Sermon "Ruth, a Woman for all Seasons" Rev. James R. Gorman

Text Ruth 1:1-19a Mtt. 22:15-22 October 18, 1987

In the story of Ruth, we have a story which is treasured by both Christians and Jews. A Moabite woman who left her home and followed her mother-in-law after the death of her husband to the land, God and people of her mother-in-law.

The story is told in a stark simplicity. Naomi, the Jew, was married to Elimelech (which means "God is King"). Because of a famine in Israel, they went seeking better fortunes in the land of Moab.

Elimelech soon died, leaving his wife, Naomi with two sons. Her two sons married Moabite women, Orpah and Ruth. Then the two sons died leaving now three widows, Naomi, Orpah and Ruth, related only by marriage, not by blood. The narrator of the story need not tell his audience that Widows would have a hard time of things. Like many single women who head households now, they would have no adequate source of income. Now we call it the feminization of poverty. How they will survive is the question that will lead us on in the story. Naomi heard that the famine was over and she decided to head back to Israel, but suggested to her two daughters in law that they would do better with the families of their husbands and that they should stay behind. They wept. Ruth must have been a marvelous mother-in-law. Orpah and Ruth did not want to go. Orpah finally returned home, according to the story, but Ruth did not.

And here comes one of the most moving passages in the Old Testament, Ruth says to her mother-in-law Naomi, "Entreat me not to leave you or to return from following you; for where you go I will go, and where you lodge I will lodge; your people shall be my people, and your God my God; where you die I will die, and there will I be buried. May the Lord do so to me and more also if even death departs me from you."

And then in the simplicity of the story, the response is silence, "And when Naomi saw that she was determined to go with her, she said no more." And the two of them went on to the town of Bethlehem

. The town of Bethlehem is significant. For Ruth would marry Boaz and she would be the mother to Jesse who would be David's father.

And in a few short months we will be celebrating the birth of Jesus who was out of the house of lineage of David, born in the town of Bethlehem

. "And all went to be enrolled, each to his own city. And Joseph went to the city of David, which is called Bethlehem, because he was of the house and lineage of David." (Luke 2:3 & 4) And thus, David's great-grandmother, Ruth, is a Jew by a decision of faith, not by birth.

At our meeting two weeks ago in Faith Forum, with Roxanne Abrams, the assistant director of the Milwaukee Jewish Council, Roxanne made an important point. She said that her history professor in college once asked his history class, "Who in this class was born a Jew?" Roxanne and several others raised their hand. Then he asked, "How many of you were born a Christian?" and three quarters of the class raised their hands. And the professor said, "NO. None of you are born Christian. You can be born a Jew, but you cannot be born a Christian."

His point is right. In order to be a Christian, at some point you have to make a decision, an adult decision we say, to be a Christian. In the reverse, one is born a Jew and would remain a Jew long after one stopped believing in God.

This is why the Ruth story stands out so in our Bible. Here is a woman who is not a Jew, who makes a decision, against all odds and against her better interest, to be a Jew.

A Rabbi from the Chicago suburbs was engaged to and then married a woman, who, when he began dating her, was not a Jew. She converted to Judaism in the course of their engagement.

Several influential members of the congregation, however, took offense at the fact that the Rabbi's wife was not Jewish at the time of their dating and asked that he be removed from the pulpit. He was. His wife's name, coincidently, was RUTH.

Jews at the time of Ruth frowned upon Jewish men marrying non-Jewish women. In the Book of Nehemiah we read some rough words about intermarriage, "In those days also I saw the Jews who had married women of Ashdod, Ammon and Moab; and half of their children spoke the language of Ashdod, and they could not speak the language of Judah, but the language of each people. And I contended with them and cursed them and beat some of them and pulled out their hair;" (Nehemiah 13:23f) Rough stuff!

But the Biblical story is strangely different. Ruth made a decision to be a Jew. That is a troubling issue for some Jews. If it was difficult for the leaders of that suburban Chicago Jewish congregation to have their Rabbi date a non-Jew, you can begin to get a feel for how hard it is for Jews to accept the fact that the great-grandmother of the great and good king David was a Moabite who converted to Judaism. Ruth was not a Jew by birth, but by choice.

The Biblical Ruth made a choice that affected all of human history. "Wherever you go, I will go; wherever you live so shall I live; where you are buried, I shall be buried. Your people shall be my people, and your God shall be my God too.

A woman who has nothing, is free to make bold decisions, and Ruth does. In the words of Janis Joplin, "Freedom's just another word for nothing left to lose." A young woman has thrown her lot with an older woman in total solidarity. Does she do it because she knows that Naomi will need her? Does she decide that her love for her mother-in-law is greater than her compulsion for self-preservation? Is she ignorant of the realities that face them both in Israel? We don't know. We just know, by the end of this beautiful story that both Ruth and Naomi are women of extraordinary wisdom and courage.

Now we turn to the Gospel of Matthew. First, it is important to point out that the genealogy in Matthew mentions four women, Tamar, Rahab the harlot, the mother of Boaz, Ruth, the wife of Boaz and great-grandmother of David, and Bathsheba, whom David insists on having as his wife even though she is already married to one of David's generals. These forerunners of Mary are unusual women. At least three of them are non-Jewish. All are assertive. All are cast as compelling and beautiful. A strange cast of characters to put in the lineage of Jesus.

A common theme in all of these women, however is that though they are not Jewish by birth, they are all faithful in the eyes of scripture. They all could say with Ruth, "your people will be my people and your God shall be my God too."

Now we come to the story in Matthew of Jesus' entrapment by the Pharisees. They are forcing him to choose between a world in which Judaism is at the center or one in which Rome

is at the center. If he chooses to say that you should give all to Ceasar, then he is guilty of heresy. If on the other hand he chooses to say that you give all to God, he is guilty of treason. Jesus squeezes through. "Render unto Ceasar that which is Ceasar's and render unto God that which is God's." Sounds like a cop out, right? Not really.

For Jesus knew that, like Ruth, the Pharisees believed in their hearts that everything belonged to God in the first place. The face of Caesar on the coin of the realm was but a temporary aberration. The coins may have belonged to Caesar, but the wealth that that coin symbolized was from God's own creation. Ruth chose to render all to Naomi and Naomi's God. Unconditionally and without reservation. The Pharisees, for all of their other reservations about Jesus, believed that in their hearts. Caesar may have minted the coin, but God was the proprietor of the wealth for which the coin was but a symbol. So return the coin, but, like Ruth, give your lasting obedience to God.

Jesus was as much a descendent of Ruth as he was a descendent of David. His faith was simple and unadulterated. Coins simply stood in the way and confused the issue of true ownership of our lives. The face of Caesar on our money gives us the illusion that Caesar must be an object of worship. The faith of Ruth is far simpler and far more wise than that. The coins did not fool her. In that way Jesus is Ruth's true heir. He was not fooled by the entrapping question of the Pharisees. The coin may belong to Caesar, but the wealth that stands behind the coin belongs first of all to God, and, thanks to Ruth, it is this God whom we must serve without condition or reservation.