“Be Prepared”. That's the motto of the Boy Scouts.
Always wise to be prepared. (Lion story).
"Be prepared for what?" someone once asked Baden-Powell, the
founder of Scouting,
"Why, for any old thing." said Baden-Powell.
The training you get in Scouts and Guides will help you be prepared when
you need to know how to read a map, or tie a knot, or cook a meal or maybe do
some first aid.
But Baden-Powell wasn't thinking just of being ready for emergencies.
His idea was that all Scouts and Guides should prepare themselves to become
responsible citizens; looking out for others and not just themselves. He wanted
them to be prepared so they could face with courage whatever challenges life
brought their way.
I’m
not sure how prepared Esther was for the particular challenges she faced in
today’s episode of the Story. She seems to have been a lovely girl, with much
more than just outer beauty to commend her. But there must have been times when
she had to pinch herself to see if she was dreaming. An orphaned Jewish girl,
living in exile, chosen from dozens of other women by one of the most powerful
men in the world and now married to him and enjoying his favour? Who would want
to rock the boat in those circumstances?
But
that’s exactly what Mordecai wants her to do.
Our people are
going to be slaughtered – he says. You’ve
got to use your influence to stop this happening.
And
Esther’s not prepared for that. Like most of us, the first thing she sees is
the problem – and the problem looks insurmountable. “For any man or woman who approaches the king in the inner court
without being summoned, the King has but one law: that they be put to death
unless the king extends the gold sceptre to them and spares their lives. But
thirty days have passed since I was called to go to the king.”
Esther’s
first thoughts are about herself and her own security, and I guess we can
forgive her for that. But Mordecai, in his own sharp way, tells her that it’s
not enough to be thinking just of herself at this time. She has to see the
bigger picture - the lives of all the Jews in exile are in danger.
And
the words he speaks to her next are probably the most significant in the whole
of the book of Esther because they’re the pivot around which the whole of this story
turns.
“And who knows but
that you have come to your royal position for such a time as this?”
You think it’s
luck, or an accident that you – a young Jewish woman, exiled in Persia, should
have become queen? What if there’s more to it than mere luck? What if God has brought
this about so that he has the right person in the right place at the right time
when his people most need it?
And
it’s those words that swing it. In a moment, Esther realises that she carries
responsibilities that are far more important than her own needs or desires;
even her desire to stay alive. She wasn’t prepared for this, but now she
determines to get prepared:
“Go, gather
together all the Jews who are in Susa and fast for me. Do not eat or drink for
three days, night or day. I and my attendants will fast as you do. When this is
done, I will go to the king, even though it is against the law. And if I
perish, I perish.”
Mordecai’s
words stop Esther in her tracks and help her see her life in a different way.
I’ve often said that the life of faith has both horizontal and vertical
dimensions, like the shape of the cross. And although this story take place
centuries before Christ, it’s exactly those dimensions that Mordecai wants to
get across to Queen Esther.
Firstly,
he wants her to understand the horizontal dimension.
Esther,
Mordecai says, you have responsibilities to your people. They’re in crisis.
There are plans to wipe them out. You’re the only person in a position to do
something about it. You have responsibilities to us.
And
as I thought about that I remembered how powerful a thing it is when people
take their responsibilities to one another seriously.
I
watched Saving Private Ryan for the first time in ages the other week, and
found myself marvelling at the courage of the men who spilled out of those boats
to storm the beaches on D-day. I don’t think it was high ideals that got them
moving, but that sense of responsibility to one another, and to the people they
loved back home.
I
thought of Jean Vanier; a French monk who founded the ‘L’Arche’ Community which
cares for people who are profoundly handicapped and can do almost nothing for
themselves. The people who work in L’Arche regularly speak about how it changes
their perspective on life, and teaches them what it means to be authentically
human. And they learn this from the people that they care for.
I
remembered my brother Kenny, who boarded at the school for the blind he
attended in Belfast from the age of 4. Kenny was away from home all week and
knowing how important it is for a wee one to be with family, one of the carers
– Kate McQuillan - wanted to help. She asked my parents if she could take Kenny
home with her now and again during the week to be with her folk – a big family
with seven kids where there was always something going on. And Kenny loved it.
We
hadn’t known the McQuillans before that; there was no financial arrangement of
any kind. They just did it out of the goodness of their hearts – and they were
a Catholic family, while we were Protestant.
The shootings and the bombings tended to make the news in Northern
Ireland. Those kind of things didn’t. But they happened all the same.
Now
contrast that with the kind of selfishness we saw two summers ago; the mass
looting and destruction that shamed England’s inner cities. Or the smug arrogance
of those who go through life demanding their rights but paying little heed to
anyone else’s. Forgetting that with those rights go responsibilities.
“Am
I my brother’s keeper?” said Cain, angrily, in the garden of Eden.
“Yes.
Yes you are” were the unspoken words on God’s lips.
Esther
realised, through Mordecai’s words, that she didn’t just live for herself. Her
life was joined to that of others, and her fate and her future was tied to
theirs. He reminded her of the horizontal dimension of life.
But
he did more than that. He reminded her of the vertical dimension too.
The
book of Esther is unique in the Bible because it’s the only book that doesn’t
mention the name of God. Not once. And yet, the clear implication is that God
is at work the whole time to bring about his ends.
As
we’ve been reading our way through the Story, we’ve encountered the reality of
what we’ve been calling the Lower Story – life in this world with all its
messiness and chaos.
And
we know that life in this world is a mixed bag. There are spells when it’s
wonderful, and spells where it’s awful. Times when everything seems to be
coming together and other times when it feels like everything’s falling apart.
And this is life.
But
for the person who believes, the Lower Story never has the last word because we
believe that behind the scenes God is working in and through, and sometimes
around those circumstances, to bring good for his people and his world. There’s
another story going on – the Upper Story – where God is at work. And we can get
in on that story if we want to.
When
Mordecai says “who knows but that you
have come to your royal position for such a time as this?” he’s opening a
window onto the Upper Story for Esther. Reminding her that there’s a vertical
dimension to life, and there’s always more going on than meets the eye.
Esther
– you have a part to play in God’s plans, he’s saying. Your life is more than
you yet know. Will you surrender yourself to that greater purpose? Will you let
God use you, even if it takes you to places where you find yourself in danger?
It
takes courage to respond to that kind of
call. It took Esther and her people three days of prayer and fasting to focus
on her task, and on the God who was working through her. But she did it. And
through her faithfulness God’s people overcame those who wanted to destroy
them, and Esther’s story has been cherished for generations by the Jewish
people: told and re-told in the annual Jewish festival of Purim.
And
as we remember it today, we realise that though we’ll never have to make
decisions with such far reaching consequences – our lives have a horizontal and
a vertical dimension, just like Esther’s.
We
have responsibilities to one another as part of the human family. We are our
brother and sister’s keeper. And we have responsibilities to God as well, because
our lives are not simply our own to live as we please.
With
Christ’s death very much in view, the apostle Paul writes to the church in
Corinth and tells them, and all who followed after: “You are not your own. You were bought at a price.”
To
be Christian, first and foremost, isn’t about coming to church or trying to be
a good person, as many people seem to think. Those things are important, but
they’re secondary. Being a Christian is about a fundamental shift in how you
view your life. Realising that if Christ put his life on the line for you, you
can do no less for him in return. Realising
that you are no longer your own, because you were bought at a price.
To
really grasp that is to begin to live in a new way – with both the horizontal
and the vertical dimensions, the Lower and the Upper story firmly in view.
That - I believe – is what Esther shows us, this
morning. And what God wants us all to be prepared for.
Amen
No comments:
Post a Comment