When the king returned from the palace garden to the place of the banquet of wine, Haman had fallen across the couch where Esther was. Then the king said, “Will he also assault the queen while I am in the house?” As the word left the king’s mouth, they covered Haman’s face. Esther 7:8
“Coincidence is God‘s way of remaining anonymous”
That quote is attributed to Albert Einstein in an essay titled ‘The World As I See It’ and I cite it [here] because it lends itself well to the entire Book of Esther. How so—because beginning in Ester 1:1 and ending in Ester 10:1 the volume makes absolutely no reference to God. Other words you won’t see in Esther include: prayer, pray, worship, and sacrifice. That amazes me. It amazes me because God is all over this book.
It Just So Happened
A skeptic might read Esther and expectedly conclude that there are a lot of coincidences in Esther’s story. They might add that not seeing God’s name mentioned gives their notion credibility. However the faithful contend that this book of coincidences is really a book of grace and Divine intervention. Just consider the interactions between evil Haman and Mordecai the good guy.
Haman loathed Mordecai because he wouldn’t bow in his presence; therefore he planned to hang him in the gallows the very next day. That night (as coincidence would have it), the king could not sleep, so he called for the records of the kingdom to be read aloud to him (surely this would put him to sleep). But it was there he heard about an attempt on his life and the man who thwarted it, none other than our hero Mordecai.
The king summoned Haman and tells him of a man he desires to bestow a great honor. Haman, the pompous fool that he was (believing it was him), gives the king an elaborate depiction of how this man should be praised. It wasn’t until later he realized that the man was Mordecai. His plot foiled, Haman discovered he was the one who would parade Mordecai through the streets praising him!
Whoever digs a pit will fall into it, And he who rolls a stone will have it roll back on him. Proverbs 26:27
Haman’s original evil plot was eventually revealed by Esther at a wine-filled banquet. The king is enraged when he discovers Haman’s wickedness and wisely walks away to gain his composure. A drunken Haman walks over to Esther and pleads for his life and in so doing falls on her. At that very moment (coincidently) the king reenters to room to find Haman seemingly assaulting his wife and was not pleased. Long story short, Haman was hung on the gallows he had constructed to kill Mordecai.
Coincidence? I think not.
God’s Love
There’s no doubt that Haman was evil and corrupt beyond redemption, but it would also be fair to say that Mordecai and Esther were in a spiritual slump, as were their Jewish brothers and sisters residing in the territory–the Godlessness of the text bears witness to that. For whatever the reasons, they had elected to stay where their ancestors had been held captive for seventy years and not return to Jerusalem–for the most part, those reasons were not good ones, and collectively they point to a backslidden condition.
I suppose the point I have taken so long to get to is realized in this one verse:
If we are faithless, He remains faithful; He cannot deny Himself. 2 Timothy 2:13
Is that not a wonderful promise? If you are backslidden, that should give you great hope—God does not abandon His children because they stumble or because they tend to stay down for awhile after they have fallen. Our Father in Heaven blesses us still because we are His, even if we have forgotten for a season to mention His name.
And He has made from one blood every nation of men to dwell on all the face of the earth, and has determined their preappointed times and the boundaries of their dwellings, so that they should seek the Lord, in the hope that they might grope for Him and find Him, though He is not far from each one of us… Acts 17:26-27
These ramblings are typically (but not always) a byproduct inspired by God through my personal Bible study at SearchLight with Pastor Jon Courson and with my pastor at Calvary Chapel Coastlands.
If someone is ashamed of Jesus, he told us he would be ashamed of us. If we are truly saved, we will not be ashamed to mention the name of Jesus.
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I hear that. But I also sense that can immature Christian (ie, truly saved) can be in error and the reason we have the Bible to correct us. Shame, fear, doubts are not necessarily signs that a person is not saved; it might juts be spiritual immaturity.
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Dave, given the lack of any specific reference to God or prayer or worship or sacrifice (except I suggest that fasting is a sacrifice), what do you suppose Esther had in mind–and did–during the three-day fast she imposed on herself, her maids, Mordecai and all the other Jews?
Fasting is generally associated with prayer, and my mind fills that in–that they were fasting and praying. What else would Esther have been doing?
This is a sincere question, not an argument.
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No argument here Vicki, because I essentially agree with you. I get a sense that the times they were living in were very similar to the times we currently find ourselves in; ie, a society where so many claim to know Jesus Christ, but because of politically correct reasons, very few dare to mention Him by name. Despite that fact, God is in the house.
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