Sometimes Hard Things Happen
A few years ago a series of books hit the best-seller list. The series was called The Hunger Games. They told the story of a post-apocalyptic earth when children from districts were chosen each year to fight to the death in “the hunger games.” These novels, along with millions of others, were available in electronic forms. And in 2014, the most highlighted passage in all electronic books came from The Hunger Games. Here’s the line that more readers underlined that year than any other line in any other electronic book:
“Because sometimes things happen to people and they’re not equipped to deal with them.” (The Hunger Games)
Something about that line scratched an itch for a lot of people. When readers hit that line, it so aligned with their experience, that reader after reader highlighted it.
Just think about it…hasn’t that happened to you? Haven’t hard things happened to you and you just weren’t equipped to deal with them? Sometimes it’s things that happen to us. Sometimes it’s things that happen around us. Sometimes hard things happen and we’re just not equipped to deal with them
This is what happens in Esther. Something hard happens and she’s not equipped to deal with it:
3:1 After these things King Ahasuerus promoted Haman the Agagite, the son of Hammedatha, and advanced him and set his throne above all the officials who were with him. 2 And all the king’s servants who were at the king’s gate bowed down and paid homage to Haman, for the king had so commanded concerning him. But Mordecai did not bow down or pay homage…5 And when Haman saw that Mordecai did not bow down or pay homage to him, Haman was filled with fury. 6 But he disdained to lay hands on Mordecai alone. So, as they had made known to him the people of Mordecai, Haman sought to destroy all the Jews, the people of Mordecai, throughout the whole kingdom of Ahasuerus. 7 In the first month, which is the month of Nisan, in the twelfth year of King Ahasuerus, they cast Pur (that is, they cast lots) before Haman day after day; and they cast it month after month till the twelfth month, which is the month of Adar. 8 Then Haman said to King Ahasuerus, “There is a certain people scattered abroad and dispersed among the peoples in all the provinces of your kingdom. Their laws are different from those of every other people, and they do not keep the king’s laws, so that it is not to the king’s profit to tolerate them. 9 If it please the king, let it be decreed that they be destroyed, and I will pay 10,000 talents of silver into the hands of those who have charge of the king’s business, that they may put it into the king’s treasuries.” 10 So the king took his signet ring from his hand and gave it to Haman the Agagite, the son of Hammedatha, the enemy of the Jews. 11 And the king said to Haman, “The money is given to you, the people also, to do with them as it seems good to you.” 12 Then the king’s scribes were summoned on the thirteenth day of the first month, and an edict, according to all that Haman commanded, was written to the king’s satraps and to the governors over all the provinces and to the officials of all the peoples, to every province in its own script and every people in its own language. It was written in the name of King Ahasuerus and sealed with the king’s signet ring. 13 Letters were sent by couriers to all the king’s provinces with instruction to destroy, to kill, and to annihilate all Jews, young and old, women and children, in one day, the thirteenth day of the twelfth month, which is the month of Adar, and to plunder their goods. 14 A copy of the document was to be issued as a decree in every province by proclamation to all the peoples to be ready for that day. 15 The couriers went out hurriedly by order of the king, and the decree was issued in Susa the citadel. And the king and Haman sat down to drink, but the city of Susa was thrown into confusion.
4:1 When Mordecai learned all that had been done, Mordecai tore his clothes and put on sackcloth and ashes, and went out into the midst of the city, and he cried out with a loud and bitter cry. 2 He went up to the entrance of the king’s gate, for no one was allowed to enter the king’s gate clothed in sackcloth. 3 And in every province, wherever the king’s command and his decree reached, there was great mourning among the Jews, with fasting and weeping and lamenting, and many of them lay in sackcloth and ashes. 4 When Esther’s young women and her eunuchs came and told her, the queen was deeply distressed. She sent garments to clothe Mordecai, so that he might take off his sackcloth, but he would not accept them. 5 Then Esther called for Hathach, one of the king’s eunuchs, who had been appointed to attend her, and ordered him to go to Mordecai to learn what this was and why it was. 6 Hathach went out to Mordecai in the open square of the city in front of the king’s gate, 7 and Mordecai told him all that had happened to him, and the exact sum of money that Haman had promised to pay into the king’s treasuries for the destruction of the Jews. 8 Mordecai also gave him a copy of the written decree issued in Susa for their destruction, that he might show it to Esther and explain it to her and command her to go to the king to beg his favor and plead with him on behalf of her people. 9 And Hathach went and told Esther what Mordecai had said.
(Esther 3:1-2,5-15; 4:1-9 ESV)
Mordecai, a Jew whose family was dragged to the kingdom of Persia, formerly the kingdom of Babylon, refuses to bow down before Haman, who is the right hand man of the king of Persia. Why? Ultimately it’s probably related to a long-standing racial or tribal conflict between the Jews and a group called the Amalekites. Haman is so filled with fury that he not only wants to destroy Mordecai. He wants to destroy all who are like him. Thus he approaches the king with a truth, a half-truth, and a lie.
- ? The truth is this: There is a certain people scattered abroad and dispersed among the peoples in all the provinces of your kingdom. The Jews were not the only ones exiled among the Persian kingdom. This is fact. But Haman probably means it insidiously–these people are everywhere!
- ? The half-truth is this: Their laws are different from those of every other people. This is true in that the Jews have religious laws that are different from Persian laws. However, the Jews do not live by those laws alone. When the two do not conflict, the Jews also live by the Persian laws.
- ? The lie is this: and they do not keep the king’s laws. It may be true to say that Mordecai does not keep the one command of the King’s regarding bowing before Haman. But it is a bold lie to say that Jews, in general, do not keep the king’s laws.
Still, the king buys it. Hook. Line. Sinker. As we will see next week, there’s one more critical piece to this sell job that persuades the king. But Haman gets his way. The king authorizes not just the death of Mordecai, but of all Jews in the entire Persian empire. (And, without realizing it, he authorizes the death of his queen, Esther).
To decide when the Jews will be exterminated, Haman doesn’t pull out a calendar. He pulls out the pur (purim for plural). These were clay cubes inscribed with characters or dots. Using the purim, the date for the massacre falls as on the thirteenth day of the twelfth month. But the decree is sent out immediately. The decree is sent out on the thirteenth day of the first month. The decree announcing the purge of all Jews from the Persian empire goes out on the eve of Passover.
Esther lived in a world where God seemed entirely absent. And in a world like that, sometimes hard things could happen that you were not equipped to deal with. And no one could have ever been equipped to deal with this.
What happened here was basically the undoing of Passover. Passover was the central moment in Jewish and biblical history. It was that moment that defined a people, a God, and the storyline of Scripture. And now, here was Haman in a position to undo Passover. Just as God once rescued his people from the hands of an oppressive foreign leader, so now an oppressive foreign leader would now utterly destroy God’s people. And the announcement of this was made on the eve of Passover. And as person after person learned about it, they felt so unequipped, so scared, they lamented, cried aloud, wore sackcloth and ashes, tore their clothes, fasted and wept.
Sometimes hard things happen to people in a world where God hides, even the reversal of Passover. Esther’s story is a painfully honest story. It’s not a health and wealth story, promising that if you follow God, every check up at the docs will be A-OK and every visit to the bank will reveal high dividends. Esther’s story is realistic. It says that in this world where God seems to always be lurking behind the scenes, tough stuff happens. Sometimes so tough it seems to be unraveling the very work of God itself.
- ? Memphis is on pace for 233 homicides this year, 20 more than the record of 213 set in 1993.
- ? Linda Egle from Eternal Threads was recently with us. She shared that there are more slaves in the world today than at any other time in history. Every year 12,000 young Nepalese women and girls are trafficked across the Nepal/India border into Indian brothels and countries beyond.
- ? A few months ago Stan Granberg from Kairos, a church planting ministry, was here. He shared that in Churches of Christ, about 75 churches close their doors for good every year.
Of course a list like this could go on an on. Living in a world where God is often working behind the scenes, sometimes hard things happen to people. Big things. Huge things. Scary things. Things no one is equipped to deal with. Things that seem like the unraveling of Passover itself.
To Engage or Not Engage
And in a world like that, we have to make a decision: to engage or not engage:
10 Then Esther spoke to Hathach and commanded him to go to Mordecai and say, 11 “All the king’s servants and the people of the king’s provinces know that if any man or woman goes to the king inside the inner court without being called, there is but one law—to be put to death, except the one to whom the king holds out the golden scepter so that he may live. But as for me, I have not been called to come in to the king these thirty days.” 12 And they told Mordecai what Esther had said. 13 Then Mordecai told them to reply to Esther, “Do not think to yourself that in the king’s palace you will escape any more than all the other Jews. 14 For if you keep silent at this time, relief and deliverance will rise for the Jews from another place, but you and your father’s house will perish. (Esther 4:10-14a ESV)
Esther’s first response is probably the response most of us feel like making in a world where God seems to be hiding. It’s the response of making excuses. Good excuses. It’s the response of not engaging. In a world where God hides and hard things happen, the great temptation is to disengage. Esther immediately protests that there’s nothing she can do because the king has shown no interest in her recently and no one, not even her, can approach the king without being called. To do so is a crime punishable by death.
Esther’s excuse has truth behind it. But, as Mordecai points out, it is ultimately just an excuse. Even if she locks herself up behind the walls of the palace she will not remain untouched by the pain and suffering about to be unleashed in the world around her–a powerful word to all of God’s people today. If we try to lock ourselves up in the walls of this church or the walls of our homes, we will not remain untouched by the pain of the hard things going on in the world around us.
Charles Taylor writes about the world we live in, a world, which he argues, is much like Esther’s. He calls it a secular world. By secular he means a world in which God seems distant. And in a world where God seems distant, he argues most of us tend to respond to the world around us by also becoming distant. Though we are deeply touched and frightened by what we see happening in the world around us, we ultimately disengage from the world because we feel like that’s what God has done. God’s disengaged from this mess. He’s gone into hiding. So we do as well. That disengagement can take many forms. Sometimes it starts with excuses. Good excuses. Like Esther’s.
God’s Engagement
That’s why Mordecai wants Esther and us to know that in a world in which God seems hidden God is far more intimately involved that we could have ever imagined:
“And who knows whether you have not come to the kingdom for such a time as this?” (Esther 4:14b ESV)
Up to this point in the story we might have thrown away everything as worthless, as godless. But this line from Mordecai makes us pick up every detail in the story and reexamine it. Because this one line means that everything in the story has happened with divine purpose. Without ever using the word “God,” Mordecai essentially tells Esther and us that though it’s hard to see in the moment, God is deeply and intimately involved in the world. He’s the one who’s orchestrated Ether’s rise to the throne. He’s placed her here so that she can now act and save her people from this horrendous death.
In a world in which God seems hidden God is far more intimately involved than we could have ever imagined. Mordecai is saying this: God used the king’s ambition for world domination which led him to banish Vashti after she wouldn’t support the cause; God used the debase roundup of young virgins, which included Esther; God used the year-long beauty contest and the one-night bedroom contest; God redeemed all of these and used it for his purposes to place Esther on the throne for this exact purpose–to save his people from Haman. Just when Esther was tempted to disengage from the world, Mordecai wanted her to know God was fully engaged in the world.
Stan Granberg was with a small group of staff and elders last Sunday. He told of one of the church plants he helped start in the northeast. They met a non Christian woman we’ll call Susan. When Stan first met Susan she said to Stan, “I don’t see God anywhere.” As far as she could tell God was completely uninvolved in her life and in her world. But just a few weeks ago Stan was visiting that church plant. Susan was there. She’s now a Christian. During the worship service her hands were lifted in praise. And she said to Stan, “I see God everywhere now!” She now saw God at work everywhere in her life and in her world.
Our Engagement
And once Esther got this, and she got it surprisingly fast, something else followed. Once we know God is intimately involved in the world, we are called to become intimately involved as well–no matter the cost. Esther realizes that because this God, who once seemed so hidden, is truly engaged in the world, she must also engage in the world. Even if it costs her life:
Then I will go to the king, though it is against the law, and if I perish, I perish.” 17 Mordecai then went away and did everything as Esther had ordered him. (Esther 4:16b-17 ESV)
When Esther seemed to believe God was disengaged, she too was disengaged. But once Mordecai persuaded her that God was deeply engaged in the world around her, she too became engaged. Even at the cost of her own life. So must we.
Leo Tolstoy’s parable Two Old Men tells the tale of two men, Efim and Elisha, who decide that before they die they must make a pilgrimage to Jerusalem. Their life-long dream has been to travel to Jerusalem. So one day they leave together. But on the way they come to a village filled with sick people. Efim wants to press on to Jerusalem. Elisha wants to stay. Efim leaves. Elisha stays and nurses the entire village back to health. He depletes his resources, has nothing left to fund the rest of his journey to Jerusalem, and thus return home. Efim makes it to Jerusalem, sees all the holy sites, does all the holy things, and returns home. The end.
Tolstoy may have several points to make with this parable. One is this: It’s easy to get distracted by all kinds of good excuses from the one thing we’ve been called to do–engage the world world around us. But it’s costly. If we nurse that village back to health we may never see Jerusalem. But in the end that’s what we’ve been placed here to do. Engage the world. But here’s the point of Esther: once we understand just how involved God truly is in the world we too will want to become involved in the world. And if we perish, we perish.
Here’s what this part of Esther is calling us to ask: Believing God is intimately involved in the world, how is God calling you to get involved?
