Christian Devotions
By Ross Freeman
Asking God
Esther 4
All the king’s servants and the people of the king’s provinces know that any man or woman who goes into the inner court to the king, who has not been called, he has but one law: put all to death, except the one to whom the king holds out the golden scepter, that he may live. Yet I myself have not been called to go in to the king these thirty days.” So they told Mordecai Esther’s words. And Mordecai told them to answer Esther: “Do not think in your heart that you will escape in the king’s palace any more than all the other Jews. For if you remain completely silent at this time, relief and deliverance will arise for the Jews from another place, but you and your father’s house will perish. Yet who knows whether you have come to the kingdom for such a time as this?” Then Esther told them to reply to Mordecai: “Go, gather all the Jews who are present in Shushan, and fast for me; neither eat nor drink for three days, night or day. My maids and I will fast likewise. And so I will go to the king, which is against the law; and if I perish, I perish!” So Mordecai went his way and did according to all that Esther commanded him. (Esther 4:11-17 NKJ)
Mordaaci and the Jewish people needed help to overturn an unjust law. But to approach the king unasked was to be put to death.
Esther in her wisdom knew that to approach the king, gain his favor and have the law overturned; she had to put her trust and faith in God. She knew that she, Mordaaci and the Jewish people could not apply to the king until they had first applied to God. Esther, therefore, encouraged them to apply to God by prayer and fasting, to obtain God’s favor in the situation, thereby finding favor with the king. In doing this Esther committed her safety into the hands of God and to be under His protection. So a solemn assembly was called where the Jews attended their respective synagogues to pray for her, keeping a solemn fast; abstaining from all meals and pleasant food for three days.
Esther sanctified this fast in her apartment in the palace with her maids; she was unable to attend the synagogues. But she did it in privacy joining her prayers and her faith with those in the synagogues. She may have been absent in the body but she was present in the spirit.
Esther went to the king not according the king’s law, but according to God’s law. She was not concerned with her own life but to serve God. She sought God, obeyed God and God brought her through.
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