Sermon: Purified For The King (Esther 2:11-19)

Purified For The King
Sunday, January 12th, 2025
Christ Covenant Church – Centralia, WA

Esther 2:11-19
And Mordecai walked every day before the court of the women’s house, to know how Esther did, and what should become of her. Now when every maid’s turn was come to go in to king Ahasuerus, after that she had been twelve months, according to the manner of the women, (for so were the days of their purifications accomplished, to wit, six months with oil of myrrh, and six months with sweet odours, and with other things for the purifying of the women;) Then thus came every maiden unto the king; whatsoever she desired was given her to go with her out of the house of the women unto the king’s house. In the evening she went, and on the morrow she returned into the second house of the women, to the custody of Shaashgaz, the king’s chamberlain, which kept the concubines: she came in unto the king no more, except the king delighted in her, and that she were called by name. Now when the turn of Esther, the daughter of Abihail the uncle of Mordecai, who had taken her for his daughter, was come to go in unto the king, she required nothing but what Hegai the king’s chamberlain, the keeper of the women, appointed. And Esther obtained favour in the sight of all them that looked upon her. So Esther was taken unto king Ahasuerus into his house royal in the tenth month, which is the month Tebeth, in the seventh year of his reign. And the king loved Esther above all the women, and she obtained grace and favour in his sight more than all the virgins; so that he set the royal crown upon her head, and made her queen instead of Vashti. Then the king made a great feast unto all his princes and his servants, even Esther’s feast; and he made a release to the provinces, and gave gifts, according to the state of the king. And when the virgins were gathered together the second time, then Mordecai sat in the king’s gate.

Prayer

Our Father, we thank you for the sevenfold purity of your word, through which our hearts are made clean, and we are fashioned by your hands into vessels of mercy, honorable and sanctified for every good work. Please form us and reform us as we hear your word now, for we ask this in Jesus’ name, Amen.

Introduction

This morning, we come to a very happy section in the book of Esther which is her marriage to King Ahasuerus and her elevation to the office of Queen instead of Vashti. And this royal marriage also marks the conclusion of one of the important sub-plots of this book which is that the King needs a new and better queen, and it also sets up the second sub-plot where the King needs a new and better advisor or prime minister.

• So the basic flow of this book is that first Esther will replace Vashti, then Mordecai will replace Haman, and then through a series of great reversals, God shakes the nations, many Gentiles are converted, and God’s enemies are destroyed.
• So while we are focusing in on just one part of that story, we don’t want to forget the broader narrative which all of Scripture testifies to and that is God’s love for the human soul, and Christ’s love for the church. The Bible begins with the marriage of Adam and Eve, and it ends with the marriage of God to Humanity, Christ to His Bride, and we will see that marriage foreshadowed here as Esther is purified, chosen, and wed to the King.

So in the sermon this morning I am going to first give you the literal or historical sense of these verses. And then we’ll double back and consider the spiritual sense that those realities point to.

The Literal Historical Sense

We can divide our text into two sections.

• In verses 11-14, Esther is Purified.
• In verses 15-19, Esther is Glorified.

Verse 11

11And Mordecai walked every day before the court of the women’s house, to know how Esther did, and what should become of her.

• Recall from two weeks ago that we are working on the assumption that Esther wants to marry Ahasuerus, not that she was taken as a captive or slave into the house of the women.
  • We also conjectured that the most likely reason for Mordecai and Esther desiring such a marriage would be for the prosperity of the Jewish people. If Esther becomes queen and has a son, that son could become future emperor of the Persian Empire. And that is a strong motive for marriage for anyone living in those 127 provinces.
• We also see that for an entire year, Mordecai was able to walk “every day before the court of the women’s house,” and get intel on how Esther was doing.
  • This suggests that Mordecai is not only an anxious/caring father, but is some kind of politician or governing official, given that he has this kind of access to the palace.
    • We will see in verse 19 thatafter Esther’s wedding, Mordecai sits within the king’s gate (this was where elders and judges sat), and in chapter 3 he is explicitly numbered amongst the king’s servants.
    • So Mordecai and Esther are a Father-Daughter duo working together to secure the good of the Jews from within the Persian court.
• Continuing in verses 12-14, we then have a description of life within the house of the women.

Verses 12-14

12Now when every maid’s turn was come to go in to king Ahasuerus, after that she had been twelve months, according to the manner of the women, (for so were the days of their purifications accomplished, to wit, six months with oil of myrrh, and six months with sweet odours, and with other things for the purifying of the women;) 13Then thus came every maiden unto the king; whatsoever she desired was given her to go with her out of the house of the women unto the king’s house. 14In the evening she went, and on the morrow she returned into the second house of the women, to the custody of Shaashgaz, the king’s chamberlain, which kept the concubines: she came in unto the king no more, except the king delighted in her, and that she were called by name.

• Now there are two basic options for what is being described here.
  • One view is that Ahasuerus sleeps with a different virgin every night. And then after sleeping with these women, they become concubines who only exist for his sexual pleasure and that is only if he can remember their name.
    • If that is the case, we could put Ahasuerus in the same category as men like David and Solomon. David and Solomon were both godly men who committed grave sins. Both fell short of the marital ideal in Genesis of one man and one woman married for life.
      • David had multiple wives and concubines (2 Sam. 5:13), and Solomon famously had 700 wives and 300 concubines (1 Kings 11:3), and yet both men were used by God and even wrote large portions of Scripture.
      • So while the idea of having many wives and concubines rightly scandalizes our Christian sensibilities, polygamy of this sort was a common vice of ancient kings and Ahasuerus would be the exception (a man better than David) if he did not have concubines.
    • So that is one possible interpretation of what is going on here, and the majority opinion, but I think there are some problems with that reading both logically and textually.
      • One logical problem is that it makes entering the king’s house (from my perspective) into a very high stakes gamble for Mordecai and Esther. If the options in front of you are Queen of Persia, or one-night stand concubine for the king, would you really take that risk, or allow your daughter to take that risk? Perhaps if you are desperate (and perhaps they are), but otherwise, I don’t think so. Or we would have to radically re-evaluate Esther and Mordecai’s character.
      • Another problem is that it makes sexual performance into the metric by which the new queen is chosen, rather than finding a woman more virtuous than Vashti. Again, this does not fit with what we have seen so far from the king’s decrees regarding Vashti and his search for a new queen.
    • So those are two logical problems with the majority view. But there are also some textual problems as well which some of the better commentators have acknowledged and puzzled over.
      • One problem is that in verse 15, when Esther goes “in unto the king” it says she “obtained favor in the sight of all them that looked upon her.” Who are all these people?
        • Either there are a bunch of people in the king’s bedroom, or the context is the King together with his advisers and officials interviewing each girl to see if she has the manners, beliefs, and qualities that would make her better than Vashti. Remember that was the whole purpose of this gathering of the women, to find a new queen to rule with Ahasuerus, not just to find a pretty face.
      • Another problem is that the location to which these women are said to go into is “the king’s house.” And “the king’s house” is the same place where Vashti gave her feast for the women (Esther 1:9), the royal throne is in “the king’s house (Esther 5:1), “the king’s house” has an inner and outer court, and at the end of the book we read, “Mordecai was great in the king’s house.”
        • So the king’s house is a large complex from which he rules the empire, it is a place of feasting and governing with his advisors, not merely his private bedchamber.
  • So to summarize my view: I think these woman received 12 months of purification, and while some of that was for cosmetics, the primary purpose was for their education in royal manners. It does not take a year to get the smell of your native land out of your skin, but it does take a year (at least) to learn royal manners and customs. So these women were in “Princess School” learning which spoon to eat with, when to speak and not to speak, etc. And while 12 months might seem like a long time to us, remember they are preparing these girls from nowhere to possibly become the most powerful woman in the whole world, the Queen of Persia. From that perspective, 12 months is a short timeline.
    • So to me it makes the most sense that once these girls have been purified, perfumed, and educated, they go before the king to be interviewed, not necessarily to sleep with him.
    • This would explain why when Esther goes before the king, she finds favor in the eyes of all, not just the king.
    • This would also explain why it says in verse 13, “whatsoever she desired was given her to go with her out of the house of the women unto the king’s house.”
      • This was part of the test and interview of each girl’s character. What do you bring with you and why? An instrument, a painting, jewelry, a garment you made. This item would give each maiden the opportunity to distinguish herself from the others and become memorable to the king.
      • Whether the king then slept with her, the text never actually says. But if he did, the author has chosen not to emphasize that, and so neither shall we.
      • Moreover, the mention of virgins in verses 17 and 19 seems to refer to the maidens who have already gone into the king.
        • So it is certainly possible that this house of concubines is not a harem for sex, but rather the place where these maidens lived until the king decided who his next queen would be. After that, they would most likely become maidens to the queen or servants in the king’s palace.
        • This would also make Mordecai and Esther’s decision to enter this contest in the first place a lot more reasonable. The worse that can happen is Esther is not chosen and becomes a servant in the palace.
• So those are two possible interpretations, and I leave to your judgment which makes the most sense of all the data.
• Now after Esther is purified for 12 months, her time finally comes to go before the king. And recall that it has been about 4 years since Vashti was deposed.

Verse 15

15Now when the turn of Esther, the daughter of Abihail the uncle of Mordecai, who had taken her for his daughter, was come to go in unto the king, she required nothing but what Hegai the king’s chamberlain, the keeper of the women, appointed. And Esther obtained favour in the sight of all them that looked upon her.

• Note that we are told here who Esther’s biological father was, a man named Abihail, which literally means my father has hayil, or my father is mighty/valorous. So Esther is descended from men of hayil, and in the eyes of Ahasuerus, Hegai, and all who look upon her, she is herself a woman of hayil, a virtuous woman.
• We might imagine Ahasuerus saying to Esther the words of Proverbs 31:29, “Many daughters have done virtuously, But thou excellest them all.” For that is certainly the universal opinion of Esther at this stage in the story, and because of her excellence, the king chooses her above all others to be his wife and queen.

Verses 16-18

16So Esther was taken unto king Ahasuerus into his house royal in the tenth month, which is the month Tebeth, in the seventh year of his reign. 17And the king loved Esther above all the women, and she obtained grace and favour in his sight more than all the virgins; so that he set the royal crown upon her head, and made her queen instead of Vashti. 18Then the king made a great feast unto all his princes and his servants, even Esther’s feast; and he made a release to the provinces, and gave gifts, according to the state of the king.

• So here Esther’s wedding feast is described, and it is significant that we are given the exact year and month in which this marriage takes place, because there is an important contrast between these events in Shushan, and what is happening at the same time in Jerusalem.
• We learn from the book of Ezra that while Esther was entering the king’s house for her 12 months of purification, meanwhile in Jerusalem the temple was finally completed (Ezra 6:15), and the Jewish people are undergoing various rituals of purification.
  • It says in Ezra 6:19-20, “And the children of the captivity kept the passover upon the fourteenth day of the first month. For the priests and the Levites were purified together, all of them were pure, and killed the passover for all the children of the captivity, and for their brethren the priests, and for themselves. And the children of Israel, which were come again out of captivity, and all such as had separated themselves unto them from the filthiness of the heathen of the land, to seek the Lord God of Israel, did eat.”
    • So while Esther is in Shushan, the priests are offering the Passover on her behalf in Jerusalem.
  • And then after this purification for Passover, we read that Ezra himself sets off from Babylon with a bunch of silver and gold and a letter from Ahasuerus to beautify the temple, appoint judges and magistrates, and teach the people the law of God.
    • So while Esther is being beautified and educated in the king’s house, Ezra is on his way to beautify and educate the Jews in God’s house.
  • However, when Ezra arrives in Jerusalem, the princes come to him and confess that many of them have not separated themselves from the idolaters, and in fact many have intermarried with the Canaanites contrary to God’s law.
    • It says in Deuteronomy 7:1-4, “When the Lord your God brings you into the land which you go to possess, and has cast out many nations before you, the Hittites and the Girgashites and the Amorites and the Canaanites and the Perizzites and the Hivites and the Jebusites, seven nations greater and mightier than you, and when the Lord your God delivers them over to you, you shall conquer them and utterly destroy them. You shall make no covenant with them nor show mercy to them. Nor shall you make marriages with them. You shall not give your daughter to their son, nor take their daughter for your son. For they will turn your sons away from following Me, to serve other gods; so the anger of the Lord will be aroused against you and destroy you suddenly.”
    • And then we read in Ezra 9:2-3 how Ezra responds to such sin, “For they have taken of their daughters for themselves, and for their sons: so that the holy seed have mingled themselves with the people of those lands: yea, the hand of the princes and rulers hath been chief in this trespass. And when I heard this thing, I rent my garment and my mantle, and plucked off the hair of my head and of my beard, and sat down astonied.”
• So this is the scene in Jerusalem just 10 days or so before Esther goes before Ahasuerus. God’s bride in Jerusalem has defiled herself with idolaters and need to be purified through repentance. And we are told in Ezra 10:16 that it was on the first day of the 10th month, the same month in which Ahasuerus marries Esther, that they began the process of ending these idolatrous marriages according to the law of God.
  • So as we said before in earlier sermons, Esther represents the faithful remnant, the myrtle tree (Hadassah) of God’s everlasting promises. And God has given us these particular dates in Scripture so that we can see these parallels.
  • The whole purpose of the Jews repenting and purifying themselves was so they could approach God, find favor with him, and dwell in His house. The whole purpose of Esther’s purification was to prepare her to approach Ahasuerus, find favor with him, and dwell in his house.
  • And this of course brings us to the spiritual sense or application of these events for us as the bride of Christ. The question we all ought to ask ourselves is: Are we prepared to go in and stand before the king? Are we ready for our interview, our assessment in the eyes of Christ’s Heavenly Court?
    • This judgment takes place every Lord’s Day here in worship, it shall take place for each of us at death, and it shall take place in full at the end of history when all shall receive either resurrection unto glory or resurrection unto damnation.
    • For those who purify themselves in this life, glory shall follow.
    • But for those who defile themselves with sin, with demons, with falsehood, to them belongs the wages of sin, fearful punishment and death.
• So how do you purify yourself in the twelve months of your preparation for the king?
  • We are told that Esther’s purification consisted of “six months with oil of myrrh, and six months with sweet odours.”
  • And what does this signify but the same bitter myrrh and sweet odors of God’s holy anointing oil?
    • We read in Exodus 30:22-30, “Moreover the Lord spoke to Moses, saying: “Also take for yourself quality spices—five hundred shekels of liquid myrrh, half as much sweet-smelling cinnamon (two hundred and fifty shekels), two hundred and fifty shekels of sweet-smelling cane, five hundred shekels of cassia, according to the shekel of the sanctuary, and a hin of olive oil. And you shall make from these a holy anointing oil, an ointment compounded according to the art of the perfumer. It shall be a holy anointing oil. With it you shall anoint the tabernacle of meeting and the ark of the Testimony; the table and all its utensils, the lampstand and its utensils, and the altar of incense; the altar of burnt offering with all its utensils, and the laver and its base. You shall consecrate them, that they may be most holy; whatever touches them must be holy. And you shall anoint Aaron and his sons, and consecrate them, that they may minister to Me as priests.”
  • So this oil that makes holy is none other than the Holy Spirit. In the words of Acts 15:8, the Holy Spirit “purifies our hearts by faith.”
  • And if your soul is a little flame, when the Holy Spirit is poured upon you, the fires of love burn hot. To have oil upon the head is to have God upon your mind, it is to think of him and love Him, and desire Him more than anything.
  • In the words of Song of Songs 8:7, “Many waters cannot quench love, Neither can the floods drown it.”
  • Love for God is the sign that the Holy Spirit is within you. And it this love of God that purifies us, covers our sins, and makes us to live a life without condemnation. For as it says in Romans 8:1, “There is therefore now no condemnation to them which are in Christ Jesus, who walk not after the flesh, but after the Spirit.”

Conclusion

• So are you walking in love? Are you keeping in step with the Spirit?
• For Jesus says that only the pure in heart, shall see God. And that you must be holy, even as He is holy.
• It is this perfect purity and holiness which Christ died to give you. And so receive His cleansing by faith, regard yourself as His Temple, and do not grieve that Holy Spirit whereby ye are sealed unto the day of redemption.
• In the name of the Father, and the Son, and the Holy Spirit, Amen.