Are you confident and secure in your relationship with God? Join Charles Morris today for three truths from the book of Esther that give us confidence our relationship with the King of Kings.
Esther – God’s Inescapable Justice (7)
On our program today, we move to the seventh chapter of Esther. The series title is “For Such a Time as This.” It’s a phrase that comes from the book of Esther. I do hope the book of Esther is ministering to your specific circumstances, struggles, and even victories. Before we get to today’s chapter, let me review where we are in the story.
Esther, a young Jewish woman, had risen to become the wife of King Xerxes, Queen of the Persian Empire. Her Jewish identity, at this point in the story, is still a secret. Mordecai, Esther’s causin who raised her, foils an assassination plot against Xerxes. But Mordecai got on the wrong side of the prime minister, Haman; the number two man in the kingdom.
Haman was an Amalekite, an ancient tribal enemy of the Jews. Mordecai not give Haman the honor him believed was due him. It made Haman angry. Instead of only punishing Mordecai, Haman responded by attacking the entire Jewish people. Haman uses his priviledged position with the King of Persia to ask for the extermination of the Jewish race. At a specified date, every Jew in the Empire – man, woman and child – would be killed. In desperation, Mordecai enlists Esther’s help to try to get this situation remedied. And Esther reluctantly but courageously agrees. She goes, at the risk of her life, into Xerxes’ presence. To go unsummoned to the Persian king was to risk possible death. He could execute you on the spot. We breath a sigh of relief in the story as Xerxes chooses to extend mercy to Esther and allow her to bring to him her request.
Esther invites the king and Haman to a banquet later that day. They both go and Esther throws this little party for Haman and the king. The king says, ‘What’s your request, Esther?’ and Esther says, ‘My request is that you come back tomorrow for a second banquet. You and Haman. Then I’ll tell you what my request is.” They agree. That day, Haman goes home happy. He’s in the priviledged cirlce. He’s going home happy until he runs into Mordecai. Once again Mordecai disrespects him and ruins his day. With the encouragement of his wife and friends, makes a decision that comforts him. Haman’s going to go to the king and ask to have Mordecai executed.
That very night, Xerxes has a sleepless night. If you’ll remember, that seemingly insignificant fact is the turning point of the whole story. That’s intentional. God is the real star of this story, the real actor, though he is never mentioned explicity. God is the one that is operating here and orchestrating these events.
So the king has a sleepless night and some of us know what a sleepless night is about. I suppose one of the remedies for sleeplessness would be to have the record of your administration read to you. They read to King Xerxes about Mordecai uncovering an assassination plot against him. The king realizeshe has not rewarded Mordecai. He jumps out of bed and says “Who’s in the court?” And they look around and here comes Haman. It’s the next morning. What’s Haman doing? He’s coming to ask the king for permission to execute Mordecai. In this wonderfully ironic conversation, the king asks Haman, “What should happen to the man the king delights to honor?” Of course, the king was referring to Mordecai. Haman thinks the king is talking about him so he prescribes the honor he thinks the king is going to give him. “Put a royal robe on the person, place him on a royal horse, lead the horse through the streets, shouting before him ‘this is what happens to the man the king delights to honor.’” Xerxes is delighted and he says “Haman, go out and do exactly as you’ve said for Mordecai.” What a turnaround. God has sovereignly overseen this switch. When that day is done, Haman runs home in humilitation. He tells his wife and friends about what happened. What a difference a day makes, the day before they’re encouraging him to go get Mordecai. Now they’re saying “Uh oh. Now you’ve done it. This is happening to you because Mordecai’s a Jew. The God of the Jews is against you. You’re in big trouble.” Even as they’re saying that to Haman, the king’s eunuchs come to take him away and whisk him to the next banquet. That’s the end of chapter 6. Chapter 7 opens up with the king and Haman going to this second banquet with Esther. Haman, with a certain sense of dread now. This was going to be his triumphing moment, the second audience with the king and queen. But now he’s on hiw way, dreading what may come about.
That brings us to chapter 7.
1 So the king and Haman went to dine with Queen Esther, 2 and as they were drinking wine on that second day, the king again asked, "Queen Esther, what is your petition? It will be given you. What is your request? Even up to half the kingdom, it will be granted."
3 Then Queen Esther answered, "If I have found favor with you, O king, and if it pleases your majesty, grant me my life—this is my petition. And spare my people—this is my request. 4 For I and my people have been sold for destruction and slaughter and annihilation. If we had merely been sold as male and female slaves, I would have kept quiet, because no such distress would justify disturbing the king. [a] "
5 King Xerxes asked Queen Esther, "Who is he? Where is the man who has dared to do such a thing?"
6 Esther said, "The adversary and enemy is this vile Haman."
Then Haman was terrified before the king and queen. 7 The king got up in a rage, left his wine and went out into the palace garden. But Haman, realizing that the king had already decided his fate, stayed behind to beg Queen Esther for his life.
8 Just as the king returned from the palace garden to the banquet hall, Haman was falling on the couch where Esther was reclining.
The king exclaimed, "Will he even molest the queen while she is with me in the house?"
As soon as the word left the king's mouth, they covered Haman's face. 9 Then Harbona, one of the eunuchs attending the king, said, "A gallows seventy-five feet [b] high stands by Haman's house. He had it made for Mordecai, who spoke up to help the king."
The king said, "Hang him on it!" 10 So they hanged Haman on the gallows he had prepared for Mordecai. Then the king's fury subsided.
It’s really a wonderful turnaround, isn’t it? In a book full of ironic twists this is the pinnacle turnaround. Haman, the one who would kill all the Jews is bowing before a Jew, begging for his life. And he even receives the sentence he wanted order for Mordecai and all the Jews.
I’ve identified three truths that I believe emerge from this part of the story.
Truth number one: a side effect of sin is blindness. If you watch any TV, you will see a lot of commercials by pharmaceutical companies advertising drugs. One of the prominent features of those ads is a listing of the side effects of the drug. They’re usually horrifying. You hear these side effects and you say “Those are worse than what this pill is supposed to heal. Why would anybody take that pill?” That’s sort of what’s happening here. Sin is on display here. And blindness is a side effect of sin. It makes you strangely myopic. You can see. It’s not taking away your physical sight. But what it’s taking away is your ability to adequately or realistically assess what you see. You’re blinded to reality.
Back in chapter 6, when the king asks Haman, “What must we do for the man the king delights to honor?” He believes the king is asking about him. He believes he’s prescribing his own honor. But, in fact, the king is not. He’s talking about Mordecai. And Haman is prescribing the honor for his enemy but he was absolutely certain that the king wanted to honor him. He was absolutely certain that what he was telling the king was for him and not for Mordecai. When Haman boasted about being in the inner ring and being invited to these private banquets with the king and queen, he thought he was being brought into the inner ring in a new and special way. What he didn’t see was that he was really being brought to his trial and his execution. Haman was convinced reality was one way and it was really another. Haman stands to all of us as a warning.
We all still struggle with sin. Coming to Christ doesn’t mean we magically don’t sin any more. And as we struggle with sin we can sometimes become similarly blinded. A person may be caught up in pornography, or adultery, and become blind to what he’s doing to himself; blind to what he’s doing to his family. That’s why we are always Christ-followers in community. Why we exercise our faith, not alone, but together, holding each other accountable with grace. The blinding effects of sin make it necessary for us to live accountable to one another.
Truth number two: I hope another encouraging one. God’s people dwell in safety. Maybe I ought to say God’s people always dwell in safety. I’m pretty confident that neither Esther nor Mordecai felt particularly safe even at this moment. Esther and Mordecai are still living in Persia under a genocide order. I doubt they feel very safe. But the reality is that neither Esther nor Mordecai could have been in a safer place. They were people under the protection of the Lord. God had promised to Abraham to multiply him and his seed and make him into a great nation. We, as spiritual descendants of Abraham by our faith in the descendant of Abraham, Jesus Christ even though our world seems like it’s spinning out of control, could not be in a safer place. We’re in God’s hands. Our times are in His hands. No matter how it appears. No matter all of the dire and very real world challenges we face, we can see the end of the story. Jesus ends up winning. If you’re like me, no matter all of the imagined scenarios that may or not may not ever happen… if you’re of the seed of Abraham, if you believe in the Lord Jesus Christ, you could not be safer. Times are in His hands. There’s no safer place to be.
Finally, truth number three: As people who claim allegiance to Jesus, our approach to God, in the midst of our trials and suffering, is not conditional. It’s guaranteed.
I think a lot of us approach God in the same way Esther approached Xerxes here. We come to God with ifs on our lips. With sort of a cringing fear, wondering, hoping that God will favor us. Wondering, hoping that we will have pleased God so we can have a hearing before Him. The reason I know we think that way is that when we’ve approached God and asked Him for something, we get angry and resentful at God. Why is that? Because we have this perception that God hasn’t held up His end. So we say, “God I did all of this for you. And you didn’t do this one thing for me.” So we get angry and resentful. Have you ever said something like that to God or thought something like that?
That reaction is wrong on so many levels. It’s wrong because it assumes we’re in a bargaining relationship with God. I do something and that obligates God to do something back. It’s also wrong because it assumes that if my prayers are not answered the way I want them to that God isn’t working for my interest. That God isn’t working for my good. That God has somehow forgotten me or has turned against me. It ignores the truth that even in the negative realities of our lives, God has promised, “I am working for your good. That is necessary for you. And it is being worked for your good.”
What I’m saying, Christian friends, is our approach to God is not conditional. It’s guaranteed. We don’t come to God with if statements like Esther came to Xerxes. We don’t come to God saying “if I’ve found favor with you, Father. If it pleases you, Father.” You don’t do that! Why? Because Jesus has already found favor on our behalf. When we approach God in the name of Jesus, the ifs in our lives with God are gone because of Jesus. We don’t have to cringe with Esther as we come into the presence of the Lord. The ifs are gone because of what Jesus accomplished in His perfectly lived life and His substitutionary death and resurrection for us.
Hebrews 4:14-16: 14Therefore, since we have a great high priest who has gone through the heavens,[a] Jesus the Son of God, let us hold firmly to the faith we profess. 15For we do not have a high priest who is unable to sympathize with our weaknesses, but we have one who has been tempted in every way, just as we are—yet was without sin. 16Let us then approach the throne of grace with confidence, so that we may receive mercy and find grace to help us in our time of need.
I don’t know what the Jews in the Persian Empire knew. I suspect they didn’t really know what was going on. They didn’t know they had an Esther in the throne room. They had an Esther advocating for them. Friend, you have someone better than an Esther in the throne room of God. Standing at the right hand of God. Advocating for you. The truth is, you have already found favor with God. You have already pleased God. Precisely because your advocate, Jesus, has pleased God for you. Has found favor with God for you. So whatever challenges you’re facing, you can go to God with confidence, knowing you will find grace and mercy to help in your time of need. A lot of us are in that time of need right now. There are no ifs in our life with God if we’re holding on to Jesus. Those are the three truths.
