Thus far, I have 27 blogs on one word: HOPE. I try to stick to an unspoken rule of writing between 800 and 1000 words for each blog (this is the guideline that is set for most op-ed newspaper columnists). That makes approximately 27,000 written words on one topic.
Oh, it's taken various turns, but each step of the way, hope has been the banner under which each written word hovers.
You'd think that by now, more than half-way through 2018, I would have mastered this topic. You'd think that all the note-taking, researching, summarizing, praying, sermon-gathering-and-listening I've done would have made me somewhat of an expert on dispensing hope to myself and others.
This was my goal back on January 1: to become a hope dispenser...a light-giver in a dark-world.
Then, there was this conversation with a friend…
Life has been a series of hardships.
One after another.
No let ups.
No opportunities to take a long deep breath.
No resting.
One difficulty has spiraled straight into another one.
My friend had questions.
I had words of response; but, in my mind, they fell short.
Words often do.
So, I listened more and talked less.
It seemed like all I had to offer were cliches, slogans, and Christianese-language, instead of life-giving, hope-dispensing HELP.
Hope, without practical help, is just "vanity...a chasing after the wind," according to King Solomon.
Oh, I could have talked about how to fill the hope bank; I could have waxed fairly eloquent about God's good promises and His faithfulness; I could have conjured up truths about finding one's way out of the darkness and the resulting bitterness...but, those wouldn’t have solved the current struggle, and the desperation that comes with TIRED...
Obviously, there is still more to learn about hope-dispensing…
I began to question: Aren’t there biblical examples of men, or women, who found HOPE when there seemed to be nothing left? Is there not a model to follow when God’s good promises seem to be falling flat, and frankly, He does not seem to be holding up His end of the bargain? Where do we turn when God seems silent? When He seems particularly absent?
But, of course, there is a biblical account of an absent, silent God! It’s found in a book that bears the name of a woman, a queen, in fact, named Esther. It’s the story of a God whose name doesn’t even appear in the book.
Esther had her share of problems. She may have had the title “Queen” attached to her name, but in reality it meant nothing. Even queens had no rights in those days of Middle-Eastern culture, certainly not in the world of the Medes and Persians. Esther was simply the King’s possession - charged with doing his bidding, to be available as he called…or face exile (there was one other queen before Esther, named Vashti…)
This is what we know about Esther - She was:
* Taken captive as a young girl.
* Orphaned and raised by a cousin, just a bit older, named Mordecai.
* Forced to live, learn and befriend in an unfamiliar world with unfamiliar language & customs
* Raised among a people who held strongly to anti-semitic views.
* Taught that in order to survive, she had to be a secret-service-Jew, and hide her heritage.
* Strongly encouraged to change her name to a more Persian-sounding-name…
* Stripped of her dreams…most likely, as any young woman, Esther longed to marry, to have a family, to gain back all she had lost. All those dreams died, when she was “chosen” to enter a beauty pageant, ultimately crowning her Queen.
Enter, Haman, a man of greed, consumed with power. When Mordecai refused to bow to Haman, an age-old grudge was re-fueled, and all Haman saw was “pay back.” He orchestrated an unbreakable law that all Jews would be annihilated in a mass-killing on one particular day: all Israelites (!) from an empire that stretched from India, all the way across Asia, down through the fertile crescent to the Mediterranean (including parts of Europe, all of Asia Minor, to Egypt, and Ethiopia) - some have estimated as many as 15 million Jews…not excluding Esther.
Now, the hope of millions, rested in the hands of one powerless, young woman.
* Where was God?
* What about His promises to a chosen people?
* What more could one girl handle?
* Where does one find hope, when it seems all the light has gone out?
Esther holds a key to lessons I've unknowingly missed on HOPE.
It’s a valuable lesson…a thread to cling to when God seems particularly silent, unheeding, and withdrawn.
I plan to dig into Esther’s life for a few weeks to discover the mystery, and the answers, she wants us to find; and, I hope you’ll come along.
To end, I’ll leave you with just one word that is the essence of this mystery:
PROVIDENCE
Let's consider it’s meaning this week…
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