Unwanted to Unforgettable (Ruth’s Story): Nana Dolce

How do I submit? How do I parent? How do I love the people of my church? They're wonderful people, but it's not always easy.

There are always opportunities every day before us, as wives, as singles, as parents, as church members, to do right in God's eyes and how we trust Him in loving people when it's hard. Welcome to Family Life Today, where we want to help you pursue the relationships that matter most. I'm Shelby Abbott, and your hosts are Dave and Ann Wilson. You can find us at familylifetoday.com.

This is Family Life Today. Well, we've had some really fun days with Nana Dulce as we've been talking about her book, The Seed of the Woman. And this is 30 narratives that point to Jesus of women in the Bible. We've gone deep. We have gone deep with Esther, with Naomi. And so, we're so excited, Nana, because you bring the Bible to life, and you're bringing us these nuggets of gold that maybe we haven't caught before as we've read this Scripture and these familiar stories.

But you're bringing not only these nuggets of gold, but application of what this can look like in our lives. Nana is a mom. She's a homeschooling mom with three children and one on the way.

She's been married 15 years. She's a Bible teacher, and she's an author. But today, we're going to look at the story of Ruth. We've already been talking about Naomi yesterday, so let's drop us back into this story of Ruth and Naomi.

Sure. Yeah, we already know the setting, the time of the judges, this famine. This family goes to Moab, and one of the sons of Naomi marries this lady named Ruth. One of the things that, you know, in our earlier conversation, I mentioned this word, context.

Yeah. Oh, that brings out so much richness. We all know that Ruth is a Moabite. We know she's not an Israelite.

She's a foreign woman. But I wonder if we've ever thought about who the Moabites were and how it plays out in this story. So the Moabites came out of Lot and his daughters. It's a scandalous story in Genesis 19. It's a creepy story.

It's a creepy story where this man, Lot, God destroys Sodom and Gomorrah. He flees to the mountains, and he has these two daughters who decide we need to preserve seed for our father. And his wife had died. His wife had died, so it was just him and his two daughters in a cave. The eldest decides, let's make daddy drink, and we will go in and lay with our father and conceive through our father.

They do it. The first daughter gives birth to a son, and she names him Moab. So Ruth's people come out of this history of incest. And not only do they have this scandalous incest in their history, but the women, the Moabite women were known to be those who seduced Israelite men.

Oh, I didn't know that. Yes, this happened in Numbers 25. After the Exodus, Moses and the Israelites are in the desert. The Moabite women come to seduce these men, and the men fall for it. They go with these women. They're lying with them. They are worshiping Baal, and God strikes the men with a plague, and thousands of them die.

And it's at that point that God says, no Moabite will enter my assembly. This is who they are. This is who Ruth is. And this is who Melon marries.

Yeah. So Ruth was supposed to be a woman who led her husband away from God, right? What we see is that she's actually a woman who's attracted to God herself, and she follows her mother-in-law back to Bethlehem, and she will display God's loving kindness in caring for this mother-in-law. We talked a little bit about that yesterday, how she endangers herself and goes into the field, but even her footsteps are ordained because they come to the field of Boaz. And Boaz is such an incredible man. Sometimes we focus on Ruth and Naomi, which is good.

We don't always focus on Boaz very much. What a good man. I wanted to do that a little bit. Yeah.

Take us there. So most of chapter two is Boaz filling Ruth. We talked about the emptiness in chapter one yesterday.

Chapter two, all the filling going on is really Boaz. Ruth is in his field. She is gleaning, which is basically poor people in the community.

They will pick up the grain on the outskirts of the field and whatever they took home, they took home. He allows Ruth to do that and then more. He says, hey, don't limit her to just the periphery. Let her come in where the sheaves of grain are and let her glean over there. When it's time for them to eat, he invites her over and he feeds her.

Some of the meal that he has for his worker says, hey, drink water, makes her sit where the shade is. But then he also fills her with words of encouragement. He says, I've heard what you've done, how you've come to take refuge under the wings of the God of Israel.

And God will bless you. He is filling her with words. He's filling her with food. He's filling her with protection. He tells his men not to touch her, which tells you they may have touched her.

Something could have happened, but he protects her. There is a passage in Ephesians that calls men, specifically husbands, to love their wives like Christ loves his church. Boaz is not married to her at this point, and yet I see him resembling what husbands are called to do. So the Ephesians passage is Ephesians 5, 29, that says that men, you are to nourish and cherish, nourish and cherish just as Christ does his church, your wives. Boaz is nourishing her with words of affirmation, with food, with protection, and he is cherishing her.

To cherish someone is to care for them in a loving way, right, to protect them in a loving way. He is such an example of that. How old do you think he was? What do you think their age difference was? Thank you for asking that question because he keeps calling her daughter.

Right. And so he had to have been older than her. When Naomi sends her, we talked about Naomi sending her to him in the threshing floor, he blesses Ruth and says, you didn't go after young men. You didn't go after the young men or the old men, which tells me he was probably older.

He was an older man. Now the scripture doesn't say how old he was, but we have indications that he was probably older than her. You know, our culture often talks about men being patriarchal in the church.

And of course, we know that there's definitely evidence of abuse, that women have been abused in the church. But I wonder what the culture would say if there were more men who looked like Boaz among us, who saw vulnerable young women and without even any intention, Boaz doesn't go after Ruth. It's Naomi who says, hey, I want you to go and make it clear to him that we need redemption.

He doesn't do that. All he's doing is nourishing and cherishing, protecting, providing, filling her with words of encouragement, with provision. She never goes back to her mother-in-law empty handed because of Boaz. I mean, what do we know about Boaz in terms of why he was such a good man? The scriptures call him a worthy man. We'll learn later that there was another redeemer, actually. There was a man who was ahead of the line in front of Boaz who really had the first responsibility to redeem and to care for Naomi and for Ruth.

And when this man is presented with the opportunity, he actually thinks of himself. My own property might be in danger if I take this woman and he doesn't do it, but Boaz does. Take us to the point where Naomi has told Ruth how to approach Boaz and what that looks like, because it seems like this is this weird, strange kind of complicated situation that in the scripture in our day, it doesn't make sense. So walk us through that as she lays at his feet. As she lays at his feet. Thank you for asking that question.

It makes me excited to answer it. Because again, I think it takes us back to that story of Lot and his daughters. Remember, he's been calling her daughter all along.

He has now eaten and he is full of wine. And this is a Moabite woman. It looks a lot like that scene. Yeah. And so you think, oh, are they going to repeat that sin?

The seduction of the Moabite women in the desert. Is that what we're going to see? Will Ruth and Boaz prove to be a worthy man and a worthy woman?

Or will they look like their ancestors? And what we find is that he doesn't touch her. He says, lay here.

She says, I want, you're a redeemer, so please redeem us. But why did she go to his feet and lay at his feet? He's sleeping? Yeah, he's sleeping and she uncovers his feet. She uncovers his feet? Yeah, she uncovers his feet and says, cover me and protect me and redeem me. It's a good question. So I have to say, I'm stumped by that one, Dave. My Bible expertise ends right there. I'm not actually sure why she uncovers his feet. But whatever it means, he understands it to be, we need redemption.

Yeah. We need redemption. But nothing happens sexually in the threshing floor. It's not a repeat of Lot and his daughter. It's not a repeat of the Moabites and the Israelite men in the wilderness. We see a worthy man and a worthy woman. He chooses to do it the right way.

He says, wait, in the morning, I will go before the elders. And if I can redeem you, I will redeem you. I mean, in some ways, another example of your past mistakes or even your family's past mistakes and sins do not define you. Absolutely.

I mean, often we think they do. It's like, well, this is where I come from and I'm a victim and I'm just going to continue that. No, the sins of the Father can stop if you choose.

Yes. And he chose to be a good man and to say this sin ends here. I'm not going to continue that. And I'm sure that there was that temptation as well to follow into the pattern of sin.

But they didn't. I just love their heart. I love his heart. And I love that he wouldn't even just say, yes, I will be your redeemer.

Let me do it the right way and go before the elders and go before the person that has rights more than I do. So he did all the right things. He did all the right things. And you're right. I agree, Nana. To have men in our culture that protect, that stand up for the innocent, that are ones that we can look to for guidance and leadership, that is so attractive, isn't it? We need it in our culture more than ever.

It is. And also men who, like Dave said, are not repeating the patterns. That's my hope for my own children, that the chains that held my parents and even Erica and I, that they won't know it. Yeah, I mean, I think a passage of Scripture a lot of people have heard is the sins of the Father. Exodus 20 is one of the first times we see that in the Ten Commandments. The sins of the Father we'll visit into the third and fourth generation. But nobody continues that verse. But, you know, the righteousness of a righteous man will be blessed for a thousand generations.

And so, Boaz is changing a legacy that we're talking about today. If he had gone the other way, there's no story. It's true in our own family as well. You can continue the darkness or you can let God bring light through you. Be that man, be that woman. And I'm sure, too, for Ruth, she wanted to honor Naomi, her mother-in-law. She didn't want to bring shame upon their family. And so, she was trusting God, loving Naomi. It's such a beautiful picture of purity as we keep our eyes on Jesus and follow Him. It is.

In the days of the judges, when everyone was doing right in their own eyes, this Moabite woman and this man chose to do what was right in God's eyes. All right. Keep going.

Yeah. Well, we're almost at the end of our story. Because he will marry Ruth and, you know, she had been married to Malon for 10 years and had never had a child. But God opens her womb and she gives birth to a little boy named Obed.

And I love the way the book of Ruth ends because it ends with Obed's genealogy. It starts with Perez, actually. It says that the generations of Perez. And so, you may ask, well, who is Perez? Perez was the son of a lady named Tamar.

All the way back in Genesis 38. She's one of the women in the Seat of the Woman book. And she, too, was a foreign woman. She was a foreign woman who was looking for this redeemer. She wanted this levirate marriage because her husbands, she had two husbands that died. Her father-in-law was Judah and he refused to do what was right by her. So, she dressed as a prostitute and became pregnant with twins. And one of them was Perez.

So, Perez reminds us of this woman, Tamar. And then it mentions this man named Solomon who is the son of Rahab. Remember Rahab with the prostitute at the walls of Jericho. And then it comes all the way down to Ruth's son, Obed, and then ends with David. The book of Ruth ends how the book of Matthew will begin. Matthew begins with the genealogy of the Seat of the Woman, the king, Jesus. And in his lineage, you find Tamar who dressed as a prostitute, Rahab who was formerly a prostitute.

You have Ruth, this Moabite woman with this history of incest within her family line. And Jesus was pleased to be born into such a family. Because he is the ultimate redeemer, better than Boaz. We've said a lot about Boaz.

Jesus is even better than Boaz. He was pleased to be born into a family that had all of this scandal. That encourages me because I have some scandals. I can tell you about some people in my family that would fit right in with this narrative. It encourages me that this redeemer came for me and that I don't disqualify because of my family history.

That was my word too. We feel so disqualified, whether our past of what we've done, maybe what's been done to us. And we are never disqualified. There's so many things that we feel like could disqualify us. Nothing. Like look at these women in the Bible.

And yet God used them in the line of Christ. That's so encouraging to me. It doesn't matter what's been done or what happened in our past because he renews all things.

It's so good. It's an inspiration because you think I am what I came from. Or I am what I've done wrong in my past. And it sticks with me forever. And this story and even the lineage of Jesus is like how in the world does the holy redeemer God come through filthy rags?

I'm not saying these people, but this story, you just don't expect that. It is the gospel. It needs to be shouted from the mountaintops as you are worthy regardless of your family's past or even your past. He can be your redeemer.

And he is. Is that what you get out of Ruth? So he came to redeem as far as the curse is found. He came to redeem all of it.

It's amazing. If I was sending my son, it would be right. You would choose the pristine, right? This is who God sent his son through because this is who Jesus came to save. That makes me think of just some of our feelings of who our kids may be dating because of a past. And I understand that as a parent, like we want our kids to marry women or men that walk with Jesus and love Jesus. For me, that's the prerequisite. More than anything else, that is it. When they follow Jesus and they're pursuing somebody that is as well, God redeems all those things in our past.

He does. Yeah, and I know that when Anne and I got married 44 years ago, there was a part of me that wasn't sure I could break the curse of the Wilson alcohol, adultery, divorce. I knew God was bigger than all that, but there was also a part of me that as a young man was afraid. Will I continue?

Will I be able? You know what I mean? There were two things going on.

One was the fear and almost the victim part, and the other side was, yes, I will. But there was that almost like, is there a chain on my leg that I can't break? And the only thing that broke that was not me.

It was Jesus. He literally broke it. He's a chain breaker. That's good. I could write a song about it.

I think there is a chain breaker song. He is a chain breaker, and you can be the one that's sort of the kinsman redeemer in your family legacy. If it's a bad one, you change it. If it's a good one, you continue it. But it's on us to say, I will be used by God to do this.

Nana, do you have any other application? I do. Just the last one for me is, He comes to redeem, and then He empowers you by His Spirit. In the days when everyone is doing right in their own eyes, God can help us through His Son by the empowerment of His Spirit to do right in His eyes. That's good.

Yeah. These are the days of the judges. Let's be worthy men and women who do right in God's eyes because He gives us His Spirit and empowers us to do that. Let's go into specifics. I was just going to say, are there ways you think we are living in the days of the judges?

Yes. I mean, in the time when it says there was no king, there's a king, but we're not submitted to the king. And so we're living by our own wisdom and doing right in our own eyes. But by His grace, I want to be like a Ruth. I want to be a worthy woman. With all my history and my family stuff, I want to be a worthy woman who is doing right in God's eyes. Well, let's go super practical. How do we do that? Let's say a listener is thinking, I want this.

I want that. I have all these things in my past and my family's past. What does it look like to do right with God? How do you grow as a believer?

Yeah, you grow as a believer through His Word. So even in parenting, right, there's a lot of fears that I have for my children based on the way that I was raised. I want them to do right in my eyes, right, in Nana's eyes, making them little idols. They are always a church. They are ministry kids and especially ministry kids.

Oh, people will talk about them if they act in a certain way. So I could use the fear of man to drive my children to be moralist. My prayer is that I would do right in God's eyes by helping them to see you will, you are a sinner. You're not going to do it perfectly. You will. There will be days when you will fall. But that's why we all need Jesus.

Because guess what? Mommy's like that too. We're all in this house depending on Him. Let's do it together as a family. I think that's one way we can do right in God's eyes, even in parenting. That's good. We can apply that to our marriage as well. You know, I've been bragging on this husband of mine.

Yeah, I can't wait. He doesn't always do right though, you guys. And there are days when it can be scary to submit to a man who, you know, as wonderful as he is, I see the faults. But when I trust myself ultimately to God Himself and say that I know that you are wiser than me, of course, letting my thoughts be known to Him. But if, oh, if He really is certain that this is how we'll move, I'll move. I'll move with Him because I want to do right in your eyes.

So how do I submit? How do I parent? How do I love the people of my church? They're wonderful people, but it's not always easy. So yeah, there are always opportunities every day before us, as wives, as singles, as parents, as church members, to do right in God's eyes and how we trust Him in loving people when it's hard. And I'm really inspired by your church and your church family, of the other women, the older women that are surrounding you. You've already talked about how you're mentoring younger women than you are and discipling them in the Word. And so you have women in front of you, beside you, and behind you that are continually growing you, challenging you, causing you to keep your eyes on Jesus.

I do. And do you think that's marked you and made a difference? Oh, it has.

It has. These are women who have suffered too. So we're not talking about little stories. Oh, she calls herself my godmother. She was there at the birth of my two biological children. She's going to be there at the birth of this baby as well.

Her son was shot in front of her house. She's suffered in ways that I can't even imagine. She is full of encouragement, full of God's Word. She's such a servant. She has a grief ministry at our church where anyone loses someone, she will send a card. She has a ministry where they'll come along that person and walk them through the stages of grief. These are the women before me. These are the Naomi's before me.

She's in her 70s. Talk to the women that are listening right now that think, I have nobody. I don't know. I'm all alone. How would you encourage them? Oh, I will encourage you to plug into a local church that sees itself as a family. The Lord has not left us as orphans. We are united and He gives us each other. Is it always easy?

No, it's not because we're sinners. And it can actually be very scary to make yourself available to other people. I've been hinting at the kind of family that I came from, which was scary. And it makes me sometimes want to hide in a cave a little bit. And it takes me a while to really trust and open myself up to people.

But it's worth it. It's worth taking the risk to say, I'm willing for you to get to know me. And I'm willing to be honest that I'm lonely. And I'm willing to be honest that I need a friend. And I need someone to call on. It can be scary to do it, but it's worth doing it. It's worth doing it.

That's a good word. And we're excited for you as listeners that you can be a part of this email series that we're doing. And I really love just this final thought from Nana's book where you say, Nana, you can trust and obey Jesus in a world where God's promises often feel distant and elusive.

So we can trust that great God. And we hope that you'll join us on this email series. I'm Shelby Abbott, and you've been listening to David Ann Wilson with Nana Dulce on Family Life Today. That's right, you could sign up for that email series by heading over to familylifetoday.com, or you can find it in our show notes section. And Nana Dulce, you can sign up for that email series by heading over to familylifetoday.com, or you can find it in our show notes section. And Nana Dulce has written a book called The Seed of the Woman, 30 Narratives That Point to Jesus.

This book talks about the profound role of women in shaping the redemptive history that we find in the Bible, and finding really your place in the unfolding story of Jesus Christ. This book is going to be our gift to you when you give to Family Life Today. You can get your copy right now with any donation that you make by going online to familylifetoday.com. And clicking on the donate now button at the top of the page. Or you can just give us a call with your donation at 800-358-6329. Again, that number is 800-F as in family, L as in life, and then the word today. And feel free to drop your donation in the mail if you'd like.

Our address is Family Life, 100 Lakehart Drive, Orlando, Florida, 32832. Now coming up tomorrow, Nana Dulce is back for our fifth and final day with her and her husband, Eric. They're going to share their unique story of dealing with infertility, foster care, and adopting an embryo. That's coming up tomorrow. We hope you'll join us. On behalf of David Ann Wilson, I'm Shelby Abbott. We'll see you back next time for another edition of Family Life Today. Family Life Today is a donor-supported production of Family Life, a crew ministry helping you pursue the relationships that matter most.