Esther faced a life-or-death moment with calmness and grace.
Her people faced extinction. Haman had schemed to annihilate the Jewish people. She didn’t barge into the throne room and blurt out her request because no one approached the king uninvited. The king had to extend his golden scepter to grant an audience.
He did and asked, “What is your request? Even up to half the kingdom, it will be given you” (Esther 5:3). It sounded like an open door. But Esther teaches us something most fundraisers learn the hard way. She asked permission to ask.
Don’t Rush Cultivation
Esther had two chances to make her request and waited both times. When Xerxes came to her first banquet, she invited him to come back the next day. Most of us would have asked on the spot. We are driven by our fundraising timeline and can push the relationship farther and faster than the donor is ready to go.
The real tension in fundraising is always this: more cultivation, or ask now?
Permission
Esther was masterful in her deference. “If the king regards me with favor and if it pleases the king to grant my petition and fulfill my request” (Esther 5:8). Every phrase she used was from the king’s point of view. Regards me with favor. Pleases the king. Grant. Fulfill.
We need to see giving opportunities from our donor’s perspective. Are they favorable to the project? Is this something they want to give to? We ask permission to ask when we’re more curious about their readiness than we are anxious about our deadline.
Anticipation
Donors indicate they are ready by asking what salespeople call “buy questions,” questions that signal they are already imagining themselves giving:
• What outcomes will this project accomplish?
• Why is this vital now?
• What won’t happen if this project isn’t completed?
When you hear those questions, the second banquet is about to begin.
Leave Room for God
The night between the two banquets, King Xerxes couldn’t sleep and called for the government records to be read aloud. God directed his servant to the passage where Mordecai had saved the king’s life. Stop and consider how improbable that is. The king, awake in the middle of the night. The servant, opening to exactly the right page. By morning, Xerxes was motivated to make things right, and Haman’s schemes began to unravel.
Esther never could have arranged any of that. She simply waited, and God was working in the dark.
God is already working in your donor’s heart. He is arranging the sleepless nights, the conversations you didn’t know happened, the conviction that make a donor lean forward and say, “Tell me more.” Your job is faithfulness. The rest belongs to Him. This is the part of fundraising no training can teach.
Her ask was successful because she waited for the perfect time.
Think About This: Where are you rushing a donor who isn’t ready yet?
Response: Lord, thank you for moving in our donors’ hearts in ways we cannot see, arranging the moments we could never plan, and making them ready to say “yes.”
