Our Kinsmen Redeemer

Ruth and Boaz are my favorite biblical love story! Have you read it? It is 4 Chapters of love in the book of Ruth in the Old Testament. Her is my version in a nut shell-hopefully just enough to get you reading!

Husband dies. She stays with Mother-in-Love. Return to MIL's homeland. Ruth goes to Boaz's fields. Picks up left over grain. Boaz ask workers to leave grain. Boaz is Ruth's kinsmen redeemer. Lays at his feet. He protect her honor. Learns another to be kinsmen redeemer. Talks to him. Happily ever after!

Here is how this love story plays into my life!


My mom had a less then a perfect home life. My grandmother eventually sent my mom to live with the Blake family (I love family names?) This family took my mom in as their own. They provided for her and shielded her from her painful childhood-or lack of. She moved in as a child and left a woman. Her cousin Ann (which is our Lydia's middle name) became her sister as well as a mother figure. Lucky for me, Ann married Mr. Boaz, Our Boaz, Clyde Boaz. Clyde cared and loved my mother as no man had done before. The men in her life were nothing like him. He was kind, gentle, and always helping someone. Nothing like drunk and angry that mom was used to. Clyde eventually walked my mother down the aisle of the church to be married. His relationship with mom did not stop there. His love continued to her 3 children. He was weekly visit, trips to dance class and Homer's Tastee Freeze on Tuesdays, Sunday shopping for back to school clothes or Easter dresses, maybe that was more Annie but Clyde always supplied the food from the snack bar. He bought my first 10 speed bicycle and Cabbage Patch doll and loved us with all 400 lbs of him. I am certain 390 lbs of it was his heart!

I tear up thinking of the love I have for Annie and Clyde Boaz even more so now that I am an adult and understand what it is like to love a child. The Boazes were never able to have a child, but they had us. Even after Clyde passed away, Annie became a treasured friend. I cherished her understanding, wisdom, and laughs and am so thankful that My Dear got to meet her. Our children would have brought them so much joy!

My mom was pulled from the cycle of poverty and abuse by a Kinsmen Redeemer. She has celebrated 40 years of marriage to my dad and brags to anyone who will listen about her children and grandchildren. So why am I telling you this? Not only was Boaz, Ruth's kinsman redeemer but he and Annie, along with the Granny Blake, were our Kinsmen Redeemer. They were not the next in line, but they were there. They saved our family for a generational curse of abuse and poverty.

Sadly, mom's childhood story is typical but the end is much different for most victims. There are needs all over the planet. Many of our friends are acting as Kinsmen Redeemers for children without parents. Other are assisting families to care for their children. My challenge to you, is there a child who needs you to be their Boaz, their Kinsmen Redeemer?