Memories of a yellow dress

*At ARISE we had to preach a 10 minute sermon, so the following is basically what I shared with my classmates. I did my sermon on Esther. I've loved the story of Esther ever since I was a little girl. The pictures were my favorite to look at in Uncle Arthur's "Bible Story" books. Esther appears before the king in a beautiful yellow dress. I just opened the book up again to admire the picture. Yep, still as lovely as I remember. Only now...I see it with different eyes.

The story of Esther starts off with King Ahasuerus, king of Medo-Persia having a party. In a drunken revelry he's deposes Queen Vashti from her throne. Therefore, he needs to find a new queen. "Then the king’s servants who attended him said: Let beautiful young virgins be sought for the king; and let the king appoint officers in all the provinces of his kingdom, that they may gather all the beautiful young virgins to Shushan the citadel, into the women’s quarters, under the custody of Hegai the king’s eunuch, custodian of the women. And let beauty preparations be given them. Then let the young woman who pleases the king be queen instead of Vashti...” (Esther 2:1-4, NKJV). The king thinks this is a pretty good idea, so he does it (2:4).

As a response to the king's command, a young Jewish captive named Esther makes her way down to the palace. Maybe she was excited. Maybe she has doubts about leaving Mordecai. I can imagine that she felt like she wasn't ready to be a queen. As Esther joins the young women from around the kingdom, they have to go through a preparation time-- "Each young woman’s turn came to go in to King Ahasuerus after she had completed twelve months’ preparation" (2:12). When Esther goes before the king, he loves her more than any of the other women. "So he set the royal crown upon her head and made her queen instead of Vashti" (2:17).

Allow me to depart from the story of Esther for a moment. God was searching for willing people to be soulwinners for Him. He led you here to ARISE. You may have had doubts as you were sitting on the plane. I did. I remember sitting in the airport thinking, What am I doing? I'm leaving everything behind. I thought I was crazy. Just as Esther was chosen, we've been chosen by a King to be His missionaries--we've been equipped. We went through a preparation time--four months of classes, experiences, and lessons learned.

Let's return to story of Esther.

After Esther is made queen, jealous Haman plots against the Jews to destroy them. A decree is written "to annihilate all the Jews" (3:13). Mordecai hears of this and pleads with Esther that she must go into the King to petition on behalf of her people. His reasoning--"...who knows whether you have come to the kingdom for such a time as this? (4:14).

Here we see from the story of Esther that a death decree has been issued--it's Esther's job to save her people. In the end times we're going to face a death decree. But I would submit to you that there is already a death decree issued. Romans 6:23 says the wages of sin is death. But we have the good news of a Savior who pardons the death decree. Will you be faithful and accept the responsibility we have as ARISE students and to God to save people from the wages of sin? Will you be faithful like Esther to say "if I perish, I perish," to give everything up, including your very life? To leave ARISE as missionaries for such a time as this?

And after a moment of silent prayer so everyone could respond in their hearts, that's how I ended the sermon. And now...I'm moving to New Hampshire to be a Bibleworker at a church there. And once again, I feel like (I imagine) Esther felt. I'm excited. I'm scared. I have doubts. I think I'm crazy. What am I getting myself into? But then I remember the death decree. The Romans 6:23 death decree. And then I remember my appeal to my fellow classmates at ARISE. I only hope and pray that I can stay faithful to God! Lord help me to stay faithful to You...