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“For if you keep silent at this time, liberation and rescue will arise for the Jews from another place, and you and your father’s house will perish. And who knows whether you have not attained royalty for such a time as this?”

—Esther 4:14

Mordecai knew the Jews wouldn’t be destroyed; they had God’s promise for this. So he knew that even if Esther did not step up, some other avenue of help would come.

But Esther was there, placed in a unique position to have an audience with the king, though at great danger to herself.

Nothing about this situation was ideal. Esther was probably a teenager when she was forced into the king’s harem, and this was after she’d been orphaned and put in her uncle’s care.

An orphaned child bride with no choice in her life path, yet, “Who knows?” Mordecai said. “Maybe you were placed here for this purpose, for this time.”

Some of us had a terrible start and no advantages in life. Some of us have never been able to make our own choices, and we’ve landed in hard situations we never would’ve picked given the chance.

Let’s consider that, perhaps, the Lord is still in charge—that maybe each of us have been put here just at this time for a purpose we can’t yet see.

The tapestry of the world is full of terrible things the Lord used for good. As Joseph said in Genesis 50:20, what man means for evil, God means for good. God is always working, and we can be a part of what he is doing. If not us, he will raise up someone else. We can be faithful where we’re placed even when we can’t understand and would never have chosen it.

he Mirror of the Word and other works by C.E. White can be purchased on her website, cewhitebooks.com or on Amazon

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