Xerxes was King of Persia. As King he had total power over his subjects. Once when his queen, Vashti, refused to appear at a drunken banquet that he was holding, he issued a decree that she could never again appear before the king, and then sought someone else to replace her as queen.

After a search throughout the kingdom, Esther was named the new queen. Now Esther was Jewish, but she kept this secret from the King.

Mordecai was a cousin to Esther, who after the death of her parents had adopted her and brought her up as his own daughter. Mordecai was also a faithful Jew.

Haman had been appointed prime minister of Persia. All the officials in the king's service were ordered to show their respect for Haman by kneeling and bowing to him. They all did so, except for Mordecai. Mordecai refused because of his faith. As a Jew he believed that it was wrong to bow down, in a sense to worship another person. Mordecai would only bow down to God.

Now as we all know, Mordecai could have gone ahead and bowed down just this once. It wouldn't have meant much because his heart wouldn't have really been in it. It would have kept him from standing out and getting into trouble. It certainly would have been the easy way to deal with the problem, but Mordecai didn't choose the easy way, because he believe that it was the wrong way. Instead, he did what he knew to be right.

Haman of course wasn't very understanding. In fact he was furious, and decided to punish not only Mordecai, but every Jew. Since it was the faith of the Jews that caused the problem, Haman's solution was to eliminate all Jews. He'd show them!

Mordecai went to Esther seeking to enlist her help. As the queen he believed that she might be able to influence the king. She was the only one in a position to get the proclamation changed, a proclamation that ordered that all Jews be put to death. In his opinion, she was the only one who could save her people. But Esther was afraid. She knew what had happened to Vashti when she disobeyed the king, and also that there was a law that anyone who went to the king without being summoned would be put to death. The only reprieve was if the king held out his scepter to that person, and otherwise they would die!

Even as Queen, Esther had very limited access and influence over the king. In fact, she hadn't seen him in a month. Mordecai's request that she go to the king and ask that her people be spared was one which put her very life at risk.

Nevertheless, Esther decided that there was no other choice. She fasted to prepare herself, and then appeared before the King. Fortunately she won his favor and he held out his gold scepter, so that her life was spared. Esther invited the King and Haman to be her guests at a banquet that night. Then she invited them again the next night as well.

At the second banquet Esther revealed that she was Jewish, that she and all her people were threatened by the proclamation that Haman had issued. It was Haman who threatened them, Haman who persecuted them. In anger the King decided that Haman should be hanged.

Mordecai and Esther - 2 people who stood up for what they believed. Mordecai could have quietly bowed down to Haman, crossed his fingers, whispered to God that he didn't really mean it, and never even been noticed by Haman. Esther could have hidden under the cover of being Queen. No one at court except Mordecai even knew that she was Jewish, and in any case the King would have protected her. But each of them made the difficult choice to stand for what they believed, what they knew to be right, even though that wasn't easy to do.

There are countless other little known examples of this kind of faithfulness. One of them was a fourth century Christian monk by the name of Telemachus. Telemachus lived in a remote village, tending his garden, and spending much of his time in prayer. One day he thought he heard the voice of God telling him to go to Rome, so he obeyed, setting out on foot. Weary weeks later, he arrived in the city at the time of a great festival. Telemachus followed the crowd down the streets into the Colosseum. He saw the gladiators stand before the emperor and say, "We who are about to die salute you." Then he realized that these men were going to fight to the death for the entertainment of the crowd. Now Telemachus knew why God had commanded him to come to Rome, and he cried out, "in the name of Christ, stop!"

As the games began, he pushed his way through the crowd, climbed over the wall, and dropped to the floor of the arena. When the crowd saw this tiny figure rushing to the gladiators and saying, "In the name of Christ, stop!" they thought that it was part of the show, and they began laughing.

When they realized that it wasn't, the laughter started to turn to anger. As Telemachus was pleading with the gladiators to stop, one of them plunged a sword into his body. He fell to the sand. As he was dying, his last words were, "In the name of Christ, stop!"

Then a strange thing happened. The gladiators stood looking at the tiny figure lying there. A hush fell over the Colosseum. Way up in the upper rows, a man stood and made his way to the exit. Others began to follow. In dead silence, everyone left the Colosseum.

The year was 391, and that was the last battle to the death between gladiators in the Roman Colosseum. Never again in the great stadium did men kill each other for the entertainment of the crowd, all because of one tiny voice that could hardly be heard above the tumult. One voice - one life - that spoke the truth in God's name.

I think that it's important to remember the examples of people like Telemachus, Mordecai and Esther. Our faith heritage is filled with them, as is the history of our nation. We wouldn't be here today living in the United States of America with the freedom and opportunities that we have, without the commitment of millions of people before us who stood up for what they believed to be right. Likewise, the Christian faith would not have endured and grown without the commitment of those who have heard God's call in their generation and responded by standing up for what they know to be right, even when the cost is high.

The challenge for each of us is to do the same.

Now, not many of us are challenged to give our lives for what we believe, at least in one dramatic encounter. But each of us is challenged to give our life for what we believe in a whole series of opportunities and challenges that we face - day by day. Not only for ourselves, but as a commitment to the generations that will follow, we too must stand firm for what we believe. In faith, God calls us to seek to do what is right, no matter what the cost. For whatever the cost in this life might be, the cost as God measures it is always higher when we give in and do what we know to be wrong.

Amen.