A New Word that Makes A Story Worth Telling - and, it brings HOPE!

The word-nerd is coming out in me today. 

You may not be one. In fact, you may not be slightly interested in words, at all. 

Inwardly, you may be groaning…

I dare you to stick with me to the end. I find this new word I’ve been introduced to (through the vehicle of the commentary I’m reading on Esther) absolutely fascinating. 

By the end of this blog, I hope you find it fascinating, too; AND, above all, it will point us  to the HOPE of PROVIDENCE.

By way of introduction, I would make this statement: authoring a book is not easy. 

A few weeks back, I used a quote by Earnest Hemingway, “There is nothing to writing, you just sit down at a typewriter (in our case, computer) and bleed.”

That’s my approach to writing.

I am also one of those who writes to know what is going on up there in my brain. 

I write for order.

I write to corral the wild horses in my head. 

There are a lot of good authors; but, to be a great author requires a sense of literary skill and style. 

Great authors utilize literary tools for effectiveness. 

By virtue of this, great authors put exclamation marks on their stories.

Their points are clear, written artistically, structurally, fluently, and, with literary efficiency. 

The Lord God is a great writer. 

He whispered the words to Esther’s story via an un-named author, perhaps Mordecai (for the sake of this blog, we’ll say it is), that we might fully appreciate the HOPE we have in the unseen hand of a Sovereign God.

As mentioned last week, the entire theme of Esther is wrapped around this fact:

God is the I Am who reverses destinies. 

He is Yahweh, Reverser of Expected Outcomes.

I know God is a great author, because to prove this somewhat unknown aspect of His character, God moves Mordecai’s pen, using a literary device that I’ve been unaware of until recently (it is, actually, a very fun word to say, and make us sound smart when we use it). 

Peripety

Peripety, in Esther, is the hinge on which the door of Providence opens.

Peripety is the “sudden and unexpected change of fortune, or a reverse of circumstances (particularly in a literary work), that swiftly turns a routine sequence of events into a story worth telling…” (WordBook Dictionary App)

Peripety is the pivot point, that moment when everything changes; highlighting the new thing the Lord is about to do. 

Most narratives place the peripety at the scene of highest climax: that moment when the protagonist of a story (our hero, or heroine) confronts the antagonist (the enemy). 

Yet, this is not so in Esther. 

The pivot point of Esther, the hinge on which the door of Providence began to open, had nothing to do with either the heroine, or her sworn enemy, Haman, doing ANYTHING. 

The peripety of Esther takes place in chapter 6, when in verse 1, we are told: 

“That night the King could not sleep. And he gave orders to bring the book of memorable deeds, and they were read before the King.”

Chapter 6 contains the first of many reversals to follow… On the very day Haman goes to the king to seek permission to kill Mordecai, Haman ends up not only not killing Mordecai, but has to publicly honor him in the King’s name. How humiliating for Haman… After all, he thought this story was all about him...a soon to be written book, titled Haman! 

Things change from this point forward - a fast-paced sequence of reversals follow - not because anyone had really done anything to this point.

Esther had stood in a doorway, praying for the scepter of grace to be extended. Yet, that one action was not responsible for any turn of events, at that point.

Esther had hostessed a banquet to “honor” the King and Haman, but nothing had come from that yet, either.

But with an insignificant, ordinary event, a sleepless night (this happens to me way too frequently, so maybe I'm being set up for "periphery?"), the tables began to turn. 

I loved what Dr. Karen Jobes said in her commentary:

By separating the pivot point of the peripety in Esther from the point of highest dramatic tension, the characters of the story are not spotlighted as the cause of the reversal. This reinforces the message that NO ONE IN THE STORY (emphasis mine throughout), not even the most powerful person in the empire, is IN CONTROL OF WHAT IS ABOUT TO HAPPEN. An unseen power is controlling the reversal of destiny, at all times. The Greek translation makes this implicit truth explicit with the statement, “The Lord took sleep from the King that night” (LXX of 6:1, pers. trans.)

That gives me shivers.

We never know what ordinary event may begin to turn the tables on our problems that strip HOPE. 

We can’t be certain of how the very thing that frustrates us the most might be used of God to start swinging open the door…

…But, Esther's story teaches us to HOPE in the unexpected.

…to HOPE in the normal, and the ordinary, and the mundane of every day activities.

…to HOPE in something as daily as eating a meal.

...to HOPE at ALL TIMES, and in ALL WAYS, and in ALL THINGS, because there may be a “BUT GOD” just around the corner. 

That's the lesson of peripety.

Now, how does that not fascinate you? 

Don’t shivers run up and down your spine?

Don’t goose bumps appear on your arms?

Peripety:

In the end, it makes a story worth telling!

(and the Lord God is a master at it!)

We call that REDEMPTION.

Praise the name of Jesus.  Our Yahweh, who is the reverser of destinies.

Our Great Promise Keeper.

The Awe-mazing Author of our very own stories.

Watch for peripety in your own life!

Expect it in the unexpected.