The Redemption Problem

Rth 4:1-6
(1) And Boaz went up to the gate and sat down there. And behold, the kinsman of whom Boaz spoke came by. And he said, Such a one! Turn aside, sit down here. And he turned aside and sat down.
(2) And he took ten men of the elders of the city and said, Come sit down here. And they sat down.
(3) And he said to the kinsman, Naomi, who has come again out of the country of Moab, sells a parcel of land which was our brother Elimelech's.
(4) And I said I will tell it in your ear, saying, Buy it before those who live here, and before the elders of my people. If you will redeem, redeem it. But if you will not redeem, tell me so that I may know. For there is none to redeem besides you. And I am after you. And he said, I will redeem.
(5) And Boaz said, In the day you buy the field from the hand of Naomi, you must buy also from the hand of Ruth of Moab, the wife of the dead, to raise up the name of the dead upon his inheritance.
(6) And the kinsman said, I cannot redeem for myself, lest I mar my own inheritance. You redeem my right to yourself, for I cannot redeem.

The book of Ruth is a picture of God's salvation plan – to redeem fallen man with a kinsman redeemer. The rules for redeeming by a kinsman were outlined in Leviticus 25. The redeemer had to be 'related'. If the redeemer couldn't redeem, then the stranger was permitted to keep until the year of Jubilee. For that reason, the redemption price was pro-rated to account for the amount of time left before Jubilee.

There was a caveat to the redemption plan, however, and that is if you sold a dwelling within a walled city, you had only one year to redeem it before you lost it forever.

Adam did that. He sold his stakes in the city of God:
Psa 48:1-3
(1) A Song and Psalm for the Sons of Korah. Great is Jehovah, and greatly to be praised in the city of our God, in the mountain of His holiness.
(2) Beautiful on high, the joy of the whole earth, is mount Zion, on the sides of the north, the city of the great King.
(3) God is known in her strongholds for a refuge.

The references in scripture as God being our stronghold and refuge are so numerous, they would require hours to compile. So what was the big deal about the redemption account as described in Ruth?

There was a redeemer in front of Boaz.

Many scholars simply say 'no picture is perfect'. But God's pictures are always perfect, and this redeemer in front of Boaz was a flaming problem to the salvation story in my own eyes. Who was in front of Jesus to redeem us?

I believe that even when the prophecy was given to Satan in front of Adam and Eve that the heel of the seed of the woman would crush the head of the serpent, Eve was expecting a redeemer. She was expecting him to come in her lifetime. There was a possibility that Eve thought perhaps Cain was the one… but then, he slew Abel. So along comes Seth, which means 'appointed', and Eve thought God had appointed her another savior. Only Seth could NOT redeem. He was plagued by the same sin debt. The redeemer had to be a related kinsman without the same debt as the ones to be redeemed. Along comes a Son – of – man.