The Moment of Death, The Moment of Life

I've passed my share of accidents (and thankfully, haven't been in any serious accidents myself). Every time I pass an accident scene, even if the vehicles involved are off the road and not obstructing the highway, traffic slows down anyway so all the rubberneckers can satisfy their curiosity. What happened? 

As we creep by the scenes of accidents, if I'm not the one driving, I fasten my gaze to the melee on the side of the road as I try to Sherlock Holmes my way through it. Well, that guy must have nudged the lady's back bumper, and she probably hit the guard rail soon after. I take into account all the shattered glass and any debris, the ambulances, the EMTs on the scene... but I almost never completely figure out for sure what happened.  

The only time I ever knew anything with absolute certainty was the time I passed what appeared to be a devastating accident, and I caught sight of EMTs wheeling an ambulance stretcher along the road. There was a person on the stretcher, but covering the person from the tips of the toes to the top of the head, was a white sheet.

I knew, when I saw that the face had been covered, that the person had died.

It rocks you a little bit, you know? That tentative grasp on this earthly life, so easily released. As we drove on, I wondered: Was that person ready? Did he know as he traveled down that interstate, maybe checking out the tractor trailer truck on his right to make sure it wasn't coming over, or deciding to change the music issuing from his radio that the time allotted to his life was entering its final few seconds?

Of course, we don't know exactly when we'll go, so that's why it's important to always be ready, because once that last breath exits the lungs, the sheet comes up over the face. First life, then death, then... eternity. 

Esther 7 brings us, finally, to the answer to the question King Xerxes has asked his queen twice before in Esther 6:3 and 6:6. Esther has risked her life as she presents herself, uninvited, before the king, and the king -- pleased with the appearance of his queen, spares her life and accepts her invitation to a banquet she's prepared for him and for Haman. 

Esther has one chance to make her request to spare her people the Jews, and she can't mess it up. Maybe she doesn't feel like the king is ready to hear her request the first day, so she keeps quiet. And Day 2 arrives. 

The Scriptures don't say whether she knew about Mordecai's high honor from Esther 6, where Haman leads his mortal enemy through the streets of Susa and proclaims: "This is what is done for the man the king delights to honor!" But it's entirely possible that Esther has watched the construction of a 75 foot gallows going up in the vicinity of Haman's house that night, because a.) it's 75 feet high, so it's hard to miss, and b.) it's construction, which tends to get noisy). So maybe... I'm just speculating... the pressure on Esther goes from forceful to irresistible. She can't keep silent anymore.

And so Day 2 of the banquet commences. "So the king and Haman went to dine with Queen Esther, and as they were drinking wine on that second day, the king again asked, 'Queen Esther, what is your petition? It will be given you. What is your request? Even up to half the kingdom, it will be granted" (Esther 7:1-2).

Significantly, this is the third time the king asks this. If you pay attention to Biblical themes at all, certain numbers play important roles: 3, 7, 12, 40, etc. The number 3 usually means completion of God's plan -- Jesus rose on the third day after His death, completing God's plan of salvation for the world. Here, Xerxes asks 3 times what is troubling Esther, before she finally pleads for the salvation of her people, the Jews.

"Then Queen Esther answered, 'If I have found favor with you, oh king, and if it pleases your majesty, grant me my life -- this is my petition. And spare my people -- this is my request. For I and my people have been sold for destruction and slaughter and annihilation" (Esther 7:3-4).

When Haman offered to pay into the king's royal treasury ten thousand talents of silver, two-thirds of the annual income of the Persian empire, he was purchasing the Jews for destruction and slaughter and annihilation. The king told Haman to "keep the money and do with the people as you please" (Esther 3:11), and so it seems likely that Haman did keep the money -- but the price had been offered nonetheless, and the outcome of the bargain was carried forward.

Sold. To the highest bidder, Haman. 

Note that Esther isn't even waging war on the issue of slavery to the Persian empire. Her plea goes beyond slavery to the decimation and genocide that is about to happen. "For I and my people have been sold for destruction and slaughter and annihilation. If we had merely been sold as male and female slaves, I would have kept quiet, because no such distress would justify disturbing the king" (Esther 7:4).

And Xerxes is furious. You can almost see the lightbulb coming on. He's taken Esther as his queen, but the realization of who her people are is just now coming into the light of day. 

And it's got to be a lightbulb for both Xerxes and Haman. Wait... her people. Destruction and slaughter and annihilation? But... hold on... the only people who are getting ready to be decimated are... are the Jews, so... the queen is... Jewish? Hold the phone, what did Haman just do?!

"King Xerxes asked Queen Esther, 'Who is he? Where is the man who has dared to do such a thing?'

"Esther said, 'The adversary and enemy is this vile Haman.'

"Then Haman was terrified before the king and queen" (Esther 7:5-6).

This is not at all how Haman pictured this banquet would go. He'd been so delighted to be given this honor -- dining alone with both his monarchs. Nobody else gets such special treatment. Just him. He's even bragged about it to all his friends and family (Esther 5:12). Even after the blow to his pride from the night before where he'd had to lead Mordecai through the streets and proclaim the king's favor over him, he still holds the distinction of dining alone with the king and queen.

He's still nearly drunk with pride... until this moment. Until this moment when he watches all his bright dreams and plans for power shatter at his feet in hopeless ruin.

Haman was terrified before the king and queen. The ghosts of his wife's words to him that morning come back to haunt him: "Since Mordecai, before whom your downfall has started, is of Jewish origin, you cannot stand against him -- you will surely come to ruin!" (Esther 6:13)

"The king got up in a rage, left his wine..."

*Inserting a comedic moment: the king is so upset, he actually left his wine. If we've seen anything in this book, we've seen that Xerxes is no teetotaler. He sure does love him some alcohol, and look, he's upset enough that he actually leaves it. Haman's got him mad!

"The king got up in a rage, left his wine, and went out into the palace gardens. But Haman, realizing that the king had already decided his fate, stayed behind to beg Queen Esther for his life" (Esther 7:7).

Frying pan or fire? Hmm. The odds of survival in either scenario aren't great. Haman goes for what he hopes might be the tender and sympathetic heart of a woman, perhaps because he knows the king a little better, and maybe he can play on Esther's pity for him. It appears that he is so distraught, that as he lurches up from the dining table where they've been reclining (as people lay on couches to eat in those days), and he collapses onto Esther's couch where she's lying... and on top of the queen herself.

You can almost feel the servants sucking in their breaths. Oh, no, he did NOT just do that!

"Just as the king returned from the palace garden to the banquet hall, Haman was falling on the couch where Esther was reclining.

"The king exclaimed, 'Will he even molest the queen while she is with me in the house?'" (Esther 7:8).

That's it. That's the end. Everybody knows it, even Haman. There is no hope, none -- for this man who just sent the king over the edge.

"As soon as the word left the king's mouth, they covered Haman's face" (Esther 7:8). They pulled the sheet up over the body. There's nothing left to do... but finish the job. Take the body to the morgue. He was -- as the phrase goes -- "a goner."

"Then Harbona, one of the eunuchs attending the king, said, 'A gallows seventy-five feet high stands by Haman's house. He had it made for Mordecai, who spoke up to help the king.'

"The king said, 'Hang him on it!' So they hanged Haman on the gallows he had prepared for Mordecai. Then the king's fury subsided" (Esther 7:9-10).

And that, my friends, is called poetic justice. The gallows Haman had built for his mortal enemy is the gallows where Haman himself hangs on display instead.

Anyway, check this out. Back in Esther 6:12, after Haman has finished leading Mordecai around the city to honor him, "Haman rushed home with his head covered in grief and told Zeresh his wife and all his friends everything that had happened to him." He covers his head at the beginning of his downfall.

Then in Esther 7:8, "As soon as the word left the king's mouth, they covered Haman's face." He covers his head when the last possible thread of hope has fled.

That tentative, fragile, grasp on life... is gone. No matter how much effort Haman expends trying to  stay alive, the time has come, life exits stage left, and his head is covered. Nothing he can do by his own efforts saves him.

He's done.

That head covering was a sign to everyone, near or far, that this man was a condemned man, a dead man. 

Okay, now look with me at Exodus 34:33-35. Moses comes down from Mount Sinai where he's been chatting with the Lord, and here's a side effect of chatting with the Lord: You stand on holy ground. And when you stand on holy ground, people are going to see the radiance of the Holy Spirit at work in you.

Here, "when Moses finished speaking to them, he put a veil over his face. But whenever he entered the Lord's presence to speak with Him, he removed the veil until he came out. And when he came out and told the Israelites what he had been commanded, they saw that his face was radiant. Then Moses would put the veil back over his face until he went in to speak with the Lord."

Over in 2 Corinthians 3:12-18, Paul reminds the Corinthian church about this incident. He says: "We are not like Moses, who would put a veil over his face to keep the Israelites from gazing at it while the radiance was fading away. But their minds were made dull, for to this day the same veil remains when the Old Covenant is read. It has not been removed, because only in Christ is it taken away. Even to this day when Moses is read, a veil covers their hearts. But whenever anyone turns to the Lord, the veil is taken away. Now the Lord is the Spirit and where the Spirit of the Lord is, there is freedom. And we, who with unveiled faces all reflect the Lord's glory, are being transformed into His likeness with ever-increasing glory, which comes from the Lord, Who is the Spirit."

When the EMTs pulled up the sheet over the victim's face, every passerby understood, that person was dead. The face was covered. There was no life left.

Paul says: "Only in Christ is that veil taken away." Romans 8:1-2 says: "Therefore, there is now no condemnation for those who are in Christ Jesus, because through Christ Jesus, the law of the Spirit of Life set me free from the law of sin and death!"

We don't have to have that veil; Christ Jesus took it away when He conquered death on the cross! There is now no condemnation for those who are in Christ Jesus.

The words of condemnation left King Xerxes' mouth and they covered Haman's face, but there is now no condemnation from the King of kings, because through Christ Jesus, the law of the Spirit of Life set me free from the law of sin and death.

That's fantastic news, you guys! He has torn the veil in two -- from top to bottom -- that separates us from Him.

And people say there's no mention of God in the book of Esther. Pfffff. The entire book is a salvation story on a smaller scale of what God has done and is doing on a grander scale.

Hallelujah!