This month I have been studying the Book of Esther. An interesting account of a very young, and very beautiful lady who, by the will of God, becomes a queen and saves her people from being butchered.
I am not going to assume that those who might be interested in reading this blog have also read the book of Esther.
The Book of Esther starts with King Ahasuerus giving a feast for all of his officials and servants. All of the power of the land that he controlled was in attendance. At the same time the Queen Vashti had made a similar feast for the wives and the women of the land. On one of the days that the celebrating was happening King Ahasuerus decided to have his wife join him where he was and sent for her. When she refused to leave where she was, the King got furious. He asked his advisers what way she should be punished. His advisers saw that the queen by refusing to obey her King had mocked him and made a fool of him. Fearing that the other women of the land would follow in the queen's example, they advised him to banish the queen from himself and replace her with a beautiful and obedient queen. So King Ahasuerus did just this.
After his temper wore itself down, he sent his eunuchs to fetch the most beautiful virgins that his land had to offer.
Now in the town of Susa lived Esther and her cousin Mordecai. Since Esther's parents had died, Mordecai took her in as his own daughter. He had taught her to conceal that she was a Jew when she was taken from her home to be in the contest of beautiful virgins.
She pleased everyone around her and ended up becoming queen.
Shortly after Esther became queen, Mordecai overhears a plot to kill the King by two eunuchs that were furious with him. Mordecai told Esther, Esther told the King and after investigation found Mordecai's claim to be true and the two eunuchs were hung. The king had it written into his chronicles.
Now Around the same time, King Ahasuerus promoted Haman to set above all the princes, officials and council around him. This being so, the people of the land were to bow to him. Mordecai however didn't and this made Haman mad. When Mordecai was asked why he didn't bow to Haman he answered that he was a Jew and didn't have to. So Haman decided that ALL Jews needed to be killed. So Haman went to the king and told him that there was a pesky people that were spread through his land that lived by their own laws and that it was not PROFITABLE for them to remain in the King's land. So King Ahasuerus assigned Haman to take care of it. Now Haman decided to send letters to all of the towns, provinces, cities and villages in his land instructing that on a single date, every enemy of a Jew was to kill them and take everything they owned. And all of these letters were sealed with the kings royal seal.(making it more or less a command)
When Mordecai and the other Jews heard about this command, they became fretful, and Mordecai requested an audience with Queen Esther and begged her to help her people. Telling her that she could continue to conceal who she was and live but by denying her people she would forfeit her place in the afterlife. So she made a plan and went to the King.
The king seeing her distressed asked her what he could do to ease her pain. She asked to have a banquet with the King and Haman and she would tell all then. So the banquet was held and the king asked again what was troubling her, not knowing how to explain she stalled and asked to have a banquet a second night. The king allowed this.
That night the king wasn't able to sleep, so he had his chronicles read to him. He remembered Mordecai and realized that he had not been honored for this good deed. During this same time Haman and his family were having gallows made for Mordecai to be hung.
The next day Haman was summoned by the King and asked how to best honor someone. Haman thinking that the King was meaning him, he said that the best of honors would be to be ridden through the town on the King's horse wearing the Kings robes, and having all the people of the town praise and bow to him in the streets. Liking this the king commanded Haman to do this for Mordecai immediately. Humiliated and furious, Haman did this and Mordecai was praised and honored through out the town.
That night at the second banquet, the king asked Esther what was troubling her and that he would give what ever she wanted and up to half his kingdom and wealth to fix what was bothering her. So she revealed that she herself was a Jew and that Haman had plotted to have her people murdered. This made the king furious and he had Haman hang on the gallows that Haman had made for Mordecai. Right away letters were written and sent though all the land that the Jews were not to be harmed and that anyone who took up a sword against them would be killed and their land and everything they had would be plundered. This was also written with the king's royal seal.
So as it happened, the day that Haman had set to kill all the Jews arrived and instead of the Jews being killed by their enemies, the Jews were able to defend themselves and kill their enemies instead and plunder them. When news of this reached the King, he asked what she wanted to be done, so she asked that they let it continue one more day. So it did, and for two days the Jews were able and allowed to distroy their enemies. And it was recorded in not only chonicles of the King but also started the Jewish holiday of Purim.
So it also came to pass that Mordecai rose to Haman's possition at King Ahasuerus' side with Queen Esther on the other.
Now the lessons I have learned from this book is that:
- You may not always be able to clearly see, hear or know God's plan for you, but it will end up being done regardless.
- You are always in the right place at the right time to do the right thing. But actually doing the right thing is up to you.
- You can always take a bad situation and make the outcome better then it would have been with a different attitude.
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