QUEEN ESTHER - PART II
Courage and Faith
After having the royal chronicles read to him by his servant, king Xerxes was shocked that no one had honored the man who saved him from an assassination attempt. He charged his servants to see if a high ranking official was there to advise him on how to properly reward Mordecai the Jew. The servants told the King that Haman had just entered the court. The King summoned Haman to his chambers and asked him, "What shall be done for the man whom the King delights to honor." Believeing the King was referring to him, Haman replied without hesitation : "For the man whom the king delights to honor, let a royal robe be brought which the king has worn, and a horse on which the king has ridden, which has a royal crest placed on it's head. Then let this robe and horse be delivered to the hand of one of the kings' most noble princes, that he may array the man whom the king delights to honor. Then parade him on horseback through the city square, and proclaim before him: "Thus shall it be done to the man whom the king delights to honor". Esther 6:7-9
The King was pleased with Haman's suggestion. He instructed him to hurry and perform what he suggested, to take the robe and the horse "and do so for Mordecai the Jew .... leaving nothing undone of all that you have spoken". Haman was forced to honor the man who would not bow to him.
For the second time the King and Haman dined with Queen Esther. The King repeated his offer to grant her any request, up to half his kingdom. Finally Queen Esther presented her request: "If I have found favor in your sight, O King, and if it pleases the King, let my life be given me at my petition, and my people at my request. For we have been sold, my people and I, to be destroyed, to be killed, and to be annihilated. Had we been sold as male and female slaves I would have held my tongue, although the enemy could never compensate for the King's loss". Esther 7:3, 4
The King was furious: "Who is he, and where is he, who would dare presume in his heart to do such a thing"? Esther turned and pointed toward Haman: "the adversary and enemy is this wicked Haman!" Needless to say, the King had Haman hung on the very gallows that he had built for Mordecai.
While the book of Esther doesn't mention God, the Temple or, any form of it's sacrificial system, there is a numbing similarity to this story and the one with Moses and the Law. A thread of progression can be seen in both accounts. In the account with Moses there is a progression from Law to Grace, Old Covenant to New Covenant. As the fading glory on Moses face depicted. In the account of Queen Esther, we have a progression from doubt to faith to victory. Away in a foreign land, in the midst of a foreign people, deprived of their temple and sacrificial system, Queen Esther retreated into the 'Temple' of her heart, fasted and prayed, then presented herself before the King, sacrificially. What Strength! What Courage!
Whoever said 'Faith' is a New Testament concept couldn't have been more wrong.
