“And the king loved Esther above all the women, and she obtained grace and favour in his sight more than all the virgins; so that he set the royal crown upon her head, and made her queen instead of Vashti” (Esther 2:17)
TEXT —Esther 2:10-17
Message
A politician who lost at the poll many times, but still went onto become one of history’s most admired personalities, said he learned to bide his time in the face of hurdles that tried to stop his march into the hall of fame. He remained humble and obedient to the laws of heaven, he said, despite the torments. Sometimes, according to him, he suffered ridicule and outright rejection from those who told himhe would never make it. They frequently referred to his serial failure in school. But the man, Abraham Lincoln, finally became the president of the United States, one of its greatest.
Centuries before Lincoln, a Jewess called Esther showed greater tenacity and trust in God when a series of events cropped up, threatening to destroy her people in the land of Persia under King Ahasuerus. This young woman was an alien slave in the land, where an unforgiving king, hurt by his wife, sought to pick anew woman from among a group that included the young Jewish lady. The odds were against her. She was in the midst of axenophobic people. The Jews were targeted for annihilation. She was closely monitored by her disciplinarian father-figure, Mordecai. She did not buckle. God celebrated her simple faith in Him, and moved the king to crown her his queen, eventually.
The path to greatness, grandeur and glory is not rosy but thorny. That route is self-rejection for stoic submission to opposition expressed in trials, troubles, temptations and tests. It is bowing to the will of God that seems to run contrary to our wishes. Many describe them as blessings in disguise. The discerning, like Esther and Lincoln, would therefore calmly receive such buffets as the cross that must be borne before coronation.
Genuine followers of Christ who want to make heaven must bear this in mind: the Master Himself carried the cross of shame before He was crowned in matchless glory. When we are mocked, threatened or denied our rights as we serve the Lord and evangelise, let us joyfully see it as the cross ahead of the crown reserved for us in Christ’s kingdom.
Listed among “500 most powerful people on the planet” by the Foreign Policy magazine in 2013, Pastor (Dr.) William F. Kumuyi is the founder and General Superintendent of the Deeper Christian Life Ministry (DCLM) headquartered in Lagos, Nigeria. DCLM started in 1973 as a 15-member Bible study group right in Kumuyi’s apartment at University of Lagos where he was a lecturer. His revolutionary Bible teaching on personal holiness and commitment to evangelism soon gained so much traction and resulted in a widespread revival.
