“In the twelfth year of King Ahasuerus, they cast Pur (that is, the lot), before Haman to determine the day and the month…” (Est 3:7).
That’s not a prayer, you say! And you’re right, of course. No prayer is recorded in this whole book. In fact, God’s name isn’t even there (except perhaps in coded acrostics). God had said He would hide His face from His people if they ignored Him. And so it happened. But doesn’t Scripture say, “The lot is cast into the lap, but its every decision is from the Lord” (Prov 16:33)? The timing of the day, seemingly selected at random, was perfect! “Who knows whether you have come to the kingdom for such a TIME as this?” God knew!
As J.R. Lowell wrote:
“Truth forever on the scaffold, Wrong forever on the throne,
Yet that scaffold sways the future, and, behind the dim unknown,
Standeth God within the shadow, keeping watch above His own.”
Nursing mothers will forget their children before the Lord forgets His people—even wayward ones!