Faces - 7 - Esther

Throughout the summer we have been looking at different characters from the Bible and looking at what we can learn from their lives. We have looked at Daniel, Sampson, Job, Ruth and Moses. Today we finish our series by looking at Esther.

Esther is one of only two women in the Bible to have her own book written about her. Like many of the other faces we have seen in this series Esther’s story starts from humble beginnings, but God uses Esther to bring about change that would impact the entire nation and ultimately bringing victory to the Jews.

We are going to start by watching a short video which gives us a snapshot into the twists and turns of her life.

The overarching theme of Esther’s life is that God is in control in all situations. God works through Esther’s life, coordinating seeming “coincidences” in her life, combined with her hard work and loyal obedience to the King and trusting in God ultimately lead to her becoming queen of Persia. We see can pick up the story of Esther making her steps towards becoming queen in Esther 2 : 5 - 11 and 17 - 18.

As we start thinking about being in control we are going to play a game, where we will see who is best at controlling their words as we play Taboo.

However, there are some twists to the story. Esther was an Israelite, a Jew, living in the foreign land of Persia. The Persians and the Israelites were enemies, which is why we saw in the passage that we just read that she chose to stay quiet about her nationality.

At the same time as this was going on and Esther was being made Queen, one of the Kings officials, called Haman was devising a plot to wipe out the Jews across the kingdom. He started stirring up trouble in the court and tried to get the king on board with his way of thinking and shockingly as we see in Esther 3 : 8 - 15 he succeeded. The King signed a warrant to massacre every Jew across his kingdom.

Today we still find people like Haman operating today. When you look at your social media feed, newspapers, or TV you see that it is full of people trying to spread rumours, fake news and hurtful gossip either about individuals or entire groups of people. We need to make sure that we do not make the same mistake that the King did and do not get drawn into believing hurtful lies about other people.

Can you think of any examples of this that you have seen recently, maybe online or on TV?

Whatever hurtful agenda bad people may have, however convincing their lies and the strength of their support. God has a plan that is stronger and can overcome it. In the case of Haman and his lust for Jewish blood, God’s answer came in the form of Esther.

When one of Esther’s relatives called Mordecai heard the news of the Kings order to massacre the Jews he goes to the palace and persuades Esther to help them. He says in Esther 4 : 13 - 14 “Do not think that because you are in the king’s house you alone of all the Jews will escape. For if you remain silent at this time, relief and deliverance for the Jews will arise from another place, but you and your father’s family will perish. And who knows but that you have come to your royal position for such a time as this?”

So, Esther is now in a dilemma, she has two choices, neither of which are particularly great:

• Option 1 is that she does nothing, continues to hide the fact that she is a Jew, watch her friends and family die and hope that she doesn’t get discovered.
• Option 2 risk her life, trust that God has a plan and try and get the king to change his mind, even if this means that her secret identity as a Jew is revealed.

If you were Esther which option do you think that you would go for?

Esther chose option 2, she went to the king and made a request… what request I here you cry. “I am organising a party, will you the King come along, as well as Haman”. A bit odd you might think, but this was all part of her plan.

At the party once it was in full swing, the King asked Esther what one thing she wanted from him, and that anything up to half his kingdom would be hers. In Esther 7 : 3 - 10 we see Esther take her chance and save the Jews from their grizzly fate prepared by Haman.

Because of Esther’s courage and continued trust in God’s ultimate power she was able to stop a genocide from taking place within her nation. Her seemingly random rise to power from complete obscurity to queen was all part of Gods plan to rescue his nation, Israel.

Unlike Haman, Ester didn’t need to lie, manipulate or bully anyone to bring about the change that she desired. She instead used methods which were much more powerful. She trusted in God, demonstrated a lot of patience, humbleness and wisdom in order to achieve the outcome that she hoped for and that God intended.

One thing that we can do to help us fight back against the lies, we come across in our lives is to make sure that we know the truth. The Bible is God’s truth written down. We are now going to spend a few minutes in small groups thinking about some truths in the Bible and when these might be particularly useful for us to hold onto.

So today we have seen that God’s overarching (sometimes called Sovereign) power was demonstrated though Esther’s life.

She chose to trust God at times when life looked bleak and battled against lies and evil with truth and humbleness. Let’s pray:

Lord God,

Thank you for Esther, and the example of humble obedience that she provides for us.

Help us all to get better at trusting you, and help us to be encouraged that your power is greater than any other, and that when we trust you, all other problems fade away.

Help us to make wise choices in who and what we listen to, read and trust.

Amen