Esther and Youth Sunday

Today was Youth Sunday at Bethpage UMC. Our high school and middle school students led us in both of our worship services this morning and did an absolutely fantastic job! The newly formed youth band led us in singing, many of the youth served as greeters, Emily prayed for us, Sara took up the offering at 11:00, Tricia introduced the story of Esther, several of the youth did a dramatic reading of Esther, and even more helped to get things together beforehand. It was a wonderful morning and a powerful testament to God's work in the life of our young people.

Esther is a strange book of the Bible. It never mentions the name of God - not once! And it is not particularly spiritual or religious. In fact, it is the story of the origination of the Jewish festival Purim. In essence, a powerful man named Haman, who is described as the arch-enemy of the Jews, wants to wipe them off the face of the planet because one of them (Mordecai) will not submit to him. Haman obtains an executive order from the king to have all of the Jews executed, but little does he know that the king's wife, Esther, is secretly a Jew. Esther musters up the courage to reveal her identity and ask the king to save her people, which he does and even gives them the authority to attack whatever enemies they have. Purim is the celebration of their survival and victory over their enemies.

One part of the story that stood out to me today is that when Esther is trying to work up the courage to go before the king (her life was on the line because no one - not even the queen - was supposed to come before the king without being summoned), she asked Mordecai and the other Jews to fast for her. In this season of Lent, people often give up something (fasting) or take on a discipline (like this blog) in order to realize more fully their dependence on God or to grow closer to God. In this not-particularly-spiritual book, we see that a group of people fast for someone else. I wonder when the last time was that we did something like that? Perhaps that is a much better use of our spiritual efforts and energy rather than always doing it for our own benefit.