If I Perish, I Perish: How a Sunday Sermon Challenged My Faith and Recovery

Walking into church this morning, it felt like one of those Sundays where the air is already charged before the first song ends. Kids heading one way, ushers moving the other, people shuffling bulletins and coffee cups, “Amen” and “Hallelujah” bouncing around the room. Just a normal Sunday… until it isn’t.

Today we walked through the story of Esther, and I haven’t been able to shake it since.

This wasn’t just “a nice sermon.” It pressed on old wounds, called out old lies, and whispered a new kind of courage into places in me that still feel afraid. I want to try to put into words what this service meant to me—not just as a guy in a pew, but as someone in recovery, someone with a past, someone trying to follow Jesus one shaky step at a time.

Meeting Esther Again… and Actually Seeing Her

I thought I knew the story of Esther.

Brave girl. Beauty pageant. Queen. Saves her people. Roll credits.

But hearing it laid out today, all the details, all the pain in between the famous lines—it hit me how messy her life really was.

She was an orphan, parents gone. She was a minority, a Jew in exile in a powerful foreign empire. She was young and vulnerable, taken into a king’s palace and thrown into a “beauty pageant” that was way more than makeup and talent shows.

People probably saw her as lucky. Chosen. Special. Crown on her head, palace meals, royal clothes. But underneath the crown was a girl who had survived more than most people knew.

And that’s where it got personal.

Because I know what it’s like for people to see the outside of your life and have no clue what it cost you just to stand where you’re standing. To look “okay” while carrying a lot of things that never show up on your face.

The pastor said something like:

“Everyone who wears a golden crown doesn’t necessarily have a golden life.”

That line stayed with me.

There are people I’ve envied before: their families, their money, their calm personalities, their “put together” lives. And I forget—they might be carrying trauma, loss, addiction, anxiety, grief I know nothing about. Just like people don’t always see my whole story at first glance.

Today reminded me to slow down and look at people with compassion instead of comparison. I needed that.

“For Such a Time as This” – When Your Mess Doesn’t Disqualify You

The line from Esther everyone remembers is when Mordecai says to her:

“Who knows but that you have come to your royal position for such a time as this?”

What got me today wasn’t just the line—it was the context.

She didn’t land in that royal position through some sweet little promotion. Her life was a chain of things she didn’t ask for:

Losing her parents. Being taken into the king’s harem. Being chosen by a king who probably saw her first as an object, not a person. Living with a secret about who she really was (Jewish) because it wasn’t safe to tell.

And yet right there, in the middle of all of that, God has her exactly where she needs to be so He can use her to save her people.

That hit home for me.

I’ve lived through things I didn’t sign up for:

Addiction and all the damage that came with it. Depression, PTSD, dark nights that felt like they would never end. Losing people. Losing myself. Watching my life crumble and trying to rebuild it with shaking hands.

It’s really easy to look back and go, “There’s no way God could have wanted this.”

And honestly—I don’t think He did. The pastor said something I agree with deeply:

God doesn’t cause all the terrible things that happen to us, but He refuses to waste them.

That’s what “for such a time as this” feels like to me.

It’s not God saying, “I’m glad you suffered.”

It’s God saying, “I’m not going to let your suffering be the end of the story.”

Sitting there in church, I found myself thinking:

Maybe I’m in this church… for such a time as this. Maybe my recovery, my mental health battles, my scars… aren’t just random. Maybe my website, YouRnotaLone.Life, my writing, my story—all of it—are pieces God is using to help someone I haven’t even met yet.

And honestly? That both scares me and gives me hope.

“If I Perish, I Perish” – The Kind of Courage I Want

Then we got to the other big line from Esther:

“I will go to the king… and if I perish, I perish.”

That’s not a depressed statement. That’s surrender.

She knows the law: if you walk into the king’s presence without being invited, you can be killed unless he extends his scepter. Even as queen, she’s not safe.

Mordecai basically tells her:

“Don’t think you’re going to escape just because you’re in the palace.”

So she decides:

“I’m going to do what’s right, no matter the cost. I’ll fast. I’ll pray. I’ll step in. And if I die, I die.”

That’s the part that really spoke to the deep places of my faith and my recovery.

Because a lot of my life, I’ve lived half-in, half-out:

Half in recovery, half flirting with old habits. Half trusting God, half holding the steering wheel tight. Half surrendered, half negotiating.

Esther’s words felt like God asking me:

“Are you willing to go all in, Josh?

Or are you still hedging your bets with Me?”

And I don’t mean all in like running into danger recklessly or not caring about my life.

I mean all in like:

All in on obedience. All in on honesty. All in on loving people, even when it hurts. All in on letting God use my story, even the ugly chapters.

In recovery we say, “Half measures availed us nothing.”

Esther lived the opposite of half measures. She lived, “If I perish, I perish.”

I felt God nudging me this morning:

“I didn’t pull you out of the dark for you to tiptoe through life. I saved you so you could live fully, courageously, and sacrificially.”

That’s the kind of courage I want—not loud, not showy, but steady.

Jesus, Esther, and the Table

We ended the service with communion.

The pastor connected Esther’s words:

“If I perish, I perish.”

to Jesus’ words in the garden:

“Take this cup from me. Yet not my will, but Yours be done.”

And as I walked up to the table, piece of bread in my hands, I couldn’t stop thinking:

Jesus didn’t just preach surrender—He lived it. His “if I perish, I perish” ended with a cross. His obedience brought me the chance to start over, again and again and again.

When they said, “The body of our Lord, broken for you…”

and “The blood of Jesus, shed for you…”

it felt less like a ritual and more like a personal invitation:

“Will you trust Me with all of you?

Not just your Sunday morning.

Not just your church face.

Your past, your trauma, your addiction, your shame, your plans, your future.

All of it.”

I didn’t have some big emotional meltdown at the altar.

But I did quietly tell Him:

“I don’t know how to be all in, but I want to be.

Teach me. Help me.

For such a time as this… use me.”

What This Service Meant to Me (In One Place)

If I had to sum up what today’s service meant to me, it would be these three words the pastor used:

1. Perspective

To remember:

The people I envy might be carrying pain I can’t see. The people I judge might be surviving something I’ve never had to face. The same is true for me—people don’t see everything I’ve walked through either.

So I want to look at people more like Jesus does: with compassion first.

2. Plans

To remember:

My story is not too messy for God. My past does not disqualify me from being used. The things I regret, the trauma I’ve endured, the seasons I barely crawled through—God can weave them into something redemptive.

Maybe I really am where I am “for such a time as this.”

Not by accident. Not as a joke. But with purpose.

3. Purpose

To remember:

I don’t want to live a safe, lukewarm, half-hearted life. I want to live a surrendered life—even when it’s scary. I want to be willing to say, in my own way:

“Lord, if I lose my old life in order to follow You,

then let it die.

Because I believe I’ll find real life in You.”

Today’s service wasn’t just about a queen who lived thousands of years ago.

It was about now.

It was about me.

And maybe, if you’re reading this, it’s about you too.

If You’re Reading This and You Relate

If you’ve ever felt like your story is too broken, too complicated, too embarrassing to be used for anything good, let me say this clearly:

God is not finished with you.

Your pain is not wasted.

You might be exactly where you need to be… for such a time as this.

If you ever need to talk, vent, or just not feel alone in it, that’s why I started my site in the first place:

You are not alone.

Neither am I.

— Josh Bridges