Esther 10:1-3 – “It Matters”

Here’s my fairly literal translation of these verses:

¹And the king Xerxes set a tax upon the land and the islands of the sea, ²and the all of the doings of his authority and his might and the declaration of the greatness of Mordecai whom the king had caused to grow, the not of them ones written upon the book of the matters of the days of the kings of Media and Persia, ³because Mordecai the Jew [was] second to King Xerxes and great to the Jews and one pleased to the many of his brothers, one seeking good to his people and speaking peace to the all of his descendants.

I’d like to record a thought which grows out of the timeline in this story. As I lamented in the last post, ancient records are notoriously undependable and seemingly always subject to debate, but from everything I have read, I see no reason to doubt that the Ahaseurus of this book is the Xerxes who reigned from 486-465 BC. I find Dr. John Whitcomb’s calculation of dates to be at least plausible, so I am willing to assume the following to be worthy of consideration:

Again, this Xerxes reigned 486–465 BC. In the third year of his reign (483 BC), he repudiated Vashti: chap. 1. In the seventh year (479 BC), he married Esther (2:16), so it would have been 478 BC when Esther was taken into the harem and started the one-year beauty treatment program. It was then in the twelfth year (474 BC) (3:7), Haman issued his evil decree, was hanged, and Mordecai issued his.  Whitcomb says the 3:7,12, “the 13^th day of the first month (Nisan), in the twelfth year of Xerxes” would have been April 17, 474 BC and the second decree from 8:9, the “the 23^rd day of the third month, Sivan,” would be June 25, 474 BC, or two months and ten days later. This would also have been the date when Haman was hanged and Mordecai elevated to Prime Minister. The decree was to be carried out on “the 13^th day of the 12^th month, Adar,” so it would have been March 7, 473 BC.

To summarize:

486 BC – Xerxes begins reign

483 BC – Vashti deposed

478 BC – Esther taken into harem

479 BC – Esther becomes queen

April 17, 474 BC – Haman’s evil decree issued

June 25, 474 BC – Esther pleads, Haman hanged, Mordecai

                elevated

March 7,8, 473 BC – Days of Purim

465 BC – Xerxes’ reign ends

What particularly strikes me about this timeline is, in reality, how short it is. That is the point I wish to ponder. When I read the book of Esther and particularly when I read this last chapter about Mordecai’s greatness in the palace and the good job he did, I am left with that feeling of “and so they all lived happily ever after.” I feel a sense that all of this took place over a very long period of time.

Yet Xerxes himself only reigned 21 years total. Before his death, Esther would have been his queen for only 13 years, and Mordecai his prime minister for only 9 years. The world has lost any records of what happened to Esther and Mordecai when the next king took over. If Esther was 16 when Xerxes married her, she would have been only 30 years old at his death. Being exceptionally beautiful, one could only assume the new king pulled her into his harem, but it would be very doubtful that he would retain her in the office of queen. Usually, when the king goes down, all his closest advisors go down with him, so it is unlikely that Mordecai would have continued as prime minister (although not impossible, as we saw with Daniel). One also wonders how the Jewish people fared without Mordecai’s influence.

So much we don’t know, yet I note how surprisingly short this entire timeline is.

But, then again, is that not the reality we all live in?

What is our life? Is it not a vapor that appears for a little while, then vanishes away?

The plain, simple fact is that, just like Esther and Mordecai, our opportunity to do good in this world is at best very brief. In a world without God, one would even wonder what’s the point of it all? Mordecai had 9 years to do good for the Jewish people. Even if, like Daniel, he survived the change of royalty and perhaps served for 40 years, still, that would seem a drop in the bucket of human history. No matter how long he served, he had no control whatsoever over those who would follow him and how they would treat his Jewish people. In spite of Mordecai’s sacrifices and good work, there was still, in the future of the Jewish people, a Holocaust to be suffered.

Again, I would ask, in a world without God, what’s the point? How easy it would have been for Esther and Mordecai to say, “Hey. We made it to the top. We have all the wealth and luxury to live ourselves in a dream world. Why should we risk any of that, so we can do good for a very short time to a bunch of people we don’t even know? Forget it! If it’s all for a very brief time, we’re going to make sure we grab all the pleasure we can!”

Can I suggest that, if you choose to live in a world without God, you really have no reason to do anything but look out for yourself? I will even go so far as to say, you’re a fool if you waste your life, if you sacrifice your own pleasure and happiness, to do good to a bunch of other people who will be here today and gone tomorrow.

That is…in a world without God.

Enter the Lord. Enter the truth that all of this does matter, that it is all a part of a grand and glorious plan, that, though like Esther and Mordecai, my opportunity may be brief, yet what I do or don’t do is recorded and remembered. What if the people around me aren’t just overgrown amoebas careening along in some arbitrary evolutionary accident? What if each of them is, like me, an eternal soul, created by and loved by the God who is running this universe and guiding it along in a very deliberate and good plan?

What if I can live with the words ringing in my head, “And whatever you do, do it with your whole heart, as working for the Lord, not for men, since you know that you will receive an inheritance from the Lord as a reward. It is the Lord Christ you are serving” (Col. 3:23,24)? What if I hear Him say, “Do not forget to do good and to share with others, for with such sacrifices God is pleased” (Heb. 13:16)? What if my Hero and example in life is Jesus who “laid down His life for His friends”?

Ah, can anyone see that, though brief, what Esther and Mordecai did, the risks they took, the personal sacrifices they made, all the good they did was in fact very important—in fact, eternally important, and that precisely because this is NOT a world without God. Our God is quite real, quite present, and that very acknowledgment on our part is precisely what makes my life and yours worth living! I can and should do all I can to bless the people around me precisely because there is a God and He cares!

He loves people and I should too. He wants to do them good and so should I. This is my chance. Even if it’s short, that’s okay, because they matter. The period of time covered by the book of Esther is barely a blip in the course of human history, yet what they did mattered.

In this world with God, we never need ask, “What’s the point?” He makes our world matter.

Esther 10:1-3 – “The Books”

Here’s my fairly literal translation of these verses:

¹And the king Xerxes set a tax upon the land and the islands of the sea, ²and the all of the doings of his authority and his might and the declaration of the greatness of Mordecai whom the king had caused to grow, the not of them ones written upon the book of the matters of the days of the kings of Media and Persia, ³because Mordecai the Jew [was] second to King Xerxes and great to the Jews and one pleased to the many of his brothers, one seeking good to his people and speaking peace to the all of his descendants.

Here we have again an illustration of Jesus’ truth, “For everyone who exalts himself will be humbled, and the one who humbles himself will be exalted” (Luke 14:11) and Prov. 29:23: “A man's pride will bring him low, but a humble spirit will obtain honor.” The “star” of our show from the beginning has been our beautiful Esther. The man Mordecai has only had what might be called a “supporting role.” Yet, who gets honored in the last three verses of the book? Mordecai. And how did this man Mordecai arrive at such honor? Is it not simply by looking after the interests of others? He’s the man who took little Esther into his home. He’s the man who risked his life to save the king. Isn’t it interesting the last words of the whole book are, “because he worked for the good of his people and spoke up for the welfare of all the Jews.” I wish the whole world could look and see that, in a sense, Mordecai never changed. He was a good man doing good and he always was. And as the Proverb says, “One man gives and receives only more.”

Commentators notice the opening words, “And the king Xerxes set a tax upon the land and the islands of the sea....” They ponder the question of “What does that have to do with anything?” Good question, actually. I would suggest the statement, that a certain king imposed a tax over his entire kingdom (and add in a few islands to boot!), was an ancient way of simply emphasizing his greatness. No one wants to pay taxes. A king must have the kingdom firmly in his grasp to be able to exact taxes from literally every corner of that kingdom. And then what is the point of that, but to emphasize Mordecai’s greatness? First, the ancient writer noted just how powerful this king was, then he would have us know Mordecai was second to such a great king. The point, I think is simply to emphasize Mordecai’s greatness.

Also notice in v.2 where the writer observes all the greatness of Xerxes and of Mordecai, then says “Are they not written in the book of the annals of the kings of Media and Persia?” And where are those annals today? Largely lost. Buried in the sand somewhere. So, there was a time when, if you wanted to know about Mordecai’s greatness, you could go read about it in these annals of the kings of Media and Persia…or you could read about him in an obscure little scroll called the book of Esther.

Which one survived? Isn’t it interesting how the Bible has survived literally millennia, while all the “annals” of all the “great” men of this world have largely turned back to dust? As Jesus said, “Heaven and earth will pass away, but My words will never pass away” (Matt. 24:35). Isaiah said, “The Word of our God shall stand forever” (40:8). People have mocked at the account of Esther and insisted, “We find no record of Mordecai in the ancient writings!” Of course, what they don’t tell you is that, at best, all they can find is a few obscure remnants of those writings.

The plain, simple fact is that our Bible is the most reliable and enduring record of the events even of this “great” king named Xerxes, not to mention Mordecai and Esther. People foolishly act and write like the “ancient” records are some kind of exhaustive and infallible record of history. Yeah, and the sky is green too. Sorry, but I’ll base my life on the Rock of God’s Word. Ancient writings, even intact, are at best only someone’s interpretation of history, while at worst, they are the manipulated propaganda of kings and courtesans who never hesitated to re-write history when it suited their ends (just like they do today). The only source of absolute truth in our world is our Bible. The Bible is true truth.

Then we should mention there are “books” being written far more important than any king’s “annals.” We read in Rev. 20:12, “And I saw the dead, great and small, standing before the Throne, and the books were opened…The dead were judged according to what they had done as recorded in the books.” Kings and everyone else should know that, in fact, their history is being recorded. However, this history is based on the facts and will not submit to re-writing and manipulation. It is and will be the truth of all they really did, all they really said, all what were really their motives. Those are the books that ought to concern the human race. Fortunately for all of us, there is one other book, called “the Lamb’s Book of Life.” Oh yes, there will be an accurate record of my life, but my eternity won’t be based on what I did or didn’t do (which, if we’re honest, is a scary thought!). What matters is whether my name is written in that Book of Life and for that, we have Jesus to thank that we are invited freely to join that happy throng. Smart people figure out which “books” they ought to be most concerned about!

Isn’t it interesting too that this book of Esther ends with the recognition of Mordecai that “he worked for the good of his people and spoke up for the welfare of the Jews”? Now there’s a record the whole world should read. How the entire world would be transformed overnight if only its leaders read those few simple words and took them to heart! Jesus Himself came “not to be served, but to serve, and to give His life a ransom for many.” Our world would throw away the Bible, yet its truth—even one simple verse—would change it all for the better. It’s too bad it has to be that way. “Blessed is the nation whose God is the Lord!”

Once again, we are left with the realization we cannot change this world, but then we can change us. Whether we’re kings or just parents, CEO’s or principals or just in charge of the office football pool, may we all be determined ourselves to be like Mordecai and Esther—to be people like Jesus, who live and do whatever they do sincerely trying to be a blessing to the people around us.

Esther 9:24-32 – “Our Heroes”

Here’s my fairly literal translation of these verses:

²⁴because Haman the son of Hamedatha the Agagite, one being hostile to the all of the Jews, had plotted upon the Jews to destroy them and cast [the] pur, it being the lot, to disarray them and to destroy them, ²⁵and in her coming in to the faces of the king, he said with the letter, “Let return his wicked plot which he plotted upon the Jews upon his head,” and they hung him and his sons upon the tree. ²⁶Therefore, they called the days the these “Purim” upon the name of the pur. Therefore, upon the all of the words of the letter the this and what they saw upon thus and what had reached to them, ²⁷the Jews confirmed and took upon themselves and upon their descendants and upon the all of the ones joining themselves to them, and not they failed to be ones doing the two of the days the these according to their writing and according to their set times in all of a year and a year, ²⁸and the days the these ones being remembered and ones being done in all of a generation from a family and a family, a province and a province and a city and a city, and the days of the Purim the these not they should fail from among the Jews, and this memory not it should cease from their descendants, ²⁹and Esther the queen, the daughter of Abihail wrote (and Mordecai the Jew) with all authority to confirm the letter of the Purim the this the second, ³⁰and he sent letters to all the Jews, to the seven and twenty and one hundred provinces of the kingdom of Xerxes, words of peace and truth, ³¹to confirm the days of the Purim the these in their set times according as Mordecai the Jew (and Esther the queen) confirmed them and according as they had confirmed upon themselves and upon their descendants the matters of the fastings and their crying out, ³²and the decree of Esther confirmed the matters of the Purim the these to be one written in the book.

As usual there is a lot to ponder in this passage. Esther and Mordecai put in an enormous effort to establish this Feast of Purim as a perpetual annual celebration for the Jewish people. That in itself calls for some serious pondering. As I mentioned in the last post, we are forgetful people. It is the better part of wisdom to give ourselves reminders of the good things the Lord has done for us. As David exhorted himself, “Bless the Lord, O my soul, and forget not all His benefits” (Ps. 103:2). Perhaps, like Davaid, we all need to pause, take our souls by the scruff of the neck, and tell them, “See here now! Don’t you be forgetting God’s goodness to you!”

As I mentioned last time, that is the basis of the very Lord’s Supper itself. “Do this in remembrance of Me.” I’ve been so blessed to have seen this here in the book of Esther. I have to confess, pretty much my entire life, I was never particularly fond of church communion. It’s always seemed to me like it was just an afterthought tacked on the end of a service now and then, like an OT ritual almost out of place in this NT dispensation. I knew Jesus died for me and was very thankful. In fact, I think about that often. It just seemed like I didn’t need the ritual of “Communion,” and, in a sense, I didn’t see the point.

Now I do. It is true—we are forgetful people! What we’re seeing is that Esther and Mordecai were a whole lot wiser than me. I’ll even go so far as to say they were more godly than me, or should I say, more God-like?  Literally, they are being like God. The Lord Himself set up the Passover as a perpetual reminder of the great deliverance from Egypt. Jesus set up the Lord’s Supper to remind us of our salvation. And Esther and Mordecai went to considerable effort to establish this Feast of Purim to forever hep the Jewish people remember their deliverance from Haman’s evil.

Now I see that it is a very good thing when those in leadership set up holidays and celebrations to help us all remember “good” days. I got to church last week, and what should it be but a Communion Sunday! For the first time in my life, I found I really could enjoy it. “This is a good thing,” I could tell myself and I was able to just let it “do its thing” and remind me of Jesus and the Cross! Esther and Mordecai would have never guessed all their hard work would bless a guy living 2,500 years later and halfway around the world!

Now I’d like to camp for a minute on this forgetfulness problem. I think the Lord is showing me something profound here. The admonition stands: “Bless the Lord, O my soul, and forget not all His benefits.” I note again that my soul needs to be told not to forget the Lord’s blessings. Apparently, if I don’t make the effort, that is exactly what I will do. And actually I’m quite aware it is true. Every time I get fearful or worrisome, that is exactly what I’m doing—forgetting all the times the Lord has blessed me in the past. Just in the last couple of years, it has helped me immensely to remind myself of Ruth and of Shadrach, Meshach, and Abednego, and make myself believe the same Lord who blessed them blesses me, that I have nothing to fear, that I can actually run into my future precisely because I’m remembering the Lord’s goodness!

However, as I consider all of that, I’m somewhat surprised to realize that my “rememberer” actually works quite well in other ways. I’ve lamented before that I have this brain that seems to constantly rehearse for me all of the stupid things I’ve done and said my whole life. It’s like an endlessly looping video that just plays over and over and over, reaching all the way back to the very earliest memories of my childhood, calling to mind all of my stupidity and failures, all my regrets. I’ve lamented before that I can’t shut it off. The other day, as it played back some failure, I thought, “I should instead try to recall some goodness of the Lord.” What surprised me was a feeling of almost demonic resistance. My mind was strangely blank. Hmmmmmm. Here I am swimming in an ocean of blessing, but at that moment it was as if I couldn’t think of anything to be thankful for!

I wonder if I haven’t discovered one of those “strongholds” in my mind, one of those “high things” that “exalts itself against the knowledge of God,” if this isn’t one of those places where I need to “bring every thought into the obedience of Christ” (II Cor. 10:4,5). It is of course true that, as long as my mind is filled with all my failures, there is no room to fill it with God’s goodness. That almost demonic resistance I felt tells me I’ve struck a nerve. Hmmmmm. I’m going to try very hard to do a “Mordecai and Esther” to my soul and make it deliberately recall God’s goodness. Maybe I can make some progress getting that video to shut off!

Then I want to note again what good leaders Mordecai and Esther are being. What is all of this they’re doing? They’re doing good to the Jewish people. Here is a woman who has been raised to be the very queen of arguably the richest empire in human history and the man who is the Prime Minister of the same. Theirs is now a life of limitless luxury. Why should they bother themselves with the needs of a bunch of people, most of whom they don’t even know? Xerxes doesn’t. And he’s the king. Why should they? And yet, here we find them in the longest chapter in the whole book, doing what? Working very hard for the good of the people. My old buddy, Alexander MacLaren observed: “The political world, with its fierce struggles for personal ends, its often disregard of the public good, and its use of place and power for ‘making a pile’ or helping relations up, would be much the better for some infusion of the spirit of Mordecai.”

Can we all say, “Amen”? MacLaren’s words are a dead-ringer for the shamelessly corrupt, indolent excuse of a government we have today. Our government “of the people, by the people, and for the people,” has instead become one “of the politicians, by the politicians, and for the politicians.” It is certainly nothing new in world history. It’s just disappointing because it is exactly what our forefathers were trying to prevent, and it is very sad to me to see especially the young people suffering immensely, while the very representatives who ought to be addressing those issues are instead only busy fattening their off-shore bank accounts.

Not so Mordecai and Esther. They’re doing what godly people do, laboring hard on behalf of their people. Therein of course lies the problem. This government that lacks any sense of morality lacks first of all godliness. If even a number of them were godly (God-like), they would be working for “we the people.” But they aren’t and they won’t. No amount of political activism will fix their problem. What’s missing is God Himself. Ours is sadly a world without God. Again, not so Esther and Mordecai. Although they may not be allowed to speak of their faith, yet they obviously march to the beat of a far different drummer than the other leaders around them. Esther and Mordecai have something to live for far beyond their own personal wealth and comfort.

Note how, in v.30, it says, “Mordecai sent letters to all the Jews in the 127 provinces of the kingdom of Xerxes–words of good will and assurance…” The Hebrew is literally “words of peace and truth.” How nice would it be to have leaders who actually communicate “peace and truth” to us the people? Whether it is in the government or in our workplaces or in our schools, leaders should be as sincere and work as hard as Mordecai and Esther to do their people good. Unfortunately, we can’t change the corruption and indolence of the leadership in our generation, but we can change us. Wherever you or I would find ourselves in positions of leadership, may the Lord help us be like our heroes and actually do our jobs and do them well.

While I’m at it, I’d like to note these thoughts very specifically include our Esther. Verse 29 says, “So Queen Esther, daughter of Abihail, along with Mordecai the Jew, wrote with full authority to confirm this second letter concerning Purim.” What I want to point out is that, in Hebrew, the verb, “wrote” is a feminine singular. The text is making it clear it was Esther’s doing. Obviously, she wrote it with Mordecai’s full support, but, the Hebrew itself is making clear, it was Esther doing the writing. Then v.32 leaves no question when it says, “Esther’s decree confirmed these regulations about Purim…” It was “Esther’s decree.” From the beginning, we’ve observed her to be a selfless, giving person. Now, when we find her at the very zenith of power and authority, what does she do with it, but good for her people. Lord help us all to be like her!