Today’s set selection from the Lectionary is one of those great climactic stories from The Hebrew Tradition, the end bit from the story of Esther. In assorted verses from Esther 7 and Esther 9 we hear about Haman, (boo!), the arrogant and corrupt official who offered bribes against an honest man, and who was discovered and executed. We also hear, less obviously, about the bravery of Hadassah the Jewess who risked her own life to save her people from genocide.

I wonder, do you remember the first time you ever heard the story of Esther? Do you remember the first time you were told any particular Bible story, or indeed heard the Bible read aloud? I ask this because Esther is a book like that for me; I don’t remember the first time I heard the queen’s story, but I do remember the first time I didn’t. Let me explain.

I was in Sunday school in my childhood church in Wheelers Hill, in the eastern suburbs of Melbourne, and my dad was the Sunday school teacher that day. I’m not sure if it was a weekly roster (I think it might have been) or whether we had “Mr Tann” for the term, but anyway it was my dad with what I’m guessing was the Grade Five group. On this particular morning there were just three of us kids, me, my best-friend Doug, and our friend Elizabeth (who was Doug’s cousin). So anyway, Dad…sorry…“Mr Tann” asked us as we gathered in the room “have you heard the story of Esther before?” and before I could say “no”, because I literally heard never heard of this person, Doug and Liz said “yeah.” Mr Tann decided that since we’d all heard it before (ahem!) and it was a lovely day, we’d just go for a walk. So, the four of us did a blockie, and Mr Tann bought us kids each an icy-pole to eat, and we just walked and chatted and had a lovely time before getting back to church in time for coffee for Mr Tann, and playtime for us, in the after-church melee of a thriving Christian community.

So, I didn’t hear about Esther that day. I don’t know when I finally heard this story for the first time, (I don’t remember asking my dad about it afterwards), but I have heard it many times since.

Okay, that’s great Damien, but why did we need to know that about you and your childhood? Well because this is a story that is actually worth telling, and in Esther 9:21-22 we get the foundation of the Jewish sacred days of Purim as a reminder. This is a story that should be told to children, and ironically, I think (I’m sure Dad wasn’t mindful of this) it’s a day worthy of confectionary…especially icy-poles. I have heard Jewish religious festivals described by the formula “They tried to kill us, but God saved us, let’s eat!” and Purim is no exception. Even without the name of God mentioned in Esther’s story we can see, and Judaism has always seen, the hand of The LORD in this whole saga. In Jewish houses and synagogues, Purim is a time of dress-ups and pantomime, with food and drink and laughter; the best way to celebrate the destruction of a man who plotted a holocaust in the 500s BCE.

Getting back to the story itself, as we read today from Esther 7 Haman’s wealth and position ultimately could not protect him from his comeuppance. But just imagine the great things he could have done. Mordecai charges Esther to act with the well-known phrase (Esther 4:14) Who knows? Perhaps you have come to royal dignity for such a time as this, but could that not have been true also of Haman? Haman chose poorly; yet in the Christian Tradition and James 5 we are all encouraged if we have wealth and influence in the world to use what we have for the good of the Church and the world and not for our own selfish and ultimately fruitless pursuits. Again, in Esther 9 we read about the ever-reliable Mordecai and how he recorded all that took place in Susa so that the celebration of deliverance wouldn’t be forgotten. Mordecai is a man who used position and opportunity to do a good thing; Haman used the same powers for evil intentions; and Esther used the same powers to have Haman executed and Mordecai honoured. Crack out the icy-poles because that’s a story worth remembering.

I love stories. This is probably not a surprise to you. I occasionally mention it, because it’s true and not out of any sense of boasting (genuinely so), that my first university degree was in Sociolinguistics and Narratology: how language works within a society, and why stories matter so much. I don’t really care that my degree has an incomprehensible name, (and to be fair it’s really just a Bachelor of Arts with a double major in English), or even that it was “my first university degree” because yes, I actually have four. What matters to me when I tell these facts about me is that they are part of my story: I want you to know about me not that I am academic, but that I genuine love books, and learning by reading and listening to stories. What makes me as good a pastor as I am, (I’ll let you judge me on my pastoral-care skills), is that I love listening to stories; therefore, I am a good listener. Which, again, is why I love Esther as a book of the Bible. It’s a great story, it’s a story deliberately recorded as a story, it’s a story which even today is celebrated by storytelling and costuming, and it’s a story about God saving God’s own people through their own obedience and trust in The LORD even as The LORD is never mentioned as an object of faith, or even as a character within the story itself. And it’s a story about me, my dad, and icy-poles for Sunday school.

In a similar way, think about Esther’s king and the story of his late-night reading. In Esther 6:1-2 we find Ahasuerus sleepless and restless, then being soothed with the story of Mordecai’s discovery of the plot to assassinate the king himself. In The 1001 Nights or The Arabian Nights a king is released from depression over his wife’s betrayal by the telling of nightly stories over the course of almost three years. In that collection the heroine is Scheherazade who avoids death each morning by leaving her story from the previous night as a cliff-hanger, requiring Shahryar to postpone her execution for twenty-four hours at a time to hear the end of each story. One take on this is that people who do not have a story will die; but that people who have stories and who share their stories prolong their lives. Judaism has the story of Purim, the stories of Pesah (Passover and Exodus), and the stories of Hannukah (the Maccabees): these are life-giving stories of rescue, so much so that the annual re-telling of each story always occurs as a festival. Christians have the stories of the Incarnation, the Crucifixion and Resurrection, and the Gifting of Holy Spirit, our own festivals.

(And, because I am a Sociolinguist and I know stuff, lemme tell youse that Scheherazade and Shahryar are Persian, not Arabian, and the fit with Ahasuerus and Esther is close, narratologically speaking.)

In Psalm 124, there is another reminder that God alone saves, and that God’s salvation is complete. It’s a great match isn’t it, between the remembrance of Esther and Mordecai, and this story where whenever God’s people are facing inevitable annihilation they are saved and victorious. In God there is total rescue with not one soul lost. Similarly, Jacob the brother of Jesus wrote in James 5:7-12 of how followers of the Way of  Christ can wait for God in patient confidence that God is faithful and true. More than that, a future left in God’s hands and with an ear to God’s word of instruction in the Present, is a secure future. Even if you have been exploited and you were the receiver of unjust action says Jacob, anxiety and irritability are not necessary; enjoy each other’s company in the Church without envy. Allow the wealthy to apologise, if they offer, and live with patient hope and even endurance like Job. God knows what you have been though, and God also knows what you have put and are putting others through, and God hears everything you say, so don’t you become unmerciful either. God’s call for the exploiters and thieves to repent is not a licence for the survivors to enact revenge and extract punitive reparations. Be faithful in conversation and honest at all times. Be so dependable at your word that oaths and public curses would not be required of you; let it be such that everyone trusts you to speak the truth at all times because it’s all you ever do.

And why?  Why this assurance that it’s okay to forgive and to trust in the better nature of other humans in our world? Because of the stories of God’s previous activities of rescue and justice. Mordecai was saved and Haman destroyed. Shahryar was saved by Scheherazade, who brought him out of his depression and taught him how to love again through her humility and kindness, (and craftiness, let’s be honest here.)

I cannot say how important the story of Esther was to the Jews of Nazi occupied Europe, but I can guess. University taught me that if you aren’t an expert in something then don’t pretend to be, shut up and let the people who know the things do the talking. This is as true for Narrative and Sociology as it is for Teaching, for Theology and for Ministry.  I know from the little bit of Story Science that I do understand that how a Polish woman remembered Esther in Ravensbrück is not my story to tell, it is hers. But imagine your story, or remember it if you have one; if your existence was threatened by circumstances seemingly beyond your control, and utter destruction as looming with the dawn, or maybe weekend, imagine the power of a story like Esther. Consider what it would mean to have such a story upon which to hold in crises, a true history full of God and Heaven’s response to those who threaten The LORD’s chosen and appointed.

God can and does rescue the hopeless and the helpless; that’s the whole of The Bible right there in black and white, and sometimes red. God can and does assist us to deal with the greedy, the self-important, and the vicious, which is also the whole of The Bible right there in black and white, and sometimes red. Is that your story? Even if you’ve never been in Esther’s position, do you trust her story and the God displayed in hers and Mordecai’s actions?

This, this is the God we adore;

Our faithful, unchangeable friend;

Whose love is as great as His power,

And neither knows measure nor end.

‘Tis Jesus the first and the last

Whose spirit shall guide us safe home;

We’ll praise him for all that is past,

And trust him for all that’s to come!

Amen.