The Grammar of Gladness: Establishing Purim Text: Esther 9:20-32
Introduction: The Unnamed God Who Governs All
The book of Esther is a peculiar book. It is a story soaked in the providence of God, from the king's sleepless night to the gallows built for the wrong man. And yet, the name of God is not mentioned once. This is not an oversight. This is the Holy Spirit's masterstroke of literary genius. This is theology that bites back. God is teaching us that He is not some divine vending machine we summon by pushing the right buttons or saying the right incantations. He is the sovereign playwright who directs the entire drama, even when all the actors on stage are seemingly secular, pagan, or compromised. He governs all things, not just the things that happen in church buildings. He is the God of the palace intrigue in Susa just as much as He is the God of the temple worship in Jerusalem.
The entire story is a magnificent reversal. A plot to annihilate the Jews is turned on its head, and their enemies are destroyed instead. A proud and wicked man, Haman the Agagite, a spiritual descendant of the ancient enemies of God's people, is hanged on the very gallows he built for the righteous Mordecai. A day appointed for sorrow becomes a day of feasting. This is the constant pattern of God's work in history. He takes the worst that men can do, the very plots of hell, and He turns them to His own glorious purposes. The cross of Jesus Christ is the ultimate example of this, where the most wicked act in human history became the instrument of salvation for the world. Esther is a preview of the gospel. It is a story of how God saves His people, even when they are far from home, even when they are neck-deep in a pagan culture, and even when His name is not on their lips.
And what is the result of such a deliverance? It is not quiet, personal relief. It is not a solemn, head-bowed moment of introspective gratitude. No, the result is an explosion of public joy. It is feasting, gladness, and the establishment of a permanent, recurring, loud, and tangible celebration. Our text today is about the institutionalizing of joy. It is about how a great deliverance from God must be remembered, and not just remembered, but celebrated. It is about building a culture of gratitude, a calendar of victory. This is not an appendix to the story; it is the point of the story. God does not just save His people from their enemies; He saves them for a life of feasting and gladness in His presence.
The Text
Then Mordecai wrote down these events, and he sent letters to all the Jews who were in all the provinces of King Ahasuerus, both near and far, to establish among them to celebrate the fourteenth day of the month Adar, and the fifteenth day of the same month, annually, because on those days the Jews obtained rest for themselves from their enemies, and it was a month which was turned around for them from sorrow into gladness and from mourning into a holiday; that they should make them days of feasting and gladness and sending portions of food to one another and gifts to the poor. Thus the Jews fully accepted what they had started to do and what Mordecai had written to them. For Haman the son of Hammedatha, the Agagite, the adversary of all the Jews, had devised against the Jews to cause them to perish and had cast Pur, that is the lot, to throw them into confusion and cause them to perish. But when it came before the king, he said by letter that his evil scheme, which he had devised against the Jews, should return on his own head and that he and his sons should be hanged on the gallows. Therefore they called these days Purim after the name of Pur. Therefore, because of the words in this letter, both what they had seen in this regard and what had reached them, the Jews established and accepted a custom for themselves and for their seed and for all those who joined themselves to them, so that celebrating these two days according to what was written down and according to their fixed time from year to year would not pass away. So these days were to be remembered and celebrated throughout every generation, every family, every province, and every city; thus these days of Purim were not to pass away from among the Jews, nor their memory come to an end from their seed. Then Queen Esther, daughter of Abihail, with Mordecai the Jew, wrote with full authority to establish this second letter about Purim. And he sent letters to all the Jews, to the 127 provinces of the kingdom of Ahasuerus, namely, words of peace and truth, to establish these days of Purim at their appointed times, just as Mordecai the Jew and Queen Esther had established for them, and just as they had established for themselves and for their seed with words concerning their times of fasting and their crying out. And the declaration of Esther established these words concerning Purim, and it was written in the book.
(Esther 9:20-32 LSB)
Codifying the Celebration (vv. 20-22)
We begin with Mordecai's official act of establishing the feast.
"Then Mordecai wrote down these events, and he sent letters to all the Jews who were in all the provinces of King Ahasuerus, both near and far, to establish among them to celebrate the fourteenth day of the month Adar, and the fifteenth day of the same month, annually..." (Esther 9:20-21)
Notice the first thing Mordecai does after this great victory. He writes. He becomes a historian. He understands that memory is frail and that gratitude has a short shelf life. If this great act of God is to be remembered, it must be recorded. And it must be promulgated. He uses his newfound authority not for personal enrichment, but to establish a cultural institution. He sends letters throughout the entire empire. This is not a suggestion for a local potluck. This is a command to establish a universal, annual celebration.
And what is the reason for this celebration? Verse 22 gives us the heart of it. It was because on these days "the Jews obtained rest for themselves from their enemies." This is a sabbath principle. God gives His people rest. But this rest is not passive inactivity. It is a rest that is won through conflict. They had to fight for it, and God gave them the victory. The second reason is the great reversal: "it was a month which was turned around for them from sorrow into gladness and from mourning into a holiday." This is the signature of God's providence. He does not just prevent the bad thing; He turns the very day appointed for disaster into a day of deliverance. He transforms the nature of the time itself.
And how are they to celebrate? With "days of feasting and gladness and sending portions of food to one another and gifts to the poor." This is not a gnostic, ethereal kind of joy. It is a material, tangible, edible joy. Feasting is central. God is not honored by sour saints who are suspicious of pleasure. God created the material world and called it good, and He is honored when we receive His gifts with thanksgiving. But the joy is not individualistic. It is communal. They are to send portions to one another, strengthening the bonds of fellowship. And it is generous. They are to give gifts to the poor. True celebration is never selfish. It overflows in generosity, recognizing that all we have is a gift from the God who has delivered us.
The Reason for the Rhyme (vv. 23-26)
The text then rehearses the historical basis for this feast, ensuring that the celebration is always tied to the story of deliverance.
"For Haman...had devised against the Jews to cause them to perish and had cast Pur, that is the lot...But when it came before the king...his evil scheme...should return on his own head...Therefore they called these days Purim after the name of Pur." (Esther 9:24-26)
Here we see the logic of the feast. It is established to mock the plans of the wicked. Haman, the Agagite, the enemy of all the Jews, thought he was in control. He cast the "Pur," the lot, to determine the day of their destruction. He was trusting in chance, in fate, in his own clever scheming. But the book of Proverbs tells us, "The lot is cast into the lap, but its every decision is from the LORD" (Proverbs 16:33). Haman thought he was rolling the dice, but God was the one determining the outcome.
And so, in an act of glorious, divine irony, the feast is named "Purim," after the very instrument of Haman's plot. It is a perpetual taunt. Every year, when the Jews celebrate Purim, they are celebrating the fact that the "chance" and "fate" of the pagans are nothing before the sovereign providence of the God of Israel. They are celebrating the great reversal, where Haman's evil scheme returned upon his own head. This is how God works. He doesn't just defeat His enemies; He makes their own weapons the instruments of their destruction. He hangs Haman on Haman's gallows. He drowns Pharaoh in Pharaoh's sea. And He defeats Satan on Satan's cross.
A Covenant for the Generations (vv. 27-28)
This feast was not intended to be a one-time party. It was to be a permanent, covenantal institution.
"the Jews established and accepted a custom for themselves and for their seed and for all those who joined themselves to them...these days of Purim were not to pass away from among the Jews, nor their memory come to an end from their seed." (Esther 9:27-28)
This is covenant language. They are binding not only themselves but their children, their "seed," to this practice. And they include "all those who joined themselves to them," which means Gentile converts. This is about building a culture of remembrance. It is a conscious decision to fight against the natural human tendency to forget God's benefits. They are ensuring that this story of deliverance will be told and retold, feasted and re-feasted, in every generation, every family, every province, and every city.
We live in an age that despises tradition and memory. We are told that we must be untethered from the past, free to invent our own identities and our own realities. But the Bible teaches that faithfulness requires remembrance. We are who we are because of the story God has written for us. And a central part of our duty is to pass that story on to our children. This is what Mordecai and the Jews are doing here. They are weaving this great deliverance into the fabric of their identity. To be a Jew would mean, in part, to celebrate Purim. It was a way of saying, "This is who we are. We are the people whom God delivers from the Hamans of the world."
Royal Confirmation (vv. 29-32)
Finally, the establishment of the feast receives the highest possible human authority.
"Then Queen Esther, daughter of Abihail, with Mordecai the Jew, wrote with full authority to establish this second letter about Purim...And the declaration of Esther established these words concerning Purim, and it was written in the book." (Esther 9:29, 32)
Esther joins Mordecai, writing "with full authority." This is not just a popular movement; it is an official, royally sanctioned decree. The authority that God had providentially given to Esther is now being used to establish a righteous tradition. This is a model for Christian leaders and magistrates. Authority is a gift from God, and it is to be used to promote and protect the true worship and remembrance of God.
And notice the content of the letters they sent. They were "words of peace and truth." This is not the peace of compromise or the truth of abstract philosophy. This is the peace that comes from God's deliverance and the truth of His historical intervention. The feast of Purim is grounded in the truth of what God did. And because it is grounded in truth, it brings true peace and true joy. The celebration is not a flight from reality; it is a deep engagement with reality, the reality of God's sovereign, saving power.
The chapter ends by noting that this declaration was "written in the book." The story of God's deliverance and the command to celebrate it are now part of the permanent record. They are inscribed, fixed, and unchangeable. This is what Scripture is. It is the written record of God's mighty acts, given to us so that we will not forget, so that we will remember, and so that we will celebrate.
From Purim to the Table
As Christians, we are not obligated to celebrate the feast of Purim. We are not under the old ceremonial law. But we are fools if we do not learn the lesson of Purim. The lesson is this: God's great acts of deliverance are to be remembered with loud, tangible, feasting joy.
The deliverance of the Jews from Haman was a great deliverance. But it was a shadow, a type, of a far greater deliverance. We have been delivered from an enemy far more terrible than Haman. We have been delivered from Satan, sin, and death. Our Haman, the Accuser of the brethren, devised a plot to destroy us all, and he cast his lots. He thought he had won when he engineered the crucifixion of the Son of God.
But in the ultimate providential reversal, the gallows that Satan prepared for humanity became the instrument of his own defeat. The cross, a symbol of shame and death, was turned into the symbol of victory and life. The evil scheme returned on the devil's own head. And God has given us a feast to celebrate this victory. He has given us a perpetual ordinance, a covenant meal, to ensure that this memory will never come to an end from His seed.
Every Lord's Day, we come to this Table. This is our Purim. This is our feast of victory. Here we remember the great reversal. Here we celebrate our rest from our enemies. Here we proclaim that our sorrow has been turned into gladness and our mourning into a holiday. We do not come to this Table as a solemn funeral. We come to it as a victory banquet. And like the Jews at Purim, our celebration should overflow in fellowship and generosity. This Table binds us together as a people, and it fuels our love and service to one another and to the poor.
So let us learn the grammar of gladness from Esther. God has delivered us. The lot has been cast, the enemy has been defeated, and the feast has been spread. Therefore, let us keep the feast.