The book of Esther is one of the most interesting stories in the entire Bible.  In it, a young Jewish girl rises to the level of Queen of Persia and saves her people from genocide.

One interesting aspect of the book is Esther’s physical appearance.  Our raunch culture encourages women to be brazen, linking beauty to porn and shaming women who don’t fit the mold.  Almost half of American women are not satisfied with their bodies.  At the same time, feminism has encouraged women to resent the role of “stroking the fragile male ego” with sexual availability.  These are confusing cultural messages that have not helped husband and wives in the bedroom.  Esther’s body is an important aspect of her life so it might be possible to learn something from how she handles herself…

Esther is described as being especially jaw-dropping.

Est. 2:7 This young woman was very attractive and had a beautiful figure.

Esther basically won a national beauty contest when the king went looking for a wife.  But there is more to Esther’s beauty.  A lady might be physically beautiful, but a rotten character can uglify her (yes, uglify is a word, and isn’t it a great word?).  Wisdom tells us:

Proverbs 11:22 Like a gold ring in a pig’s snout is a beautiful woman without discretion.

True beauty doesn’t need beauty-pageant pedigree.  Most men can’t “gather all the beautiful young virgins” (2:3) and pick his favorite.  Almost all men are ordinary guys who fall in love with ordinary women.  Almost all husbands are massively attracted to their wives.  Powerful beauty is possible for all women and it doesn’t require a “beautiful figure” like Esther.

The reason that all women can be powerfully beautiful is because God’s definition (thus, the real definition) of feminine beauty doesn’t depend on shape, size or age.  God creates all kinds of women, including some with profound physical handicaps, but the Bible makes it possible for all women to reject the worldly categories and become powerfully beautiful.  Here’s how God defines a feminine beauty…

Proverbs 31:30 Charm is deceitful, and beauty is vain, but a woman who fears the LORD is to be praised.

1 Peter 3:3-4 Do not let your adorning be external – the braiding of hair, the wearing of gold, or the putting on of clothing – but let your adorning be the hidden person of the heart with the imperishable beauty of a gentle and quiet spirit, which in God’s sight is very precious.

Real beauty arises from the heart.  Esther was no sex object; she was a beautiful person.  She won the favor of Hegai in 2:8-9 so that he advanced her to the highest place in the harem.  She was a prayerful lady who trusted God in dangerous times.  She’s to credit for one of the classic statements of faith in the Bible, “I will go to the king, though it is against the law, and if I perish, I perish” (4:15-16).  The “hidden person” of Esther was powerfully beautiful.  In fact, everyone liked Esther.  Can you imagine the cat-fighting competition in an ancient harem?  And yet…

Esther 2:15 Esther was winning favor in the eyes of all who saw her.

Normal people think beautiful people have it easy, but Esther literally feared for her life.  Her husband was an ungodly man with too much power, and he was an angry drunk (1:10-12 & 7:7).  In spite of these challenges, Esther’s faith gave her direction and shelter.  I imagine her clinging to passages like this one: “For he will hide me in his shelter in the day of trouble; he will conceal me under the cover of his tent; he will lift me high upon a rock.” (Psalm 27:5).  Anxiety, envy, disappointment, selfishness, irritability and bitterness are not beautiful.  But faith, with its companions joy and peace, are powerfully beautiful.  I would go so far as to say that faith even makes a difference in physical beauty.  Have you ever noticed that most 50-year old pastor’s wives are better looking than 50-year old women in Beverly Hills? I’m not talking about the Ed Flanders stereotype; I’m mean seriously make a comparison sometime.  But I digress…

Esther had access to the king of Persia because she was “very attractive,” a quality that most women never need. God created a body for Esther that gave her access to a shallow, powerful man, but she used her brains and her heart to influence him.  A beautiful, silly Esther would have cowered in the back of the harem when she heard the word “genocide,” but Esther was wise, powerfully so.  She inserted herself into the most important national politics of the day and the Jews still honor her annually as one of the most important people in human history.

The modern woman thinks she has to act tough or slutty in order to influence men, but God created women to reveal Christ-likeness through dignified beauty.  I think Esther is a perfect example of dignified beauty, but so is Ruth.  We don’t know anything about Ruth’s physical appearance, and I suspect she wasn’t extraordinarily beautiful because Boaz didn’t need her to be, but who knows?  The point is that both Esther and Ruth used their bodies wisely, I daresay sensually, for the goal of redemption and blessing.  That’s key.  When a lady realizes the beauty that God has woven into her frame, and when she decides to use her beauty to bless others, everything changes.  The cultural norms become irrelevant.

What did Ruth do with her body?  She worked hard in the fields to provide for her depressed mother-in-law.  She also surprised Boaz in the middle of the night by snuggling up to him in her best pajamas.  You have to admit that that’s an interesting parallel to Esther.  Ruth’s goal was to bless Naomi, and Esther’s goal was to bless the Jewish people; neither of them thought of themselves.  There was no 1960s resentment over objectification.  Wives lavish their beauty on husbands as an expression of love.

God defines feminine beauty as a “gentle and quiet spirit.”  That easy to interpret as a wimpy doormat, so let’s dig a little deeper.  The Bible doesn’t have any problem with capable, strong, ambitious, sweaty, educated, extroverted women.  “A gentle and quiet spirit” refers to her heart.  A godly woman’s heart is what makes her beautiful, and she expresses her heart with her body, regardless of how she compares to Esther’s figure.  Christian women use their bodies to give a cup of hot coffee to a homeless person, or to shovel the foundation of a orphanage, or to type a great novel, or to comfort her husband, or to smile graciously at hostile co-worker.  Her heart is not storming with anger or discontent.  A gentle and quiet wife is not harsh, brazen, wimpy, boisterous, complaining or rude.

Where does a gentle and quiet spirit come from?  The Gospel.  All shame and fear and selfishness are extinguished by the Gospel where a lady finds complete purity.  She’s comfortable in her own skin because she is created by a Master, as Leif Enger wrote, “Fair is whatever God wants to do.”  Her eyes sparkle because she is “chosen” and “so precious” to God (1 Peter 2:9; 3:4; 1 Sam. 16:7; Psalm 149:4).  The open flower can be crushed, but a woman of faith finds rest in a God worth trusting.  There is nothing more beautiful in all creation than a woman who understands the Gospel.  Her heart is an imperishable beauty and she “greatly enriches” her husband’s life (Pro. 31:11).  Only grace sets the heart free from fear and resentment to spill out in power to the people around us.

Esther knew how to influence her husband.  She had a creative plan that took advantage of every aspect of her beauty.  She dressed in royal robes, she invited him to a mysterious feast, she crafted a intriguing conversation, she spoke the truth plainly.  She invited her husband to experience her beauty, probably because she knew that her beauty could inspire him to be heroic.  And it did.

All of us should be offended by Esther’s trapped subservience, the harem, the 12 months of body prep before she could audition for the king.  But can there be any doubt that Esther overcame cultural evils and saved the ancient Jews from genocide?  Too bad Hitler didn’t meet her.  Any man would be improved by such a powerfully beautiful woman.

Every woman can achieve the imperishable beauty of Esther and they do not need women’s magazines or Victoria’s Secret to do so.  Feminine beauty includes the body, but only insofar as her gentle and quiet spirit is expressed through it.  Contrary to popular belief, normal men don’t need their wives to look like Esther, but they will fight to the death for wives who live like Esther.