Episode 188: Esther, Part 4--Such a Time as This (Platform and Protest)

How do we respond when something truly terrible is about to happen?  Do we ignore it and hope it doesn't affect us?  Do we make provisions for ourselves alone and hope to weather the storm?  Do we risk our comfort, our privilege, and our way of life to speak up?  These are the kinds of questions that come to the surface in the fourth chapter of Esther.  With the villainous Haman's plan to kill and plunder the whole Jewish people set into motion, and the clock ticking on its execution, Mordecai starts protesting in the street insisting that he and his people's lives matter, and that the rest of the empire cannot simply turn their eyes from what is happening, using the imagery and practices of lament to get their attention.  And Esther, Mordecai's cousin and the queen over the empire, has to decide if she dares to take the risk of losing everything by using her platform to get the king to stop the plan of government-sanctioned genocide.  And through it all, there is the driving question, "Who knows if you have been brought to your position of influence for just such a time as this?" What do we do with the privileged positions each of us has--how do we use our platforms to save life, to help those who are oppressed and at-risk, and to speak for justice and mercy in the midst of the tragedies and schemes around us all the time?  And how do we know what we have been raised up for in our lives in such a time as we are living in?  Those are the questions that pastors Erica, Sarah, and Steve look at in this latest episode of our ongoing series running through the book of Esther.  Join the conversation!