I grew up feeling like a queen because dad would
affectionately call me his Queen Esther. Pictures of Queen Esther have always
fascinated me. She is usually depicted wearing a dazzling crown and beautiful
robe. The deposed and banished Queen Vashti’s crown was removed from her head
and placed on Queen Esther’s. She did not snatch the crown off of Queen
Vashti’s head. There was no ugly scene such as occurred when Miss Amazon 2015
was crowned the winner of the beauty pageant and her runner up contestant
jumped up and snatched the crown off the winner’s head, threw it to the floor,
and stomped off in a huff convinced she was more deserving. As I watched that
scene on TV it made me think of how we Christians can snatch someone’s crown away,
thinking we deserve the prize or trophy more because we worked long and hard to see a
Muslim woman come to the Lord.
Once a fellow
Christian was indignant with me. He had spent time sharing Christ with a
certain Muslim woman whom I will call Farhat. I felt I could do
a better job at evangelism than him so basically convinced her to spend time
with me which she did. I clearly remember the day a lady in the church
encouraged me by saying, “You have a star in your crown, Joy.” Sounded odd but
good at the same time. Yes, I snatched someone’s crown of pride and joy away, albeit
unknowingly at the time. It took years before I recognized how my actions had
come across. After a few months another
follower of Christ who was from the same culture and language as Farhat
thought she could do a better job at it than me and convinced the newly
baptized woman to come under her discipleship efforts so off went Farhat to the
new teacher. I lost Farhat completely and was devastated because I had invested big time with her. This
happens frequently in Muslim ministry. We conclude or assume we have more
training, more cross cultural experience, know the language, are missionaries
with a parachurch organization, are the appropriate gender culturally speaking, have
more grounding in Scripture, are more "Spirit-filled", or are from that particular
ethnic group, etc. We snatch the
crown….that pride and joy of a hungry seeker, new believer, fellowship group,
or ministry project, and place it on our head. Most of the time this kind of
snatching is not done with ill intention.
It is usually done without thinking it through or talking it out.
Partnering is not considered.
The Bible talks about receiving the crown of righteousness,
crown of life, crown of rejoicing, and crown of glory. We also read about
laying down our crowns at the feet of Jesus. There will be no snatching of crowns in heaven by anyone. I think our eyes
will be more on our Savior’s multiple crowns than our own.
Dear heavenly Father, please help me to not snatch anyone’s
crown away. Grow me in sensitivity. In Jesus’ name, Amen. 
