SPIRITUAL
DIARY FOR 9/22/2011 8:09:07 AM
My Worship Time Focus: PT-1 “The Choice of Ester”
Bible Reading
& Meditation Reference: Ester 2:5-7
Message
of the verses: “5 Now there was at the citadel in Susa a Jew whose name was Mordecai,
the son of Jair, the son of Shimei, the son of Kish, a Benjamite, 6 who had
been taken into exile from Jerusalem with the captives who had been exiled with
Jeconiah king of Judah, whom Nebuchadnezzar the king of Babylon had exiled. 7
He was bringing up Hadassah, that is Esther, his uncle’s daughter, for she had
no father or mother. Now the young lady was beautiful of form and face, and
when her father and her mother died, Mordecai took her as his own daughter.”
Today’s SD begins the second
evidence of the hand of God working in the affairs of the people as we are
introduced to two of the main characters in this drama, Mordecai and Hadassah
(who is Ester). There are three sub-points
under this second main point and today’s SD will deal with the first
sub-point.
Mordecai was from the tribe of
Benjamin the same tribe that King Saul came from, and it was Saul who was given
a task from the Lord to kill all of those who were Amalek. These were the people who attacked the
children of Israel when they were traveling through the wilderness and Joshua
fought against them at that time. Moses
had to go up on the hill top and hold his hands up in order to ensure the
victory for the children of Israel. The
tribe of Amalek began with the grand-son of Esau who was the brother of Jacob,
so the history of Israel and the people of Amalek goes back a long way and it
was not a good relationship from the beginning.
Haman who will be introduced as the third main character in this drama
is from that people of Amalek and so this bad blood between the children of
Israel and Amalek will continue. The
ironic thing is that if Saul who was from the tribe of Benjamin would have
followed his instructions from the Lord then this dram would have never taken
place for Haman would not have been born.
As mentioned Mordecai was from the
tribe of Benjamin and his ancestor, Kish was deported from Israel to Babylon in
the second deporting that took place in 597 BC.
In 539 after the Persians took over Babylon and Cyrus offered to the
Jews a chance to go back to Jerusalem, but Mordecai did not go. He was raising his cousin Ester (her Persian
name) and worked for the government of Persia.
Hadassah means “myrtle” and Ester means star. The myrtle tree produces flowers that look
like a star. It was because of her
beauty that she would be taken into the king’s harem. An English proverb says “Beauty may have fair
leaves, yet bitter fruit,” and it could be that there were many beautiful women
in the kingdom of Persia at that time who were exercising the truth of that
proverb.
It is key to remember is the fact
that these two key players who were Jews did not reveal that they were Jews at
the beginning of this story. Mordecai reveals
it first and then Ester when it becomes important for the king to know it. In
keeping this truth away from the Persians could present itself as a problem to
some, yet no one had asked them if they were Jews and so they did not lie about
it. Dr. Wiersbe quotes Matthew Henry to help explain this “All truths are not to be spoken
at all times, though an untruth is not to be spoken at any time.”
Dr. Wiersbe brings up another point
here and that is that it seems that either Ester or Mordecia were living a
kosher life and this would mean that they were breaking that law. He asks “Why would God overlook the
unfaithfulness of Mordecia and Ester and
still use them to accomplish His purposes?
There are other problems that come
up and that is that Ester was chosen by the king to go into his harem and this
surely was against the law along with being married to a non Jew. I think back to the story of Ruth who was
from Moab and yet married Boaz who was a Jew and we find Ruth in the bloodline
of Christ along with another Gentile woman who was a prostitute, Rahab. Paul writes that the grace of God is more
powerful than sin and in the case of these three ladies we can surely see that
the grace of God is seen in a mighty way.
When you read the books of Ezra and
Nehemiah you find that there was trouble when the Jews were marrying gentiles
and they were disciplined for that, but in the cases of these three women the
situation is different for there was purpose in their marriages. Again we need to look at the grace of
God.
In his introduction to the book of
Ester John MacArthur writes about these issues.
“The following observations help to shed some light on these
issues. First, this short book does not
record everything. Perhaps Mordecai and
Ester actually possessed a deeper faith than becomes apparent here (cf.
4:16). Second, even godly Nehemiah did
not mention his God when talking to King Artaxerxes (Ne. 2:1-8). Third, the Jewish festivals which provided
structure for worship had been lost long before Ester, e.g., Passover (2Ki.
23:22) and Booths (Ne. 8:17). Fourth,
possibly the anti-Jewish letter written by the Samaritans to Ahasuerus several
years earlier had frightened them (ca. 486 B. C.; Ezr. 4:6). Fifth, the evil intentions of Haman did not
just first surface when Mordecai refused to bow down (3:12). Most likely they were long before shared by
others which would have intimidated the Jewish population. Sixth, Ester did identify with her Jewish
heritage at the most appropriate time (7:3, 4).
And yet, the nagging question of why Ester and Mordecai did not seem to
have the same kind of open devotion to God as did Daniel remains. Further, Nehemiah’s prayer (Ne. 1:5-11, esp.
v. 7) seems to indicate a spiritual lethargy among the Jewish exiles in Susa. So this issue must ultimately be resolved by
God since He alone knows human hearts.” I think that that is the best place to leave
it. Paul writes that all have sinned and
fallen short of the glory of God and so again we must look at the grace of God,
for without the grace of God all would have to deal with the judgment of
God. I for one am thankful for the
courage of both Mordecai and Ester for without their courage the entire Jewish
race may have been wiped out and then how would the Savior been born??
Spiritual
meaning for my life today: The quote
from Matthew Henry seems to have hit home with me as I did the SD. I suppose that there are times when I do not
follow that quote and it gets me into trouble that could be avoided. I surely make it a practice never to lie and
as I look at Ester she was not lying when she did not divulge that she was a
Jew. This is the kind of thing I am
talking about.
My Steps of
Faith for Today:
1.
Continue to
word on a better prayer life.
2.
Continue to learn to be content.
9/22/2011 9:28:10 AM
No comments:
Post a Comment