Esther - Week 2: A New Queen Is Crowned

Erin Davis: Welcome back to The Women of the Bible podcast. I’m Erin Davis. We’re walking through the study Esther: Trusting God’s Plan, and I have some friends with me and we’re walking through the book of Esther together.

I want you ladies to introduce yourselves to those who are listening, and what I’d love to know (because of what we’re talking about in this session) is how you’re interacting with women? I know that we have a shared heart for women to know and love the Word of God.

You’re impacting women’s lives in areas that I’m not, so just tell us your name and how you’re interacting with women. Venessa, we’ll start with you.

Dr. Venessa Ellen: I’m Dr. Venessa Ellen, and I have a couple of touchpoints where I get to really minister to women, and it’s exciting! One, I serve as a chair of a Women’s Ministry Degree program at the College of Biblical Studies in Houston, Texas.

So I get to mentor the ladies and take them through and watch them graduate with their degree—for some of them, their very first degree! So that’s really exciting!

Then on the other side, my husband is a pastor. So at our church, Community of Faith Bible Church in Houston, I’m the Women’s Ministry Director and church administrator.

So I get to really, really dig deep into the lives of women. Also, my husband and I spend a lot of time doing premarital and marital counseling. So we’re heavily into the biblical counseling movement and just really love it and enjoy it.

Erin: Wow!

Betsy Gómez: That’s great! I am Betsy Gomez. My family and I moved recently to Irving, Texas. My husband is one of the pastors there. We started First Irving in Español. So right now we are in the very beginning of this Spanish congregation within an English-speaking church, and I’m there serving women.

Erin: I love that. I’m Erin Davis. My interactions with women happen mostly on my back porch these days. I have four little boys, and so I’m just in a season of life where home is my ministry headquarters.

I have a sweet group of college girls who come every Friday. Right now we’re walking through the book of Hebrews, and they are my absolute delight! They’re never allowed to graduate or leave—I love them so much!

I love to teach in my own local church. I have great women friends that I hope would say that I point them to Jesus. I live in an all-boy household—one husband and four sons. I would just be adrift without women, and I’m so grateful for all the ways that I get to come alongside women and they come alongside me.

We’re going to talk in this session about some tough stuff. Our focus is going to be on the fact that God is at work in our difficult circumstances. It’s with those women in mind I thought we might like to start, because there are women listening . . . I think every woman listening faces something hard! You know, there’s some pocket of brokenness in her life.

But there are some walking a really hard, rocky road! She needs to hear . . . I’m going to say it here and I hope she hears us say it over and over that, “God is at work in your difficult circumstance!” He’s at work in your difficult circumstance! He’s at work in your difficult circumstances!

So I thought, as women who love women and women who interact with women, we’d just fire off some of the difficult circumstances we see in the lives of the women in our world.

Dr. Venessa: It could be the father of a young daughter walks away, and she grows up without her biological father . . . or she gets a stepfather that is not as kind, sort of like our king here [King Xerxes in the book of Esther], and she experiences that from a young child.

Betsy: Yes, I see a lot of brokenness around me with all the sexual abuse that women are experiencing—that’s being hidden—and all the pain that they are experiencing. Also, a lot of brokenness in their families. I see when I walk with young women, as you said Venessa, a lot of lack of identity because of fathers out of the home. It’s really hard to be a young woman these days, to be a woman.

Dr. Venessa: The hope is there for us in Christ! A quick testimony: our oldest daughter is adopted. She was molested by her stepfather from age seven to seventeen (she allows me to tell her story), but today you would never know it! She’s saved, and she’s serving the Lord. She’s a director of our children’s ministry at the church, and God has done a wonderful work!

I think that’s the story we’re diving into, how many things can happen to you from young, but God! But God!

Betsy: Amen!

Erin: Absolutely! Things that are totally beyond your control and situations that you can’t extract yourself from. I think of a friend I know who deals with really debilitating anxiety. She knows the Lord; she loves His Word. She wants to be free of it, and I know that she will be—because “whom the Son sets free is free indeed” (see John 8:36). I know He wants her to be free but right now she’s not there.

She’s walking through it day by day, minute by minute. A woman in hard circumstances knows the hope is there, but she needs the reminder that God is at work even though we haven’t reached the “happy ending” of her story. That’s true whether that’s a difficult marriage or a child who’s not walking with the Lord or a sickness or a chronic illness or a terminal illness or a financial struggle.

No matter what it is that you’re in the middle of, God is at work in the midst of that, and that’s what we’re going to see in Esther chapter 2.

We read through that chapter together over lunch; we won’t read the whole chapter here again. But what has happened is: King Xerxes dethrones his queen because she won’t bow to his whims. He decides to hold an elaborate beauty contest (this guy goes for “elaborate” every time!). He is going to have women gathered together, and he will choose his new queen  from there.

We see here in Esther 2:2 who is in the beauty contest: “Then the king's young men who attended him said, ‘Let beautiful young virgins be sought . . . for the king.’” Let me take us to verse 5 where we meet Esther:

Now there was a Jew in Susa the citadel whose name was Mordecai, the son of Jair, son of Shimei, son of Kish, a Benjaminite who had been carried away from Jerusalem among the captives carried away with Jeconiah king of Judah, whom Nebuchadnezzar king of Babylon had carried away. He was bringing up Hadassah, that is Esther, the daughter of his uncle, for she had neither father nor mother.

The young woman had a beautiful figure and was lovely to look at, and when her father and her mother died, Mordecai took her as his own daughter (vv. 5–8).

What do we already know about Esther from just these few verses?

Dr. Venessa: Life had already been hard for her from a young child! Her parents were deceased and she was technically orphaned and she’s growing up, probably (it doesn’t tell us, but we could speculate) . . . She might not have known Mordecai that well. We don’t know.

Erin: They’re cousins. He takes her in. And what do we know about Mordecai just from these few verses? His life hasn’t been any easier, right? What can we see in the passage?

Betsy: We see him taking her in. He adopts her as his daughter, and this is beautiful, because we see adoption right here.

Erin: And it’s only after he’s been taken from his homeland. We see in Scripture this captivity of the people of God. He’s been removed from Jerusalem and taken to Susa, which is about 700 miles as the crow flies (it’s probably a lot more like a thousand travel-miles). There aren’t planes, there aren’t cars. He’s a long way from home!

Esther and Mordecai had both endured a great deal of heartache. I think we tend to romanticize what happens next in the story. If you’ve seen movies of this or Sunday school portrayals, it sounds like Esther is a Cinderella. She’s rags-to-riches! There’s this elaborate beauty contest. We saw in verse 2 that the contestants are these virgins.

The historian, Josephus, estimates that there were about 400 virgins rounded up for this contest. So let’s not race past that. Let’s sit in that a minute. What is happening? Four-hundred women taken—taken!—and forced into the king’s harem. Imagine the culture; think with me what is happening in those young women’s lives.

Betsy: Yes, we think that these women are like Cinderella’s sister, craving to be picked, like, “Oh, yeah! The king, the prince will love me. I’ll love him! I want to be chosen!”

Erin: They hope the glass slipper fits!

Betsy: But this meant to be taken away from your family, from your life, from your dreams. Everything’s shattered, and it’s not like you’re going to a nice place. You’re going to a harem. And that’s not a beautiful picture, because there you’re an object. It’s horrible.

Dr. Venessa: Yes, and they’ve already been taken. They were in this position because of disobedience, so they’ve already experienced being exiled. Some of them have gone back and some of them haven’t, so they’ve been going through turmoil for quite some time.

And now we look at this. It says the young women were “gathered.” They weren’t like volunteering.

Erin: No, this isn’t American Idol. They don’t sign up and hope they get picked.

Dr. Venessa: No, they were gathered. Verse 3 tells us that. What I found interesting is, they were gathered into a harem. Then after their night with the king, now they’re tossed into concubines. So you don’t even get to go back home if you’re not picked.

Erin: No, they’re tossed aside. That’s what happens systematically. I would have to imagine that some of them are never called upon. I mean, there are 400 of them in the harem. They’re called to a night with the king . . . and we know what that is. They’re not sitting on a couch watching a chick flick.

They are summoned to the king at his whim and forced to do what he requires of them, and the one who pleases him will be crowned queen,but the odds are almost none of being chosen. And if they are ever summoned to him and not chosen, you’re right, they’re sent back as concubines, totally discarded, never to be called on again.

This is a degrading system that treats women as property. It’s not romantic, it’s not lovely, it’s not sweet. We see a picture of Xerxes in the text, that this is a man who abuses his power to get what he wants. He is using these women to get what he wants.

I think it’s important, as we look at this story, to think how difficult these circumstances are! You or I are not going to face circumstances this dark. We will face hard things, but I can’t fathom a situation where we’re rounded up and held as property at the whim of a powerful man. This is a difficult, difficult circumstance . . . and yet . . . the Lord is at work.

Betsy: You would ask yourself why God allowed this to happen! Why? Where was God here? I really love the fact that God is not hiding the consequences of our brokenness . . . and that brings me hope. Because when I see a situation where I’m tempted toward that: “Where is God at work in that place?” I can look here and I can see the invisible hand of God working in spite of the situations.

Erin: Absolutely.

Dr. Venessa: And this is very akin to what we still in our day today, the sex trafficking.

Erin: It’s what it is!

Dr. Venessa: We did some missions work down in Mexico, Queretero. They were telling me of a lady’s testimony there. She had been taken and mistreated and violently molested and so on, and in the end God comes around and saves her. And she goes to the prison and ministers to the guy that does all this to her.

It’s always the hand of God. We don’t always know the end of the story, as Esther didn’t know the end story, but God is there! He’s working there. I think we still see this happening today. Young girls are taken off their porch, taken from a poolside, gathered up. We still see it.

Betsy: And something that is a contrast, that I think we can highlight, is with all these evil, crazy things happening, the word “favor” appears so many times. So even though she was going through this difficult situation, God was granting her favor because He had a better plan in mind. It’s important for us to understand that, even in the dark places. God is shining His light because He’s at work!

Dr. Venessa: Yes, it’s important not to become hopeless, because He is our hope! And it may be that your situation, your circumstances may not even change.Technically, Esther didn’t know if her situation was going to change. Look at Joseph: his situation didn’t change for years. But God is with you. If you belong to Him, He’s with you.

Erin: He’s working things that you cannot see, that you couldn’t ask Him for. There have been so many situations in my life where I am somewhere in some circumstance. I’ll think, Man! If I had written today, if I had written this year, if I had written my life, I never would have inserted this into the script! And yet, the Lord in His infinite timing was working those things to my good!

Betsy: Yes, I imagine Esther asking herself, “Why am I here?” Because, by that time, she might not have seen the purpose yet of everything, because the scenario was not put in place yet. It reminds me of Joseph, Why am I here? Why am I being mistreated? What is God doing? I imagine there are many women in situations where they are asking the same questions.

Why am I stuck in this marriage? or Why do I have this situation with my child? or Why do I have to face this in my work? God is at work!

Erin: Yes, and I think we ask, “Why?” I think the other question we ask is, “Where?” “Where are You, God, and why won’t You show up in this situation?!” That question is so corrosive to our hearts. The Lord can handle it. We can ask those hard questions of Him. But I think when we start to say, “Where are You in this?” and imply that He’s absent, it weakens our faith.

Scripture gives us an answer, I think, when our hearts speak untruth. My friend, Tippy, says, “Feelings aren’t facts; they’re just feelings.” You can feel that God has abandoned you, you can feel that God has dropped the ball, you can feel that whatever you’re going through is purposeless, but that doesn’t make it a fact. What is true is Scripture.

I want to take us to Psalm 139:7–12, because it answers the, “Where are You?” question.

“Where shall I go from your Spirit? Or where shall I flee from your presence? If I ascend to heaven, you are there” (vv. 7–8). And we would nod our heads and go, “Yes, of course God’s in heaven.”

But here it says, “If I make my bed in Sheol, you are there. If I take the wings of the morning and dwell in the uttermost parts of the sea, even there your hand shall lead me, your right hand shall hold me. If I say, ‘Surely the darkness shall cover me, and the light about me be night’” (vv. 9–11).

That feels like something these women might cry out, “This darkness is going to cover me, it’s going to swallow me!”

I say that the valley of the shadow of death is that place where you say, “If I have to stay here one more minute, I’m gonna die!” That’s how it feels, that “the darkness is going to swallow me!” But here’s the answer (that’s the feeling, but the truth is): “Even the darkness is not dark to you; the night is bright as the day, for darkness is as light with you” (v. 12).

So even in the darkness of a wicked king’s harem . . . and that’s dark, right? I don’t know how it gets much darker. Sex trafficking has happened; the objectification of women has happened; these women’s lives have been shattered. That’s dark! But even the darkness is not dark to Him; He is there!

I’ve been struck lately just by the omnipresence of God. And that’s a “church word” that non-Christians go, “What? Omnipresence?” It just means He’s everywhere! He’s everywhere always! He’s with Esther in a pagan king’s harem. He’s with your sweet daughter, Venessa, whom you mentioned, who’s walking the path of redemption after abuse.

He’s with the women in your churches who don’t see a way out of their situation. He’s with you in every single hard place. And you know what? I can go through hard things, but I can’t go through hard things alone!

Dr. Venessa: That’s right.

Erin: It’s when I feel like I’m by myself that I can’t endure. And I think we pray for people wrong. I think it’s good to pray for people (of course we should pray for people). But here’s what I hear the people of God saying all the time: “Be with them. Be with them in their hardship; be with them in their hospital room; be with them as they mourn the loss of their loved one.”

And Scripture says, “He’s right there. He’s in every hard place!” So I wonder if we could just give ourselves and other women listening . . . What’s some new language? What are some new ways we could encourage women to pray for others who are going through hard things?

Dr. Venessa: I would say, “Comfort them, Lord.” Because He’s the Great Comforter, no matter what the hurt is. We can’t know the hurt of the loss of a child (unless you’ve had that). We don’t know the depths of that or, like, an adulterous husband or something like that. I always say, “Comfort them, Lord.” He’s the Great Comforter.

I always say, “Lord, grant them wisdom to go through their situation.” The Scripture says, “If you lack wisdom, ask it of Me!” (see James 1:5). Sometimes you’re going through and you’re in your darkness and you don’t know what to do next. Ask the Lord for wisdom.

So maybe we can pray the things they don’t remember: “Lord, remind them of Your truth, remind them of Your love, remind them that You love them regardless of this situation. Remove the people who have incorrect information about You.”

People are quick to come along to say, “It’s oka-a-ay. Just trust God.” Yes, but what does that really mean if my child just died in a pool? What does that mean if my son is on drugs? What does “trust God” mean?

Betsy: Yes, I think we also need to pray, “Lord, open their eyes so they can see You!” I think that sometimes we complicate things. It’s really simple. Sometimes it’s just, “Open their eyes so they can see Your greatness, Your mercy, Your grace, Your doing. Open their eyes so they can see their own sin, so they can repent.”

“Open their eyes that they can see that throne, that it’s open for them. Open their eyes so they can see the wonders of Christ.” That’s very thoughtful, what you said Erin, because it’s true. Sometimes we pray for things that are already answered.

Erin: Absolutely!

Betsy: We need to start praying for the Lord to do something with the fact that He’s there!

Erin: Now, I struggle with prayer sometimes, especially in difficult situations. I know I don’t have the words; I don’t necessarily want to hear my own voice in those situations. So it’s always a good idea to pray Scripture over somebody. It is the Word of God. It will have an impact, it will accomplish what the Lord has for it.

And so that psalm that we just read where it’s saying, “Even the darkness is not dark to You. The night is as bright as the day.” I can think of a million situations where having somebody speak that over my life would be such a comfort! So we can rest that God’s presence is everywhere.

It was with Esther in this dark, oppressive system; it’s with every woman in every situation. His presence is available, and His presence is such a comfort because we’re never, ever, ever, ever alone! We’re never, ever, ever without the Great Comforter, the Great Physician, the Defender, the Mighty Savior, the Rock, the Counselor. He is with us all the time!

The only other person who is with us that much is ourselves—and I would like to escape myself most of the time and be with Him! And it’s such a comfort.

And so, before we move on, I want us to meet Mordecai quickly. We’re going to be back in Esther chapter 2. When we meet this hero, we’re all going to learn to love Mordecai over the course of this book. We already read about him: he is in exile; he has been taken from his home; he is the adoptive father of Esther. And what we see in both Mordecai and Esther is that they’re refugees. That’s not their home; they’re displaced persons.

All of this is interesting language for our times when there’s lots of talk about refugees and asylum and sanctuary cities. Those are the words that are given for Mordecai and Esther, but they’re true for us as well. Let’s turn ourselves to 1 Peter 2:11. Betsy, do you have it; can you read it to us?

Betsy: “Beloved, I urge you as sojourners and exiles to abstain from the passions of the flesh, which wage war against your soul.”

Erin: Peter’s writing this. Who’s “the Beloved,” who is he writing to?

Dr. Venessa and Betsy: To believers.

Erin: It’s to the church, and he calls us “sojourners” and “exiles.” I’m not a political refugee; I live in the same little hometown I’ve lived in since I was born. I live on a piece of property where my husband’s grandfather built the house in the ‘60s.

I mean, I am deeply rooted where I live, so I am not a sojourner and an exile like we would typically think of. So why is Peter calling me, as a follower of Christ, a sojourner and an exile?

Betsy: I think because we don’t belong here. This is not our home. And let me tell you, this is my fourth year of living in another country, and the fact that I am away from home has been a constant reminder of, “Where do I really belong?”

Because even though we know who we are—I know my heritage, my culture. But living here I need to conform myself in some ways to this living. I need to learn how to be on time for a dinner, and stuff like that.

The reality is, it’s really hard when you don’t feel like you belong. It’s hard when I need to communicate because English is not my first language. But the reality is, my identity is not in that feeling of being inadequate, of being from another country. It is not in trying to Americanize myself. My identity is where I really belong, It is in Christ, it’s heaven. I am a citizen of heaven!

And that is what has to inform every decision, everything I do. It’s the pattern of living that I need to conform myself to.

Erin: I love that.

Dr. Venessa: Yes, and we’re not to be conformed to this world but be transformed by the Word of God. Sometimes we get the idea that the things of this world are who we are and what we’re about and we conform ourselves to the ways of this world system—forgetting that we don’t belong here. We’re just passing through.

This is not our home. God is going to call us unto Him. So we don’t need to take on some of the tapestry of the world—the language, the lingo, the dress, the conversation, the mentality of the world that is so anti-God. We forget where we really live.

Erin: We will always be exiles, which means there are always going to be pockets of brokenness in our lives. Until Christ returns for us or until we’re individually called to be with Him, there will be difficult circumstances. It’s been so helpful to me in my thirties to stop getting over the shock of that, to stop being surprised by hard things. To just know that I am broken, my people are broken, my land is broken, my culture is broken. We’re going to remain broken until the Lord sets all things right. And so I can know this is not “it” for me. This is not my home. I’m an exile here.

I think as we think back to the list of the challenges women we know are facing, they’re always going to deal with brokenness. We’re always going to deal with brokenness. We represent different ages and stages of life at this table, and none of us have arrived. None of us have outrun the brokenness!

Dr. Venessa: And we never will.

Erin: And we never will. But that is not our hope. Esther’s hope was not ultimately in being elevated out of this broken system. I think of the 399 women who didn’t become Esther, and yet Jesus still loved them. They were still made in the image of God.

Whatever hard situation you’re facing today (and I could count mine on two hands, probably you could, too) my hope is not in the resolution of those circumstances. My hope is that God is omnipresent—He’s everywhere! Every time I have to lay on my bathroom floor and cry over something hard, He’s there.

Every time I’m in my minivan and I think, I might jump out of the driver’s seat if they don’t stop whacking each other with their MacDonald’s toys! Not to trivialize hard things, I mean, in the moment that feels really hard.

Dr. Venessa: Yes it does.

Erin: Or every hospital room . . . He is with me in all of that. That’s hope! And the other hope is this: He is eternal, and He makes all things beautiful in His time. Not in my time. I would have everything beautiful now! But in His time, He makes all things beautiful! That is the hope that any woman in a difficult circumstance—listening and walking through the story of Esther—has.

Dr. Venessa: I think it’s important, also, for us to say that the Scripture says you can grieve your disappointments. Sometimes we want women to have the joy—the happy, happy, joy, joy face—when their world is crumbling around them. It says, grieve your disappointments. The thing is, don’t act like God is not in the middle of your disappointment.

Do not give way to your disappointment to where it has more power than the power of Christ in your life. But does that mean that we can’t cry sometimes? Does that mean that the situation didn’t just hurt really, really bad?

Betsy: We see a lot of mourning here, and I think it’s a good thing to lament. It’s a healthy thing. We see it throughout the Psalms. The thing is, where is my grieving going to point me? This story is pointing to God. It’s saying, “I am grieved. I am lamenting, but I have a hope that’s bigger! And I’m going to hold fast!”

Dr. Venessa: Yes, and I think that’s the key. If you’re not careful, your grieving, your disappointment turns into a big ol’ pity party. Before you know it, it’s not about God any more. Now it’s about me and what I didn’t get or what I should have received.

Erin: That’s hopeless grief. There’s anger, there’s grief, there’s sorrow, there’s lamentation, and then there are those things with hope. They just look different!

Betsy, would you by way of closing this episode . . . We mentioned women in different circumstances, and I know there was a woman listening that went, “That’s me! I’m in a difficult circumstance, and I just need to know that God is at work!” Would you just reach through the microphone—the Lord will do it supernaturally—and just pray for her?

Betsy: Lord, You know my sister. She’s in desperate need for You! I pray that You will open her eyes to Your greatness, that today she will gain a big, huge understanding of Your sovereign doing in her life.

I pray that You will open her eyes to your love demonstrated in Christ, that you will open her eyes to Your grace, and that You will open her eyes to the hope that is waiting for her in her real home in heaven! I pray that you will deliver her and that she will see You as her Intercessor, Her King, Her God.

Thank you God, because in the midst of our pain we have hope, and this is our hope. Jesus is our hope! Thank You God, in Jesus’ name I pray, amen.

Venessa and Erin: Amen!

All Scripture is taken from the ESV unless otherwise noted.

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