Everyone loves a great storyteller—and there is none greater than God himself. But the Bible is not an easy read. There are not only language challenges but also the way we tell stories has changed significantly in the last four thousand years. But the best readers can get past such challenges, and the rest of us can benefit from their help. Find a translation you understand. There is nothing wrong with a modern translation or a paraphrase. After all, it’s better to read a paraphrase like the Living Bible or the Message Bible than to read no Bible at all. (A paraphrase simply means someone put the language into easier words. Modern words.)
Think of the Bible stories you know. Can anything compete with them? God creates time, space, stars, planets, and the earth? Noah builds an ark and God fills it with animals? Moses confronts Pharaoh and God sends ten plagues designed to rebuke each of ten false gods? That’s incredible. Think of the miracles: the earth opens up and swallows God’s enemies? God defeats an enemy army with hailstones? David kills Goliath? Ruth and Boaz. Abraham and Sarah. Mary and Joseph. Families. Feuds. War. Peace. The Promised Land and the birth of a nation. Jesus plays with children, raises the dead, dies on a cross, comes back to life. These stories are unlike anything in literature.
One of the best stories is the book of Esther. The Persian king brings a beautiful young Jewish girl into his harem and makes her queen. Haman, the king’s no. 2 man, hates Esther’s uncle, a godly man who refuses to bow to a him, and builds a gallows 75-feet tall on which to hang Uncle Mordecai. Haman has also devised a plan that will allow him to kill not only Mordecai but every one of his countrymen. Haman is going to wipe out the entire Jewish race. One day the king asks Haman for advice:
“What should be done for a man the king wishes to honor?” (Esther 6:6).
Haman assumes the king plans to honor him. So he comes up with an amazing list of honors—all Haman could ever have imagined. The king says That’s a great list. Go and do all of that for Mordecai the Jew. Haman is secretly humiliated and now hates Mordecai more than ever. But he obeys the king. Then, just as Haman’s genocidal plans are about to begin, Queen Esther risks her life to expose his evil plans to the king. What happens? The king has Haman hung on the gallows he built for Mordecai the Jew, Esther 7:9.
What a perfect, simple story. The arrogant man filled with monstrous hatred is forced to bestow his own personal fantasy of honors on his worst enemy, then is hung on the world’s tallest gallows, gallows he had designed to kill that same enemy.
Why? Because he made himself an enemy of God and of God’s people. You can’t fight God. You will never win.
“Your arm’s too short to box with God!”
Dear God, remind us that there is no storyteller like you. Your word is filled with so many amazing stories, true records of the amazing way you have worked in our world and in the lives of your people. Make us better students of the word. Lead us to translations of the Bible that will help us understand your message better. Be glorified in our Bible reading and Bible study.
AΩ
Household Words: 