{"id":17776,"date":"2021-09-08T06:00:00","date_gmt":"2021-09-08T05:00:00","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/mailchi.mp\/urc\/urc-daily-devotion-8th-september-2021"},"modified":"2021-09-08T06:00:00","modified_gmt":"2021-09-08T05:00:00","slug":"urc-daily-devotion-8th-september-2021","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.trinitywimbledon.org\/index.php\/urc-daily-devotion-8th-september-2021\/","title":{"rendered":"URC Daily Devotion 8th September 2021"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

Wednesday 8th September<\/span><\/strong><\/p>\n

Esther 6: 14 – 7: 10<\/strong>
While they were still talking with him, the king\u2019s eunuchs arrived and hurried Haman off to the banquet that Esther had prepared.  So the king and Haman went in to feast with Queen Esther. On the second day, as they were drinking wine, the king again said to Esther, \u2018What is your petition, Queen Esther? It shall be granted you. And what is your request? Even to the half of my kingdom, it shall be fulfilled.\u2019  Then Queen Esther answered, \u2018If I have won your favour, O king, and if it pleases the king, let my life be given me\u2014that is my petition\u2014and the lives of my people\u2014that is my request.  For we have been sold, I and my people, to be destroyed, to be killed, and to be annihilated. If we had been sold merely as slaves, men and women, I would have held my peace; but no enemy can compensate for this damage to the king.\u2019 Then King Ahasuerus said to Queen Esther, \u2018Who is he, and where is he, who has presumed to do this?\u2019  Esther said, \u2018A foe and enemy, this wicked Haman!\u2019 Then Haman was terrified before the king and the queen.  The king rose from the feast in wrath and went into the palace garden, but Haman stayed to beg his life from Queen Esther, for he saw that the king had determined to destroy him. When the king returned from the palace garden to the banquet hall, Haman had thrown himself on the couch where Esther was reclining; and the king said, \u2018Will he even assault the queen in my presence, in my own house?\u2019 As the words left the mouth of the king, they covered Haman\u2019s face. Then Harbona, one of the eunuchs in attendance on the king, said, \u2018Look, the very gallows that Haman has prepared for Mordecai, whose word saved the king, stands at Haman\u2019s house, fifty cubits high.\u2019 And the king said, \u2018Hang him on that.\u2019 So they hanged Haman on the gallows that he had prepared for Mordecai. Then the anger of the king abated.<\/p>\n

Reflection<\/strong>
I read Esther and find it a gripping tale.  Good folk in difficult situations, bad folk in positions of power, an idiotic king who can\u2019t see what\u2019s before his eyes,  eunuchs and women simultaneously on the edge and in the centre of the story as they vie for power.  It\u2019s reminiscent of so many tales – both ancient and modern.  As I write the latest saga with Mr Cummings and Mr Johnson is being played out and conversations that were expected to be private, and so were rather careless, are now revealed for all the world to see.  We look to our political, not royal, masters for palace plots and intrigue these days!  <\/p>\n

I am interested, however, in how the outsiders end up as central to the story.  Esther\u2019s beauty and skill at playing the royal game ensured she rose in power.  Mindful, I suspect, of the fate of her predecessor, she made sure that no fault could be found by the king in her.  In playing this game she gained power but it must have felt like walking on eggshells or working now with a narcissistic bully.  The unnamed eunuchs, ever present, are always happy to step forward to be helpful if they themselves aren\u2019t thereby endangered.  <\/p>\n

I wonder how we function in the brutal world of church or office politics.  Do we keep our heads down?  Are we like the Eunuchs deciding when to risk acting?  Are we like Esther having to play a role in order to survive?  Are we able to change the rules so that we don\u2019t play the game in the way that the world wants?  In Jesus\u2019 own encounters with power I\u2019m always taken by the ways in which He doesn\u2019t play along but subverts in order to free.  Are we able to understand and then subvert the rules of the games we\u2019re often asked to play in order to allow ourselves, and others, to be free?<\/p>\n

Prayer<\/strong>
Living God,
You have always inspired your people to work against the odds,
to find ways out of difficult situations,
to turn the tables when all seems lost.
Help us to use our positions, like Esther of old,
to make the world a better place,
that Your people might be freed.
Amen.\n<\/p>\n<\/td>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Wednesday 8th September Esther 6: 14 – 7: 10While they were still talking with him, the king\u2019s eunuchs arrived and hurried Haman off to the banquet that Esther had prepared.  So the king and Haman went in to feast with Queen Esther. On the second day, as they were drinking wine, the king again said … <\/p>\n

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