Wednesday, March 29, 2017

Drunk on Faith


I cried through the megillah reading this year.

My daughter who sat next to me hugged and kissed me with 
her black-lipsticked mouth, leaving a smear on my cheek.  
She was surprised that the megillah
 brought me to tears. "You're so emotional, Mom! It's gonna be okay,"
 she whispered.  She wiped my black -smeared cheek and my tears and 
blew me more kisses.

I cried in empathy with Esther, the orphan, who was given a lonely mission that
 she neither wanted nor requested.  I know what it's like to be separated
 from family after being forced into an unwanted sexual relationship. 
 I suspect that, like me, Esther would have gladly died, rather than
 be violated by King Achashverosh and then have to live separately 
because of it for the rest of her life - becoming just one of the many girls
 the king used for pleasure and discarded.  Esther spent the rest of her 
life in the king's palace, not really belonging nor wanting to be
 there, cut off from her people.

Esther made the best of her situation. In the end, when she
 understood why she had been chosen, Esther accepted her 
destiny. She rose to the occasion and saw opportunity and
 ultimately redemption in her desperate situation. 
 She chose to use her position for good.  Mordechai helped
 her see the bigger picture.

Through my tears I remind myself of the many 
Mordechai's in my life who believe in me and my mission.

Like Mordechai, they cannot fully enter my inner world, 
but like Mordechai they stay close by and remind me 
not to get lost in despair.  They know I am here in this
 strange, lonely place for a reason.

They remind me that I am on an important mission.
Like Esther, I was given this unique set of circumstances for a reason.

Like Esther, I can choose to run away from this mission and God
 will find some other way to save my family from this evil.

Like Esther, I will gather courage and find my voice and do
 the right thing.  I will let my voice be heard.  I will banish 
self-doubt by turning to God.  My faith will carry me through 
this mission.  I will find the strength to confront people of
 power, and I will arrive uninvited and speak my truth.  
I will find a way to be heard and expose evil.

I could have gone quietly into the night, lived my life,
 healed my own pain, focused on my own family and
 ignored the larger mission in the situation I was given.

I am not Esther, but I can see that in my own life, in my individual
 story, I too can make a difference.

I am confronting an evil that almost destroyed me and
 is threatening to destroy my people.

Sometimes, when I am high on faith, I truly do not know the difference
 between cursed be Haman and blessed be Mordechai.
When I am drunk on faith it's all the same. Nothing bad 
ever happened, or will happen. I have everything I need,
 and I am everything I need.  I have clarity.

When I know that everything is from God and I occupy a
 place of love, there is truly no difference between good and bad.