14 day plan

Exceptional Bible Characters

Day 12 of 14

GNT

Esther 4:14-16

14If you keep quiet at a time like this, help will come from heaven to the Jews, and they will be saved, but you will die and your father's family will come to an end. Yet who knows—maybe it was for a time like this that you were made queen!”

15Esther sent Mordecai this reply: 16“Go and get all the Jews in Susa together; hold a fast and pray for me. Don't eat or drink anything for three days and nights. My servant women and I will be doing the same. After that, I will go to the king, even though it is against the law. If I must die for doing it, I will die.”

Reflection:  Remarkable in her beauty, Esther was thrown into prominence and the public eye without her consent, or any control over her situation. This lack of control over her own life could have defined her whole character and actions. She had beauty, and intelligence. But it is her bravery that I most admire her for. Esther chose to rise to the challenge of coming before the king on behalf of her people, the Jews, when they were threatened. I have always felt an overwhelming dread for Esther at the point in her story when
Mordecai challenges her to step forward in defence of her people. She had been through so much already: pulled away from her family because of her beauty, added to the king’s harem, even chosen as a bride for the king. Yet it was this choice, when she risked her life to stand up for her people, that I most admire. Instead of maintaining the status quo, remaining safe within the position her beauty had both forced her into and which sheltered her in relative safety, she used her beauty, her brains, and her bravery to do the right thing.

Question: Are you ever tempted to remain in relative safety when God may be calling you to step out for him? Can you think of a situation in your life where this might be the case?

Prayer: Dear God, thank you for the beautiful and intelligent Esther. Thank you that she was also brave, and trusted in you. Please help us to follow her example in seeking you, and your will in our lives, and in stepping out in faith and bravery to do great things for you. Thank you for your promise to give us the strength to do so. In Jesus’ name we pray, Amen.

We are reading the Bible with Karen Mudge until 10th February.

Good News Translation® (Today’s English Version, Second Edition) © 1992 American Bible Society. All rights reserved. Bible text from the Good News Translation (GNT) is not to be reproduced in copies or otherwise by any means except as permitted in writing by American Bible Society, 101 North Independence Mall East, Floor 8, Philadelphia, PA 19106-2155 (www.americanbible.org). LICENSEE shall reproduce the following trademark and trademark notice on the copyright page of each copy of the Licensed Products: ®

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Esther 4:1-17

Mordecai Asks for Esther's Help

1When Mordecai learned of all that had been done, he tore his clothes in anguish. Then he dressed in sackcloth, covered his head with ashes, and walked through the city, wailing loudly and bitterly, 2until he came to the entrance of the palace. He did not go in because no one wearing sackcloth was allowed inside. 3Throughout all the provinces, wherever the king's proclamation was made known, there was loud mourning among the Jews. They fasted, wept, wailed, and most of them put on sackcloth and lay in ashes.

4When Esther's servant women and eunuchs told her what Mordecai was doing, she was deeply disturbed. She sent Mordecai some clothes to put on instead of the sackcloth, but he would not accept them. 5Then she called Hathach, one of the palace eunuchs appointed as her servant by the king, and told him to go to Mordecai and find out what was happening and why. 6Hathach went to Mordecai in the city square at the entrance of the palace. 7Mordecai told him everything that had happened to him and just how much money Haman had promised to put into the royal treasury if all the Jews were killed. 8He gave Hathach a copy of the proclamation that had been issued in Susa, ordering the destruction of the Jews. Mordecai asked him to take it to Esther, explain the situation to her, and have her go and plead with the king and beg him to have mercy on her people. 9Hathach did this, 10and Esther gave him this message to take back to Mordecai: 11“If anyone, man or woman, goes to the inner courtyard and sees the king without being summoned, that person must die. That is the law; everyone, from the king's advisers to the people in the provinces, knows that. There is only one way to get around this law: if the king holds out his gold scepter to someone, then that person's life is spared. But it has been a month since the king sent for me.”

12When Mordecai received Esther's message, 13he sent her this warning: “Don't imagine that you are safer than any other Jew just because you are in the royal palace. 14If you keep quiet at a time like this, help will come from heaven to the Jews, and they will be saved, but you will die and your father's family will come to an end. Yet who knows—maybe it was for a time like this that you were made queen!”

15Esther sent Mordecai this reply: 16“Go and get all the Jews in Susa together; hold a fast and pray for me. Don't eat or drink anything for three days and nights. My servant women and I will be doing the same. After that, I will go to the king, even though it is against the law. If I must die for doing it, I will die.”

17Mordecai then left and did everything that Esther had told him to do.

Good News Translation® (Today’s English Version, Second Edition) © 1992 American Bible Society. All rights reserved. Bible text from the Good News Translation (GNT) is not to be reproduced in copies or otherwise by any means except as permitted in writing by American Bible Society, 101 North Independence Mall East, Floor 8, Philadelphia, PA 19106-2155 (www.americanbible.org). LICENSEE shall reproduce the following trademark and trademark notice on the copyright page of each copy of the Licensed Products: ®