wonderful plan.

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So three points. God's redemption is characterised by costly love, verses one to 10 is driven by his people's prayers. Verses 11 and 12. Centres on a precious son, verses 13 to 22.

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And then we'll think about the relevance for us. So first, God's redemption involves costly love. So in chapter three, we left Boaz hoping to marry Ruth and act as Naomi's guardian redeemer. But in chapter three, verse 12, there is of course that roadblock there is a closer relative who has first dibs.

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Now in chapter four, it's the next day and the relative has come to town. Verse three, then Boaz said to the guardian, Redeemer, Naomi, who has come back from Moab is selling the piece of land that belonged to our relative Aek. I thought I should bring the matter to your attention and suggest that you buy it. If you'll redeem it, do so.

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But if you will not tell me so I will know for no one has the right to do it except you and I am next in line. Now, not everything in this narrative is clear to us here. For example, this is the first time in the book we've been told Naomi owns a field and no one's really sure how the whole guardian redeemer thing works anyway, so what I think makes best sense is that a lile, as an Israelite under God's covenant had a family land inheritance, which on his and his son's deaths passed to Naomi.

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But. She wasn't able to live off the land. Maybe she couldn't work it herself. Maybe Aek had mortgaged the land out, dunno whatever reason Naomi was now in such poverty she had to sell and lose the family land.

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But a relative, the guardian redeemer could legally pay to buy it and keep it in Naomi's name. And it seems that in the case of an airless widow like Naomi, when she died, it would become this. So in many ways, quite an attractive deal. You know, support an elderly relative for a few years, then their land becomes yours.

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I mean, you know, here in Sydney, property prices are meant to be dropping, aren't they? But if you get a snippet at something like this, you'd be all over it, like a rash. And so the relative says verse four, absolutely, yep, I'll do it. Sign me up.

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But then Boaz introduces the condition because Naomi's not just. An airless widow. She's an airless widow with a daughter-in-law. Verse five.

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Then Boaz said on the day you buy the land from Naomi, you also acquire Ruth the Moabite, the dead man's widow, in order to maintain the name of the dead with his property at this. The guardian redeemer said Then I cannot redeem it because I might endanger my own estate. You redeem it yourself. I cannot do it.

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Now again, we don't know all the exact details here, so it sounds a little bit like the Leverett marriage law in Deuteronomy Chapter 25, where a man had a responsibility to marry his brother's widow so that family would continue to be cared for. But neither Boaz nor this guy was Ruth's brother-in-law was Marlon's brother. So it's not really applicable. We also dunno why exactly this would ruin the guardian redeemer's own estate or, or threaten it.

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But it seems like this was actually a later adaptation of the lever at law, which wasn't quite as binding because unlike Deuteronomy 25, if you read on here in Ruth, you can clearly back out of the deal without any penalty or shame or in Genesis 38 by being struck down by God like Onan was. So it's not that the guardian redeemer had to do it, nor that it was a shameful or a failure of duty for him not to do it, but he doesn't want to. The other option is that Boaz here is deviously springing a catch in the fine print. You want the land fine, but you gotta take the woman as well, right?

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I don't think that's the case. During lockdown, I found some free online holiday activity resources for the boys. If you remember Lockdowns, you know, a vital thing. So I was very keen on them.

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They looked very good when I clicked on the link. I discovered they came free with your a hundred dollars yearly subscription, so no thanks. That is not Boaz here. He has already proven is utter integrity by refusing to take advantage of Ruth in chapter three, and Ruth herself is very attractive, very admired, despite being a Moabite.

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So I just think it's Boaz being Boaz and following due process, right? He said, look, do you want to redeem it? In principle, it's yours if you want it. Okay, you do great.

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Now, just before you do, are you aware of all the costs, great costs? Beautiful costs, but real costs. You could pay for this land and then have to hand it straight back if an error is produced and lose it for yourself. I think Boaz is just making clear the cost that genuine redemption may involve.

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It is not for you, it is for them. You bear the cost and the risk that comes with it. Faced with this verse six, the other redeemer suddenly finds a reason to back out. Now, I think there is a bit of humour in it, but the main point is to show Boaz willingly accepting and bearing the cost of Naomi and Ruth's redemption because he loves them.

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And I think in that there is clearly a small hint of Jesus. Willingly accepting and bearing the cost of our redemption simply because he loves us. He gave his life freely for us at the cross. And is that not a huge part of why we love him?

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Oz Guinness tells a story in Stalin's Russia of the attempt to stamp out Christianity, and he relates that A KGB agent saw an elderly lady at church kissing the feet of a figure of Jesus. And so to test her to catch her out, he asked her grandmother, are you also prepared to kiss the feet of our beloved secretary of our great communist party? And she replied. Yes, of course, as long as you also crucify him first.

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But that's it, isn't it? It is a very costliness of Jesus' love for us that wins our love for him, and I hope that is what has brought you here to Moore College to give him your heart and your time and your life. Is Jesus love for you, the engine room of your soul? It can be very easy, can't it?

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In reality, in the crush of life and in the pressures of ministry to the the love of the Lord for you grow distant and cold, can't it? Like the Ephesian church in Revelation two, you have forgotten your first love. We can always do with a reset and reminder, and I think we get a lovely one here in Boas. Remember, brothers and sisters is not first and foremost about how much you love God and what you might do for him.

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It's about how much he loves you and all he does for you, especially his costliest love of all your redemption in the Lord Jesus. Uh, second, God's redemption is driven by the prayers of his people. After Boaz redeems Naomi and marries Ruth, the elders endorse it all with this prayer. In verse 11, may the Lord make the woman who is coming into your home like Rachel and Leah, who together built up the family of Israel, may you have standing in thar and be famous in Bethlehem through the offspring the Lord gives you by this young woman.

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May your family be like that of Perez. Whom Tamar Border a Judah. Now this was probably a set prayer for occasions such as this. It's quite formal, and it asks for productivity and prominence using key Israelite cultural biblical theological markers.

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Rachel and Leah, the mothers of Israel's tribal heads, and Perez, a key judite leading figure from the past. Now I wanna return to the content of the prayer in our final point, but for now, I just wanna note the bare fact of how God's plans for his people are carried and driven through prayer. I read some articles on how in Ruth the character short prayers are actually driving all the action as they are answered by God through the narrative. Importantly, not always how the characters expect.

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And so in chapter one, verse nine, Naomi prays for a husband for Ruth, but she thinks it's only gonna happen in Melbourne. There's no chance in Israel. And so she tries to send Ruth away back to Moab. God actually answers Naomi's prayer for her husband, for Ruth, but in Israel with her where humanly speaking, she has the least chance.

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Or the one that I love the most. In chapter two verse four, Boaz's workers greet him with the friendly prayer. May the Lord bless you without a clue that God blesses Boaz in the very next verse as he sets his eyes on Ruth for the verse time. So in Ruth prayer is extremely powerful, but it is often unexpected and I think these two truths hold for us as well.

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That is by God's grace, he has chosen that the prayers of his people will drive his plans in the world. And secondly, God always answers his people's prayers faithfully, powerfully, but often not in the way we might expect. I read a church newspaper clipping about their small partner church in India who were desperately in need of fuel for winter, but too poor to afford any. And so they held a prayer meeting and prayed that God would provide fuel for them after church, a herd of elephants randomly stampeded through their village.

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Very dangerous, but as they went. They dropped enormous piles of dung and dried elephant dung. Just happens to be an excellent fuel. So the clipping said they went back in a church and sang to hymn God works in mysterious ways, his wonders to perform.

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And in fact, this has been my personal growth point. This year, not praying for Elephant Dunn, but praying in general. Some of you may know Bishop Alfred Awa from Uganda, friend of the College, very big personality. We studied our PhDs together here in the more post-grad community.

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Wonderful experience. Each week we would meet in our group of about seven to chat and pray and have lunch. And as Alfred was settling in, I asked him how he was finding our fellowship and he said, wonderful. One thing, you westerners, you do not know how to pray.

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You are so quiet, and when you finish asking, I say to myself, is that it? When we Africans pray, we say we are gonna pray prayers that make God sweat wet, possibly a little theologically loose, but I felt rightly rebuked. When I think how great God truly is and how little my prayers often are, there can be a huge disconnect, can't there?

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Chrissy and I have found some things in life at the moment feel very overwhelming and insurmountable, and so we've decided this year to adopt Alfred's approach. So our prayer motto for the year is. Let's make God sweat. We ask for big things as well as little, and we leave it completely in his hands to answer how he wills.

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And we've already found many times he's actually answered very directly and immediately and other times in ways we haven't considered. Sometimes it's yes, absolutely. Sometimes it's no, there's something better for you. Sometimes it's been weight, but he answers, doesn't he?

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He's often far more willing to act generously and powerfully for his people than we are often willing to ask, isn't he? So? Pray. Pray for your needs and hopes in him.

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And of course, most of all, pray for those in your life who need his redemption. Make God sweat over them, won't you? And third Ruth four shows us God's redemption centres on a precious son. So verses 11 and 12, we had this elder's prayer for productivity and prominence, and again, they probably had no idea how precisely or to what extent God would answer their prayer.

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For productivity and prominence through the family of Boaz. Verse 13. So Boaz took Ruth and she became his wife. When he made love to her, the Lord enabled her to conceive and she gave birth to a son.

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Verse 16. Then Naomi took the child in her arms and cared for him. The women living there said, Naomi has a son, and they named him oed. He was the father of Jesse.

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The father of David. This then is the family line of Perez. Perez was the father of Hezron. Hezron, the father of Ram.

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Ram of Aab. Aab of nation, nation of Solomon, salmon of Boaz, Boaz of Obed, OED of Jesse and Jesse, the father of David. Now it's unusual to our conventions of writing, but this genealogy is actually the climax and most important part of Ruth most directly. And immediately, Naomi having a grandson is God's direct kind answer to the plight of her bereavement.

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The book began with, but then it goes beyond OED to his grandson David, the Great Covenant king of Israel. And we know how God makes David. And the line of kings who come from him, the conduit of his saving plans for the world, culminating of course in Jesus Christ himself. But I think the particular lovely thing Ruth ending this way shows us is just how appropriate it is for David to be God's chosen messiah.

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Because David's own existence is literally due to a precious, redeeming son obit who was born out of the kindness, the he said of God through the kindness of Ruth and Boaz for each other. In other words, grace, love, costly redemption, and godly kindness. Stitched into David the King's very identity, and through David's greatest son, Jesus Christ. It is also stitched into yours and mine.

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Uh, in our circles, we've come to rate family systems and with great reason. Usually it highlights our quirks and issues we need to work on, but it also ought to remind Christians. By redemption and adoption, we now belong to a family system constituted by, defined by and soaked in saving grace and kindness. And is that not both a great comfort and challenge to us as more College and you as a Christian leader, you are a product of the redeeming love of Christ.

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You are a conduit. Of the redeeming love of Christ to others. That is your family line. That is who you are at your core.

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And so I wanna ask, how is that gonna impact your conversation? When Chapel finishes and you go to morning tea, how will that impact your conduct during lectures or in the teams you are put in? How will that impact your integrity and service towards those under your care in Christ? How will that impact your loving priority for your family?

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You are from the family of the precious redeeming son, born of grace. Let me wrap up. If you wanted to summarise Ruth as a whole, I think it'd be something like this. God gloriously uses our common complicated lives.

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For the coming of his saving kingdom in Christ. God gloriously uses our common complicated lives for the coming of his saving kingdom in Christ. So like David Foster Wallace urged his audience. I think Ruth shows us indeed.

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The lives of its characters are best, happiest, most compassionate, most sacrificial when they see themselves with all their ups and downs. In service of something greater. All their stories combined. But unlike David Foster Wallace, Ruth also shows us that something bigger isn't just all our stories combined, but all our stories combined around the kind redeeming God he is the one who we ultimately live in service of.

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For whom we serve others. So keep fighting that sinful tendency we have to make it all about you. Don't think my good, my success, my comfort, my ministry, my prominence, keep making it all about him. How from Ruth?

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Four. Let Jesus redeeming love. Be the engine room of your soul. Pray prayers that make God sweat.

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Be a conduit of God's saving kindness to others.