As we mentioned, one of the purposes of Purim is to realize that Hashem never despises the Jewish people. Even in a situation where it looks like He's disgusted with us, His love is there.
Eicha ends with the pasuk, “If You would be totally disgusted with us, You would get extremely angry at us.”
Since that last pasuk is seemingly not a happy ending, we repeat the second-to-last pasuk, “Bring us back and we'll return. Renew our days like that of old.”
In reality, the last pasuk is not a negative pasuk. It’s just that people might misunderstand it, so we don't end with that. The pasuk says, “If You were really disgusted with us, You would've gotten very angry and totally destroyed us.”
But You didn't.
This concept, that God does not get totally disgusted with us, is brought up in a discussion between God and the Jewish people, at the time of the destruction of the Temple.
The Midrash Raba in Shemot 31,10 brings a pasuk in Yirmiyah 6 that says, “Disgusted silver, they called them,” at the time of the destruction of the Temple. The goyim had the Jewish people in shackles and chains, and they said, “God is disgusted with You,” and they quoted this pasuk.
When Yirmiyah heard this, he went to God and said, “God, did You really get disgusted from them?” As it says in Yirmiyah 14, “Are You disgusted with them?”
He continued, “If You were really disgusted with, us You’d totally wipe us out.” And God said, “Absolutely not. I'm never disgusted with the Jewish people.” As it says in the Torah, “I'm not disgusted with them.”
The Chatam Sofer asks, What is the greatest miracle of Purim? Is it the fact that Haman comes in and gives that great description of how Mordechai should be paraded through the streets, or the fact that Achashverosh couldn’t sleep that night, or the fact that Esther becomes the queen? He answers that all of that is understandable. The biggest miracle, he says, is that after 186 days, Achashverosh calls for Vashti in an embarrassing fashion and ends up killing her, because that is what prepared the entire miracle. That put Esther in the palace, and everything happened because of that.
And when did that happen? While we were committing the very sin that caused the decree to happen to begin with- we were enjoying the party of Achashverosh! At the very party that caused us to get the decree, God has mercy on us and prepares the way for the great miracle. That, says the Chatam Sofer, is the most outstanding point in Megillat Esther, because it shows this concept, that God is never disgusted with the Jewish people, neither the global Jewish people, nor the individual. We can always turn everything around.
Another example of this comes as something of a juxtaposition. The reading for this past week was Amalek, but we also read the story of Shaul Hamelech, when he does not listen to the word of God and he doesn't wipe out Amalek. And what does it say? Shemuel told Shaul, “You despise the word of God. God is disgusted with you and you're not going to be the king.”
End of Shaul.
But then, 500 years later, Shaul has these two descendants, Mordechai and Esther, who fix the sin and become the shining stars. They wipe out Haman, whom Shaul left alive. They fixed it. That’s the way Hashem works. Even if someone does something wrong, Hashem will wait 500 years to fix it or to turn it around, because God is never disgusted with the Jewish people.
He'll take lemons and make them into lemonade. Mordechai and Esther fixed the problem.
As Mordechai told Esther, “Who knows if this is not the time that you came to the palace for… If you don't do it, the Jewish people will be saved, and you and your father's house will be destroyed.” What did he mean that ‘she and her father's house would be destroyed? ‘
“This is our opportunity,” she said, “to fix the sin of our great-great-grandfather Shaul; to turn it around so that God will no longer be disgusted with us, but, rather, be happy with us.”
This is the important takeaway from the story of Purim- the turnaround.
The turnaround is that it looks like God's disgusted with us, but He’s not.
In the beautiful words of the Rambam, in the laws of Teshuva chapter seven, when discussing how Teshuva brings us close, it says, “Yesterday before Teshuva, this man was disgusted. He was hated, he was distanced, he was abominable. And today, after Teshuva, he's loved, he's coveted, he's close, and he's beloved.”
And he goes to say that the same words that God uses to distance, He uses to bring close. Then, again, in the next chapter, he writes, “Yesterday, he was distanced from God and he cried out and wasn't answered. And they tore up his prayers in front of him, as if yo say, “We don't want you.” And today, after Teshuva, you're connected to Hashem. You cry out and you’re answered immediately. As if to say, “We love the Mitzvot that you do. We're desire the connection.”
That's the turnaround. We're never despised, Hashem always loves us. It's up to us to flip it all around with Teshuva.
Have a wonderful day.