For Such A Time As This - Sermon for Week Ending October 3, 2020

Reading: 

Our reading is from Chapter 2 of the book of Esther. Esther becomes the new queen.

After Queen Vashti was dethroned, the king’s attendants said to him, “Let beautiful young virgins be sought out for the king, and let the girl who pleases the king be queen instead of Vashti.” This pleased the king, and he did so. There was a Jew whose name was Mordecai, who had brought up Esther, his cousin, for she had neither father nor mother.  The girl was fair and beautiful, and she was taken into the king’s palace with the other girls. The turn came for each girl to go to King Ahasuerus. The king loved Esther more than all the other women. Of all the virgins, she won his favor and devotion, so that he sat the royal crown on her head and made her queen instead of Vashti. Esther did not reveal her kindred or her people.

Sermon: 

“For just such a time as this” is one of my favorite lines in the Bible. It comes from the book of Esther, a book that many fundamentalists believe should not have even been included in the Bible, as it has no mention of God. In Judaism, though, the book of Esther is the basis for the Festival of Purim, celebrating the deliverance of Jews in the diaspora, in this case, Persia.

Although Esther is the main character in the story, most folks favorite is Queen Vashti, a hero to feminists everywhere, because when her husband, King Ahasuerus, was giving a banquet for the nobles of the Persian provinces, and she was holding one for the wives, he demanded that she come to his banquet so that he could show off her physical beauty to the men. And she refused. Humiliated, the King dethroned her and made a degree throughout the land that the husband is the master of the house. After that, a haram of beautiful women was gathered so that the King could choose his next queen. And he chose Esther, who, as we heard in the reading, was not Persian, but Jewish. Her cousin Mordecai warned her not to reveal that fact to the king or anyone else, because the Jews were persecuted in Persia. But when the king’s top official, who hated Mordecai because he ‘didn’t know his place, convinced the king that all the Jews in the Kingdom should be killed, young and old, women and children, Mordecai went to Esther to ask her to plead for her people before the king. Ever since Vashti’s offense, anyone, including the queen, could be put to death for even entering the King’s inner court. And even if she did get in, and stay alive, the king would know the truth she had been hiding, that she was a member of the group of people he had just ordered killed. Mordecai convinced her to do it anyway by appealing to her big heart and to her responsibility as a person of privilege, saying, “Perhaps you have come to royal dignity for just such a time as this.” Esther was privileged among her people because she was the queen of Persia. And she got that position by “passing” for Persian.  Passing is as old as human civilization itself.  In order to have more opportunities in a society ruled by white supremacy, or in some cases just to stay alive, light-skinned African Americans have passed for white. Jews in Nazi Germany bleached their hair and passed. Gay people pass all the time. Mordecai asked Esther to use the privilege she had gained by passing to save the lives of her people who couldn’t, including him. It is a profound question that he asked her to consider: “Who knows? Perhaps you are here in this place for just such a time as this.” Maybe God put you here. Maybe fate. Maybe it was just a random confluence of events. But here, you are. And here, you have the opportunity to do something great for your people. You are the only one who can. It is a question that we can ask ourselves. Are we in a place or a position that we haven’t been in before to do something for someone else? Something that will make a real difference?  Are we prepared to do it now, where we weren’t before? Is this a time where we can use our privilege to help our fellow humans who don’t have it? How important are they to us?  Are they worth our making sacrifices for? John Lewis was born into a family of sharecroppers. When his life-long commitment to fighting discrimination gave him privilege, gave him a voice that people listened to, he used it to lift up others. Ruth Bader Ginsburg was the daughter of immigrants and grew up in Flatbush. When her life-long commitment to fighting discrimination gave her privilege, gave her a voice that people listened to, she used it to lift up others. Jimmy Carter has said more than once that he believes that he won the presidency so that he could get to know leaders around the world and make the connections that allowed him to accomplish everything that the Carter Center, created after his presidency has done and continues to do, to save and improve the lives of people all over the world. Like Esther, this might be our crucible moment. Being stuck at home during Covid is a good time to think about what this question might mean for us, personally and as a church.  What are we able to do now that we might not have had the finances or the direction or the information to do before?

How have events in our world in the last few months ignited a new spark in us to do something to contribute, to make a difference? Are we in this particular place for just such a time as this?

What new vision can we help to make a reality? Let’s think about it.