“ Salmon fathered Boaz by Rahab, Boaz fathered Obed by Ruth, and Obed fathered Jesse.  Jesse fathered David the king.”

Matthew 1:5-6a 

“Then Naomi took the child in her arms and cared for him. The women living there said, ‘Naomi has a son!’ And they named him Obed. He was the father of Jesse, the father of David. 

 This, then, is the family line of Perez: 

 Perez was the father of Hezron, 

Hezron the father of Ram, 

Ram the father of Amminadab, 

Amminadab the father of Nahshon, 

Nahshon the father of Salmon, 

Salmon the father of Boaz, 

Boaz the father of Obed, 

Obed the father of Jesse, 

and Jesse the father of David.”

Ruth 4:16-22 

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December 8, 2025 

Happy second week of Advent! During this season of preparation, we are using Matthew’s genealogy—specifically the women named there—to anticipate Jesus’ birth. This week, we study Ruth.  

My children have the honor and privilege of knowing both their maternal and paternal grandmothers personally. And while they were too young to remember, they also had the privilege of meeting three of their four great grandmothers before they died. One of these women was named Ruth—which mean that my children share something with King David: they all have a great grandmother Ruth.  

You may recall from David’s story that his family was a simple, hardworking Bethlehem farming family. When Samuel came to town, the elders were concerned and alarmed to see him (1 Samuel 16:4). There was no thought that a king would come from this area, much less the youngest son of a sheep herder. And there was no thought that the king would come from the family of an impoverished immigrant, either.  

But all throughout the Bible, God reminds us that what makes someone worthy and valuable in human eyes is often the very opposite of what God values. Over and over again, God chooses the small, weak things of the world to shame the strong. Over and over again, God chooses the second born, the illegitimate, the foreigner, the orphan, the widow, the overlooked.  

And this brings us to Ruth. She is a widow, an immigrant (from a particularly despised country no less), and too poor to survive without assistance. And God chooses her to be featured in this book, to be held up as the faithful one, to be in the genealogy of Jesus Christ, the Son of God—and to be David’s great grandma Ruth.  

Questions for reflection and discussion:  

  • What do we learn about God’s character and what God values in Ruth’s story? 
  • How does God’s Kingdom seem upside down to us?  
  • How are our values out of alignment with God’s….and how can we realign them?  

Church Reading Plan: 2 Chronicles 8; 3 John 1