[00:00:00] On that day King Ahasuerus gave to Queen Esther the house of Haman, the enemy of the Jews, and Mordecai came before the king, for Esther had told what he was to her.
[00:00:09] And the king took off his signet ring which he had taken from Haman and gave it to Mordecai, and Esther set Mordecai over the house of Haman.
[00:00:16] Then Esther spoke again to the king. She fell at his feet and wept and pleaded with him toai commanded concerning the Jews, to the satraps and the governors and the officials of the provinces from India to Ethiopia, 127 provinces, to each province in its own script and to each people in its own language, and also to the Jews in their script and their language.
[00:01:40] And he wrote in the name of King Ahasuerus and sealed it with the king's signet ring.
[00:01:44] Then he sent the letters by mounted couriers had fallen on them. Now, in the 12th month, which is the month of Adar, on the 13th day of the same, when the King's command and edict were about to be carried out,
[00:03:02] on the very day when the enemies of the Jews hoped Susa the Citadel was reported to the king. And the king said to Queen Esther, In Susa the Citadel, the Jews have killed and destroyed five hundred men and also the ten sons of Haman. What then have they done in the rest of the king's provinces? Now what is your wish? It shall be granted to you. And what further is your request? It shall be fulfilled. And Esther said, If it please the king, let the Jews who are in Susa be allowed tomorrow also to do according to this day's edict,
[00:04:24] and let the ten sons of Haman be hanged on the gallows.
[00:04:27] So the king commanded this be done.
[00:05:24] and powerful and holy and righteous and true. Jesus, you are good and your mercy endures forever. We pray, Lord, that
[00:05:28] your Holy Spirit would be upon us. That it would guide us
[00:05:33] into all truth and righteousness. Holy Spirit, be
[00:05:37] with us now. We bless you. We praise you. We thank you for
[00:05:41] your ministry of comfort, for your ministry of strengthening,
[00:05:45] for the faith that you give us, for us to understand about how God delivers, how God heals, how God provides, how God creates a breakthrough and hopefully that will be something that enriches our discipleship and our own understanding. There
[00:07:00] are difficult components to this passage particularly because
[00:07:04] of the violence it entails and billions of people live in that same condition today where on a day to day basis, their lives or their livelihoods are in danger now in our society that
[00:08:20] is something that most people thank God don't have to face there will be significant destruction. We know that the universe that we are operating in, inside of a creation that has fallen because of our sin, that there is a continual process of death and decay obstacle to experience malevolence and evil and violence and pain and to then say, well, how could god allow this? How could a loving
[00:11:04] god permit all this to happen? And for many people, the end and that will be more like what the world should be. That is an indication in these people's hearts that they are longing for something that there is this incongruity between our current state and what would quote unquote make sense and
[00:12:20] it is the hope of Christians who have entrusted their lives to We need to see this through an eternal perspective. We need to see this through God's eyes. All of this is well and good. But there's something within us that cries out for peace. There's something within us that cries out for safety and comfort and security. And in this world, tremendous amounts of effort
[00:13:43] are put into establishing these things, granted that Jesus is our high priest that God hears our prayers and that the prayers of a righteous and fervent man will avail much and so when we examine this situation when we examine the book of Esther and we see this dynamic where an
[00:15:00] edict has been written that you are going to be victimized and overpowered and you don't have the power to overcome this yourself and so you call out to god. You throw yourself upon his mercy and you receive from
[00:16:22] god a promise that everything will work out that you will be happen to them or the circumstances align where they can't execute their plan. God is going to intervene on my behalf and from scripture, we know that we are to be still and to know that he is God. We know that the Lord will fight our battles and so we can point to scripture and say, okay,
[00:17:41] given the scriptures, that is how I expect it to play out. saying he's glad that he has been imprisoned, we can look at the history of the church and see how the blood of martyrs that has been spilled has been a forerunner of tremendous expansion of the kingdom of God. We can see that in the case of Joseph, his brothers sell him into slavery,
[00:19:01] but Joseph even himself says at the end
[00:19:04] that God meant it for good this in a way that benefits others but and myself potentially
[00:20:21] through the strengthening of my own faith according to you
[00:20:25] know various passages where we're talking about how we deliverance was something that was active. God made a way for the people to defend themselves. God didn't strike down all of the enemies of the Jews supernaturally. He also didn't allow the Jews to be overpowered
[00:21:40] and using it for the glory of God that way.
[00:21:43] In this particular case,
[00:21:44] because of the structure of opening a structural door where if the Jews defended themselves, they had legal permission to do so. It's a little bit intricate and a little bit complicated, but there is an important principle for us
[00:23:01] in terms of our discipleship.
[00:23:03] And for me, the idea here thing that is attempting to overtake us, even if it does some damage, is ultimately going to glorify God in the end, whether that's short-term, long-term, or anything in between, or all of the above. But it could be that God's will is for us
[00:24:20] to take substantial, active measures of self-defense.
[00:24:26] It could be that we are to continue Number one, it would be disobedient to the will of God in that situation. And ultimately you can think of some counterfactuals for the New Testament. So what if as soon as Paul got into jail, he was plotting a prison break? Paul didn't do that.
[00:25:40] And you could rationalize something like that
[00:25:43] and he even had the opportunity to do so.
[00:25:46] He was kept in custody for many years and we simply say, all right, we are going to, we're gonna be passive and we are going to pray, and we're just going to hope that nothing, hope that God delivers and that something happens and we don't do things that God is calling us to do. That's also a mistake because number one,
[00:27:02] that's disobedient.
[00:27:03] If God is calling us to that whenever we face challenge, we're not going to be able to tactically, strategically, rationally, all of the above, we're just not going to be able to figure everything out
[00:28:22] in the way that we want.
[00:28:23] It's not something that is going to work out for us. of the biblical options, while we need to study to see what courses of action are available to us, ultimately, we need to go to the Lord in prayer, cast ourselves upon His mercy, claim the promises that Jesus has given us and that the Word has given us,
[00:29:42] and then say, Lord, I am at your disposal. can change and so it is incumbent upon us to not get locked into any one stream of thinking and to ultimately not rely on our own reasoning as Proverbs tells us. We should rely on god and on the Holy Spirit and what that tells us is that when we get into trouble, when bad things happen,
[00:31:03] when bad things are coming against us, for whatever reason, spirit immediately and often and not seeking the presence of God and not worshiping and staying in the word and understanding the options but ultimately giving God the the free reign to do whatever he wants to in our lives that in of itself is a mistake. It's not that we are accidentally going to get things right so to speak even though it might
[00:32:21] seem that way. You know if it's if there's four options, it's
[00:32:24] 25% chance we're just gonna pick one for whatever for around through away from this wherever you want me to go Lord whatever you want me to do I will do because I know that you are faithful to give me the tools that I need the spiritual strength the faith the wisdom the provision to get through it I know that you will provide and that you are
[00:33:40] faithful I know that you are good and your and do it. It is as simple as that but that is one of the hardest things that we can internalize and actually execute upon because when we
[00:35:05] get in trouble, our decision making a result in the natural, in the spiritual, when
[00:36:22] we are following the will of God and we know that we're
[00:36:26] following the will of God and we so that we can continue in obedience
[00:37:43] to the will of our perfect and loving God. Jesus, thank you for