In 1995, Thomas Cahill began a series he called The Hinges of History. Perhaps the two best known are How the Irish Saved Civilization and The Gifts of the Jews. In his introduction to the series, he wrote:

We normally think of history as one catastrophe after another… but history is also the narratives of grace, the recounting of those blessed and inexplicable moments when someone did something for someone else, saved a life, bestowed a gift, gave something beyond what was required by circumstance.

It is my firm belief that we are now at one of those hinge points in history, both in the life of our church and in the larger pages of history as well. The question asked to Queen Esther is always the question for each of us: Who knows but what you have come to the kingdom for such a time as this? (Esther 4:14).

This is our opportunity to live at this hinge point of opportunity and make a difference in how the future will look. It is also the great reminder that we serve a God of redemption and reclamation—not a God of catastrophe and despair.