Summoned: Answering a Call to the ImpossibleSample

Summoned: An Introduction

This book in the Bible is a story about a Jewish woman named Hadassah, later called Esther, who lived in Persia after the Babylonian exile from Jerusalem. She lived among those who did not return to Jerusalem under Zerubbabel, and her story is filled with hardship, hurt, and heinous events. As a woman, Esther had to endure long-suffering and uncertainty. She made difficult choices and was forced into a lifestyle where faith was not favored. God’s people were living outside of His promised land, exiled from their holy city, and presumably from His presence.

This reading plan will not be an exercise recounting the children’s version of Esther, with beauty pageants and pretty tiaras. Our study is a raw look at the biblical text. Cultural Christianity, a shallow and self-centered view of God and the world, has watered God’s Word down to a suggested blueprint for living, filled with short quips and encouraging phrases. This assumption couldn’t be further from the truth. We will reject the notion that God’s Word is only for the purposes of self-discovery or finding validation for our own religiosity. Instead, we open the pages of our Bibles expecting to hear truths about hard topics, causing us to grapple with God. These are the truths that will forever shatter chains we have been unable to break.

How can a book of the Bible with no mention of God at all teach us about our world today, much less teach us about Him? It is within the story of one woman that we become familiar with the unseen God. In fact—spoiler alert—this story isn’t about Esther at all. It’s about God and how He moves, in spite of unbelief, disobedience, or pain.

Through the rise and fall of queens, the harsh schemes of hateful men, and the victory only God can give, our study of the life of Esther will bring us to the place where we can truly say that “we know that for those who love God all things work together for good, for those who are called according to his purpose.”