Esther Scripture Quotes

Pretending we are strong or being strong out of woundedness actually accomplishes very little for us in the end—and very little for God. It prevents us from being known, fears and all, and being radically accepted. There is no “fake it till you make it” in Scripture.

Esther Meek summarizes this uncontractual dynamic in the following way: “Law, so prominent in Scripture, is not to be understood as creating relationship. Rather, law nourishes relationship.”11

Proverbs is in many respects a work on ethics, presenting arguments concerning the manner in which moral precepts relate to life and the good; Job investigates the reasons good individuals (and, by implication, good nations) should suffer catastrophe; Esther seeks an account of how God’s will works in political circumstances in which one sees nothing but the decisions and deeds of human actors; and so forth.

Those who seek to glorify biblical womanhood have forgotten the dark stories. They have forgotten that the concubine of Bethlehem, the raped princess of David’s house, the daughter of Jephthah, and the countless unnamed women who lived and died between the lines of Scripture exploited, neglected, ravaged, and crushed at the hand of patriarchy are as much a part of our shared narrative as Deborah, Esther, Rebekah, and Ruth.

Those who seek to glorify biblical womanhood have forgotten that the concubine of Bethlehem, the raped princess of David's house, the daughter of Jephtah, and the countless unnamed women who lived and died between the lines of Scripture exploited, neglected, ravaged, and crushed at the hand of patriarchy are as much a part of our shared narrative as Deborah, Esther, Rebekah, and Ruth. We may not have a ceremony through which to grieve them, but it is our responsibility as women of faith to guard the dark stories for our own daughters, and when they are old enough, to hold their faces between our hands and make them promise to remember.

Those who seek to glorify biblical womanhood have forgotten the dark stories. They have forgotten that the concubine of Bethlehem, the raped princess of David’s house, the daughter of Jephthah, and the countless unnamed women who lived and died between the lines of Scripture exploited, neglected, ravaged, and crushed at the hand of patriarchy are as much a part of our shared narrative as Deborah, Esther, Rebekah, and Ruth. We may not have a ceremony through which to grieve them, but it is our responsibility as women of faith to guard the dark stories for our own daughters, and when they are old enough, to hold their faces between our hands and make them promise to remember.

Listening to the rabbis, one would’ve thought the only figures worth mention in the whole of history were Abraham, Isaac, Jacob, and Joseph . . . David, Saul, Solomon . . . Moses, Moses, Moses. When I was finally able to read the Scriptures for myself, I discovered (behold!) there were women. To be ignored, to be forgotten, this was the worst sadness of all. I swore an oath to set down their accomplishments and praise their flourishings, no matter how small. I would be a chronicler of lost stories. It was exactly the kind of boldness Mother despised. On the day I opened the chest for Yaltha, I had completed the stories of Eve, Sarah, Rebekah, Rachel, Leah, Zilpah, Bilhah, and Esther. But there was so much remaining to be written—Judith, Dinah, Tamar, Miriam, Deborah, Ruth, Hannah, Bathsheba, Jezebel.

We must not suppose these marks shine equally and in the same degree in all the books of the Bible. For as one star differs from another star in light, so in this heaven of Scripture, some books send out brighter and richer rays of light; others far more feeble and fewer in proportion to their being more or less necessary to the church and as containing doctrines of greater or lesser importance. Thus the gospels and Paul’s epistles shine with far greater splendor than the book of Ruth or Esther; but yet it is certain that in all are these arguments of truth and majesty, which by themselves prove a book divine and authentic (or at least that nothing can be found in them to make their authenticity [authentian] doubtful). Neither is it necessary that all these marks should occur in every chapter or verse of a canonical book to distinguish it from an apocryphal or in each part of Scripture detached from the whole. It is sufficient for them to be given in the divine writings considered collectively and as a totality.

It is intriguing that, in the Christian Scripture’s story of creation, God says, “Let there be . . .” and then there is. (This has nothing to do with the question of evolution; oughtness makes reality, however it comes about.) I can relate to this easily when I think of all the birthday party games I invented over my children’s young lives, and all the classes I have invented over my students’ lives. I have said plenty of “let there be’s,” which have brought realities to be. Also, when my daughters each said “I do” at their weddings, they said something normative; they generously let something be, and that brought reality to be. If all real things require a “let there be,” a normative dimension, they require a larger context of persons in which promise and covenant and gift pertain.

In this weaving together of the story of the Old Testament, four simple categories help identify how each part points to Jesus in the New Testament: 1. The easiest category is made up of passages or verses that offer prophecies of the coming Messiah, such as the Genesis 3:15 reference to Eve’s seed defeating Satan. Isaiah 53 and 61 are other examples. 2. Then we find stories that show God’s work to preserve the lineage of Christ, such as Joseph’s actions in Egypt that kept Abraham’s descendants from dying out. Esther, Rahab, and Ruth’s stories fall into this category as well. 3. We also see pictures of the coming Christ, His work, and His kingdom. The Old Testament sacrificial system clearly illustrates this. The story of Hosea and Gomer pictures Jesus’s coming redemption of His bride, as God instructed Hosea to pursue and restore Gomer despite her adultery (see Hosea 1:2–3). Boaz and Ruth’s story reflects aspects of the gospel as well, as Boaz took his place as Ruth’s kinsman-redeemer (see Ruth 2–3), foreshadowing Jesus’s redemption of His bride, the church. 4. Many stories simply reinforce our need for a Savior. Stories such as the rape and dismemberment of the concubine of an unnamed Levite in Judges 19 reinforce the Israelites’ warped sense of right and wrong, inability to be righteous on their own, and need for salvation through Christ. Most parts of the Old Testament will fit one or more of these four categories.

Nothing in Scripture is without purpose. God has been telling us the same story over and over again, so that someday it will seep inside us and we will open our eyes.

First, the Deuterocanonical books Baruch, Tobit, Maccabees, Judith, Sirach, Wisdom and parts of Daniel and Esther were all included in the Septuagint that Jesus and the apostles read as Scripture. Second, the New Testament itself in at least some and possibly many places references Deuterocanonical books. Heb 11:35b, for example, references 2 Macabees 7:1–19. First Peter 1:6–7 references Wisdom 3:5–6 and Sirach 2:5. First Peter 1:17 references Sirach 16:12. Numerous other similar instances can be found.

And it is amazing how often the most trustworthy trustees are those who have personally experienced the worst that idolatry and injustice can do. There is good news for all those who have been thrown into the pit by the Nietzschean power plays of every human structure and system—God does not forget his image bearers even in the deepest and darkest prison. And there is hard news for those who seem like the children of privilege, the ones who are handed the robe and ring even before they deserve it; they too will be broken by the very institutions they thought they would rule, and will have to choose whether to forgive and serve them nonetheless, to seek destructive dominance, or to descend into a hell of their own disappointment. It might seem like it should not be this way. Surely institutional problems require institutional solutions. But this is not the witness of Scripture. Instead, over and over, both the most likely suspects and the most unlikely ones are called by God to become trustees. God works through the favorite son Joseph, and God works through the Canaanite prostitute Rahab. God calls Saul, the tall and dominant warrior, and God calls David, the youngest son keeping the sheep. Esther and Ruth, Nehemiah and Ezekiel, Hezekiah and Jeremiah—the story of the institutions of the world hinges not on institutions but on persons. It hinges on image bearers, and on their very personal responses to the injustice and idolatry that surround them, whether they become caught up in god playing or humbled in worship, corroded by cynicism or sustained by hope, bitter or forgiving. So the institutions of our time will be changed not by impersonal institutional forces; they will be changed by trustees, the image bearers who face their institutions’ failings, forgive them and lead toward a better way. One of them is named S. Kandaswamy. One of them could be you.

Scripture references for Keepers of the Covenant: Ezra 7–10 Esther 1–10 Ruth 1–4 1 Samuel 15:1–35 Genesis 19:1–38; 36:1–12 Exodus 17:8–14; 28:1–42; 34:15–16 Numbers 1:47–53; 3:11–13; 8:5–26; 18:21; 25:1–15 Deuteronomy 25:5–10; 25:17–19 Joshua 2:1–22; 6:22–25 Judges 4–5 Matthew 1:5–6

The final reason we want to know the will of God is because we are cowardly. It’s true. Sometimes when we pray to know the will of God, we are praying a coward’s prayer: “Lord, tell me what to do so nothing bad will happen to me and I won’t have to face danger or the unknown.” We want to know everything is going to be fine for us or for those we love. But that’s not how God spoke to Esther. As a Jewish woman who won an unusual beauty contest to become Xerxe’s queen (see Esther 2:2-17), Esther would learn that God’ plans can include risk—and an opportunity to show courage. The king’s right-hand man, Haman, was the enemy of the Jews and devised a plot to kill all the Jewish people, and Xerxes, king of Persia, unwittingly signed this decree. When Mordecai, Esther’s older cousin and guardian, learned of this plot, he told Esther, knowing she was the only one in a position to save the Jewish people—her people. But she refused, telling him that if she visited King Xerxes without being summoned, she would, by Persian law, be killed—unless the king extended the golden scepter and spared her life. Entering the throne room on her own was very risky, which is why Esther sent people to Mordecai to say that she wouldn’t do it. The Scriptures give us Mordecai’s response to the words of Esther’s emissaries: 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?” (Esther 4:13-14) So what would you do at this point? Pray for some sign from heaven? Wait for God’s will to be revealed? Question why God would put you in such a predicament? Do nothing, figuring that anything involving suffering and possible death must not be His plan for your life? Look at what Esther did: 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.” (vv. 15-16).

Notice what we don’t read in this story. We don’t read of Esther seeing any divine word from the Lord, though a discerning reader may see God at work in Mordecai’s advice to her. She had no promise as to what the future would look like. All she knew was that saving her people was a good thing. God did not tell her what would happen if she obeyed or exactly what she could do to ensure success. She had to take a risk for God. “If I perish, I perish” was her courageous cry. Esther didn’t wait for weeks or months trying to discern God’s will for her life before she acted. She simply did what was right and forged ahead without any special word from God. If the king extended to her the golden scepter, praise the Lord. If he did not, she died. Esther was more man than most men I know, myself included. Many of us—men and women—are extremely passive and cowardly. We don’t take risks for God because we are obsessed with safety, security, and most of all, with the future. That’s why most of our prayers fall into one of two categories. Either we ask that everything would be fine or we ask to know that everything will be fine. We pray for health, travel, jobs—and we should pray for these things. But a lot of prayers boil down to, “God, don’t let anything unpleasant happen to anyone. Make everything in the world nice for everyone.” And when we aren’t praying this kind of prayer, we are praying for God to tell us that everything will turn out fine. That’s often what we are asking for when we pray to know the will of God. We aren’t asking for holiness, or righteousness, or an awareness of sin. We want God to tell us what to do so everything will turn out pleasant for us. “Tell me who to marry, where to live, what school to go to, what job to take. Show me the future so I won’t have to take any risks.” This doesn’t sound much like Esther. Obsessing over the future is not how God wants us to live, because showing us the future is not God’s way. His way is to speak to us in the Scriptures and transform us by the renewing of our minds. His way is not a crystal ball. His way is wisdom. We should stop looking for God to reveal the future to us and remove all risk from our lives. We should start looking to God—His character and His promises—and thereby have confidence to take risks for His name’s sake. God is all-knowing and all-powerful. He has planned out and works out every detail of our lives—the joyous days and the difficult—all for our good (Ecclesiastes 7:14). Because we have confidence in God’s will of decree, we can radically commit ourselves to His will of desire, without fretting over a hidden will of direction. In other words, God doesn’t take risks, so we can.

Every time God asks a question in Scripture, He already knows the answer. But isn’t it interesting what our answers reveal about our hearts? Cain made the foolish mistake of thinking he could conceal his sin from God. “‘I don’t know,’ he replied. ‘Am I my brother’s keeper?’” (Genesis 4:9).

This sounds strange to us because when we hear the word heart, we tend to think of how we feel, not how we think. For example, when we say something like “follow your heart,” we are talking about acting in a way that is based on feelings. So when we read about the heart in the Bible, we must be careful not to let our cultural context influence us too much. We must remember that when it comes to the heart, thinking and choosing are just as much a part of the heart as feeling. Troxel adds, “It may surprise you that out of all the times that the Hebrew word for ‘heart’ appears in the Old Testament, our intellectual and rational functions are most often in view. What modern people would attribute to the head or to the brain, Scripture applies to the heart.

I followed Ruth's example, you know." He tilted his head in confusion. There was a Ruth in his neighborhood. But when could she have met her? "Ruth?" She gave him a pull-yourself-together look. "King David's great-grandmother." "Oh, that Ruth." He sat up straight. "Wait. You did?" She turned so she could look him in the eyes. Softly, so softly he had to lean close to her, she whispered, "Your people be my people, and your God my God." Whatever control he had exerted over his heart for months, whatever walls he had built, simply crumbled. He tugged her until she laid against his chest, and for a long time, simply held her. "I love you," he said.

The heroes you read about in the Bible—Ruth, Esther, Joseph, Mary—often they were ordinary young men and women, not superheroes. Just because their names and stories appear in Scripture doesn’t make them any more special than you. They were faced with challenges that most of us know from our Bible storybooks. But in their lives, in their world, these now-famous moments were simply the circumstances and decisions facing them that day. God’s will wasn’t a mysterious riddle waiting to be answered somewhere in their future. God’s will was in their faces. God’s will was in their now. And the same thing is true for you. Today is your mission. Today is your answer. In God’s timing, today holds the key to where He’s taking you tomorrow.

Undoubtedly, one of the reasons the book of Esther is included in Scripture is to help us see the sovereign hand of God at work behind the scenes, caring for His people.