Sabbath Devotional :: Such a Time as This

As we leap and march into a new month, the calendar can feel a little unpredictable — Easter is early, and when does Fast Sunday fit in with General Conference? March is an opportunity not just to celebrate spring or Pi Day, but to celebrate strong women. There is International Women’s Day this coming week, and we’ll honor the founding of the Relief Society in Nauvoo with a church-wide female broadcast on March 17. This month, I am also thinking about Esther. When I put the MWEG conference on my calendar for March 23, I noted that that Saturday was Purim Eve, her holiday. Like Easter, the Jewish holiday of Purim floats around with the lunar schedule, but is anchored in late winter in the month of Adar.

Adar means “strength.” Purim is seen as the most joyous day of the year for Jews to celebrate their deliverance. Though the linguistic origins of Easter and Esther are different, I like the connection. Esther was a savior for her people. I want to acknowledge here the heartbreaking tragedy unfolding in Gaza and how that might color our thoughts about scriptural stories of violence. Current world events should shape the lessons we take from scripture. From Esther, I take the vital example of courage, faith, community, and fighting injustice through proactive and non-violent means.

We think we know her story — a replacement trophy wife who won over the king, hid her ethnic identity until it was time to save her people from the wicked Haman, and came to the kingdom for “such a time as this” (Esther 4:14). Her familiar Minerva Teichert portrait hangs in temple dressing rooms and Relief Society classrooms across the globe. However, I don’t think we often read the ending of her book carefully. Were the Jews spared because Esther persuaded the king to not kill them, after Haman was executed on the very gallows he built to kill Esther’s cousin Mordecai?

No; the king was unable to rescind his royal order for their destruction. Yet he allowed Queen Esther to issue a writ that granted permission to the Jews to assemble in self-defense, and fight back against any who tried to kill them. The Jews gathered on that day of their decreed destruction, and there were battles, and they prevailed against their enemies. A ruler had enacted unfair, grim, and unchangeable laws. Yet because of her conviction and courage, she was able to author alternate plans and rally her community. She worked with men in power, subverted the law, and changed history. I like this original “Mormon Woman of Ethical Government.”

What doesn’t immediately stand out about Esther’s story, unless you’re familiar with Jewish calendars, is the timing of it all. The king’s decree of destruction was sent out right before Passover (Esther 3:12). She learned of the plan, and asked all the people to fast on her behalf. After three days of united fasting, it was on the third day (Esther 5:1) when Esther entered the king’s presence to obtain his favor. These elements — Passover and deliverance on the third day — add increased symbolism to Esther’s story. She is a type of Christ. Christ is the Passover sacrifice, decreed for destruction but raised from the tomb on the third day. Christ did not change the grim law of death, but fulfilled the law to save us all.

Esther is the only book in the Bible that doesn’t mention the name of God, and this book is conspicuously missing from the Dead Sea Scrolls collection of canonical scripture. Yet when the heroine of the book is a type of Christ, his fingerprints are all over the story. Through the Lord’s mercy, Esther brought deliverance to her people, at great peril to her own life. In fact, she knew death was a real risk in her plea to the king. Jesus also knew the risk, and the plan, and embraced it to save us too. And as his people, like Esther’s people, we do not just need to be a group of passive delivered supporters. The example here is of action. We can protest injustice, rally others, stand up for righteousness, face evil, and speak truth to power.

At this springtime emergence of new life, perhaps it is time to seek our own strength and embrace change. It is not only on January 1 that we can make resolutions. God likes calendars — cosmic invitations to remember him. In the very beginning he set the lights in the heavens to be for signs and for seasons (Genesis 1:14), and the Jewish religious calendar is all based on those monthly moons. As we circle through the year, and approach these heavenly meeting times as decreed this spring, let us also remember the strong women who made change possible, and Jesus, who is the ultimate changemaker of all stories.

In my house, the words of D&C 123:17 are framed as a constant reminder and reassurance: “Therefore, dearly beloved [sisters], let us cheerfully do all things that lie in our power; and then may we stand still, with the utmost assurance, to see the salvation of God, and for his arm to be revealed.” And Jacob’s words in 2 Nephi bring comfort as well: “I speak unto you these things that ye may rejoice, and lift up your heads forever, because of the blessings which the Lord God shall bestow upon your children” (9:3).