Esther 4:14-16
“For if thou altogether holdest thy peace at this time,
then shall there enlargement and deliverance arise to the Jews from another place;
but thou and thy father’s house shall be destroyed:
and who knoweth whether thou art come to the kingdom for such a time as this?
Then Esther bade them return Mordecai this answer,
Go, gather together all the Jews that are present in Shushan,
and fast ye for me, and neither eat nor drink three days, night or day:
I also and my maidens will fast likewise;
and so will I go in unto the king, which is not according to the law:
and if I perish, I perish.”
This past Monday evening and Tuesday was the day of the annual Jewish celebration of the Feast of Purim. It originated at the time of Esther, the Jewish Queen of Persia, who God used to protect His people. Purim is the celebration of the enemies of the Jewish people being destroyed instead of the Jewish people themselves. The Jewish people had been overthrown by the Babylonian Empire and King Nebuchadnezzar and many Jews were brought to Babylon in captivity from Jerusalem, which is recorded in Daniel1. The Babylonian Empire of the Old Testament is basically known as modern day Iraq. The Babylonian Empire, when it was later ruled by Nebuchadnezzar’s son, King Belshazzar, was conquered by the Persian Empire ruled by King Darius, which is recorded in Daniel 5. It was the Persian Empire who was still ruling over Israel at the time of the Jewish maiden Esther becoming Queen in Persia 60 years after the fall of Babylon to Persia. God used Esther, who had become the queen to King Ahasuerus, to deliver His people who were destined to extermination due to the evil man Haman who was a trusted advisor to the king. This week is the time in history where these events recorded in the book of Esther in the Bible were taking place as God protected His people from being destroyed. During the reign of terror by the Nazi leader, Adolf Hitler in the 1930s, God’s people were once again under attack by an evil leader who sought to exterminate the Jewish people. God ended up using the US Military to lead allied forces to defeat Hitler in his efforts to destroy God’s people all over Europe delivering them from prisons and concentration camps beginning just prior to 1945 and into that year. Each year on January 27 we celebrate this evil being overthrown; it is known as Liberation Day, which is also Holocaust Remembrance Day. Several weeks ago, during our Wednesday Prayer & Bible Study meetings, I asked if anyone remembered what happened 47 years ago that day. The date was February 11, 1979, that Ayatollah Khomeini and the Iranian Revolution took over as the supreme leader in Iran ousting the monarchy. Last Sunday, I mentioned that the Middle East region of the world is safer today that it has been in decades because of the preemptive attack on the evil Iranian leadership by Israeli and American military forces. This week we have seen legal Iranian immigrants all over the United States celebrating in the streets due to the efforts to over throw this evil regime. God always protects His people and He often uses men and women in His efforts to protect His people. We need to pray for those carrying out this mission, for the families who have already suffered losses, and for a more peaceful leadership for the people of Iran. I am also praying for a spiritual awakening of the Iranian people in Iran like is taking place in many other places where Iranian people have fled for safety over the past forty-seven years. God always protects His people.