Original Meaning

MORDECAI’S COUNTER-DECREE IMPLIED the survival of the Jewish people even before the thirteenth of Adar dawned. Eleven months after Haman had cast lots, the ill-fated day finally arrived. Before the author reports what happened that fateful day, he summarizes the significance of the events: “On this day the enemies of the Jews had hoped to overpower them, but now the tables were turned and the Jews got the upper hand over those who hated them” (v. 1). The outcome of the conflict had already been settled before it began because “the tables were turned.” God’s people would face the confrontation with the confidence that they would not be annihilated. In contrast, the people “of all the other nationalities” were living in fear of the Jews. The nobles, satraps, governors, and the king’s officials helped the Jews in their defense, because they feared Mordecai, the man who had stood up to Haman and now ruled in his place.

In the armed conflict on Adar 13, the Jews struck down, killed, and destroyed those “who hated them.” Five hundred men fell in Susa on the thirteenth and another three hundred the next day; seventy-five thousand died throughout the empire. The killing is reported in words that once again echo the Lord’s command to Saul in 1 Samuel 15 (see comments on Bridging Contexts section of 8:1–17).

The author is careful to say three times that the Jews “did not lay their hands on the plunder” (vv. 10, 15, 16) even though Mordecai’s decree allowed it. Mordecai’s decree included the permission to plunder because he was reversing the exact terms that Haman’s decree had previously established. However, unlike the Agagite’s intent, the Jews understood the execution of Mordecai’s decree as governed by the ancient command of holy war against the Amalekites.

One of the rules of ancient holy war was that plunder must not be taken. When Abram, for example, fought for Sodom because his nephew Lot had been taken captive, the king of Sodom offered him material reward. Abram, however, would accept nothing, lest that wicked city be the source of his prosperity (Gen. 14). This example set a precedent for God’s people.

When the Lord commanded the conquest of the Promised Land, Joshua and the Israelites devoted whole cites to the Lord. This meant killing every living thing in it—men, women, children, cattle, sheep, donkeys—and burning the buildings to the ground. Any gold, silver, and precious articles found in the city were put in the treasury of the Lord’s house (e.g., Josh. 6:20–24). The Hebrew word for such complete destruction was ḥerem, which means something devoted exclusively to God. There was to be no personal profit in holy war because the destroyers were acting not on their own behalf but as agents of God’s wrath.

In actual fact, Israel’s execution of holy war was often less than holy and tainted with their own sin. Immediately after crossing the Jordan, the twelve tribes were to conquer the land by waging holy war under Joshua’s leadership. Jericho was the first city to be attacked with the orders that “the city and all that is in it are to be devoted to the Lord” (Josh. 6:17). The spectacular victory at Jericho was followed by the devastating Israelite defeat at Ai. Why was Israel defeated, even though their forces greatly outnumbered the men of Ai? The Lord said to Joshua in 7:11–12:

Israel has sinned; they have violated my covenant, which I commanded them to keep. They have taken some of the devoted things; they have stolen, they have lied, they have put them with their own possessions. That is why the Israelites cannot stand against their enemies; they turn their backs and run because they have been made liable to destruction. I will not be with you anymore unless you destroy whatever among you is devoted to destruction.

This disaster was caused by one man, Achan, who had taken a beautiful robe, two hundred shekels of silver, and fifty shekels of gold, all of which were to be destroyed. Achan’s possession of them brought him and his family under the same ban of destruction as the things he had taken. Achan, the silver, the robe, the gold, his sons and daughters, his cattle, donkeys, and sheep, his tent, and all that he owned had to be killed and burned in order to satisfy the Lord’s command concerning the complete destruction of Jericho.

Throughout its history, Israel took illicit plunder, trusted in the strength of its own army instead of waiting on the Lord, and generally lived no better than the wicked people they were to war against in God’s holy name. Israel’s first king, Saul, followed in Achan’s way and violated the trust of holy war when he failed to destroy completely the Amalekites (see comments on Est. 8:1–16). Saul did not kill every living thing, and he plundered the best of their possessions. The confusion of his motives is revealed when he is confronted by the prophet Samuel (1 Sam. 15:18–19):

[The Lord] sent you on a mission, saying, “Go and completely destroy those wicked people, the Amalekites; make war on them until you have wiped them out.” Why did you not obey the Lord? Why did you pounce on the plunder and do evil in the eyes of the Lord? (emphasis added)

Caught in disobedience, Saul tried to rationalize his actions, explaining that he was going to sacrifice all the plunder to the Lord later anyway. He tried to justify himself by claiming a deferred obedience. This is the context for Samuel’s famous words, “To obey is better than sacrifice. . . . Because you have rejected the word of the Lord, he has rejected you as king” (1 Sam. 15:22–23).

Because King Saul failed to execute holy war properly in obedience to the Lord’s command, he was disqualified as Israel’s king and God’s agent on earth. In Esther, the author’s emphatic statement three times over that the Jews did not lay a hand on the plunder suggests that this episode against Haman and those who “hated” the Jews was understood as holy war, not as an opportunity for looting and personal gain. The Jews of Persia succeeded where Saul failed.

The ten sons of Haman were also killed that day, leaving no one to carry on their father’s legacy of hateful pride. This is another practice in ancient warfare. When a leader was killed, so was his entire family so that no one would survive to mount a vengeful coup. The names of Haman’s sons may reinforce the author’s message that this is holy war. They are of special interest because they may be daiva names of ancient Persia.1 Daiva names were once used of the gods in early Iranian and Hindu writings but later came to be associated with demonic powers in Eastern religions. If the names of Haman’s sons do reflect this origin, the original readers would have probably recognized them as such. The author lists the names of Haman’s sons possibly to show the allegiance of Haman and his family to the demonic powers of darkness and evil and, therefore, proper casualties of holy war.

In the Hebrew manuscripts and printed Hebrew edition (BHS) of Esther, the names of Haman’s sons in verses 7–9 are written in margin-justified columns, set off from the rest of the text. The special significance of this unusual morphology is unknown. A similar arrangement is found in the list of names of the kings of Canaan conquered by Joshua and the Israelites in Joshua 12:9–24. Perhaps the practice of setting apart these names from the rest of the text visually expresses the idea that these enemies of Israel had been set apart for destruction. One of my Old Testament professors thought that the arrangement of their names on the page visually suggested their hanging.2

In the opinion of some scholars, the many Persian names found in the book of Esther provide striking evidence of the historical authenticity of the book’s setting, since according to Yamauchi some of these names have also been found among the Persepolis texts.3 However, this argument is not completely compelling, because the linguistic difficulties of tracing these names in the Hebrew text of Esther back to their Old Persian origins are complex.4 It appears that the author of Esther did have at least some knowledge of proper names from the Old Persian language, but what they meant and why he lists them so explicitly remains uncertain.

Esther requests that the bodies of Haman’s sons be hung, that is, impaled, on gallows for public humiliation, just as their father had been. Though perhaps barbaric by modern standards, this also was a custom in ancient warfare. The bodies of King Saul and his sons—even Jonathan, whom David loved—were humiliated in this way by the Philistines on the city wall at Beth Shan (1 Sam. 31:1–13).

Echoes of Saul’s failure resound throughout this episode of how the Jews got the upper hand and finally destroyed Haman the Agagite, who was effectively, if not formally, the “king” of their enemies. Thus, under the leadership of Esther and Mordecai, the Jews of Persia obeyed where King Saul had disobeyed and did to their enemies as the Lord had commanded so long before.

Mordecai’s counter-decree legalized warfare throughout the empire on only Adar 13, but Queen Esther requested a second day of killing within the city of Susa on Adar 14. Her request delayed the subsequent celebration by the Jews in Susa until the fifteenth. At the time the book was written, Purim was celebrated in some places on two consecutive days, but in other places only one. The author feels constrained to explain not only the origin of the holiday but why it was celebrated on two consecutive days in some parts.

Some believe the details of the Esther story should be understood as myth with little or no historical basis, written to explain the significance of a Jewish festival whose true origin had been forgotten. However, an etiological reading of the story need not exclude the historical basis of the events it describes. Even if one rejects the story as history and reads it as myth, the author apparently had no problem with casting Esther as the initiator of a second day of bloodshed to explain the second day of Purim. From a literary perspective, the two days of killing are consistent with the other double events marking the rhetorical structure of the book.

Both Christian and Jewish interpreters have found Esther’s request morally troubling and especially unbecoming a woman. In Paton’s opinion, “for this horrible request no justification can be found.”5 C. A. Moore observes:

It is Esther’s request for the exposure of Haman’s sons and an extension of the fighting, as well as her “failure” to intercede for Haman in 7:9, that has been primarily responsible for her reputation as a sophisticated Jael, i.e., a deceitful and bloodthirsty woman (see Judg. 4:17–22). Such a reputation certainly has some justification . . . but unless one is willing to judge Esther’s outward act in complete isolation, without any real knowledge of her inner motives and without full knowledge of the external circumstances, then one’s judgment must be tentatively made. Then, as now, what the vanquished call “the villains” the victors regard as “the heroes.”6

Michael Fox points out that given the stipulations of Haman’s decree, the Jews’ enemies could not lawfully have attacked them on a second day. Therefore, the Jews were safe and Esther’s request was literally overkill. He evaluates Esther’s action as “punitary and precautionary, eliminating opponents who might cause problems in the future.”7 While this might be considered the prudent act of a wise leader, Fox also notes that at this point Esther seems to turn vindictive. She no longer even attempts to justify ethically her request to the king and does not mention the welfare of her people. Mordecai is not mentioned as instigating the second day, and his decree does not compel it. Apparently Queen Esther has come into her own, acting not at Mordecai’s urging, but on her own authority as a monarch. According to Fox, Esther’s personality

has evolved into the near-opposite of what it was at the start. Once sweet and compliant, she is now steely and unbending, even harsh. . . . Literary values are here less important than liturgical purposes. Esther’s request for a second day of fighting results more from the need to explain an existing practice than from any literary conception of her personality.8

Esther’s apparent brutality does trouble modern sensibilities, as indicated in what is perhaps the most recent rendition of the story, Hugo Weisgall’s new opera, Esther. In October 1993 the New York City Opera performed the premiere of Esther. At this scene the biblical story is supplemented when the heroine laments the slaying of the Gentiles and averts any perception of Jewish triumphalism with these words:9

At last, there is a quiet, the horror long past.

Yet, that that day could not have been avoided

Fills me with grief, with regret.

Yet I cannot forget, no one should forget,

It must not be forgotten. It must not be repeated.

So much blood, so many, so many dead.

The biblical Esther is evaluated almost universally in negative terms for requesting a second day of killing. The author makes no attempt to exonerate the queen or to justify her request. Yet it apparently served as a perfectly acceptable explanation of the two days of Purim in the mind of the author. If this episode in Israel’s story has no basis in history, and if the author could have invented any reason to explain a second day of Purim, one wonders why he invented one that seems to impugn Esther and suggests that the Jews held their power as ruthlessly as did the pagan rulers. On the other hand, if it was widely known that Queen Esther was in fact responsible for the second day of killing in Susa, the author could not have easily avoided including it. If tradition is correct, it is perhaps after this incident that the people nicknamed their queen “Esther” alluding to Ishtar, the Babylonian goddess of love and war.

The Bible is remarkable in revealing the darker side of God’s chosen leaders, often just at their shining moment. King David’s adultery is a similar example of a story whose presence in the Bible is difficult to explain unless it was widely known to be true. His adultery occurred at the pinnacle of his remarkable military success and prosperity. Even today, many leaders fall at the height of their achievements. If the second day of killing happened because of a darker side to Esther’s character, the author does not attempt to vindicate her. Perhaps he is suggesting that no one, Jew or Gentile, can handle power without yielding to its dark side. Perhaps Esther’s request for a second day of killing shows that she herself had begun to feel the heady intoxication of the power she had so remarkably attained. Even as others in the court have manipulated Xerxes for their own agendas, Esther also has now learned to exercise her power over Xerxes for her own purposes.

On the other hand, Esther’s reasons for the second day of killing in Susa may have been legitimate, even though they are unknown to us, and were also possibly unknown to the author. Haman was, after all, second only to the king, and he likely had many in Susa who were loyal to him and his decree. Esther’s request is another instance of the disquieting moral ambiguity that characterizes this story. Rather than attempting to resolve it, we should reflect on it.

Whether or not Esther was justified in extending the killing a second day, the perennial failure of Israel’s greatest leaders to war against moral and spiritual darkness without engaging in sin themselves suggests that no one is worthy to wage true holy war in God’s name. God’s strategy against sin and evil was awaiting the perfect warrior, who could execute divine justice with clean hands and a pure heart. His name is Jesus.

Bridging Contexts

THE EFFICACY OF God’s word. This final episode in the story of Esther brings the narrative to denouement. The victory implied by Mordecai’s counter-decree has now been realized. The crisis is over, the danger is past. The story, though not the book, has come to an end. Literary critics have described this scene as anticlimactic. David Clines argues that the book of Esther once ended with chapter 8 and that this episode is a later addition by an author of lesser “narratival and logical skills.”10 Fox writes, “There is little doubt that in literary terms, the drama has fizzled out and been replaced by somewhat tedious reportage and analysis.”11

It may be agreed that this episode is “reportage,” lacking the vivid drama and action of previous scenes; however, the change in style is purposeful. The meta-message is that once Mordecai’s decree was issued, the deliverance on Adar 13 was a fait accompli. It remained only to report that, just as the decree implied, the Jews did have victory over their enemies and were in fact delivered from annihilation.

The motivation for this downshift in style is theological. Because Mordecai’s decree expressed God’s ancient decree of survival for his people and the destruction of their enemies, it was a done deal before the day dawned. The decree in effect guaranteed the outcome. The author is showing it is God’s decree, his word, that assures the survival of his people; the rest is just detail. But it is important detail, because it shows that God’s word is truly effective in the outworking of human history. God is capable of doing exactly what he says he will do, even centuries after he says it. This episode highlights the powerful efficacy of God’s word as it is actualized in history through flawed, and even evil, people.

God in the affairs of Esther. The conflict between Mordecai the Jew and Haman the Agagite precipitated another episode of holy war between God’s covenant people and the world that wanted to destroy them. Both sides of God’s promise to Moses at Sinai—salvation and destruction—have been realized for the Jews and their enemies in Persia. The resolution of this episode of holy war invites the reader of Esther to consider not only how God has done it, but even if God has done it, since he is nowhere mentioned in the story. Even though the outcome of the story is consistent with God’s ancient promise, what was God’s role in these events?

In all other episodes of holy war in the Old Testament the text explicitly involves God. When the people of Israel first fought the Amalekites, Moses stood on the hill overlooking the battle, holding the staff of God raised to heaven (Ex. 17:8–16). During the period after the Conquest, the Lord raised up judges, who delivered Israel from oppression when the Spirit of the Lord came upon them (cf. Judg. 2:16–18). Saul and David were charismatic kings upon whom God’s Spirit rested. Solomon received his wisdom from the Lord. God gave Daniel the ability to understand dreams and to discern wisdom. All of these people took their places in redemptive history as agents of God working to fulfill his covenant promise to his people.

In the book of Esther, the deliverance of the Jewish nation is connected to the same covenant that runs throughout the Old Testament. Yet neither Esther nor Mordecai are described as devout Jews, nor are they described as empowered by the Spirit of God. As far as we know from the story, both of them seem either ignorant of, or indifferent to, the covenant God had made with their ancestors. Neither are shown to be living out the implications of that covenant in their individual lives. Yet it is through Esther and Mordecai that somehow God’s covenant promise is fulfilled to the Jews scattered throughout the Persian empire. We cannot even be sure from the text that Esther and Mordecai themselves were fully aware of being essential links in redemptive history.

Indeed, M. Fox is not convinced that even the author of Esther is certain about God’s role in the events he recounts. He considers the meta-message of the author’s silence about God to be a “carefully crafted indeterminacy” that is

an attempt to convey uncertainty about God’s role in history. The author is not quite certain about God’s role in these events (are you?) and does not conceal that uncertainty. By refusing to exclude either possibility, the author conveys his belief that there can be no definitive knowledge of the workings of God’s hand in history. Not even a wonderful deliverance can prove that God was directing events; nor could threat and disaster prove his absence. The story’s indeterminacy conveys the message that the Jews should not lose faith if they, too, are uncertain about where God is in a crisis. Israel will survive—that is the author’s faith—but how this will happen he does not know.12

When the Bible states that the Spirit of the Lord is “upon” someone or that God has raised up someone for a special task, the reader knows to expect a story about the remarkable intervention of God in history. All biblical narratives (except prophetic narratives) were written after the events they describe had happened, as the author is reflecting back on and interpreting the significance of past events under divine inspiration. Since all history-telling is selective, the choice of events that are recognized in hindsight as significant contributes to the meta-message of the Bible as those events take their place in inscripturated redemptive history. It is, therefore, appropriate to interpret the book of Esther in this canonical context, with God as the invisible mover behind the deliverance of his people from the threat of annihilation.

However, as those events were unfolding day by day, even the individuals involved may not have recognized their significance in God’s great plan and purpose. The author’s deliberate silence on God’s role as the story unfolds is also a part of his message. Fox’s emphasis on the “indeterminacy” suggested by the author’s silence should be allowed its full force. The fact is, God’s “absence” in Esther is true to life as we experience it. Who could have been certain that God was positioning Esther to be an agent of his deliverance when she was taken to the bedroom of a lustful pagan king (and she pleased him in one night more than all the other virgins!)? In hindsight we may understand it to be so, but at that moment God truly was unseen and his intent concealed. It is therefore both appropriate and highly effective that the author of Esther has portrayed God as absent and his role in the story as uncertain, even though the outcome of the crisis itself seems assured when read within the larger biblical context.

When the Jews finally are delivered from destruction on Adar 13, consider the means by which it came. It stood as the terminus of a long sequence of improbable and even morally questionable events. When the deliverance was realized, it came about not through a miraculous showing of God’s power or a great spiritual revival among the Persians. It came about through the natural outworking of all the ethical and political flaws inherent in the administration of the Persian empire. Just as the nobles, satraps, and governors had bowed down to Haman in fear of his power, they now helped the Jews only because “fear of Mordecai had seized them . . . his reputation spread throughout the provinces, and he became more and more powerful” (vv. 3–4).

There was nothing noble or admirable about the way this reversal of fortune occurred. God did not change the hearts and character of the people. They simply continued in the political intrigue and manipulations that characterized them. Even Esther manipulated the king for her purposes, just as others had done. Mordecai’s increasing power caused others to fear him, suggesting that he was not meek and mild in his new eminence. As both Christian and Jewish interpreters have agreed, this episode of Israel’s history in Persia is not one of impeccable morality and exemplary spiritual character. Even so, God’s promise could not be frustrated.

Fox understands the book of Esther to link

the issue of national salvation to human character. It raises the question of whether a person of dubious character strength and (initially) unclear self-definition can carry the burden of national salvation. Esther becomes a sort of judge (of the type we see in the book of Judges) without benefit of the Spirit of the Lord. She is a leader whose charisma comes not in a sudden divine imposition of spirit but as the result of a difficult process of inner development and self-realization. . . . In Esther, not miracles, but inner resources—intellectual as well as spiritual—even of people not naturally leaders, are to be relied upon in crisis.13

In other words, the book of Esther shows how God fulfilled his covenant promise through providence instead of miraculous intervention. Divine providence means that God governs all creatures, actions, and circumstances through the normal and ordinary course of human life, without the intervention of the supernatural.14 The biblical author’s view that the deliverance was a fait accompli on the basis of the ancient decree given to Moses reflects deep confidence in God’s ability to do exactly what he says, regardless of how he chooses to do it.

The medieval Jewish exegete Abraham Saba understood the book of Esther to indicate a maturing of Israel’s faith. He takes this incident in Israel’s history to mark the time when the Jews finally came to accept the Torah wholeheartedly as the basis of their faith.15 Jewish midrash suggests that until that time God’s people followed him only because of the mighty miracles he did, instead of believing him because of who he is.16 As miracles ceased, Israel’s heart wandered to other gods, no longer confident in Yahweh’s power. Saba explains that this great deliverance achieved without miracles was the reason the Jewish people finally came to rest their faith on the Torah, the Word of God, rather than miraculous displays of his power. The story of Esther implies that what God’s Word has decreed will happen, even without miracles. God’s omnipotence is truly great.

Contemporary Significance

GOD’S POWER AND presence in our lives. God works the same way today as he did in the book of Esther. We, too, live in an age when miraculous displays of God’s might are not the usual way he does things, yet we are still expected to believe in his power and presence. A colleague recently told about an incident that spurred on his faith in God’s power and presence in his life.17

One Sunday morning while Jeff was driving home from church, his five-year-old son, Nate, asked him to speed up so they would not be late for the start of Robin Hood on television. Jeff reminded Nate that the television had not been working because of a problem with the cable box. The repairman had been called, but since it was Sunday, he wasn’t expected until sometime the next day. And even if he had shown up, the house was locked while they had been at church. After a few minutes of sullen silence, Nate suggested they pray that God would fix their TV in time for Robin Hood.

Jeff was about to remind Nate that we should not pray for things like that, because God is not at our beck and call, when he remembered the sermon text, 1 Peter 5:7, “Cast all your anxiety on him because he cares for you.” The preacher had exhorted the congregation to pray about any matter that was on their heart, large or small, for if it troubled them, their heavenly Father cared about it. Jeff wanted his son to know he could turn to God with any troubling matter. A glance in the rearview mirror at Nate’s pouting face clearly showed that missing Robin Hood was troubling to his son. Jeff pulled the car over and listened as Nate asked God to please fix their TV in time for Robin Hood. More concerned about his son’s developing relationship with God than about the TV, Jeff asked the Lord to please hear Nate’s prayer.

Soon they pulled into their driveway, and Nate bounded toward the front door as Jeff pulled the car into the garage. Jeff knew they had locked the front door before leaving for church and so was surprised to find the door standing open behind Nate. Jeff was flabbergasted when he entered the house and found Nate sitting in front of the TV watching Robin Hood! Just then a good family friend came down from upstairs. The friend was unexpectedly passing through town and, knowing where the outside key was hidden, had let himself in. Just a few minutes after he had arrived, the TV repairman arrived and quickly fixed the problem. Jeff says that now, more than a decade later, Nate barely remembers the incident. But Jeff vividly remembers it as an example of the extraordinary and completely unpredictable ways in which God can work.

However, are we certain that it was God at work? Certainly there was nothing miraculous about the repair of the TV. A more skeptical person might view this incident as merely an interesting confluence of improbable events. Reviewing the unusual sequence of events in hindsight, it’s likely the TV was already working even at the moment Nate offered up his prayer, so it would have been repaired even if Nate had not prayed—or would it?

The relationship between petitioning prayer and divine providence is a deep mystery. Do our prayers move God to change the sequence of events? Does God anticipate our prayers and providentially arrange antecedent events to answer them even before we ask, as Nate’s petition for the TV suggests (cf. Matt. 6:8, “. . . your Father knows what you need before you ask him”)? If so, does God’s foreknowledge of when we don’t pray also have an analogous effect?18 Was God at work in this extraordinary sequence of ordinary events or not? And if so, to what end? There is an unavoidable indeterminacy in understanding God’s role in such events in life and history.

The author of Esther was reflecting on this kind of indeterminacy and inviting his readers to do so when he carefully crafted the story of the Jews’ deliverance without explicitly mentioning God’s role in the events. The book of Esther invites its readers to ponder the nature of faith in a world where God is unseen. Only people who entertain the possibility of God’s interaction with human lives can discern the indeterminacy in events that the author of Esther so eloquently expresses, for consistently atheistic rationalists will not admit even the possibility of an unseen reality.

Hebrews 11:1 defines faith as “being sure of what we hope for and certain of what we do not see” (emphasis added). In other words, the very definition of faith calls us to a certainty in the unseen reality lying behind, or beyond, the events we do see, even when, and perhaps especially when, the events are so incompatible with what we would expect given God’s power and presence. Therefore, on what is our certainty to rest, if not on the visible events of history and life? It rests on the explanation God gives us of the unseen reality behind the visible events, that is, on God’s Word. We move from indeterminacy to certainty only on the basis of God’s Word. This means that the indeterminacy of Esther can be resolved only by reading the story in its wider canonical context. If this is done too quickly, however, the reader will miss the opportunity to reflect on the relationship between events and faith.

Events as historic as the deliverance of the Jews in Persia as well as those as private as a child’s answered prayer are an encouragement to view all of life and history with the certainty of the unseen reality of God’s presence and power. Such events reveal that God can and will do just as he has promised, even when we don’t see how he possibly could. The awareness of God’s power and presence should excite us to prayer that is full of anticipation. The answers to our prayers are already on their way, set in motion through a chain of previous events that might appear insignificant even if we somehow became aware of them.

God’s redemptive plan. Our modern faith in God’s promises rests on the texts of the Bible that are growing more ancient with each passing generation. We live at a time when there are no prophets of Yahweh bringing us his Word, so all that we know of God is found in his written Word and the promises it contains. The Bible contains selected events from times long ago and an explanation of the unseen reality that makes these events significant throughout all subsequent human history. Most centrally, it speaks of the crucifixion of Jesus, Israel’s perfect warrior who with clean hands and a pure heart finally waged the ultimate holy war on the cross, conquering sin and death. But those words are two thousand years old, and many today fail to see their relevance for the troubling issues of modern life.

The Bible assures us that the full expanse of human history, including the days in which we now live, is encompassed by God’s redemptive plan. At the moment he left, Jesus promised to be with us always, even to the end of history (Matt. 28:20). God is still working in this world, calling people into his kingdom and bringing all of history to its appointed end. One day God’s redemptive work will be consummated when Israel’s divine warrior and king returns and the world bows in submission to him. There is good reason to believe he is able to do just as he has said, even though he said it so long ago. Scripture warns of being skeptical about God’s ability to fulfill his ancient promises (2 Peter 3:3–7):

. . . you must understand that in the last days scoffers will come, scoffing and following their own evil desires. They will say, “Where is this ‘coming’ he promised? Ever since our fathers died, everything goes on as it has since the beginning of creation.” But they deliberately forget that long ago by God’s word the heavens existed and the earth was formed out of water and by water. By these waters also the world of that time was deluged and destroyed. By the same word the present heavens and earth are reserved for fire, being kept for the day of judgment and destruction of ungodly men. (emphasis added)

The omnipotent word of God that created the universe justifies our certainty in the continuity of God’s providential work in and through human lives to move his people from death to life as he moves history toward its end on the day of judgment. Our generation is no less a living link in God’s work in history than were Esther and Mordecai’s. Christ has come, but the gospel must still go out to all nations in every generation until he returns.

Even those whose sinful pride, like Haman’s, pit them against God and the gospel are in the final analysis players in the universal plan of redemption. Perhaps in the end, they tragically will be what the apostle Paul refers to as “objects of his wrath,” who like Haman (and Judas Iscariot) form dark links in a plan of salvation that nevertheless cannot be thwarted (Rom. 9:22–24). One would hope that before their end they will turn to Christ and become “objects of his mercy,” counted among the people whom God has called out from both the Jews and Gentiles to be saved from his destruction of evil. For all who have come to know Christ have been saved from God’s wrath, whether Jew or Gentile.

Walking by faith. As God brings his ancient promise of salvation to fulfillment in individual lives throughout history, we cannot at any moment know the significance of world events or even that of the ordinary events of our own private lives. The author of Esther calls us to trust in the power and presence of God even when, and perhaps especially when, he seems absent and we cannot imagine how he could possibly do what he has promised in his Word.

Reflection on the events described in Esther should make us more open to the creative and unexpected ways God works in us and through us. We are called to walk by faith, not by sight; however, that faith is a certainty in the unseen realities lying behind what we do see. We are to live with the knowledge that both our best moments and our worst are all a part of what God is doing in us and through us in the lives of others. We cannot see the end of the matter from the beginning or the middle. The story of Esther assures us that we do not have to.