God’s story — better than fiction!

 

 

READ Esther 1-4

A good mystery keeps me occupied for hours. I prefer books, but enjoy some movies and a few television shows, particularly the British shows with a far better combination of plot and character than our home-grown varieties. Last night we watched an episode of “Shetland” then I finished a book by Charles Todd, not realizing how these would set me up for today’s reading.

Today’s reading begins with a powerful king who wanted to show off his beautiful wife to the leaders of the territories that he ruled. She refused to do it and he was furious. He didn’t kill her, but made certain she was no longer queen. He also passed a law that every man be master in his own household so the women of his kingdom would not follow that queen’s example and cause all sorts of problems.

Esther was an orphan raised by her uncle Mordecai. She was minding her own business when the king remembered he had no queen. His young attendants suggested he gather a few beautiful women and choose a new queen from the one he liked the best.

At this point I thought how beauty does not necessarily mean character, talent, or any quality that fit the role of being a queen. In the book I’d finished last night, a very beautiful and charming woman had been murdered because she didn’t “have a brain in her head” fit for the nobleman who married her. Fiction, but nonetheless a reflection of a reality that fits men too. Good looks are often a deterrent to character-building and used to gain position and popularity until the realization comes that they have little else to offer.

Esther must not have been like that. The king loved her for her looks? It seems he was impressed by her other qualities, but before that shows up, her uncle overheard a plot to kill the king and reported it to his niece. She told the king and the plot was stopped. Mordecai’s good deed was recorded in the chronicles and filed away.

The king seemed to be one of those powerful men who listened to advice more than making his own decisions. For some reason, he put a man named Haman in a top position without realizing this guy was a snook who cared more for his own ego than the lives of thousands of God-fearing people. When Mordecai refused to honor him, Haman determined to kill all the Jews throughout the kingdom.

Of course Uncle Mordecai eventually got the message to Esther and begged her to do something. She felt backed into a corner. If this king was approached without being summoned, he had the power to kill whoever came in without an appointment. Either way, she would die. The conversation went like this:

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. 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?” Then Esther told them to reply to Mordecai, “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.” (Esther 4:13–16)

This reveals the character of this young woman. Unlike Haman who would kill to protect his ego, she would die to protect her people. I have to wonder what I would do in her place. I also realize that while dying physically is a huge threat, it should not be so for a Christian. Paul said,

We walk by faith, not by sight. Yes, we are of good courage, and we would rather be away from the body and at home with the Lord. So whether we are at home or away, we make it our aim to please him. (2 Corinthians 5:7–9)

I am hard pressed between the two. My desire is to depart and be with Christ, for that is far better. But to remain in the flesh is more necessary on your account. (Philippians 1:23–24)

Death is a great threat, but dying to self is my current challenge. Paul also wrote: “I have been crucified with Christ. It is no longer I who live, but Christ who lives in me. And the life I now live in the flesh I live by faith in the Son of God, who loved me and gave himself for me.” (Galatians 2:20) The old me, the old way of life, have been crucified with Christ. Living accordingly is a daily choice. What I do may not affect thousands of people like the decision facing Esther, but I don’t know that. The power of God and even the Butterfly Effect tell me that my decisions each day could have far-reaching effects. Even if they do not, doing what God tells me to do is a vital part of what it means to be a citizen in His kingdom.

 

That longing to go home

The devotional writer says, “God has put in the heart… a longing for himself. The mass of humanity does not understand it. People just know that there are times when they want to be quiet, times when they want to be alone, times when the calendar or the stars or death speaks to them. They hunger and they thirst—but for what?”

Being alone for several days brings out this longing. So do horrible stories in the news, funerals, and sometimes fatigue. It is what some call a homing instinct, a deep and profound sense of wanting to “go home.”

I notice it when life is not satisfying, or when I’m sad for no reason, or even happy for no reason, but sometimes this longing for home hits me at odd moments. I might be driving, or pushing a grocery cart when it sweeps over me and automatically I say, sometimes aloud, that I want to go home.

So we are always of good courage. We know that while we are at home in the body we are away from the Lord, for we walk by faith, not by sight. Yes, we are of good courage, and we would rather be away from the body and at home with the Lord. (2 Corinthians 5:6–8)

While God blesses my life, I know that this world will never satisfy me completely. No matter what I have or gain, God “put eternity in my heart” (Ecclesiastes 3:11) and it is eternity that I long for, not more stuff or more of anything else, or even to have life totally the way that I want it to be. The ache for eternity, that homesickness for heaven cannot be satisfied by anything less than being with Jesus.

Yet I am here. God wants me to make the best of where I am and do whatever He gives me to do. Paul had that same longing for home, yet knew that God had reasons for him to stay, at least for a few more years…

I am hard pressed between the two. My desire is to depart and be with Christ, for that is far better. But to remain in the flesh is more necessary on your account. (Philippians 1:23–24)

Paul’s reason for staying was the reason God gives every Christian. We are not in heaven yet because He has a task for us here. Part of that task is making clear to ourselves and to others the meaning of this hunger in our hearts, this longing that is sometime vague, illusive, and even an unwanted intrusion.

The devotional writer says that Christians know this hunger yet at times may lose our way. He says we must never lose our address. That is, don’t deny the hunger or even offer a nod to satisfaction with this life. This homesickness for God is a divine gift and precious, a continual reminder that my dwelling here is a mere tent and at any time the Lord “may come to draw the pegs.”

If I feel like that, how about those who have not yet identified this deep desire and do not know what is pulling on their hearts? This is God’s reason for His “not yet” to me. I have an obligation to expose the mystery of this longing.

For now, I am a stranger and a pilgrim here, filled with a sense of not belonging yet knowing this is where God wants me to be. He gives me zeal to do His will, yet because of that deep longing to go home, part of that zeal is being able to see by faith that being here is temporary. No matter how much He blesses this life, this life is not all there is.