Boaz and Ruth: True Love Means Letting Go

True Love Means Letting Go

I read a note on facebook about loving enough to let go and I was fascinated. The text concentrated on agape love, where a father figure loves a child. It was insightful just how God loves us yet He still allows us free will. T.D. Jakes in his famous blessing full viral mail ‘LET IT GO’ talks about the gift of goodbye. It doesn’t make one mean or resentful, but is good for the heart.

Romantic love as the world presents to us is so skewed. The bible has several representation of true love; Paul did not have to look anywhere to write to the Corinthians the words of 1 Corinthians chapter 13. He had good reference from the word of God.

Abraham in Genesis 13 loved his nephew Lot enough to agree to part with him and let him choose the Jordan Valley that was full of pasture, while he remained in Canaan. Yet in chapter 14 he sets out to rescue Lot who had been captured. In chapter 18 he pleads with God not to destroy everybody in Sodom because Lot lived there. When God asked for his son Isaac as a sacrifice, he was willing to give him over. He loved Lot and Isaac enough to let go of them.

I love reading the books of Ruth and Ecclesiastes, one because they are short and I can easily read through and two because they are exciting. As I do HATUA, I went through the book of Ruth again and one thing came screaming at me. It was obvious Boaz’s feeling for Ruth was a typical love at first sight story. The way he went out of his way to provide for her and what he said to her on his threshing floor.

What Boaz said to Ruth in response to her advances was mind blowing. In this age and time, the fact that a lady has given in to your subtle advances is an excuse to take advantage of her feelings. Boaz is a rare kind of man, no wonder he represents Christ’s redemption mission (to jews and gentiles) many years later. Boaz says in Ruth 3:12; “It is true that I am a closer relative and I am responsible for you, but there is a man who is a closer relative than I am……….. in the morning I will find out whether or not he will take responsibility for you. If so well and good, if not I swear by the living God that I will take responsibility….”

Yes, he went through the process of obeying the law as prescribed in the word of God with wisdom knowing which side of his slice was buttered. In the end he ended up with the woman he claimed everybody in Bethlehem knew is a fine woman. What caught me is that Boaz loved Ruth enough to put his interests on the line and let go. In the end, he married her and through his lineage we got two great men who shaped Israel and the world, David and Jesus Christ.

November 18th 2010: kenyatta otieno