But when the attendants delivered the king’s command, Queen Vashti refused to come. Then the king became furious and burned with anger.
Esther 1:12 (NIV)
It was the first day of my sophomore year of high school. I walked into the drama room for my Acting II class. A poster on the bulletin board caught my eye. It was an audition notice for a movie being filmed locally. The production company was just a mile from the school.
How cool was that?
I decided to audition. I got a starring role.
It changed my life.
The production company was run by a former Hollywood filmmaker who had become a follower of Jesus. He moved to Iowa and began making faith-centered films. While on set I met a man who would spend two years discipling me. Ten years later the same man would hire me to work for the company that he and his wife founded. That job became my career. Thirty years later I own the business.
A poster in the Drama Room caught my eye.
Drama is an apt segue. Today, our chapter-a-day trek begins the journey through the book of Esther which is one of the most dramatic stories in the entire Great Story. In fact, every year – all over the world – Jews gather to read the story aloud and dramatize as massive audience participation production.
The most astonishing thing about the story of Esther is that God is never mentioned…at all. Not once.
But God’s hands are present and evident through the entire story, providentially guiding the events.
Just like He does in mine.
Whoever authored Esther was as masterful a storyteller as Shakespeare. Today’s chapter is the opening act. It is the set-up that sets the story into motion. Persian emperor Xerxes enters, and what an entrance it is.
An empire from India to Ethiopia (half the known world)
A 180-day festival to show off his vast wealth and splendor.
Bright gold
Luscious silk
Glittering jewels
Opulent palaces
Verdant gardens
A seven-day feast in which wine flows ceaselessly into cups of gold for every guest.
At the end of the feast, Xerxes calls for his queen, Vashti, to come out from her private ladies feast. He doesn’t call her for her companionship. He isn’t interested in sharing the moment with her.
He wants to put her beauty on display like all his other treasure — just one more possession.
Vashti says, “No.”
The king’s desire for Vashti is not romantic — it is possessive.
He wants beauty displayed.
Admired.
Owned.
Her refusal is electric precisely because it breaks the spell of indulgence.
The party stops.
The music falters.
The room goes cold.
One woman saying no exposes the emptiness beneath all that glitter.
It is one of Scripture’s quietest — and most powerful — acts of dignity.
The ripple effect sends a threatening shockwave through the greatest empire on the face of the earth.
The King who commands armies can’t command respect.
Vashti is swiftly stripped of her title and she is escorted to the exit stage left. With Vashti’s exit, the stage is cleared for a young woman named Esther to make her entrance.
One act of self-respect threatens an empire built on display and domination. It is life-changing for Vashti. It is also life-changing for Esther.
She just doesn’t know it yet.
In the quiet this morning, my mind wanders back to a poster that caught my eye as a fifteen-year-old high school sophomore. A poster that would alter the course of my entire life.
God is the author of life. He gave us a Great Story from Genesis to Revelation. That Story isn’t yet complete. We’re still living in it. The author is still at work. I am part of the same Story. My life is woven into its tapestry.
Jesus told His followers to never stop asking, seeking, and knocking.
Along my life journey, I’ve come to believe that a part of what Jesus meant was for me to live each day with my eyes, my heart, and my life open. Open to God’s providential hand as He authors the story.
An unexpected introduction.
A sudden turn in the road.
A phone call out of the blue.
An opportunity I never saw coming.
A poster that catches my eye.
God is authoring the Great Story. He’s also authoring my story if, in my free will, I choose make room and live expectantly.
Ask.
Seek.
Knock.
“For everyone who asks receives; the one who seeks finds; and to the one who knocks, the door will be opened.”
And so I enter another day of the journey, eyes peeled, listening for the Author’s next cue.
If you know anyone who might be encouraged by today’s post, please share.
