Esther 2:8, 1 Samuel 9:21, 1 Samuel 9:15-16

Liz Dumain reflects on the backgrounds of Esther and Saul and how God chooses little people for great things.

Liz Dumain

I was doing some research recently about what questions people most often ask when using a search engine. I wasn't surprised to discover that the most frequently asked question recently is, 'What is the meaning of life?'

I suspect there's a question behind that question. What people are really asking is, 'Who am I and what am I here for?'

It's the greatest heart cry of our generation - I wonder what your answer is today?

There are so many things that can affect how we feel about ourselves and therefore the answer to those questions and one is the start we've had in life.

Too often we assume that those we perceive as successful have had great starts, with stable family lives and brilliant childhoods, but that's often not true!

In the Bible we see two people who had dodgy starts, for whom God had great plans. Firstly, Esther was created with a purpose from a terrible start. Esther was an orphan, living in the household of her extended family. Who knows what effect that had on her! When the king got angry with his wife and had her killed and so needed a new wife, Esther was one of the women in his sights.

Esther 2:8 says, "When the king's order and edict had been proclaimed, many young women were brought to the citadel of Susa and put under the care of Hegai. Esther also was taken to the king's palace and entrusted to Hegai, who had charge of the harem".

Esther had no choice; she was taken to the palace and put in a harem to be beautified for a year, for an elderly king to call her whenever he chose. However she ended up saving her people by negotiating their freedom from a tyrant king.

She had a terrible start. She was a girl that no-one would have ever expected to amount to much, but she was called to do a great thing for God.

Let's look at someone else. Saul was created with a purpose from an ordinary life. God spoke to a prophet called Samuel about who was to lead the people in the future and picked an ordinary man.

It says in 1 Samuel 9:15-16, 'Now the day before Saul came, the Lord had revealed this to Samuel: "About this time tomorrow I will send you a man from the land of Benjamin. Anoint him ruler over my people Israel; he will deliver them from the hand of the Philistines. I have looked on my people, for their cry has reached me".

This would have been a right old shock, as the tribe of Benjamin was the smallest. It wasn't like the tribe of Judah who were known as the tribe of kings. The tribe of Benjamin were a bit of a rag tag tribe really. It was made up of a bundle of groups, so it had never quite sorted out its government and it was almost wiped out in a battle, to the point that they had to go and borrow people from other towns to reproduce. So he was from the lowest of the low tribe and the littlest of the little. It certainly wasn't the place you'd expect a king to come from, or someone with a big call on their lives.

1 Samuel 9:21 says, 'Saul answered, "But am I not a Benjamite, from the smallest tribe of Israel, and is not my clan the least of all the clans of the tribe of Benjamin? Why do you say such a thing to me?"'

Here he is, the next king and he's from the tribe of little; the tribe of overlooked; the tribe of unimportant. Even Saul can't quite fathom it!

So in Esther and Saul we have two ordinary people; people with tricky starts, who you might never have expected to be called by God for a purpose. They are two people who bring hope to you and me, because we're called to serve God from whatever 'tribe' we've come from. However little or unimportant we feel we are; however difficult our start in life and however overlooked we feel, we're called by a King to a life of adventure in His service.