The Girl Queen, the Captive Conqueror: A Devotional Commentary on the Book of Esther (10:1-3)

And so we come to the end of the Book of Esther. In these last three verses we see the final, complete reversal of the fortunes of God's People. Mordecai, who used to sit by the gate of the king's palace, is now second in command over the whole Empire, promoting the well-being of his people and speaking shalom to "all his seed" (10:3). On the one hand, it reminds me of the story of Joseph in Genesis, another displaced son of Abraham who went from imprisoned slave to second-only-to-Pharaoh over all Egypt, who looked back on his story and said to those who had harmed him: "You intended it for evil, but God intended it for good, to accomplish salvation for many lives."

Interestingly, the wording of Esther 10:2 echoes the epigraph form that the Book of Kings always used to sum up the reign of each of Israel's monarchs: all the deeds of Mordecai, "are they not written in the book of the chronicles of the Kings...?" Essentially, Mordecai--King Saul's heir, remember--has ascended as close to the place of a king over Israel, as a displaced Jew in a foreign empire could possibly get. After all the terror and distress, the trauma and pain, the near-misses and ominous uncertainty of Esther's story, we see, at last, God's purpose in it all: the mini-resurrection (of sorts) of Saul's line, and through that "resurrection," shalom for all God's people.

And maybe you see where I'm going with this?

Because in Christ we have the true Resurrection of which Mordecai's mini-resurrection is just a dim shadow, and in Him, we see how our own stories, as difficult or painful as they might be, fit into God's plan to speak shalom to the world. Be encouraged today: however hidden him they might sometimes be, God does have a Resurrection purpose that he can, and will, bring out of whatever it is you may be facing today. And a day will come when we, with Mordecai and Esther, will be able to look back on it all and say: all that happened for this, that we, too, might be part of God's Word of Shalom to the world.