Esther 4:14: For if you remain silent at this time, relief and deliverance for the Jews will arise from another place, but you and your father’s family will perish. And who knows but that you have come to your royal position for such a time as this?”
How many of us fall into the trap of life becoming a routine, and are we aware of how destructive this lifestyle can be? The danger of routine is that we hold back from change, from opportunities, from experiences and from encounters.
Esther was no different really. She was pretty comfortable with her ordinary life and didn’t like the idea of being cast into the light of public life as a queen. She’d rather have stayed at home and been an ordinary girl, but God had other plans for her life that she chose to follow.
I don’t know about you, but when I read that I think that that all seems like a lot of effort. We crave our comfort zone. We cling to the norm. We like our routines. Why though? Maybe it’s because we feel safer, maybe we simply think that we’re incapable of anything greater.
So often look at our own capabilities and our own weaknesses, and say: “God, I don’t think I’m ready for that.” Have we forgotten what this is all about? Have we forgotten that we are not on this earth to bring glory to ourselves through what we can personally accomplish, but to bring glory to God, who in everything we do?
Here’s a question: do you truly believe that anything is possible through God? We need to remember that the power that raised Jesus from the dead lives in us, through the Holy Spirit. Once we are rooted in this truth, we will see the new challenges and adventures that God has waiting for us, as well as realising the work He has been doing all along.
I am currently in my last year of sixth form, and in the past I have struggled with sharing my faith at school. But in the last two years my eyes were opened to the potential Jesus has given me to bring his light into school. I have had amazing conversations with girls in my classes about Jesus, scripture and encountering the Holy Spirit – conversations that were impossible for so many years. God made me for those conversations; He made me to go to that school; He made me to be friends with those girls. He made me to tell them about Jesus. He made me for times such as these. This only became possible when I fully trusted Jesus, rejected the security of routine and stepped outside of my comfort zone. And the same can be true for you, wherever you study or work. Someone once told me to grow where I have been planted; it’s time to open up and allow God to use you where He has put you.
Take time to stop and think about all the ways God is using you in your life, because as it says in the book of Esther, He made you for those times.