“Such a Time as This” – A Preach Palestine sermon (2022)

Written and delivered by Pastor Melissa Atchison (December 4, 2022)

Scripture text: Esther 4:1-17

Esther in Advent. It’s a tale of intrigue, humor, and violence.” (Working Preacher podcast)

While I love a strong female character, especially in the Bible, this one’s not a favorite of mine. It’s hard for me to see the ending of this book as anything more than a gory celebration of revenge. I do like how using the Narrative Lectionary disciplines us to look at parts of the Bible that we might not otherwise spend time on. And the dangerous aspect of the drama in Esther parallels the risks of the Christmas story, that we are moving slowly toward. Sending the Messiah into the world was fraught with danger! Also, while I’m suspicious of this book that never mentions God, I do love the discipline of looking for God in places where the Holy Presence is not obvious.

Even if you’ve never read the story of Esther, you may have heard this phrase in verse 14: “for such a time as this.” The season of Advent invites us to think about timing, God’s timing. God’s provision of the Messiah “as a plan for the fullness of time, to gather up all things in him…” (Ephesians 1:10) As we are waiting in Advent anticipation, Esther shows us what it’s like to be in the right place at the right time. And to have resistance to admitting that. She’s living a super-privileged life in the palace, keeping her identity as a Jew a secret, so removed from her people that she is unaware of the threat of genocide. Her cousin is making a scene out in the street, loudly enacting his distress and grief as a dramatic subversive action to get her attention. Messages are sent back and forth between Cousin Mordecai and Queen Esther about the antisemitic villain’s plan to massacre their people. And Esther replies, ‘Everyone knows that if anyone goes to see the king without an invitation, even the queen, they will be killed.’ In other words, ‘Cousin, I hear you asking me to do something to help. I can’t! If I try to talk to the king about this, I could get the death sentence for just entering the inner court.’

And then Cousin Mordecai sends back the zinger: ‘Don’t think you’ll escape death if you stay quiet.’ He’s telling her that her identity as a Jew makes her just as much at risk in the coming pogrom as he is. Her royal position won’t protect her when the persecution begins.

I imagine Esther thinking about how to save herself. Maybe she could find a way to still keep her Jewishness a secret, to deny it, to hide in her position of privilege, to survive this doom.

She has power. Did she consider using that power to protect herself? That would be a very human instinct: self-preservation. And it could flit through her mind as she’s hearing the messenger repeat Mordecai’s words. But then, “Who knows? Perhaps you have come to royal dignity for such a time as this.”

Esther does a turn around. She is no longer stuck in fear of being killed for speaking to the king. She has turned loose of the impulse to prioritize her own safety. She will act.

“And if I perish, I perish.” Words of bravery! She is becoming the heroine of this drama.

The rest of the story includes Esther’s genius plan of a series of banquets for the king and the villain Haman, climaxing in Esther revealing to the king the evil plot to destroy her people, the Jews. Cut to the end - the Jews are saved!

Now, let’s look for God in this story.

When Esther asks the people to fast with her in preparation for this dangerous plan she’s hatching, the story does not say, “fast and pray with me.” Just “fast.” It does seem like praying is implied. For me, fasting is a way to pray, with my whole body. So, we can find God there, 

in the three day fast that Esther and the people are practicing in solidarity, an ancient spiritual practice that in this story seems to have a specific intention of seeking God’s guidance and strength for what comes next. I see God just a bit earlier in this conversation, too. When Mordecai’s words are delivered - the “Perhaps” part…“Perhaps you are here, right now, for such a time as this…” And Esther does that turnaround from “I can’t” to “I will.” That feels like a great thing that God is doing here. I would say the Holy Spirit is moving these characters to see God’s way out of a dead end, in God’s timing.

People of God, we are sometimes the ones who say, or think to ourselves: ‘I can’t help! Something bad will happen to me! I’m hiding here in my privilege, for good reason!’ We have power. Will we use it to maintain our own comfortable lives, or will we leverage it for justice?

If we don’t use our power for good, when we know that there is a need, when we know that others will suffer if we don’t… If we don’t use our power for God’s good, we are denying our identity as God’s people, as followers of Christ.

I do believe the Holy Spirit moves us through messages we receive. This week, I didn’t have a cousin wailing in the street outside my office, calling on me to help. Instead, I received an email message. When I’m studying for a sermon or lesson, I spend time pondering what life was like in the middle East way back then. The email I received urged me to spend time thinking about what life is like in Palestine nowadays. It asked me to “Preach Palestine,” to tell you about the current situation there, to remind you that people, Christians and Muslims, are suffering there. It came from Friends of Sabeel North America, an ecumenical liberation theology movement founded by Palestinian Christians in the Holy Land. (“Sabeel” means “path.”)

This is an organization I know to be reputable. I believe their reports of human rights violations. We have connections as Mennonites to the needs in the Middle East. In 2017 MCUSA passed the “Seeking Peace in Israel Palestine” resolution. Our conference, Western District, has an Israel Palestine Task Force, with that aim. We, as a congregation, have made the decisions together to boycott Hewlett Packard, to be in relationship with the Youth Vision Society in the Gaza Twinning initiative, and to send financial support to the Middle East Children’s Alliance as one of our outreach budget line items. And still, I agonize over whether I am the person, for such a time as this, to Preach Palestine. I worry that my Jewish acquaintances will be offended. I worry that I’ll be labeled antisemitic. I worry that some of us will shut down if a sermon points to an international political situation as touchy as Israel-Palestine. 

There’s confusion for some about Israel still being God’s chosen people. Because we have been dwelling in the Hebrew Bible stories together for more than three months this fall, 

we have a shared recent experience of reading the covenant promises God made to the Jewish people. Most importantly, I want us to hold onto the promise God spoke to Abraham, blessing the family Abraham would have so that they would “be a blessing to all the nations.” That is why they were chosen. To be a Hebrew in covenant with God, the Jews needed to follow God’s instructions to love the foreigner, to share with the poor, to care especially for orphans, widows - those at the margins. Whether or not we think about the current nation of Israel as the people we read about here - God’s chosen people - we can think about Israel as a democratic country and based on it being a democracy, it is reasonable to expect justice for Palestinians. And if you do think about the political entity of Israel as God’s chosen people, then it would be reasonable to expect that government to treat its neighboring peoples in a way that passes on God’s blessing to them.

Many are speaking out now, naming the current political situation as apartheid - a system of discrimination based on race. (The word origin of apartheid is Afrikaan: literally “apartness.”) B’Tselem, the venerated Israeli human rights organization is calling this apartheid.

So are the United Nations, Amnesty International, & Human Rights Watch. Harvard Law School’s International Human Rights Clinic and Addameer Prisoner Support and Human Rights Association names Israel’s treatment of the Palestinians apartheid. Even former Attorney General of Israel Michael Benyair stated, earlier this year, that he must conclude that his country “has sunk to such political and moral depths that it is now an apartheid regime.” (February 2022, in an Op-ed for The Journal)

For an Israeli Jew, there are no restrictions to movement or limitations to deciding where to live throughout Israel and the West Bank, while Israel limits those choices for Palestinians. Israeli Jews enjoy certain laws, administrative structures, and privileges - such as education, social and health benefits. These are not afforded to Palestinians. Evidence for calling this apartheid includes the pervasive system of permits Israel has instituted to manage nearly every aspect of private and public life. Controlling where one may attend university, access medical care and shop, or run a business: this biased system limits personal freedom, economic development and the natural growth of Palestinian villages and cities. (A Dossier on Israeli Apartheid: A Pressing Call to Churches Around the World)

Our Palestinian Christian siblings wrote an appeal 13 years ago, titled “A Moment of Truth” - for a time such as this, so to speak. In it they appealed: “We ask our sister Churches not to offer a theological cover-up for the injustice we suffer, for the sin imposed upon us. Our question to our brothers and sisters in the Churches today is: Are you able to help us get our freedom back?”

We know how the rising together against South Africa’s apartheid made a difference, brought change for good. I will put a link in tomorrow’s newsletter where you can find the Palestinian BDS source: Boycott, Divest, and Sanction. I encourage you to further educate yourselves and join the targeted consumer boycotts, and campaign alongside others to pressure institutions to boycott and divest. And to pray, with our whole bodies, our pocketbooks, our votes.

Those of us who have been afraid, ambivalent, or indifferent can be moved by the Holy Spirit to do a turnaround from “I can’t” to “I will.” Like Esther’s cousin’s persuasive message,

the Spirit is saying, “Perhaps you have come to this position of privilege for just such a time as this!” We can name the bitterness we see in Israel and Palestine and take action to join with others to patch it with God’s healing. This time of Advent waiting can be a time of exercising our privilege to call out injustice. We don’t have to become heroes. We do need to hold onto our identity as Christ followers and consider: Perhaps we are here now, with the power of privilege, for such a time as this. This time to call for change.