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■ Pray together: Give thanks for your experiences, ask God for help where you need it.
■ Pray together to learn new things about God and that your relationship with God deepens and gets stronger.
473 BC: The highest officer in the Persian kingdom, Haman, has ordered that all Jews be killed. King Xerxes ruled over a kingdom that reached all the way from Ethiopia to India. Xerxes tried to cover up the signs of gradual decay of his kingdom with debaucherous parties. Everyone should be overwhelmed by his might and splendor. Ester was a Jew, believed in the God of Israel and was raised by her cousin Mordechai. Ester didn‘t have a special gift as a prophet does, but she was beautiful and made it into the anteroom of royal might as a wife. But even as a wife, she was subject to Xerxes‘ might and arbitrariness.
Esther 3:12-4:17
12Then on the thirteenth day of the first month the royal secretaries were summoned. They wrote out in the script of each province and in the language of each people all Haman’s orders to the king’s satraps, the governors of the various provinces and the nobles of the various peoples. These were written in the name of King Xerxes himself and sealed with his own ring.13Dispatches were sent by couriers to all the king’s provinces with the order to destroy, kill and annihilate all the Jews—young and old, women and children—on a single day, the thirteenth day of the twelfth month, the month of Adar, and to plunder their goods.14A copy of the text of the edict was to be issued as law in every province and made known to the people of every nationality so they would be ready for that day.15The couriers went out, spurred on by the king’s command, and the edict was issued in the citadel of Susa. The king and Haman sat down to drink, but the city of Susa was bewildered.
14:1 When Mordecai learned of all that had been done, he tore his clothes, put on sackcloth and ashes, and went out into the city, wailing loudly and bitterly. 2 But he went only as far as the king’s gate, because no one clothed in sackcloth was allowed to enter it. 3 In every province to which the edict and order of the king came, there was great mourning among the Jews, with fasting, weeping and wailing. Many lay in sackcloth and ashes.
4When Esther’s eunuchs and female attendants came and told her about Mordecai, she was in great distress. She sent clothes for him to put on instead of his sackcloth, but he would not accept them.5Then Esther summoned Hathak, one of the king’s eunuchs assigned to attend her, and ordered him to find out what was troubling Mordecai and why.
6So Hathak went out to Mordecai in the open square of the city in front of the king’s gate. 7 Mordecai told him everything that had happened to him, including the exact amount of money Haman had promised to pay into the royal treasury for the destruction of the Jews.8He also gave him a copy of the text of the edict for their annihilation, which had been published in Susa, to show to Esther and explain it to her, and he told him to instruct her to go into the king’s presence to beg for mercy and plead with him for her people.
9Hathak went back and reported to Esther what Mordecai had said.10Then she instructed him to say to Mordecai,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.”
12When Esther’s words were reported to Mordecai,13he sent back this answer: “Do not think that because you are in the king’s house you alone of all the Jews will escape.14For 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?”
15Then Esther sent this reply to Mordecai: 16 “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.”
17So Mordecai went away and carried out all of Esther’s instructions.
■ God decided to use this young woman to save many people, God loves to use people nobody was counting on. Can he count on you? You can pray as follows: ”Father, I acknowledge it is no coincidence that I’m not studying in this time and place and that you gave me the relationships and gifts I have. Please open my eyes so I can see what You want from me. Here I am, use me for Your Kingdom (Isaiah 6:8).
Following Jesus means on the one hand, to dedicate yourself completely to Jesus and to surrender all your own plans and personal rights (for time, plans, money, and so on).
At the same time, we can do this fully through God’s grace. And this means, that you can always call on Him for His protection, provision and promises ( “ I am with you and will lead you”).
Again and again throughout history, there are people who were called to make utmost radical decisions. Dietrich Bonhoeffer was one of these people. As a messenger for the resistance to Hitler during World War II, he travelled to Norway, Sweden and Switzerland, risking his life. Eventually, he was killed.
“Inactive waiting and dully looking on are not Christian responses”, he wrote. As a Christian, he regarded himself obliged to support the resistance against a dictator. To finish the war quickly and to save hundreds of thousands of lives was more important to him than surviving himself.
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