“And because of him you are in Christ Jesus, … who became to us (redemption) from God”
Our life in Christ operates in two scriptural modes. One is grace, the other is faith. Grace is God’s love to us and faith is our response. It is God’s power that makes both effective.
We have been drilling down the terms in 1 Corinthians 1:30 giving us an In Christ Jesus focus. We considered wisdom from a human point of view, i.e., being able to discern God’s truth. Then, we considered righteousness as the vital 2 Corinthians 5:17 union of a believer with God. Righteousness is God the Father’s nature birthed into each of His adopted children. Last week we reviewed sanctification as God’s purpose for us in Christ Jesus and our own purposeful commitment making His righteousness in us visible to others. Sanctification is the work of the Holy Spirit.
Now we come redemption, the third term in our verse. The verse puts it this way. “And because of him you are in Christ Jesus, who became to us wisdom of God, righteousness, sanctification and redemption.” Jesus Christ became to us the wisdom of God. Wisdom is made known to us through righteousness, sanctification and redemption. This is God’s wisdom coming through Jesus Christ because we are in Him. Our wisdom focus is from our human perspective but the verse’s concern is righteousness, sanctification and redemption in Christ Jesus.
Redemption is the work of Jesus as the Son of Man. Notice righteousness comes from God the Father while sanctification is nearly always referenced to work of the Holy Spirit. Redemption has to do with the death of Jesus on the cross paying the price for our sin. In this verse we have God in His three persons making possible our complete salvation.
The New Testament word redemption is translated by three Greeks words. The most common usage is λυτροω (lutrao) meaning to set free or loose. The idea is to unbind or take off the fetters and set free. This is the word used in 1 Corinthians 1:30.
The other two words translated redemption come from the root meaning to buy as in the marketplace. The root describes the “agora” where Paul often went in a city to engaged people about the Lord. It was where people congregated bringing in their product to sell in the market place. The Greek word αγοραζω (agoradzo) means to buy and the other similar word εξαγοραζω (exagoradzo) was used to buy a slave “out of the market” so that a slave is no longer available in the marketplace.
Expositors tie the meaning of redemption to ownership and personal possession. A redeemed person is loosed from their circumstance and freed to make a different choice, or in the case of εξαγοραζω, a person is freed from the ownership of a person and becomes the personal property of another.
Redemption is also tied into “kinsman-redeemer” from Jewish law and culture. The law of kinsman-redeemer (Leviticus 25) provided for the nearest male relative to take responisibility for property of relatives including remaining family.
The little book of Ruth is a short story (85 verses) about the “kinsman-redeemer” helping us undertstand the rich culture embedded in this redemption term. Keep in mind Ruth becomes the great grandmother of King David. This story was proabably written by Samuel during the reign of King David.
Ruth is a Moabite (gentile) widow who journey’s with her mother-in law Naomi back to Naomi’s Bethleham home after about 12 years in Moab. Naomi’s deceased husband has relatives in Bethleham but no mention is made of Naomi’s family. Ruth loves her mother-in-law and pledges to return with her to her own people promising to go where she goes and die where she is burried.
They arrive in Bethleham just before the barley harvest. It just so happens one of the rich land owners is a realive of Naomi’s dead husband Elimelech.
Naomi instructs her daughter-in-law Ruth to glean in the fields and happens to come upon the field of Naomi’s kinsman Boaz. It was a Jewish custom to let those who were without means to glean in the fields behind the harvest workers picking up left over grain to keep for themselves. Boaz is single and Ruth is very attractive (You have to read the story for yourself)!
Boaz is not the closest relative to Naomi but he arranges for the man who is to meet with the elders at Bethleham’s gates (where these matters are discussed and agreered upon). Boaz brings up the matter so the nearest relative has the option to take up the responsibility for this deseased family and then just happens to remind him it includes a widow whom the kinsman is not interested in bringing into his family. Upon which occasion, Boaz offers, being the next in line, to take full responsibility including Ruth who he then as able to marry.
This scripture is written for our instruction (Romans 15:4). Boaz is considered a type of Christ. He not only nurtures Ruth before the contract is made but He continues to enrich her with all that he has after becoming his bride. Boaz honors Ruth for her faithfulness and takes full responsibility giving her both security and hope for her future progeny. Boaz takes full possession of Ruth and covenants her with the full benefit of all that he is and has. Ruth is in the genealogy of Jesus.
This picture of the “kinsman-redeemer” includes all the meanings inherent in the three Greek words translated redemption in the New Testament.
1. λυτροω (lutrao), to loose or set free, 1 Corinthians 1:30. Ruth is confined by her circumstances. She is forced to be a “gleaner” in the fields to support herself and her mother-in-law, Naomi. She is purchased out of those circumstances and place instead into the abundance of her redeemer who sets her free from being dependent upon self so that she can rely on the grace and love of the one who bought her, Boaz.
2. αγοραζω (agoradzo), to purchase or pay, Revelation 5:9. Boaz pays the price to the closest of kin. Jesus paid the price with His blood to God, to Himself, because it is the standard of righteousness required to be in Christ.
3. εξαγοραζω (exagoradzo), to take out of, or remove from the market place. Galatians 4:5. Ruth was taken out of the circumstance of being a widow and given the standing of Boaz’s wife. She no longer was in the “market place” so to speak. This Galatians verse speaks to being redeemed from out of the slave market law and becoming, instead, a son in the family of God, whereby from our heart we can address God as Abba! Father!”
God’s wisdom to us through redemption has several facets but the primary emphasis is the personal side of freedom, payment and possession. It is Jesus Himself who gave up Himself so that we can become part of Him. We saw the picture in Romans 7, similar to the story of Ruth. We died with Him, died to sin, so that we could belong to Jesus only. The old relationship was done away with so that Christ could take possession of us. Freedom, payment and possession is linked to all three of the Greek words through context.
Paul reminds us in Romans 5 there is so “much more” because being redeemed means we are standing in God’s grace. Being in God’s grace is like Ruth being the object of Boaz’s love just as “God’s love has been poured into our hearts through the Holy spirit who has been given to us.” This is tied into the meaning of redemption as we can see in Paul’s Romans 7 illustration.
“Likewise, my brothers, you also have died to the law through the body of Christ, so that you may belong to another, to him who has been raised from the dead, in order that we may bear fruit for God.” –Romans 7:4
But “much more”, there is the redemption of our body (Romans 8:23) for which Paul tells us we have been sealed by the Holy Spirit (Ephesians 4:30). Not only do we become partakers of His divine nature (2 Peter 1:4), but we also will reign with Christ (2 Timothy 2:12).
The term redemption opens the door to all the mysteries in Christ because it is the term to express, not only what we have been saved from, but also the riches in Christ Jesus awaiting those who accept His grace becoming lovers of God through Him who loved us. Let me do a wrap with a quote from the first three verses of Revelation 1:
““The revelation of Jesus Christ, which God gave him to show to his servants the things that must soon take place. He made it known by sending his angel to his servant John, who bore witness to the word of God and to the testimony of Jesus Christ, even to all that he saw. Blessed is the one who reads aloud the words of this prophecy, and blessed are those who hear, and who keep what is written in it, for the time is near.””
“Our redemption is drawing near”