John Anthony Dunne, on how the church can embrace the secular story of Esther as Christian Scripture:

It was precisely because God embraced Israel-in-exile, that is to say, Israel in the position of experiencing the curses of the covenant, that God could then likewise embrace the Gentiles (i.e., those outside the covenant). Thus, when we as Christians read the story of Esther in all of its proper secularity, we find God’s embrace of a people assimilated to their pagan context as a result of the exile and those continuing to experience the absence of God as an extension of the covenantal curses. Thus, in Esther we see God embrace Israel-in-exile—those experiencing not the blessings of the covenant but curses, those who had been unfaithful—and all of this ultimately prefigures God’s embrace of the nations. Because God can embrace Israel-in-exile he can also embrace those from the lands of exile.