Why Don’t People Choose Salmon As A Baby Name?
Ruth 4:18-22 (NLT)
This is the genealogical record of their ancestor Perez: Perez was the father of Hezron. Hezron was the father of Ram. Ram was the father of Amminadab. Amminadab was the father of Nahshon. Nahshon was the father of Salmon. Salmon was the father of Boaz. Boaz was the father of Obed. Obed was the father of Jesse. Jesse was the father of David.
I’ll hold my hands up - when I come to a genealogy in the Bible I usually skip it. I skim read at the best of times, and so when it comes to a long list of names and ‘was the father of, was the father of, was the father of’, I jump ahead. But if we do that with the genealogy at the end of Ruth’s story, we miss the best part.
The real end of Ruth’s story is found in the final four verses. The book concludes with a genealogy showing Ruth and Boaz’s son Obed was the grandfather of King David, who in Matthew 1 we read is part of the lineage of Jesus.
In the final verses, the seemingly mundane, ordinary events in the story are woven into God’s grand story of redemption for the whole world. What starts as the tragic story of two widows, who spend months picking barley and making friends with the farmer, leads into God’s story of salvation.
First up, the genealogy makes us question why people don’t choose Salmon as a baby name, but secondly (and definitely more importantly) the genealogy invites us to reflect on our own lives. At the end of the book of Ruth we realise that God doesn’t just redeem and restore Naomi and Ruth’s situation, he uses it to redeem and restore humanity.
So how might God be at work in the mundane, ordinary events of our lives? How might God be working through our day-to-day existence, our work, our meetings, our friends, our suffering, our rejoicing, and weaving it into his story of redemption, restoration and salvation for the world?
Prayer — God, thank you that you’re Saviour and Sovereign, that you rule and you reign, that you redeem and restore. Would you use the mundane, ordinary events of my life and weave them into your grand story of redemption, beyond anything I could ask or imagine.
