But back in Esther’s day . . . ?

I find it really intriguing to look at how the Spirit moved back then. In certain cases we see him moving almost forcefully. Like when King Saul was overcome by the distressing Spirit and prophesied.

I’ve mostly been looking to Daniel for my examples, since it’s the same century and empire as Esther. Most of the mentions of a/the spirit in the book of Daniel is someone noticing the excellent spirit in Daniel. But we also see in Daniel a lot of examples of the physical side of the spiritual–like when Gabriel arrives and says, “Hey, God sent me as soon as you started praying. I know that was three weeks ago, but dude! I got waylaid by some spiritual bad guys and had to wait for backup.” Isn’t that cool? I mean, not cool for Gabriel. But I was so struck the first time I read that and realized that that is sometimes why an answer to prayer isn’t instantaneous–God’s messengers travel through space, and they can be held up.

One of my recent scenes in Jewel of Persia is the Spirit coming upon my heroine–she has the impression that she must pray for a certain someone, but she’s mad at him. So instead she prays for her family.

Doesn’t cut it. The Spirit whips away and leaves her. Today’s scene is where she learns why she was to pray that day. Gonna be fun stuff.