Ruth 4:13-17 So Boaz took Ruth and she became his wife. Then he went to her, and the Lord enabled her to conceive, and she gave birth to a son. The women said to Naomi: “Praise be to the Lord, who this day has not left you without a kinsman-redeemer. May he become famous throughout Israel! He will renew your life and sustain you in your old age. For your daughter-in-law, who loves you and who is better to you than seven sons has given him birth.” Then Naomi took the child, laid him in her lap and cared for him. The women living there said, “Naomi has a son.”  And they named him Obed. He was the father of Jesse, the father of David.

The story of this family recorded in the Book of Ruth is all-encompassing and totally human in all its detail. Everyone’s emotions and concerns are laid bare. Particularly poignant are the cases of Boaz and Naomi. He is at a point where he knows he is middle-aged. So is Naomi who feels life has not treated her well. They both experience this vulnerability. But life is not over, not by any means and not as God saw it. In fact, if there ever was a panorama of new beginnings, this is it.

Boaz marries Ruth and she gives birth to a son. In the process Naomi’s economic life and purposefulness are restored. We get to see that out of pain and difficulties the Lord not only sustains but enriches the lives of those who trust him. Above all, it becomes clear that God had a master plan for each of these people even as they were dealing with the ordinary events in their lives.  The child that was born to Boaz and Ruth was named Obed, the father of Jesse, the father of David. In Luke Chapter 2, we are told that when Mary was pregnant with Jesus, a census was decreed by Caesar Augustus requiring everyone to return to his own town to register. “So Joseph also went up from the town of Nazareth in Galilee to Judea, to Bethlehem the town of David, because he belonged to the house and line of David.”

Who would have thought that out of Naomi’s mess, such glory could be revealed – the Savior of the world was born. Your life might not look like much to you, but in it and out of it, the Lord God can bring new life to you and to others in your sphere of influence.