This past week, I found myself working through the story of Esther. Now, if you’re not familiar with her story, well, in short, I’ve never met anyone who said, “I wish I was Esther.”
We love her story; in fact, many daughters through the centuries have been named after Esther. We love her courage, conviction, and compassion for her people.
But if we're honest, Esther's life was not the life she would have chosen.
She was taken from her home, raised by a cousin because her parents were gone, and eventually swept into the palace of a hedonistic pagan king she did not choose to marry. In other words, her story was not an answer to some prayer she had been praying… not at all!
But as I re-read her story this past week, I found myself encouraged and reminded of this hard, but simply amazing reality…
GOD USES US WHERE WE ARE, NOT WHERE WE WISH WE WERE.
I know this is not true of every single person reading this right now, but many of us are in situations we’d prefer not to be in. Whether it’s a situation at work, or within our home, or maybe a challenging family or relational situation. You might not be there now, but it’s safe to say we’ve ALL experienced being in situations that we never asked to be in—circumstances that we never in a million years would have ever sought out.
As noted above, Esther’s story does not begin in a place of comfort or dignity. Rather, Esther was swept up into a system she did not choose—a royal search driven by a king’s appetite for beauty and pleasure. What had the appearance of some sort of beauty pageant was in all reality nothing more than a coercive and dehumanizing process where young women were taken, prepared, and presented for the king’s approval, with little regard for their person or future.
So, with that as her backstory, what might be the most powerful part of her story is not her request to save her people from annihilation, but that Esther did not allow her heart to be filled with bitterness or resentment over the reality of her circumstances.
I realize that Esther’s situation might be an ‘extreme’ example of a person being in a circumstance they’d prefer not to be in, but to be honest, I think that’s what makes her story so compelling.
Despite all that was happening with her, Esther found a way to protect her heart from growing bitter towards God, and towards the people around her. How did she do that?
Well, she didn’t get there by herself, rather, she received the gift of perspective. See that with me in Esther 4:14…
“Who knows if perhaps you were made queen for just such a time as this?”
Cousin Mordecai's words to Esther are worth sitting with. He doesn't show up with a divine guarantee… he doesn't say, "God told me you were made for this."
Mordecai simply asks Esther a question… "Who knows if perhaps you were made queen for just such a time as this?"
Again, this is what I’d call the gift of perspective… Mordecai telling his young cousin… “Esther, look around you… look at where you are… is it possible that none of this is an accident?”
Throughout the story of God, we see this pattern play out again and again. In other words…
GOD USES US WHERE WE ARE, NOT WHERE WE WISH WE WERE.
As way of reminder, or even perspective for you…
your zip code is not an accident…
your cubicle is not a coincidence…
and the neighbor who never waves back, the coworker who seems unreachable, the person on the treadmill next to you every Thursday — they are in your life for a reason.
You may be the only person in their world who carries the grace, the peace, and the love of God close enough for them to see, hear and feel.
Esther made the most of a life she didn't choose. We see that in her response to the gift of perspective she received from Cousin Mordecai…
“I will go in to see the king. If I must die, I must die.”
Esther 4:16 (NLT)
I don’t know where you are right now, but for those of you who are in a place you’d prefer not to be, who knows, maybe, just maybe you were perfectly placed where you are so that those around you might catch a glimpse of the goodness of God through you.
