For Such A Time As This... Devotional

Today I want to share the journey I went on in seeing that God had called me “For such a time as this” and how that message transformed any situation I ended up finding myself in. 

Let me share with you the life of Esther and my study of her…  I have actually studied and taught the book of Esther several times... the first time I studied it, I studied it with my mom.  My parents were missionaries in the Philippines and in order to stay connected my mom we would study the bible (in this case Esther) and would skype to share what we were learning.  That was the first time.  The last time I studied that book in the bible, I was teaching a women’s bible study.  It was during that bible study that my mom was diagnosed with a terminal cancer.  The remaining days I had with my mom were spent talking about Esther together.  I will come back to sharing about my mom a little later but that will be part of what I want to share.
 

Overview of Esther

Esther was an unlikely queen.  She lived in Persia when King Xerxes reigned.  Esther was an orphaned daughter of Jewish parents and was raised by her uncle Mordecai. As the years passed, Esther grew into a stunningly beautiful woman.

After King Xerxes banished his first queen for disobedience, he ordered his officers to bring all the beautiful young women of the land into his harem as he wanted to select a new queen. Because of her beauty, Esther was taken into Xerxes palace.  When she entered the palace, her uncle told her to keep her Jewish heritage a secret.

• Esther was an orphan.  She didn’t lose one parent, she lost both.  She wasn’t in her 20s, 30s, 40s or 50s.  It is believe that she was around 13 yrs old when this story took place
• Because of her beauty, she was taken in to the palace to be a part of the king’s harem.  This isn’t necessarily a positive situation.  When she entered the place, she lost all her freedom.  She now belonged to the king.  If she wasn’t selected to be queen, she would stay as part of his harem.  That’s not a situation you want to find yourself in.  Esther needed to compete with hundreds of other beautiful young women for the attention of the King. 
• She was a Jew that couldn’t live out her heritage and faith.  Her uncle told her to keep it a secret.  Why?  We are not sure but I am prone to think it had to do with protecting her and giving her a chance to be selected without being bias. 

Put yourself in her shoes… Most likely Esther felt lost and alone when she entered into the palace.  She had no fellowship with likeminded people, no chance to attend the synagogue or hear the sacred scrolls.  She was no longer with the only person she knew to be family – her uncle but instead, she found herself surrounded by hundreds of beautiful women, all competing desperately to win the king’s favor.  I am not a competitive person so that right there would make me want to toss the towel in… for a young Jewish girl from a humble background; it must have been a huge culture shock.

By the grace of God, Esther (who is now 14 yrs old) found favor in the king’s eyes. She was crowned queen of Persia.  Because of her uncle’s advice, she never revealed her Jewish heritage.  Like all good stories, beneath the swirling events taking place in the royal court, trouble was brewing.

So what was brewing?  Mordecai (Esther’s uncle) refused to bow to a powerful politician named Haman.   Haman (being a proud and arrogant man) became offended and enraged.  As a result, Haman decided to punish Mordecai and his entire people. After getting approval from the king, Haman arranged for all the Jews in the land to be killed.

Desperate, Mordecai tore his clothes put on sackcloth and ashes (a sign of mourning) and went out into the city wailing loudly and bitterly.  Other Jews joined him in fasting, weeping and wailing as well as wearing sackcloth and ashes.  As a result, word reached Esther in the palace that Mordecai was causing a “scene”. She asked why he was doing this and he explained the dire situation and pleaded that Esther go before the king and intercede for her people.

At first, Esther refused. After all, the king had not summoned her for thirty days. What if he was angry with her? If she simply walked into his throne room, she risked immediate death. But Mordecai appealed to her with a heart-wrenching plea.  Humbled, the queen sent word back to Mordecai. She would go in to the king. “And if I perish, I perish.”

Esther (after much prayer and fasting) comes up with a wise and strategic plan.  When she approached the king, instead of the King becoming angry and ordering her to be put to death, scripture says the King was pleased with her and held out his royal scepter and offered her anything she wanted.  Esther courageously initiates her strategic plan and invites the king and Haman to - not just one banquet but two!.  It is during the second banquet that she begs the king to spare her people’s lives.

My focus this morning is not on Esther’s plan. Suffice to say, King Xerxes granted her request. Haman was punished, the Jews were saved and Mordecai was promoted.

What does this account of Queen Esther teach us?  I want to focus on today on how she got to the point where she got the courage to go to the king.

In chapter 4, Esther asked why Mordecai was making a scene at the city gates and he explained to her that Hamon is going to kill all the Jews and pleaded that Esther go before the king and intercede for her people.  Esther responds -  verse  11  “All the king’s officials and the people of the royal provinces know that for any man or woman who approaches the king in the inner court without being summoned the king has but one law: that they be put to death unless the king extends the gold scepter to them and spares their lives. But thirty days have passed since I was called to go to the king.”

 

1.      At some point in all of our lives, each of us are going to be put in difficult situations where we have to make tough choices and do hard things.  Are we ready?

Esther was asked by Mordecai to do something extremely hard.  It wasn’t just extremely hard – Mordecai was asking Esther to risk her life.  Can you image the fear and anxiety that ran through her body?  We may not be asked to risk our lives but I can guarantee we all will find ourselves in positions where we need to make difficult choices and do hard things. 

For some of us, these situations can be extremely hard. 

·        For me, it was living a life of singleness.  The death of the dream of getting married and having babies in my 20s and 30s. 

·        Staying in a hard marriage. 

·        Putting up with a difficult boss. 

·        Not being able to have kids. 

·        Being single and raising kids on your own.

·        Maybe you are dealing with a rebellious child. 

·        Care of your elderly parents and making decisions about their health and well-being.

·        Maybe you or your loved one has health concerns.

·        Maybe you need to walk away from an unhealthy friendship. 

·        Maybe you need to forgive someone that you don’t think deserves your forgiveness.

·        Maybe you and/or your loved ones are dealing with strongholds that have been gripping you and your family for years – depression, anxiety, drugs, alcohol, and anger. 

·        Maybe it is time to deal with that family secret that no one talks about. 

·        Maybe it is time for drawing a line and saying generational sins will not have a place in your home and in your marriage etc.
 

We find ourselves in hard situations… many hard situations have serious consequences as a result.  What are we going to do when faced with a hard situation.  Are we going to run and hide?  Are we going to avoid it?  Before Esther went before the King, I want you to note that she first pushes back and reminded Mordecai “look – what you are asking me to do – it will most likely kill me!”

What was Mordecai response - “…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?” (Esther 4:13-14)

Mordecai was saying… Look Esther - Let me remind you, who you are.  You are a Jew.  This decree includes you.  Don’t think you will escape this just because you live in the palace.  You may remain silent but when they find out you are a Jew, they will kill you.  Mordecai also reminded her of who her God was.  God will deliver the Jews – if not you then someone else.  And then he ends it with - maybe, just maybe you have been placed where you are for “such a time as this.”  Mordecai “kicked her in her royal butt”

 

2.      I want to encourage you that when facing a difficult situation, it is important to remember who you are and who God is.  It is also important to remember that God may just be calling you to rise up to the occasion.  He may be calling you “for such a time as this!”

Maybe, just maybe God has you in a tough situation to be the deliverance for someone else? 

·        How often do we get caught up in our own situations that we forget how big our God is and that His ways are so much bigger than ours? 

·        We need to remember who we belong to. 

·        Claim God’s promises.  Scripture says “All His promises are yes and Amen.”  If we are children of God, He will provide deliverance for us.  It may not be in the form of deliverance we want, but His ways are greater than ours. 

·        Maybe God has called you for such a time as this.

·        Are you being called to bring healing?

·        To restore a broken relationship?

·        Change the cycle of sin?

Esther’s response “Go, gather together all the Jews who are in Susa, and fast for me. Do not eat or drink for three days, night or day. I and my attendants will fast as you do. When this is done, I will go to the king, even though it is against the law. And if I perish, I perish.”

Before Esther went in to see the king, she instructed Mordecai to gather all the Jews of Susa. She wanted them to fast and pray for God’s intervention. And she and her maids did the same.  Esther knew that she couldn’t do this in her own strength.  She needed to rely on God and others.  I want you to note that her attitude also changed.  She surrendered to situation.  She said, “If I perish, I perish.” 

Stop for a second and think about what it must have taken for Esther to relinquish herself to the point she was able to say “If I perish, I perish.”  Her true inner self had to “die” to her own dreams, desires, plans in order to surrender to God’s plans.  Think of the fear and anxiety, the loneliness and emptiness she must have felt.  But when she went to that inner place of surrender, she found God there.

 

3.      Third – We can’t lean on our own strength.  We need the support of others and we need to seek the Lord through fasting and prayer.  We also need to surrender to God’s sovereign plan for our lives.  We need to come to a point in our walk with Christ, where we stay “it is well with my soul.”  This is Esther’s resolution… If I perish, I perish. She got to the point where she was indifferent to her circumstance.

 

·        Do you have friends who will “go to bat” for you in prayer. 

·        Friends that will fast and pray for you.  I have several friends who does just that.  One of them is here today – Tracie.  Tracie is part of my inner circle that helps speak truth to me and challenges me to surrender to God’s plans. 

·        Let’s be honest - It is way too easy to avoid surrending ourselves to God.  It is way too easy to avoid pain and put walls up to protect us. Those protective walls are false and only cause more pain in the end.

·        We need friends that will hold our “feet to the fire” and that challenge us to “Consider it pure joy when facing trials.”  We need friends that will challenge us to not to avoid hard situations but to perserver and to let perseverance finish its work so that we may be mature and complete, not lacking anything.”  I am not going to go into too much further detail on this but I have a hand out on each table titled “Find a Friend To Wound You.”  The article is about having friends that will hold you accountable – friends that care about your eternal soul above your momentary feelings.

·        Let me say one thing… You can’t just go around and confront others about their sinds.  That’s not what I am saying.  What I am saying is find a friend that you can be transparent and real with.

·        If you don’t have these types of friends in your life, I want to challenge you to seek them out. 

·        But start with being that type of friend.  Be a friend that will fast and pray.  Be a friend that will challenge others (in love) to surrender to God. 

·        Be a friend that care about the eternal soul over the comfort of the moment.

When Esther approached King Xerxes, she went in the strength of her God.  Using her God-given wisdom and experience, Esther carefully and intentionally planned the best strategy for asking the king. She didn’t blindly rush into the throne room. Instead, she prepared a rich banquet, trusting that God would hear her prayers and grant her an audience with the king.

If Esther had listened to the inner voices of doubt and fear, she would never have dared to go before King Xerxes. Yet she went to the Lord in prayer and fasting.  She dealt with the voices of doubt and fear.  She knew there was only one still, small voice that mattered. And that was the voice of God. When her very life was on the line, Esther chose to trust God’s wisdom and yield her life to him.

 

4.      Fourth – We (when we seek the Lord for strength) can approach our situation with strength and confidence.  Are we letting God give us the strength to preserver through hard situations?

I want to share about my sweet momma.  I told you a little about my mom in the beginning.  What you may not realize is that my mom was my best friend.  I don’t say that lightly.  It was very, very true.  I shared everything with my mom and much of who I am today is because I had wonderful parents that walked with me through some of the hardest of hard times one should have in a life time. 

One of my biggest fears and most crippling thoughts that caused me great anxiety as a single person in my 20s and 30s wasn’t me dying, but my loved ones dying and me being left behind and alone. 

The death of my mom to a rare form of Leukemia was my biggest fear becoming a reality.  When she was diagnosed, she was already well into stage 3 and quickly approaching stage 4.  From the day she was diagnosed, she lived 12 weeks.  You need to understand something.  I never felt called to singleness.  I always wanted to be married and have a family.  I honestly didn’t think I could live a day without her never mind a year or two.  It was my mom who walked me through the challenges of singleness and pointed me to Christ.  She always held my feet to the fire when I was called to do hard things.  She wouldn’t let me take the easy road.  I felt that I still needed that in my life.

 

·        As I mentioned before, the first time I studied Esther, I studied it with my mom.  My parents were missionaries in the Philippines and in order to stay connected, my mom and I studied scripture together. 

·        The last time I taught it, it was right before, during and after her illness.  My mom knew what I was teaching so we often talked about it during her illness.

·        My mom took our study of Esther and put it into practice in her daily life.  She lived her remaining 12 weeks with the knowledge that she was living “for such a time as this.” 

 

Let me share a little of how she lived this out. 

First, she was handed a hard situation.  She was diagnosed with a terminal cancer… At first she cried and struggled with it.  Like Esther she wanted to push back.  She didn’t feel like it was her time to go.  She didn’t feel like she was ready to leave her family and grandbabies.  My mom was able to surrender to the knowledge that as Psalms 139 says “all her days were ordained before one of them came to be”, she got to the point where she realized that she was being called for such a time as this.  She couldn’t change the situation so she was going to blossom in the situation and make the best of it.

 

At the same time, I want you to know God also was working in my life.  The Sunday before she was diagnosed, I was teaching on how Esther came to the point of saying “If I perish, I perish.”  I was sharing how Esther needed to relingquish and surrender her will to God’s will.  I asked the ladies in my study to think of something that in their minds were unbearable.  What was their greatest fear?  A unfaithfull husband?  The death of a child… Facing death yourself.  I shared with the group my biggest fear was the loss of my mother.  I walked them through what that would look like.  If I lost my mom, then what?  Then I would be heart broken, Then I would feel alone and lost, Then I would… You can fill in the blanks.  I got to the point that I was able to say out loud to them If my mom, then God.  Two days later my mom went into the hospital and 4 days later was diagnosed with terminal cancer.  I can honestly tell you that If my mom, then God has been true ever since.  God has truly been my deliverer.

 

God had asked both of us to make difficult choices and do hard things…  He was calling each of us “for such a time as this.”

 

So what did that look like for her?

 

Each time she went in the hospital, she would say “I am here for a reason.”  Every nurse, doctor, cleaning service personal… she focused on each and every person she came in contact with.  She spent time getting to know each of them.  Ask them questions about their up-bring, home life, she wanted to know their passions.  She deeply carried about each of them and through caring about them she was able to share about her faith.  She knew this was her calling and that she needed to rise up to the fact that God was calling her “for such a time as this.”  One nurse had quit her job and was moving to Maine.  On her last day at the hospital, when her shift was over, she came in my mom’s room and sat with my mom for over an hour before she left.  She told my mom that she had made up her mind that she was done with the politics and dynamics of the hospital and that was why she quit.  She told my mom that my mom’s presence and interaction with her over the last few days made it hard for her to leave.  She was amazed at my mom’s peace and contentment and all she wanted to do was to sit with her and glean from whatever my mom had.  My mom got to share Christ with her.

 

Third – she didn’t walk through her diagnosis and terminal illness in her own strength.  She had a team of people praying for her and she would pray daily that she wouldn’t miss any of God’s divine appointments. 

 

Fourth – She walked with intent in her “for such a time as this” situation with confidence and strength. 

 

She held on to two verses.  Proverbs 18:24 “but there is a friend who sticks closer than a brother.” And Psalms 139:16 “all the days ordained for me were written in your book before one of them came to be.”  She had always known her days were numbered and often talked about it.  She lived her life with that knowledge.

 

She was also intentional with me.  She knew her “for such a time as this” was my biggest fear and she knew she was leaving me behind.  The Sunday before she died, she asked me to join her in her bedroom.  I sat next to her and we had a conversation that people dream of having with their loved ones.  No word was left unsaid.  As we sat there several of my family members came in and she would dismiss them.  This was her time to be intentional with me.  She needed to say things that she knew I would hold on to for the remaining days of my life.  God in his wisdom - he did not allow me to realize during those 45 minutes that she was saying goodbye.  For me, it was just one of our normal conversations but for my mom, she was leaving nothing unsaid.  She was giving me her final wisdom, discernment and instructions and she did it with confidence and strength.  She didn’t cry.  She wasn’t sad.  She knew where she was going and she knew what she needed to do before she left.

So what do we learn from Esther?

Esther’s courage was not her beauty, or wisdom, or even her position. It was her faith in an unshakeable, unstoppable, unchangeable God.

Wherever you are in life know God has ordained you to be where you are at this very moment in your life for a reason. He has called you and ordained you to handle the circumstances you are in. He has a purpose and a plan. God knows every intimate detail of your life.  God knows and cares about every twist and turn and oh please, please hear me on this… He knows where you are and he knows where you will land.  Remember who you are just like Esther had to remember who she was.  Walk in his strength and wisdom. And, above all, learn to listen for the still, small voice of God. And when you hear it, obey. 

My prayer is that it “May it be well with your soul.  For God has called you and me “for such a time as this!”