I’ve been working through the book of Esther but often accounts like this are best understood when we see the whole story together. Whilst we can preach sermon series on books like Esther, Ruth and Jonah, there’s benefit from time to time to getting that big picture view to understand the overall message. So, here’s a sermon I recently preached looking at the whole book.
Introduction
How do we make sense of what we’ve been through in recent years? I’m thinking of the things we’ve all been through together the pandemic, the fall-out from war in Ukraine and a cost-of-living crisis. I’m thinking about the things many of us have been through as individuals and families. Some of you will be listening to this on the back of personal upheaval in your life, an unexpected move, loss of job, grieving the loss of loved ones, or the shocking news of serious illness.
How do we make sense of all of that. Well, there may be specific causes and reasons which I’m simply not in a position to give answers for but there’s one answer I can give.
God has been preparing you for this moment
In Esther 4:14, a man called Mordecai goes to find his cousin, Esther. She has ended up as the Queen of Persia. He tells her that she is needed to speak up for her own people, the Jews. She hesitates. It sounds risky. Mordecai’s response is to warn her that if she refuses, God will find other ways to deliver his people but she may still forfeit her own life.
He challenges her with these words.
“And who knows but that you have come to your royal position for such a time as this?”
“For such a time as this?” Could these words speak to you and I now? After all as God’s people we’ve been raised up to a royal position. We are a “a royal priesthood.”
How did we get here?
The story of Esther starts with a drunken feast (ch1). The emperor, Ahasuerus has organised a big party and invited all the big names in the kingdom. His wife, Vashti has her own party too. Ahasuerus summons her to come and join him, wearing her crown. He wants her to display her beauty for his glory. She refuses. Perhaps with good reason.
Ahasuerus is furious. He takes advise from the lads around him at court. They suggest he get rid of Vashti and call a beauty contest to choose a new queen. This brings an influx of new, young women into his harem and they are each summoned in turn to perform for him. The language is understated but you get the point. The unpleasant reality is that young girls are being trafficked for the Kings’ gratification. One of them is Esther. Let’s be clear, this meant suffering and shame for her. Yet, in the middle of all of this, God is at work and she is chosen to be the new Queen. Mordecai, her uncle and guardian moves close and comes discreetly to the palace to check up on her each day. This puts him in place to overhear a plot against the king, something that will become significant later as his advice saves the king’s life (ch2).
At the same time one of “the lads”, part of the king’s entourage, Haman is promoted to prominence. He would have probably been one of those involved in advising the king. He is given power and prestige. People are expected to bow down to him but Mordecai refuses, which enrages Haman. He finds out that Mordecai is a Jew and so he determines to have the Jews annihilated. He gets Ahasuerus to pass a law setting a date for this to happen (ch 3).
This is why Mordecai has come to the palace asking Esther to intervene on her people’s behalf and to break cover, identifying herself as a Jew. Esther however is nervous. She points out that if she goes into the king’s presence without him inviting her, he can turn against her and have her killed. This probably tells us a lot about Ahasuerus’ character (ch 4).
Some things to note
A lot has been made of Vashti’s actions. Was she justified? Is she a feminist hero? Well on one level yes. Ahasuerus strikes us as being an unpleasant husband and not a particularly pleasant ruler. However, the book itself doesn’t put the focus on that type of message. There is a sense that Vashti was meant to come, was meant to display her beauty for his glory. We might argue that Ahasuerus and Vashti are the Anti-God and anti-Church. God is often portrayed as the husband of his people, or Christ to the church. How different Christ is to Ahasuerus, he is the one who lays down his life for his bride. How different the church is meant to be. We are meant to display his glory.
Esther therefore presents us with a picture of what the true bride of Christ is meant to be like. She is the one who is beautiful and uses her beauty for good. She willingly displays her beauty. If Esther provides us with a picture of the church, this helps us to think about how we are meant to apply the statement that God has raised us up “for such a time as this.”
Haman is not just any old foe. We are told that he was an Agagite, a descendant of the king that Saul failed to kill. He was one of the Amalekites who were an historical arch-enemy of Israel. We are reminded that we face an enemy too.
This helps us to think about what it means to be “for such a time as this.” First, we remember that Christ came “at just the right time.” Secondly, we see that the church too, as God’s people, as the bride of Christ is here for just the right moment
Stop and think –
What does this mean for our church, in our community right now? How can we be here for “just this moment?” To help us think a bit more about this, let’s look at what happens next?
What happens next?
Haman -takes against Mordecai personally and arranges to have him executed on a 75 foot high impaling stake, which he erects in his garden (ch 5).[1] His hatred increases when the king remembers Mordecai’s previous intervention and gets Haman to honour him in the streets of the city (ch 6). However, Esther does what Mordecai has asked and intervenes. She arranges a series of banquets with Ahasuerus and Haman invited. Finally, she pleads for her people with the king. She identifies Haman as the true enemy, a vile or wicked adversary. The king’s wrath is turned against Haman and he is impaled on his own stake. God’s people are given authority. God’s people are given authority to fight back and defeat their enemies (ch 7-8).
The result is that God’s people fight a great battle, they go on the offensive defeating their enemies. Many people are afraid to the point where they even become Jews themselves. Esther and Mordecai are both honoured and Mordecai is exalted to Haman’s old position as de-facto Prime Minister (ch 9-10).
Further things that might have got your attention
We see that Esther names the enemy and enables the king to see Haman’s true colours. That’s what we need to do too when it comes to sin and evil. We need to name the enemy. This means that we first recognise that there is a literal enemy, Satan, we can sometimes be reluctant to talk about him, preferring to think in terms of abstract evil. But the rebellion against God is personal, with a leader, a fallen angel. He is powerful and dangerous but finite and already defeated. WE go on to name sin for what it is, that it is our enemy, that it is ugly, that it is destructive.
I can’t help but notice a link between Haman’s stake and The Cross. Just as Haman intended his impaling stake to be the end of Mordecai, so too Satan hoped to destroy Jesus at Calvary. There’s one difference. Jesus actually goes to the Cross to die, unlike Mordecai but it is sin and evil that meets its destruction there.
Paul says
13 When you were dead in your sins and in the uncircumcision of your flesh, God made you[d] alive with Christ. He forgave us all our sins, 14 having cancelled the charge of our legal indebtedness, which stood against us and condemned us; he has taken it away, nailing it to the cross. 15 And having disarmed the powers and authorities, he made a public spectacle of them, triumphing over them by the cross.[2]
Thirdly, we see that the victory is already won, just as it was for the Jews in the king’s palace when Haman’s fate was sealed. However, just as the people still had to go out to fight their enemies, there’s still spiritual warfare for us and sinful desires to put to death.
What does this mean for us as a church now?
God has brought you through everything that you’ve come through in order that he might uses you where you are, in the community you are in, at the very time you find yourself in. There will be specific ways in which he will use you here. However, this boils down to two things.
- Interceding: loving and crying out for people
- Offering hope: pointing them to the refuge they can find in Christ.
[1] The pole was 50 cubits high which converts to about 75 feet/23 metres. It could refer to a gallows and some Bible versions talk in those terms. However, in the ANE, the custom seems to have been to impale on a sharp stake rather than hanged with a noose. This method of execution was probably the precursor to crucifixion. Indeed, whilst Isaiah 53 points accurately to the nails of the Cross, it is probably that his contemporaries would have pictured impalement when hearing “he was pierced…”
[2] Colossians 2:13-15.
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