In the Field of Grace

by Tessa Afshar

  She shivered. “I missed you.” He had been away from home for two days, dealing with a caravan carrying goods that had been stuck in bad roads outside Bethlehem.

  “They tell me you have overworked and refused to rest all day. I came to scold you. Now I find you looking lovelier than a new lily. Do you not feel tired?”

  She frowned. “Not even a little. I feel strong and well, as if I had never been sick.”

  Boaz lowered his lashes. “I am glad you are having a good day. Best not overdo it, though. You might pay for it tomorrow.”

  The surge of health lingered through the night. Ruth chatted with her neighbors and chased after Obed who had begun to walk in earnest two weeks before. She noticed that he loved being in the midst of so many admirers, and did everything in his power to charm their guests. His antics made everyone laugh, and Ruth looked on with pride. She ate more heartily than she had in months and never once felt the need to crawl into bed, overcome by exhaustion.

  In the morning she awoke, still free of pain. The sheer bliss of uninterrupted physical well-being overwhelmed her senses. It was pure delight not to be sick. She stretched her hands above her head and arched her back like a contented cat in the sun.

  “How do you feel?” Boaz stood near a window, sunlight revealing the tense expression on his face.

  “I feel wonderful.”

  “Not sick?”

  “Not at all.” She went still as a realization settled into her heart. Pushing the covers back, she ran to him and wrapped her arms around his neck. “Boaz, I think the Lord has healed me.”

  He smiled down into her eyes. “I pray you are right.”

  At Boaz’s insistence Ruth left the cleaning to others in the household. Husband and wife spent the morning playing with Obed. Boaz brought them into the barn and let Obed tangle his chubby hands into the horses’ manes. The little boy screamed with delight and the horses bore his enthusiastic assault with admirable aplomb.

  In the evening, Naomi joined them for a supper of leftover roast lamb and fresh bread. “Daughter, do my eyes deceive me? I have worried for you these past two days, noting how hard you’ve pushed yourself. I must admit, however, that you look recovered.”

  Ruth grinned. “I have not had a moment of discomfort or sickness since yesterday. The Lord has healed me, I am certain. But this husband of mine is too cautious to believe it. He won’t agree unless the Lord were to send him a personal letter, declaring me restored.”

  Boaz pushed his sleeves up over his elbows. “It has only been two days. Let’s wait a month.”

  “A month! You called a physician after three days when you thought I was sick. Shall we not hold the reverse true? Three days, and you can declare me healed.”

  Naomi laughed. “She has you there, Boaz.”

  He held up a hand. “I never thought I’d see the day when the two of you convened against me.”

  Convinced of her healing, Ruth waited patiently for five whole days. She felt no surprise when she remained free of any nagging symptoms. Every passing hour seemed to add to her vigor and she began to put on a bit of healthy flesh. Still, Boaz would not budge and acknowledge that she was cured.

  On the fifth night after the feast, when Boaz drew Ruth into his arms for a comforting peck on the cheek, she kissed him on the mouth and kept on kissing him, until with a groan, he gave in and kissed her without holding back.

  “You should ask yourself, husband,” Ruth said much later as she leaned against her pillows, her arms crossed over her chest, unable to quash a smug smile, “when it comes to the important moments in our lives, why is it that I always have to make the first move?”

  Boaz roared with laughter. “You ought to have known, that night on the threshing floor, when you had to throw yourself at me, that you would have a rough life ahead of you.”

  “I did not throw myself at you!”

  “As I recall, I opened my eyes in the dark of the night, innocent as a babe, to find my feet naked and a brazen woman cuddled up to me.”

  She leaned in for a deep kiss. “I don’t think we should tell Obed about that story.”

  “About what a hussy his mother is? Too late. I already told him. I’m sure he will tell our grandchildren as well. I fear the secret is out. The whole world will probably hear about it before the next harvest.”

  She thumped him on the arm. “No one shall find out. I’m very good at keeping secrets.”

  “Beloved, I am afraid one day you will be famous. Everyone will hear about your story, for you are far too extraordinary to remain forgotten. As long as there are people in this world, they will speak of your faithfulness and courage.”

  “If anyone is going to be famous in this family, it is you. You are already well known in Bethlehem. And in the years to come, many will speak of your extraordinary goodness.”

  “I care nothing about fame, Ruth. I only know the Lord has blessed us beyond what I could imagine. He has spread His wings over us. Remember how I prayed that over you the first day I met you?”

  Ruth bolted up with excitement. “I had forgotten the blessing you spoke over me that day. He honored your prayer, Boaz.”

  “And by blessing you, He blessed me.”

  “What do you mean?”

  “He has given us a glorious lineage. A child of our flesh. We had to wait both of us, for many years. But those years weren’t wasted. God built our character in the waiting times. In the despairing seasons. The Lord has given us happiness. But He has given us something more important still. He has matured us in the invisible things of the soul. We learned the power of obedience as we waited. No matter what we go through now, that inner strength will undergird us.”

  “I look forward to a boring old age, with no adventures and no need to exercise extraordinary inner strength.”

  “He has restored you to me. That’s as much adventure as I need.”

  “Does this mean that you are convinced I am healed?”

  His hand tangled in her hair and pulled her forward in a blatantly possessive move. “I’m convinced. With all my heart, I love you, Ruth of Moab.”

  She trembled in his arms. “I am my beloved’s and he is mine.”

  Seven months later, Boaz took Ruth with him on a trip to Jerusalem. After concluding his business, he brought her to a stretch of land at the foot of the mountain ridge east of Jerusalem. He had arranged for a servant to bring a rug and some cushions as well as a basket of food. “I thought we could have lunch by ourselves,” he said.

  She extended long legs over the rug and, flopping on her belly, lay against a cushion. “It’s beautiful here. Whose land is this?”

  He ignored her question. “Do you know what today is?”

  She frowned. “The day I eat too much and fall asleep in your arms?”

  “It’s the anniversary of the day you arrived in Bethlehem. Three years ago on this day, you came to Israel.”

  Ruth gasped and sat up. “I had forgotten. Has it truly been that long?”

  Boaz nodded. “My life changed the moment you stepped foot into Judah and I did not even know it. I was in my house, having supper, washing my hands, having a conversation with Mahalath. Going through the mundane routines of my normal life. And the whole while, my world had turned on its head.”

  “And I thought my biggest longing was to fix the holes in Naomi’s roof and find a way to feed us so that we wouldn’t starve. Think of the shock in store for me. The Lord must have laughed hard that day.”

  “I bought you a gift. To celebrate.”

  “A gift?” Ruth, who had received so few presents in her early years, had become spoilt with a husband who loved to give freely. “What is it?” She looked about for a package wrapped in fabric and saw nothing.

  Boaz spread a hand in front of him. “This. This land is yours now. You know I own fields all over Judah, and not only in Bethlehem. Parcels like this aren’t available for purchase every day. As soon as I saw it, I thought of you.”

  Ruth gasped. “Th
e land?” She had never owned land of her own before. Not even a patch the size of a pillow, let alone land that spread beyond the horizon. “This beautiful place? You bought it for me?”

  “I plan to make it an olive grove.”

  “Boaz!” Ruth threw herself into his arms and covered his face with tiny kisses.

  Boaz laughed. “I thought you might approve. We shall call it the Mount of Olives. What do you think?”

  “It’s perfect!”

  “It will be many years before the trees will mature and bear fruit. But they will be here long after we are gone. They will be a reminder of our lives, yours and mine, of the hard stony years, and the sweetness that God created in spite of them.”

  Ruth reached for his hand. “I could not imagine a better way to be remembered. I hope our descendants will understand that without the stones, there can be no oil. I pray they will learn fortitude and faith when they look at these trees you dream of planting.”

  “Who knows? Perhaps, one day, hundreds of years from now, a great-great-great-great-grandson of ours might sit under the shade of those trees and find comfort in his hour of need.”

  Epilogue

  Though the fig tree should not blossom,

  Nor fruit be on the vines,

  The produce of the olive fail and the fields yield no food,

  The flock be cut off from the fold

  And there be no herd in the stalls,

  Yet I will rejoice in the LORD;

  I will take joy in the God of my salvation.

  God, the LORD, is my strength;

  He makes my feet like the deer’s;

  He makes me tread on my high places.

  HABAKKUK 3:17–19

  Time was running out. David examined his face in the smooth surface of a polished copper mirror, seeing the shadow of death hanging over him. His once robust body had lost its vigor, muscles melted like wax, skin hanging loose and wrinkled off his fragile bones. All his beauty and might stolen by the passing of the seasons. Forty years had flown since he had become king. He had lived through uprisings and betrayals; he had seen his sons die and his daughter disintegrate by the shame of rape. He had overcome powerful enemies and established a secure kingdom for his people. He had caused an innocent man’s demise.

  Let death come. It held few terrors for him. He had tasted of the best and the worst. What could death do to him?

  Though I walk through the valley of the shadow of death, I will fear no evil, for You are with me.

  It was the unfinished business of life that devoured his peace.

  Pulling his blankets more securely around him, David shivered in spite of the fire that burned in the hearth. Summer held the land in a fierce grip. Everyone in Jerusalem sweated, but the trembling in the king’s limbs persisted. It never stopped. Warmth had eluded him for months.

  Abishag ran over to add another blanket to the ineffectual heap already suffocating him. He waved her away with a weak hand. She was new to her duties, the latest brainchild of his wily advisors who intended to keep him alive and in power as long as possible.

  “Fetch my box,” he said with a wave of his hand.

  They hadn’t trained Abishag properly. Just stuffed her into silks and linens, painted her eyes with kohl and shoved her into David’s chamber, hoping for the best. As if the comely lines of a woman’s body could drive the old age right out of him.

  In her ignorance, she fetched David’s linen casket. David squelched a wave of impatience. “Not that one.” He pointed a crooked finger toward a carved chest at the foot of his bed. “My personal writings.”

  The cedar box was heavy. It wobbled in the girl’s slim hands as she hefted it over to him. He hoped she would not drop it on her henna-stained toes, and sighed when she managed to bring it without incident.

  He waved Abishag away, then pulled out a thick sheaf of parchment from the carved box. Somewhere buried in the bowels of that chest lay a few of his deepest secrets. He studied every sheaf with an intensity that belied the infirmity in his body. Age had not robbed him of his brains. Some pieces he set aside immediately. Others, he lingered over. By midnight, he had found what he sought. His bed looked like a library after a war, with bits of parchment and rolls of papyrus scattered in every direction.

  Abishag had long since fallen asleep at his feet. Pity prevented him from waking her to bring order back into his room. Instead, grasping the scraps of parchment he had searched for with such diligence, he lay back and fell into an exhausted slumber.

  The sound of a gasp dragged David out of an uneasy dream. For a moment he blinked in confusion at the beautiful young woman who stood, her hands in a knot, studying his bed, her doe eyes wide with shock.

  David wondered if an assassin had loosed an asp in his covers and looked around with concern, trying to pinpoint the source of her dismay. His gaze fell on the disarray he had caused earlier.

  “I was searching for something,” he said, trying to make his voice sound soothing.

  “Your maidservant will clean it up.” Abishag knelt by his side and reached for the stray sheaves that had landed on the floor. When she had finished, she noticed the piece of rolled parchment he still held in his hand and reached for it.

  David pulled his arm back. “This stays with me.”

  That night the girl lay next to him, as she had done most of the evenings since they had brought her to serve his needs. She slept next to him to try and warm his shivering body. He had never touched her; she was nothing more than a living blanket. In the morning she awoke early and helped him out of bed. When she reached to anoint his hands with scented oil, she noticed that he still held on to the faded parchment.

  Her plucked eyebrows shot up. “My lord! Let me put that away.”

  “No. I want to hold it.” He clutched the roll in his fist. “Now send for my son Solomon.”

  It had been a week since he had declared Solomon his successor. Even though Adonijah was older, David had chosen Bathsheba’s son to be king after him, upholding a promise he had made to her long ago.

  The young man arrived, and with the grace of a gazelle, prostrated himself before David. How old was he now? Seventeen? Eighteen? David signaled Solomon to rise and studied the handsome face for a few moments.

  “Soon you will be king,” he said without preamble.

  “May the king live forever!”

  “Well, he won’t. You will be king come winter, and I will sleep with my fathers.”

  He detected a sheen of tears in his son’s large brown eyes. “I would rather have you, Father.”

  David’s mouth softened. “Sit with me awhile. I have not spent enough time with you. I regret that. Matters of state and the troubles of rule always seemed more urgent than the need to be with my family. I haven’t had a chance to be a real father to you.”

  Solomon sat at David’s feet, like a child. Then he lowered his head. “I am afraid. I am afraid I won’t be a great king like you. You were a success even before you were my age. Already a hero.”

  David guffawed. “I was the eighth son of a farmer in Bethlehem. At the bottom of the pile. A nobody. My family sent me to keep the sheep company; that’s what they deemed me worthy of. I played my wooden harp and made up songs, and no one heard me but the sheep. Then Samuel poured the anointing oil on my head and told me I would be king. And even as the Spirit of the Lord rushed upon me, I looked at him as dumbly as one of my father’s cattle.

  “No. I have but one success and it is not the throne, for God Himself gave me that. If you want a true hero, you will have to look farther up our family tree.” He held up the faded roll of parchment.

  “What is that?”

  “My secret. And yours.”

  “A secret?”

  “This is an account of my great-grandmother’s life. Some say the prophet Samuel wrote it. But it is not so. Ruth wrote most of it by her own hand, for her husband taught her to read and write. Through the years, my great-grandfather Boaz and his son Obed added more details t
o her story, as they remembered it.”

  “What secret does it contain?”

  “For one thing, she was a Canaanite. Born and raised in Moab.”

  Solomon’s back snapped up straight in astonishment. “Never!”

  “It’s the truth, I assure you.”

  “But … how can this be? The king of Israel bearing Moabite blood in his veins? Moses taught that no Moabite may enter the assembly of the Lord. Even to the tenth generation, none of his descendants may enter the assembly of the Lord. Everyone knows God chose you, my father, handpicked you from all the men of Israel, to be our king. Would He have put you on the throne if you had the blood of Moabites?”

  “Apparently.”

  Solomon stood. His ivory white hands shook. “That is a great reproach to our family. I won’t tell anyone. I promise.”

  David laughed so loud the sparrows resting on the windowsill took to hasty flight. “I am very proud of my great-grandmother. She loved the Lord better than the rest of us and served our people with unmatched loyalty. That makes her a true Israelite.”

  “Not so loud, I beg you, Father! Do you wish people to find out that you approve of your Moabite lineage? Best keep that shame buried somewhere in a dark place.”

  “I’ve kept it buried too long. The best part of our family, and we act as if it were the plague that blighted the seed of Jesse. The few who know about it advised me never to speak of it after I ascended the throne. But it proved to be foolish advice.”

  “You must admit our heritage presents a problem, my lord. She belonged to Moab!” Solomon pronounced the word Moab with the same distaste he would have shown an army of locusts.

  David took a calming breath. “Why don’t you read it? We can speak of the matter after you have.” He held out the parchment for Solomon. “Stay here in my chamber while you read. Perhaps you will understand better once you know her story.”

  “Read it, my lord?”

  “I trust you know how? With all the money I spent on teachers, you should at least be able to decipher a simple script.”