Redeemed

Good morning. Welcome to Insights. I'm

Pastor John and today we're going to be

talking about redeemed.

So, let's pray. Lord, we just thank you

and praise you and ask you Lord to open

our eyes and our hearts and our minds to

receive from your word and help us Lord

to understand the depth of your word

today. In Jesus name we pray. Amen. So

when we say redeemed,

we're talking about something that comes

out of the the law of Moses.

And uh

years ago when I first got first got

saved, one of the first songs I remember

hearing was uh redeemed. It says, "I

have been redeemed by the blood of the

lamb." And uh some of you know that song

really well. But that uh to explain

redeemed,

we need to look into the Old Testament

into the book of Ruth.

And what's going on here is Naomi, whose

husband was IMC,

had left Judah with his wife and his two

sons, and they went to Moab. And if you

don't know who the Moabites were, the

people that lived in Moab, they were the

descendants of Lot, of Lot's oldest

daughter and of Lot. And what happened

was while they were in Moab, his sons

married Moabitete women. And then he

died.

And then they died.

And when they left Judah, they left

because there there was a famine. And so

they left their property in Judah and

they went to

Moab.

And uh at the end in chapter 4,

we're we're looking at how

redemption

works. And it says Boaz. Then went Boaz

up to the gate, and sat him down there.

And behold, the kinsmen of whom Boaz

spake came by. Unto whom he said, "Oh,

such a one, turn aside, sit down here."

And he turned aside and sat down. And he

took 10 men of the elders of the city,

and said, "Sit you down here." And they

sat down. He needed witnesses to what he

was going to do. And he said unto the

kinsmen, Naomi that is come again out of

the country of Moab, sellth a parcel of

land, which was our brother IMC,

and I thought to advertise thee, saying,

"But it before the inhabitants, and

before the elders of my people, if thou

wil redeem it, redeem it. But if thou

will not redeem it, then tell me that I

may know, for there is none to redeem it

beside thee, and I am after thee." And

he said, I will redeem it.

Then said Boaz, what day thou buyest the

field of the hand of Naomi, thou must

buy it also of Ruth the Moabitas, the

wife of the dead, to raise up the name

of the dead upon his inheritance. And

the kinsman said, I cannot redeem it for

myself, lest I mar my own inheritance.

Redeem thou my right to thyself, for I

cannot redeem it. Now this was the

manner in former time in Israel

concerning redeeming and concerning

changing. For to con confirm all things,

a man plucked off his shoe and gave it

to his neighbor. And this was a

testimony in Israel. Therefore the

kinsman said unto Boaz, "Buy it for

thee." So he drew off his shoe. Now

to understand what's going on is every

person in Israel when when they went in

and conquered the land under um

uh

Joshua, every every man was given an

inheritance.

So they all had property. And when IMC

went to Moab,

he had to sell his property

with the promise of being able to buy it

back so that he had money to go to Moab.

And so after he died and his sons died,

there was no male heir left in his line

to redeem the property.

So the the law stated that if someone

died without an heir that their near

kin, the kin closest to them, whether it

was an uncle, a father, a brother, or a

first cousin, could redeem that property

for the person.

And so that's what's going on here. But

one of the things about that redemption

price was when you you redeemed it, you

also had to take the widow as a wife and

produce an heir to that person.

And so the closer kinsman, the one that

was closer than Boaz,

he said he couldn't redeem it. He

couldn't take root to be his wife. So

Boaz did it. And so afterwards and if

you know the whole story

Boaz be was the father of Oed. Oed was

the father of Jesse and Jesse was the

father of King David.

So this reestablished that royal

bloodline that was nearly lost because

IMC died. Now

you might be asking yourself why is this

important? Why do I need to understand

this redeemed process that happened in

the book of Ruth? Well,

one of the things that we recognize

about what Jesus did on the cross first

is the atonement. His blood paid the

price for our sins.

And then he redeemed us through the

sacrifice of his body on the cross. And

when he said it is finished, he he also

said everything is now done. And what

was done? The re he had redeemed man.

Redeemed them from what? Well, we have

to go back into Genesis to understand

exactly what Christ redeemed. When God

created man, he gave man dominion over

all the earth. God had created it

belonged to God.

He gave man dominion over it. He said to

subdue it, subdue it and make it fertile

and make it grow and be my caretaker.

And if you're a Lord of the Rings fan,

and I happen to be a Lord of the Rings

fan ever, it's I it's one of the best

fantasy fiction books I've ever read.

Um,

Aragorn, he's the the king, the return

of the king. He's the king.

His his ancestor had established the

stewards of Gondor. And what they were

their job was was to manage the king's

affairs in Gondor

and to rule over Gondor in his absence.

So when God created man, he gave him

dominion over the earth.

He basically said, "This is my creation.

I have created all these things and I'm

giving you possession, dominion over

this to be my steward of my creation and

to take care of everything that I have

created. That was what God that was

God's commission to man. Well, in the

fall of the in the garden, that

dominion, that God-given right to man

over God's creation on earth was passed

to

Satan. He became the god of this world

when man fell from grace.

So when we get to the New Testament and

we get we're at the death, burial, and

resurrection of Christ. And as he's

hanging on the cross and he says, "It is

finished."

He was

saying

to God the Father and the world that the

redemption price needed to redeem

dominion over the earth

was

paid. Now, this redemption price, what

what did it entail? Well, it took

Jesus's life to pay the price. And if

you look at when Abraham was commanded

by God to take Isaac and take him up on

this mountain and to sacrifice him, just

as Abraham's about to drop the knife and

sacrifice Isaac, God tells him to stop

and not to harm the lad because the

sacrifice had been given. And there

caught by its horns was a ram. and

Abraham sacrificed that ram that was a

substitutionary sacrifice for Isaac. So

when we get into the New Testament and

we begin to look at what Jesus did on

the cross, he became the substitutionary

sacrifice for our sin. This was a debt

that Jesus didn't owe

and it was a debt that we couldn't pay.

So Jesus paid the price and what that is

is he ransomed us back

from Satan, the god of this world. And

in that process, there's a legal process

involved. And you have to look into

Revelations chapter 5 to understand at

the at the scroll

in heaven. The word goes out. Who's

worthy to open the scroll? Well, the

only person that could be worthy to open

the scroll is the person who redeemed

that purchase price. So, you have this

scroll that's in the hand of God and God

is sitting on the throne and the four

and 20 elders are saying, "Who's worthy

to break the seals? Who's worthy to open

this?" Well, the only one worthy was the

person that paid the ransom, the

redemption price for what is contained

in that scroll, which is God's wrath.

And so,

the lamb, Jesus, slain from the

foundations of the earth, goes to the

father who's sitting on the throne. He

takes the scroll out of his hand and he

breaks the seals because he's the one

that paid the redemption price. for

what's contained in that scroll. And so

we come to this place where we if if

we're truly seeking God and truly

looking at this whole situation, we

understand that everything that God told

Moses to write down, which is in the

book of Leviticus, the law

was all designed for the Jewish nation

as a whole, the Hebrews, the Israelites,

and for us who were grafted in through

Jesus Christ to be able to recognize

that every single thing that's written

in there was a a forerunner, a shadow of

what was to come, which was Jesus. And

Jesus fulfilled every single part, every

curse, every penalty, every judgment

contained in Leviticus. Because there

are there are things if you do this,

this will happen to you. If you're

caught in adultery, you're supposed to

be taken out and stumped. All this was

in Leviticus. And Jesus redeemed us from

that wrath.

And that's what our hope is. It says the

heirs of salvation are not appointed

under wrath. Well, to become an heir of

salvation requires us to accept what

Jesus did by faith. It says, "For grace

are you saved, and not by works, lest

any man should boast." And that's

telling us we can't work our way into

heaven. We have to accept the gift of

God to be able to get into heaven. And

that gift is Jesus Christ. So that's why

Romans 10:9-10 says what it says about

if you confess with your mouth, believe

it in your heart that God has raised

Jesus from the dead, you shall be saved.

For that confession can only be made by

faith

in Jesus Christ and receive him receive

his grace by faith that what he said he

would do.

So as we're looking into the perfect law

of liberty which is the gospel of grace

we come to this point where we realize

that the law was given to teach us to

recognize who Jesus is. it. But there is

no way that you can actually live by the

law successfully because it says if you

live by the law, you have to keep every

part of it. And if you fail in one area,

you're guilty of it all. Grace says that

you receive Jesus as Lord and Savior,

and his grace alone, what was done with

his blood, is enough to pay the penalty

for breaking the law. Now what we're

supposed to do as we progress forward in

our relationship with Christ is we are

supposed to become more like Christ. He

says let this mind be in you which is in

Christ Jesus to the pulling down of

strongholds and the renewing of your

mind. So we have to be submit ourselves

through obedience to the word of God and

allow it to shape us and form us and

transform us into the image of Christ.

He says we're heirs and joint airs with

Christ. And that means that when Christ

returns and you can read in Revelations

when Christ returns we return with him.

And so it's very like super important

for us to wrap our mind around the

thought and the idea of what God gave us

is that he redeemed us just like Boaz

redeemed Naomi and Ruth and restored to

them what they had lost. And that's what

Jesus did for us when he said it is

finished. What did he restore? Our

relationship, our access to God. Um I

I've talked about this a lot because

there's certain things that's happened.

When Jesus said it is finished and he

gave up the ghost, the earth went dark.

The light of the world had passed on. It

was earthquake and God rent the temple

bell from top to bottom. And this thing

wasn't like a curtain. It was like six 6

in thick and it was made it was super

heavy. And God tore it from top to

bottom and took away what separated the

Holy of Holies where God would inhabit

the temple from the people. And so we

now through Christ's redemptive work on

the cross now have direct access to God.

We don't need a libitical priest who's

going to go and sacrifice, make a

sacrifice and a blood atonement and all

of these other things for our request to

come before God and to be heard because

Jesus did all of that in our place when

he went to the cross. So when you think

about that word redeemed,

it's a very very broad

statement and it encompasses everything

in our lives. It covers everything.

There's no part that God left out when

Jesus said it is finished. Everything

was paid for at that point and it became

active when Jesus came out of the tomb.

And that was the when he came out of the

tomb, the establishment of the new

covenant, one that was made in the

hearts of men rather than on tablets of

stone. And so as you're going through

your day and going through the things

that we go through every day, and we all

go through things, the idea

is that you would focus on what Jesus

said and what Jesus did and what Paul

wrote in all of his letters so that we

understand that we are no longer slaves

to sin. We don't have to go back there

ever again.

that everything that God said we are, we

are. And everything that God said that

we could do, we can do.

Not because of anything we did, but

because of the very things that Christ

did.

And so when you are thinking about your

day and thinking about things that you

went through in life, remind yourself

that you are the redeemed.

And you're the redeemed because he said

so. He redeemed us. He paid the ransom

price. He used his own blood to make

atonement for our sin. And so we have

access to God where people didn't

before.

And so I want you to keep that when you

see yourself in a mirror, tell yourself,

I am redeemed. I'm no longer under the

curse. I'm no longer under the the

penalty and the judgment and of the law.

I have been set free. And he whom the

son is set free is free indeed. So I

want you to keep that in mind this week.

Heavenly Father, we thank you for an

opportunity to share your word once

again. Help us, Lord, to keep our focus

on you and the things that you would

have us to do. Help us, Lord, to always

recognize that it's not anything that we

did, but it's because of what you did

that gives us that grace that we have to

enter into your presence. We're careful

to give you all the praise and all the

glory in Jesus name. Amen. We'll see you

guys next week.