In him we have redemption through his blood, the forgiveness of sins, in accordance with the riches of God’s grace
Ephesians 1:7 NIVUK
‘Who are you?’ he asked. ‘I am your servant Ruth,’ she said. ‘Spread the corner of your garment over me, since you are a guardian-redeemer of our family.’
Ruth 3:9 NIVUK
There are some words in the Bible that just aren’t used now the same way they were then.
This can cause us to be a little confused and misinterpret the Bible.
One of these is the word ‘redeem’.
It’s fallen out of fashion, but when I was growing up, it was used if you had a token or a coupon and could use it to get free stuff from a shop: like 20% off, or a buy-one-get-one-free offer, we would say that you had redeemed the token or coupon.
But that’s not what is meant here.
What is meant will really surprise you.
The Old Testament uses the word in three ways that are quite alien to our modern, Western culture.
The first relates to death – in particular the death of the firstborn in the last plague before the people of Israel were released from Egypt.
The Israelites were to do something we will find very strange. To mark this event, the firstborn of all their livestock was to belong to God and either be sacrificed to Him or have another animal sacrificed in its place. Firstborn human sons were to be redeemed by paying money or making a sacrifice (Exodus 13:11-16).
In other words, the idea is that had those livestock or those sons been outside an Israelite house, they would have died.
This is what Jesus came to do. He came to redeem us from death:
the people living in darkness have seen a great light; on those living in the land of the shadow of death a light has dawned.’
Matthew 4:16 NIVUK
‘Where, O death, is your victory? Where, O death, is your sting?’
1 Corinthians 15:55 NIVUK
The second way relates to something very controversial nowadays: servitude or slavery.
You see, a poor Israelite might sell himself to another person to obtain money, and essentially be their servant for, at most, forty-nine years. In that time, if they happened to work hard and earn enough money, they had the right to redeem themselves – essentially to pay off their contract – and have themselves released from bondage (Leviticus 25:47-53).
David refers to God doing something very interesting:
Praise the Lord, my soul; all my inmost being, praise his holy name. Praise the Lord, my soul, and forget not all his benefits – who forgives all your sins and heals all your diseases, who redeems your life from the pit and crowns you with love and compassion, who satisfies your desires with good things so that your youth is renewed like the eagle’s.
Psalms 103:1-5 NIVUK
The pit referred to here likely refers to a pit slaves were often put into before they were sold, like Joseph (Genesis 37:21-22).
Now, the Bible doesn’t tells us that David was ever a slave – there is no recorded moment in his life when this happened – so David is likely referring to it allegorically. However, he does make a very good point, because Jesus came to deliver us from slavery to sin (Romans 6:16-23).
That is, where we are subject to addictions, habits and patterns of behaviour that are destructive, Jesus came and died to set us free from them by redeeming us on the cross.
The third one relates to poverty.
And this one is really unusual to us.
If an Israelite came upon hard times, a person called a kinsman-redeemer (a wealthy member of their clan) had the responsibility to buy their land from them – effectively a lease for at most forty-nine years – to help them out (Leviticus 25:25-28, 47-55). There was even a law that if a childless woman lost her husband, her brother-in-law had the duty to marry her and have a child that bore the name of the deceased (Deuteronomy 25:5).
These laws might seem very obscure to us, but they all had the same desire behind them: to prevent fellow Israelites from dropping into poverty and ignominy.
The best known beneficiary of these rules is Ruth the Moabitess, whose Israeli husband died and she came to Israel as a foreigner with her mother-in-law Naomi (Ruth 1). Hers is a story that begins with hardship, but ends in happiness as she is redeemed from poverty by Boaz (Ruth 3, 4:1-12).
This picture is one where a family member stoops down to a relative in dire need and rescues them.
This is what Jesus did for us:
For you know the grace of our Lord Jesus Christ, that though he was rich, yet for your sake he became poor, so that you through his poverty might become rich.
2 Corinthians 8:9 NIVUK
Now, we should not misunderstand this. Jesus did not come to make us materially rich. There are plenty of examples of early believers who were reduced to poverty because they followed Jesus, so that interpretation can never be correct.
No, this refers to spiritual riches – an eternity in Heaven. But it also refers to having a relationship with God, who takes care of us in the here and now (Matthew 6:33). This is why David was able to write these words:
I was young and now I am old, yet I have never seen the righteous forsaken or their children begging bread.
Psalms 37:25 NIVUK
These are all beautiful pictures of what Jesus came to earth to do, but what relevance do they have for us, now?
We are followers of Jesus Christ. While we will never die on the cross to save people from their sins, there are aspects of His ministry of redemption that we should take on:
· We should reach out to those who live in fear of death and bring them the hope of the redemption that comes through Christ’s resurrection
· We should reach out to those who are locked in patterns of destructive behaviour so they can find the freedom that comes from being redeemed by Jesus
· We should reach out to those who are burdened by financial difficulties and help them to find redemption in Christ and a way out of their struggles
Why should we do this?
Because Jesus did it for us, and:
‘The King will reply, “Truly I tell you, whatever you did for one of the least of these brothers and sisters of mine, you did for me.”
Matthew 25:40 NIVUK
Questions
1. Before this study, what did redemption mean to you?
2. Which of the three pictures of redemption means the most for you?
3. How can you share this redemption with other people who need it?
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