Esther 4:13-14God does use men, like Esther, to advance his kingdom and cause. Nevertheless, God's purposes don't depend on Esther. Christian leaders who remain silent, thinking it is to their advantage, are not undermining our cause, but their own. We can entreat them to do what they seem called to do, but we should also recognize that God will deliver us, if not from that quarter, from some other.
Then Mordecai commanded to answer Esther, Think not with thyself that thou shalt escape in the king's house, more than all the Jews. For if thou altogether holdest thy peace at this time, then shall there enlargement and deliverance arise to the Jews from another place; but thou and thy father's house shall be destroyed: and who knoweth whether thou art come to the kingdom for such a time as this?
-TurretinFan
2 comments:
I've been pondering for some weeks that phrase in the book of Ester thinking about just what it means and how it equips us to be "kingdom" people today in a world that is quickly heading down the drain into the cesspool of immoralities of all kinds as described in Leviticus 18.
What exactly does this mean: "Esther 4:14 ...And who knows whether you have not come to the kingdom for such a time as this?" "??
Clearly we are given this to contemplate and come into an understanding of God's Kingdom in contrast to the world's and the god of this world.
The Apostle Paul wrote a descriptor of it as Righteousness, Peace and Joy in the Holy Spirit. Apparently that must have been what was in view for Mordecai to say that to Esther seeing they were not in the Promised Land and Jerusalem laid in ruins?
It also gives a sense that the Kingdom of God that we are to come into is not what is afoot with Christian Zionists and Dispensationalists.
It seems to me the Apostle Peter, among others, captured the essence of what it is, this Kingdom, when he had written by the hand of Silvanus, this:
1Pe 5:5 Likewise, you who are younger, be subject to the elders. Clothe yourselves, all of you, with humility toward one another, for "God opposes the proud but gives grace to the humble."
1Pe 5:6 Humble yourselves, therefore, under the mighty hand of God so that at the proper time he may exalt you,
1Pe 5:7 casting all your anxieties on him, because he cares for you.
1Pe 5:8 Be sober-minded; be watchful. Your adversary the devil prowls around like a roaring lion, seeking someone to devour.
1Pe 5:9 Resist him, firm in your faith, knowing that the same kinds of suffering are being experienced by your brotherhood throughout the world.
1Pe 5:10 And after you have suffered a little while, the God of all grace, who has called you to his eternal glory in Christ, will himself restore, confirm, strengthen, and establish you.
1Pe 5:11 To him be the dominion forever and ever. Amen.
The Kingdom is a calling and we have in our time too been called to His Eternal Glory in Christ to be beacons of Eternal Life in this temporary sojourning wherever we are! My flesh is working overtime at times to ignore this truth! My soul is weary at times too!
I'm similarly disturbed by the silence of Christian leaders with regards to the aberrant ecclesiology (and distorted teaching on the Gospel itself) of Abolish Human Abortion. There's a fairly large and militant group proselytizing, and no one seems to want to speak up about them. If the Caner debacle gets the attention that it does (and that it should), surely AHA could receive 1 or 2 critical appraisals from able critics like Dr. White and Turretin Fan.
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