Later when King Xerxes’ fury had subsided, he remembered Vashti and what she had done and what he had decreed about her. ² Then the king’s personal attendants proposed, “Let a search be made for beautiful young virgins for the king. ³ Let the king appoint commissioners in every province of his realm to bring all these beautiful young women into the harem at the citadel of Susa. Let them be placed under the care of Hegai, the king’s eunuch, who is in charge of the women; and let beauty treatments be given to them. ⁴ Then let the young woman who pleases the king be queen instead of Vashti.” This advice appealed to the king, and he followed it.

Dear God, this is an interesting way to do a “Match.com”. The sad thing is that it had to be done at all. The only things that make this story passable for me is that 1.) Vashti wasn’t killed and 2.) you were working in this to save the Jewish people.

It kind of begs the age-old question—Do you cause bad things to happen to people for your purposes or do you simply work within the bad things that people do for your purposes? I feel like the answer is the latter. I don’t think you caused Xerxes to banish Vashti, but you knew how to use his sin.

Frankly, stories like this give me some comfort because I know that there are times every day when I fail you, but it seems that there is nothing I can do that will go too far to destroy your plans. I can hurt individuals, to be sure, and this is something I should avoid, but I know that you have accounted for my incompetence in whatever your plans for me are.

Father, what I really do not want to do with my life is hurt those around me. Whether it be my wife, children, family, friends, business, etc. That is where my desire for perfection starts. I want to be pleasing to you. I want to be your man to the people to whom you have entrusted me. Help me to not make the mistakes that Xerxes made (figuratively or literally), but at the same time I want to thank you for loving me just the way I am and planning around me accordingly.