Esther
I recently read the book of Esther in my daily reading. I have read her story several times and was once again struck by her courage and bravery in a difficult situation.
If you don’t know the story it is the story of the preservation of the Persian Jews from annihilation and Esther is the means by which God preserves them. After King Xerxes bans his Queen because she refuses to appear before him at a party, he orders all of the beautiful girls to be presented to him so he can find a new Queen. Esther is taken from her cousin, Mordecai, (who took her as a daughter after her parents were killed) and put into the king’s harem. Eventually Xerxes chooses her to be his wife and the Queen.
Through a series of events involving Mordecai, the king commands that all Jews be killed on a certain day. Mordecai goes to Esther and asks that she speak to the king to save the Jews.
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. And who knows whether you have not come to the kingdom for such a time as this?” 15 Then Esther told them to reply to Mordecai, 16 “Go, gather all the Jews to be found in Susa, and hold a fast on my behalf, and do not eat or drink for three days, night or day. I and my young women will also fast as you do. Then I will go to the king, though it is against the law, and if I perish, I perish.”
The passage above is such an amazing account to me. She knew there was a great possibility she would die if she spoke to the king and she even admits that, but she chooses to do it anyway. God mightily uses her courage and strength of character to accomplish His will and to save the Jews, her people.
