This entry was posted in Passion and tagged ohara, passion, RCL1213, wk19 by Grace Lee. Although I can’t make the confession that is 100% similar to Esther’s, I hope that my trust and commitment to the Lord will grow day by day. The book of Esther poses a fascinating question to us: In such morally, culturally, spiritually ambiguous situations as this, does God still work with us We’ll see how God works in this passage under three headings: 1) The importance of being in the palace 2) The danger of being in the palace and 3) How to live in. I guess this is how selfish and foolish we can be after having received incomparable blessings from God. Honestly, I am not sure if I would be able to give up my reputation, academics, health, family, and friends to fulfill God’s plan. It asks me if I would be able to sacrifice my position or possessions for the sake of God’s will. Esther’s faith and confession deeply challenges my own faith and Christian life. She believed that her God will answer her and her people’s prayers and from this came the courage she had. Because Esther realized God’s plan, she was able to take the risk in prayer. She knew that the reason God made her the queen as a wife of King Xerxes was to save His people through her position. Instead, Esther stood before the King to spare the lives of all the Jews, risking her own life. She could have saved her life by keeping her Jewish identity a secret. When I first heard this story in the Bible, I did not understand how Esther was able to risk her life for her people. Upon realizing Haman’s evil schemes and Esther’s secret, the King made a decree to kill Haman and save the Jews. After inviting the King to dinner, Esther was finally able to reveal herself as a Jew and request for his grace upon the Jews. She confessed, “If I perish, I perish.” When she went to the King risking her life, the King was surprisingly happy and delighted to see his beautiful wife. However, Esther was not afraid and was determined to go before the King to save her people. They could be put to death for seeing the king without invitation. During the time, it was dangerous and prohibited for the king’s wives to visit the king before his calling. He asked her to stand before the King on behalf of the Jews to rescue them from being unjustly killed. With only a few days before the punishment of the Jews, a leader of the Jews, Mordecai, visited his niece, Queen Esther, to encourage her. Due to a malicious scheme of an official named Haman, all of the Jews were to be annihilated soon for not bowing down before the King. At the time, the Jews had lost their land of Israel and were exiled to Babylon. Queen Esther was a Jew married to King Xerxes of Babylon. And if I perish, I perish.’ ” Esther 4: 15-16. When this is done, I will go to the king, even though it is against the law. Do not eat or drink for three days, night or day. If I suffer in obedience to Him, I am blessed.ġ Peter 3:14: “But even if you should suffer for what is right, you are blessed.“Then Esther sent this reply to Mordecai: ‘Go, gather together all the Jews who are in Susa, and fast for me. If they call me intolerant, they call me intolerant. If my heart gets broken, my heart gets broken. Let’s have the obedient attitude of Esther, knowing that to please and obey God is more important than trying to avoid discomfort in this world. We may not be called upon to suffer the extreme consequence of death in obedience to the Lord, but there are many other “sufferings” we attempt to avoid, which results in our disobedience. 1 Peter 3:17: “It is better, if it is God’s will, to suffer for doing good than for doing evil.” God doesn’t take pleasure in our suffering, but He tells us that we will suffer. How often do we disobey God, giving the excuse that the result would be more than we could handle? Or that He wouldn’t mind our disobedience because He wouldn’t really want us to face the possible outcome? But disobedience is disobedience. Ultimately, she chose to be obedient to God, regardless of the possible result. Are you familiar with this line from Scripture? It was said by Queen Esther (Esther 4:16) when she determined to approach her husband, the king, to plead for the deliverance of the Jews––even though she knew that to approach the king without being summoned meant almost certain death.
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