- Lord, we thank you for who you are. We thank you that we can come
to this place this morning and worship you for who you are. Thank you for revealing yourself to us through your Word. We commit this morning to you. We ask that you would
teach us, Holy Spirit, from your Word all about you, Lord. We commit this time to you now. In Jesus' name, amen. Amen. What a powerful time of worship to start off our time
together this morning. Good morning to you, girls. Good morning to all of
our satellite campuses and for those of you
that are watching online, good morning. What a privilege it is to
study the Word of God together. We may not all be in
the same room together, but we are all studying the
book of Esther together, and it is a beautiful thing. Today we're in chapter seven, so if you could turn your
Bibles to Esther chapter seven. And here we are in chapter seven and the subtitle in your Bible
might read something like Haman hanged instead of Mordecai, or Haman impaled, or the death of Haman. Spoiler alert, this is the chapter where the wicked man Haman
dies on the very same gallows that he built for another man. Last week in chapter
six, we saw that Haman was really becoming his own destruction. Remember those seven words
that we started off with last week in chapter six, "That night the king could not sleep." Just to recap a little bit of that, the king wouldn't sleep one night, so in efforts to kind of
lull himself to sleep, he asked that the book of the
chronicles be read to him, and in that, it was
brought to his attention that not by mere coincidence,
we learned that, right? It was the hand of God's providence that Mordecai had saved the king's life from a scheme of two men who
were seeking to take his life. And in that, the king
asked, what did we do to honor the man who saved my life? And the men said, nothing. So as it turns out, the
king, he called for Haman, who just happened to be nearby. Also, not a coincidence, but
God's hand of providence, and he asked Haman, what
should be done for the man who the king wants to honor? And we talked about how
Haman, mistakenly thinking that it was him that the
king wanted to honor, he began to reel off this
list of extravagant things that he thought were gonna happen to him. But he was wrong. The king said, in Esther 6:10, "Hurry. "Hurry, Haman, take
the robe and the horse, "just as you have suggested,
and do so for Mordecai the Jew "who sits within the king's gate. "Leave nothing undone
that you have spoken." Haman, in that moment, became responsible for carrying out his dream in
the man that he hated most, Mordecai, the man that caused
Haman to build those gallows and want to annihilate
the entire Jewish people. Haman's whole life is getting
ready to unravel here, right before his eyes. We remember last week in chapter six, we talked about this
being a real turning point in the chapter. And my hope today as we
jump into chapter seven, my hope is that we can look
at four different aspects of this story together. First, I wanna look at Haman's
counsel, Haman's pride, God's judgment, and God's covenant. So Haman's counsel, Haman's pride, and then God's judgment,
and God's covenant. I actually wanna start reading
in chapter 6, verse 12. This is right before Haman
gets picked up to be taken to this banquet that
we're gonna read about in chapter seven today. So chapter 6, verse 12. I'm reading out of the
New King James Version, and it says, "Afterward,"
afterward meaning right after Haman had paraded
Mordecai around the city honoring him, "Afterward
Mordecai went back "to the king's gate. "But Haman hurried to his house, "mourning and with his head covered." Verse 13, "When Haman told his wife Zeresh "and all his friends everything
that had happened to him, "his wise men and his
wife Zeresh said to him, "'If Mordecai, before whom
you have begun to fall, "is of Jewish descent, you
will not prevail against him "but surely you will fall before him.'" And I wanted to start here,
backed up in these verses a little bit this morning because last week as we read these verses, they weighed heavy on my heart. Number one, Haman's counsel. After Haman had just paraded
Mordecai around the city honoring him, as the king had asked to do, Haman goes back to his inner circle. He goes back to his clique. He goes back to his friends. He goes back to his group counsel group, and he seeks their advice again. Again, because if you remember,
just a couple chapters ago in chapter five, Haman goes into his wife and that same circle of friends, and he tells them of all the great things that the king has done for him, the great ways that the
king has honored him and what he has given to him, but he goes on to express
that he experienced no satisfaction from any of it because the man at the
gate, Mordecai the Jew, would not bow. You remember that? In response, do you
remember what his friends and his wife told him then? They stroked his ego a little bit, right? They told him what he wanted to hear. They said, well, if he's
not gonna bow to you, then why don't you go and have
gallows built 50 cubits high and why don't you hang him on it? That was their advice then. And now? Now they're singing a
different tune, aren't they? Now they're looking at
Haman and they're saying, Haman, you should've known. You should've known that you
wouldn't have stood a chance against this man of Jewish origin. And Haman may have been
thinking at that time, but wait, the gallows. Remember, you talked about the gallows. I moved forward with the
gallows that you suggested. The point that I'm wanting to make here is that Haman's counsel was
unreliable, undependable, and inconsistent. But you know, it's no secret to us that Haman didn't find
it necessary to go out and to seek better friends, ones that would give him honest answers and consistent answers, ones
that would have given him the hard word up front, even if it hurt, ones that would've given him godly counsel and heavenly wisdom. We don't really expect that
from what we know about Haman in Scripture. Haman didn't worship the living God. He served a pagan king in a pagan nation. Our expectation of Haman is not that high. But for us, there's a lesson here. The lesson is it matters
who our counsel is. It matters who our inner circle is. It matters who our friends are. And this is something
that the Bible talks about over and over all throughout Scripture, just alone in the book of
Proverbs several times. Proverbs 11:14 said, "Where
there is no guidance, "a people falls, "but in an abundance of
counselors there is safety." Proverbs 15:22 says,
"Without counsel, plans fall, "but with many advisers, they succeed." The Bible encourages us, moves
us towards godly counsel, seeking out godly counsel, and Paul tells us in
15:33, "Do not be deceived. "Bad company corrupts good morals." What that means is, when we
hang with the wrong people, when we spend our time
with the wrong people, and they become our people, we too are on a slippery slope. Listen, I know that you
know that it matters who your friends are. Most parents tell their kids
that from the age of five. But now we're a little
bit older, and guess what? It still matters who our friends are. God has designed us all
to be relational people. We need each other. We know that. And today we live in a culture that is more connected than ever, yet more isolated than ever. The more we interact online,
the more we use our phones, the more we crave that
face-to-face intimacy, the more we crave real friends, but the more elusive it becomes. We've traded trust for tweets
and good talks for tags and smiles for statuses and love for likes and conversations for comments. It's true if you really think about it. But this is not a substitute
for real relationships. Ecclesiastes 4:9 and 10 says,
"Two are better than one "because they have a good
reward for their toil. "For if they fall, one
will lift up his fellow, "but woe to him who is alone when he falls "and has not another to lift him up." In this life, you know this,
we will find ourselves often in need of people, of
friends, to confide in, to share our thoughts with,
to receive direction from, to receive encouragement
from God's Word from, to be prayed for. Don't hear me wrong here in this moment because, yes, we first
should go to the Lord. We first should go to him
in prayer and to his Word, yes, always first. In fact, I think sometimes
we can err in that and run first to our husbands
or our friends or our moms or our sisters, and all too quickly, and we have to be cautious of that. But we do need, we each
need, a place, a person, a small group of people
to whom we can run to and say, listen, can you
give me some advice here? This is my situation. Can you pray for me, more importantly, when we're at a fork in the road or maybe we're in a tough
season or tough situation? And I felt the Lord putting
that on my heart today because it's very likely that those people who will be that and who
will do that in your life are sitting in this room right now, that are in this study, that
are a part of this church. There may be some of you
who can quickly identify who those people are or who that person is
in your life right now, and that is a gift. Thank the Lord for that
friendship in your life. And also, evaluate those friendships. Look at them, whether it's
a friendship of 40 years or whether it's a
friendship of four weeks. Think about the last time you
reached out to that person for counsel. How did that go? When you reached out for
prayer, how did that go? Did you receive godly counsel? The book of James, it tells us what heavenly
wisdom looks like. It says that the wisdom from
above is pure and peaceable and gentle and open to
reason and full of mercy and good fruits. It's impartial and it's sincere. And that's a good scale
for us to weigh the wisdom that we receive from our counsel with. The counsel that Haman received
was not any of those things. It was actually the opposite
of all of those things. But for us, those things are the goal, and also, we need to
consider, are we those people to other people in our lives? Are we that for our circle of friends? We can do a little self-inventory there. To have good friends, we
have to be good friends. And you know what Proverbs 18:24 says? "A man who has friends
must himself be friendly." That sounds obvious, right? Well, of course. But it's not so obvious. We have to be friendly in
order to receive friends. And for those of you here that
are sitting here thinking, Tiffany, that's my prayer. That's actually one of
the main reasons I'm here. I wanna have godly friends in my life. I wanna have an inner
circle of godly people with the same goals. I want those type of friends in my life. That's my desire. I wanna encourage you this morning, you are in the right place. You are doing the right thing. You are going in the right direction, Bible study and church. We even have this new
Mentoring Matters ministry that's starting up right
after Bible study ends where you'll be placed in a group, a really small group of women, and they'll be a woman
who's there to mentor you, to pour into you. And also for those of
you that are desiring those friendships in your life, pray. Pray that the Lord would give
you those godly friendships, someone that can encourage you, and you can mutually encourage each other. I have prayed that prayer in
my life time and time again, and I remember the first
time that the Lord answered that prayer in my life by bringing me my friend named Hilary, my
first real sold-out Christian, when I was about 17 years old. When I was a junior in high school, the Lord answered that prayer and the Lord gifted me a
friend in a woman named Kim, who was just a few
years older than myself. She discipled me. While I was in college, the Lord gifted me with a woman named Lisa
who I had prayed for, who poured into me, and loved on me. While I was engaged to be married, the Lord gifted me with
a woman named Dotty, who studied the Word with
me and prayed with me and taught me what it
was to be a godly wife and a helpmate to my husband. And now as a wife and a
mom, I look in this room and so many of the answers to my prayers are sitting in these seats right now. Pray. The Lord will give you that. He desires that for you just
as much as you desire that for yourself. And also, when we step out into faith and we ask God to lead
us to the right friends or the right people in our lives, we have to be careful of this. We have to be careful
to not be too concerned about the packaging. And what I mean is oftentimes we have this thing in our mind, this vision in our mind of what
that person would look like, or whether they would be
a good fit for us or not, whether it's their status
or the way that they look or what they do. But you know what? God's not concerned with that and neither should we be. And I say that because
as a 17 year old girl praying for Christian friends,
I struggled with that. I think one of the most beautiful things about the body of Christ
is how diverse we are. I often go out to eat after
church or after Bible study and I just sit back and look
at the table and I think, where but the body of
Christ would this work? It's eclectic. We are eclectic as a
body and it's beautiful and it's how God has intended it to be. Show me your friends and
I'll show you your future. It's not just some cool
quote on Instagram or Google. It's actually a Biblical concept. Proverbs 13:20, Solomon
wrote, "He that walketh "with the wise shall be wise, "but a companion of fools
shall be destroyed." I found this interesting. JD Greear, who spoke at our
church not too far back, he said, "I'm often asked, "what is the secret to enduring faith?" And he said, "I'm all
for theological truth "and spiritual disciplines. "Yes, of course. "But if there's a secret, if
there's a secret ingredient "to enduring faith, it's this. "Your friends are your future you. "Show me your friends and
I'll show you your future." In Haman's case, this was true, right? Unfortunately, things did
not end well for Haman as we will see. Back to our text, where in
chapter 6 still, verse 14, "While they were still talking with him, "the king's eunuchs came,
and hastened to bring Haman "to the banquet which
Esther had prepared." Chapter seven, verse one
says, "So the king and Haman "went to dine with Esther. "And on the second day,
at the banquet of wine, "the king again said to Esther, "'What is your petition, Queen Esther? "It shall be granted you. "And what is your request,
up to half the kingdom? "And it shall be done!'" The wine course of this
meal was the final course to these long Persian meals, and as this meal was wrapping
up, as it was ending, can you imagine what Esther
was feeling at that point? She knew this was it. She knew this was her moment to step out and to make her request. When I think about that, my
stomach turns a little bit. So she knew that this was her moment. I love that Esther was sensitive
to the Lord's prompting. Had she made her request the night before, then the king would have never
had had that sleepless night and Mordecai would have
never been honored. You know, when the Lord is
prompting us by his Spirit, when we know that he's
prompting us to speak truth or to give in some way or to
act in a specific direction, we can't wait. We have to move. I remember the first
time the Lord prompted me to go speak to someone. It was actually at the high school camp that I had rededicated my life to Lord at and there was a girl
from high school there and she was a tough girl and I'm not sure that she
actually really cared for me much, to be honest, and I was worshiping in the front row and the Lord had put it on
my heart to go and ask Cassie if she wanted to also
commit her life to the Lord. And I remember thinking, no
way, Lord, not happening. She would think I'm such a hypocrite. Here I am coming up and I
rededicate my life to the Lord five seconds ago and now I'm gonna ask her if she wants to do the same thing? And I was wrestling with the
Lord and I finally gave in, could feel my heart
beating out of my chest, and I walked to the back
of that chapel up at camp and she was sitting on the
window ledge, and it was low. It wasn't like a high one. It was a low window
ledge and I talked to her and she sent me away. She said, no, Tiffany, just go, just go. So I went back down and I sat at my seat and I was like, really, Lord? What was this about? I told you I shouldn't have even gone. I knew that was gonna happen. Minutes later, the Lord was
prompting my heart again, heart pounding. I said, no, Lord, she
already told me to go away. I'm not going back. He kept pressing on my heart, so I reluctantly got up again,
probably shaking my head like I don't know what
I'm doing right now, and I went back and I
said, Cassie, I'm so sorry to come up to you again, but the Lord keeps
putting you on my heart. Can I pray for you in any way? She said, no, Tiffany, no. I was in tears at that point, like, Lord, did I hear you wrong? What is the lesson here? And it actually happened one more time, and I went back, and one more time, she sent me back to my seat. So I let it go. And you know what? I didn't feel impressed
by the Lord to go back, but that night, as I
was walking to my cabin, I remember it was cold
and I was in Cabin K and she was in Cabin B up the hill, and I remember a counselor
coming down to me, saying, Tiffany, Cassie's up in
her cabin and she's crying and she wants to talk to you. And I thought, oh man, and I took off and I was running so fast
and there I had the privilege of praying with Cassie to accept Christ as her Lord and Savior in her life. Right? This was Esther's moment and she knew God was prompting
her to make this petition. This was the third time that
the king was asking Esther what was on her mind,
and he says to Esther, what's your petition? What's your request? Verse three, "Then the
Queen answered and said, "'If I have found favor
in your sight, O king, "and if it pleases the king, "let my life be given me at my petition, "and my people at my request. "For we have been sold, my
people and I, to be destroyed, "to be killed, and to be annihilated. "Had we been sold as
male and female slaves, "I would have held my tongue, "although the enemy could never compensate "for the king's loss.'" She did it. In that moment, a word fitly spoken. Esther knew that the king
had had favor on her. She said, "If you have
found favor in my sight." He had already shown her that. He showed her when he chose her out of all the women at the harem. He had shown her when he
extended his royal scepter to her when she approached him
without being summoned, an act that was actually worthy of death. God had his hand on Esther and as a result, the king favored Esther. And that's part of God's
providence in this story. Esther said, "Let my life and
my people's life be granted," and what she was saying there was, whatever was true for her
people was true for her. Their destiny was her destiny and she wanted to make
that clear before the king. She said, we've been
sold, but not just sold, we've been sold to be destroyed, king. So the king answered and said
to Queen Esther in verse five, Well, "Who is he, and where is he, "who would dare presume in
his heart to do such a thing?" It seems that the moment we think, wouldn't the king have known? Wouldn't he have remembered
that it was actually he himself who had approved the plan? He was the one who gave
authorization to Haman to carry out this plot
in Esther chapter three, though he did it in ignorance. At that time, he did
not know that his wife, the Queen Esther, was a Jew. Esther responded in
verse six and she said, "'A foe, an enemy, this is wicked Haman.'" "Then Haman was terrified
before the king and the queen." Esther was wise. Instead of saying anything about the king and putting any blame on him, she said it was the wicked man Haman. He is the enemy. Can you imagine what Haman
would have been feeling at that moment? Haman never imagined that
Esther herself, the Queen, was a Jew. Now there he was, standing
before the king and the queen, and he was appropriately being accused of plotting the murder of the king's wife. It reminds me of another
story in Scripture. In 2 Samuel 12, remember,
David had slept with Bathsheba, who was Uriah the Hittite's wife, and then things began to unravel and in an effort to cover things up, he actually had Uriah killed. Yes, David, a man of
power, a man of wealth, a man of many wives. He did this to a common man,
one who stood actually at war on David's behalf, a
soldier in his own army. So God sent the prophet Nathan to David and he said, there were two men, David, that were in the same city. One was rich and the other one was poor. The rich man had a ton of flocks of sheep and herds of cattle. The poor man, he had nothing
but one little female lamb, which he had bought and he raised and it grew up with him and his children. That sheep was a member of his family. It ate off his plate
and drank off of his cup and slept in his bed. It was like a daughter to them. And one day, a traveler dropped
off at the rich man's house and the rich man was too
stingy to take an animal from his own herd or his own flock to make a meal for his visitor, so he took that man's one poor lamb and prepared a meal and
set it before his guest. And David, in that moment,
he just exploded in anger and he says, as surely
as God lives, Nathan, the man who did this ought to be lynched. He must repay for the lamb
four times over for his crime and his stinginess. Nathan looked at David and
said, David, you are the man. You are the man. Similar situation, Haman, you are the man. You had it all. You sacrificed it all. Why? Why? Because of pride. Because it was never enough for you. This brings me to my second
point, which is Haman's pride. You know, it's easy to sit
back and to read these chapters and to relish in disgust for Haman. It's easy to look at his character and just see him for what he is, vile, selfish, prideful man. And, you know what, those
things are true of Haman. But, as HA Ironside says, "It
is well for us to remember "that in every man's heart is
found the same evil thing." Haman fed the evil thing. The words ring true in my
mind from a lesson I once did, don't be a Haman. Jeremiah 17:9 says, "The heart
is deceitful above all things "and desperately wicked. "Who can understand it?" It is out of the heart that Jesus says that all kinds of evil precedes. I know that the last thing
that any of us want to do today or recognize today is that we have anything
in common with Haman. We all wanna be Esthers, right? I know I do. I wanna be identified
with Mordecai and Esther, but not with Haman, not one bit. Haman thought it was his due
power to rule over others. Haman craved being honored by others, which blinded him from the truth that his actions were becoming atrocious. And you know what? Sin does that to us. It blinds us from reality. Pride does that to us. Haman was given to pride in
its truest, most comprehensive, fullest form, and it ended up killing him. Pride was this destructive
platform for Haman, and you know what? If we allow it, it can be the same for us. Look at what Scripture
tells us about pride. Proverbs 16:18 through 19 says, "Pride goes before destruction." Proverbs 16:5, "The Lord
detests all the proud of heart. "Be sure of this, they
will not go unpunished." At its very root, even
at its smallest form, pride is sin, and it's destructive. John Stott once said, "Pride
is your greatest enemy, "but humility is your greatest friend." It's the devil's most effective tool, and we all know what pride looks like. We all know what pride looks like. Usually on someone else, we
can identify it more quickly. But because pride is something that we can so easily fall prey to, we have to constantly
be examining our hearts. Lord, if there be any
evidence of pride in me, Lord, cleanse me from it. Keep short accounts. Search me, Lord. You know, even today, pride appears itself in a different way. In our society today, this
phrase of self-consciousness all the time can be a form of pride. We're so consumed about
what people think of us and how they're going to treat
us when we walk in somewhere or what are we gonna do if
the spotlight ends up on us? It can be because we're prideful. We somehow have become the
center of our own thought life. Galatians 6:3 says, "For if
anyone thinks he is something "when he is nothing, he deceives himself." James 4:6 says, "But he gives more grace. "Therefore," it says,
"God opposes the proud, "but gives grace to the humble." CS Lewis said, "Pride
is a spiritual cancer. "It eats up the very possibility
of love and contentment "or even common sense in our lives." And I love what Jon
Courson says about pride. He said, "Pride is the only
disease known to mankind "that makes everyone else around us sick." And I could you a dictionary
definition of pride, although I'm sure you know what it is. Let me read you a list
that Nancy DeMoss Wolgemuth put out that contrasts the
characteristics of a proud person and a humble person. She said, "Proud people focus
on the failure of others. "Humble people are
overwhelmed with a sense "of their own spiritual need. "Proud people have critical,
fault-finding spirits. "They look at everyone else's
faults with a microscope, "but theirs with a telescope. "Proud people have an independent,
self-sufficient spirit. "Proud people have to
prove that they are right. "Proud people are
self-protective of their time, "their rights, and their reputation, "but humble people are self-denying. "Proud people have a
drive to be recognized "and appreciated, but
humble people have a sense "of their own unworthiness, "and they're thrilled that
God would use them at all. "Proud people are self-conscious. "Humble people are not
concerned with self. "Proud people are concerned
with being respectable, "with what others think. "They work to protect their
own image and their reputation. "But humble people are
concerned with being real "and what matters to
them is what God thinks "and what God knows, and
they're willing to die "to their own reputation. "Proud people have a hard
time saying, 'I was wrong. "Will you forgive me?' "Proud people are concerned
about the consequences "of their sin, "but humble people are
grieved over the cause, "the root of their sin. "Proud people don't think they
have anything to repent of, "but humble people realize
that they have need "of a continual heart
attitude of repentance. "Proud people don't
think they need revival, "but they're sure that everyone else does. "And humble people
continually sense their need "for a fresh encounter with
God and for a fresh filling "of his Holy Spirit." Wow. Reality check, right? There's no room for pride in a heart that is fully surrendered to God. And I know that none
of us are sitting here being full-on Hamans, but if we look, if we examine our hearts, we ask the Lord to examine
our hearts closely, we may recognize these small seeds that are buried deep within us, and if we continue to feed those seeds or not address them, at
some point they could grow into something that we
never could have imagined and never want to see in our lives. Pride is the seed in which
every other sin grows. And for those of us who
can say, you know what, there's evidence of pride in
my life, there's good news and that good news is the word confession. Because when we confess our
sin of pride to the Lord, that indicates the beginning
of the end of that pride. It's this growth toward
humility in our lives. And also when we accurately
view God for who he is and we recognize him for who he is, we have nothing to boast in, nothing to be prideful of,
except for what Jeremiah says, in Jeremiah 9:24. He says, "But let he who
boasts boast in this, "that he understands and
knows me, says the Lord, "who practices steadfast love, justice, "righteousness in earth, for
in these things I delight, "declares the Lord." Let's look back at our
text, in verse seven. It says, "Then the king arose in his wrath "from the banquet of wine and
went into the palace garden, "but Haman stood before Queen
Esther, pleading for his life, "for he saw that evil was
determined against him "by the king. "When the king returned
from the palace garden "to the place of the banquet of wine, "Haman had fallen across
the couch where Esther was." Bad move, Haman. "Then the king said, 'Will
he also assault the queen "while I am in the house?'" This king is furious in that moment, and "as the words left the king's mouth, "they covered Haman's face." The significance of
this is that a criminal would be unworthy to even
look at the king face to face, and hence when criminals were
condemned to death in Persia, the first thing to do
was to cover their face with a veil or a napkin. Verse nine, it says, "Now
Harbonah, one of the eunuchs." If you remember, Harbonah's
actually mentioned twice in this book, and we
talked about Purim before. In Israel, they celebrate Purim and they read the book
of Esther, actually, and after they're done
reading the Megillah, there are several benedictions at the end, and they're set to music. And one of the very last
ones, as the song concludes, it says, "And Harbonah should
be remembered for good." That's Harbonah. "But Harbonah said to the king, 'Look! "The gallows, 50 cubits high, "which Haman built for Mordecai, "who spoke good on the king's behalf, "is standing at the house of Haman.' "And then the king said, 'Hang him on it!' "So they hanged Haman on the gallows "that he had prepared for Mordecai, "and the king's wrath subsided." My third point is God's
judgment, God's judgment. You may have heard Pastor
Greg talk about it, that there are laws that govern
everything we do in life. There's a law of gravity,
discovered by Newton, that basically says things
tend to fall downward. What goes up must come down. Then there's the law of thermodynamics, which is effectively saying that everything is breaking down. And then there's Murphy's Law, anything that can go wrong will go wrong. And then there's the Biblical
law of sowing and reaping. Galatians 6:7 and 8, "Do not be deceived. "God is not mocked. "For whatever a man sows,
that he will also reap. "For he who sows to his
flesh will of the flesh "reap corruption, but he
who sows to the Spirit, "will reap of the Spirit
everlasting life." There is a negative and
positive to this Biblical law. If you sow to the flesh,
you reap corruption. If you sow to the Spirit,
you reap everlasting life. You may think that we're
getting away with things, the sin in our lives, but we're not. It will come out eventually. I read a story about an
actor from the early 1900s who was an avowed atheist,
and his name was WC Fields. And right before his
death, a friend visited him in the hospital and he
was surprised to walk in and see Fields reading,
thumbing through a Bible, and he asked him, "What are
you doing with a Bible?" And Fields replied, "I'm
looking for loopholes." There are no loopholes, friends. For whatever a man sows,
that he will also reap. Our God is a righteous judge. Psalm 19:9 says, "The
fear of the Lord is clean, "enduring forever. "The judgments of the Lord "are true and righteous altogether." When it comes to God's judgment,
sometimes people will say that they believe in God, but they believe in a God
that's not judgmental, one that will just accept
them the way that they are. And that sounds nice, but really effectively
what they're saying here is I believe in a God who
doesn't care about right, a God who doesn't care about wrong. They're more bluntly
saying, I believe in a God that I just kinda made up
to fit what works for me, whatever makes me feel good. Nahum 1:3 says, "The Lord is slow to anger "and great in power, "and the Lord will by no
means clear the guilty." If God really is loving,
then he will also be just. That's what the Bible tells us. The love of God makes
him a righteous judge, and this is where the gospel comes in, because each one of us deserves judgment. We have all sinned, right? We know that, Romans 3:23. And the penalty of our sin is judgment. I'm sorry, the penalty of our
sin, the judgment for our sin should be death. But God loved us so much that
he gave us a gift in Jesus and Jesus paid the price
for our sin on the cross. And the Bible tells us that
when we believe in our hearts and we confess with our mouth
that Jesus Christ is Lord, that he is faithful and just
to forgive us of our sins. Anyone that calls on the name
of the Lord shall be saved. Now Jesus did pay the
ultimate price for our sins. And if we're Christians,
we don't have to experience God's wrath because
Jesus took that for us. But the Bible tells us
that those he loves, he disciplines, for
our good, Hebrews 12:6. He disciplines us in
response to his love for us and his desire for us to
be like him, to be holy. Proverbs 3:11 and 12 says,
"My son, do not despise "the Lord's discipline or
be weary of his reprove, "for the Lord reproves whom
he loves and as a father, "the son in whom he delights." Sometimes the Lord will
use testing and trials and various predicaments in our lives to bring us back to him, to draw us near to him in repentance, and he loves us enough to do that. My fourth point is God's covenant. You know, the invisible hand of God is evident everywhere in this book, and we know that the name of
God is not actually mentioned in this book, but his invisible hand is everywhere, that things that we read in this book, they are not coincidences. They are not random. There is a designer. There is a coordinator. There is power behind all of this. God literally bellows
through the book of Esther. There are no miracles
in the book of Esther, but the whole thing in
itself is a divine miracle. The people, all of the people being in the right places at once
and in the right times, this is more than miraculous, and there's a story here. There's a story about Esther. There's story about Mordecai. There's a story about Harbonah. There's a story about Haman. And there is an even bigger picture, there is a bigger story here
about the covenant relationship that God has with Israel. This covenant relationship
that says Israel will be his prized possession, in Exodus 19, that Israel will be a
kingdom of royal priests, that they will be a holy nation, that God will defend them
from all of their enemies. He will protect them. That he will be gracious and merciful and forgiving towards them. This is an irrevocable covenant
that God made to Israel. Not Haman, not the
enemy Satan using Haman, could destroy the people of God. Not any of it could put
an end to God's promises towards the nation of Israel and the ultimate salvation of Israel. No one, no matter how
they attempt to destroy the people of God and the
purpose of God can succeed because God's covenant love
for Israel will be fulfilled and is being fulfilled right now, today. And there's a new covenant, too, right? A new covenant. The old covenant was
established at Exodus, but the new covenant was
established at the cross at Calvary. The old covenant was the nation of Israel, but the new covenant
is for all Christians. The old covenant redeemed
Israel from bondage, but the new covenant redeems us from sin. The old covenant was through Moses and the new covenant is
through Jesus Christ. The old covenant offered
prosperity and security and priority with God, and the new covenant offers eternal life, brings us in as children of
God, allows us to know God. The new covenant brings us Jesus. God is still on his throne, girls. These are challenging times. We see that. These are challenging days to live in. Watching the news, reading the paper, those things make you
sick to your stomach, but God is on his throne. I know that I can become distressed at the way things are going. I can be scared. The way that the things that
are going on in our world are crazy, disturbing, upsetting,
distressing, terrifying, but we don't have to fear because the Divine Architect
is ordering our lives, our daily lives. Those of us who belong to him
are in a covenant relationship with him just like Israel. Just like he did Esther,
he makes promises to us. Just like he did to Esther's people, he makes promises to us, doesn't he? What are God's promises to us? That he will fight for us,
that he will strengthen us, that he will uphold us, that he will be strong on our behalf. He says no weapon formed
against us shall stand. He says he will never leave us. He promises that he's gone
to prepare a place for us, like we just sang. He says that he will
give us peace and wisdom when we need it. He promises us forgiveness. He promises us a plan and not just a plan, but he promises us a good plan. And so many other things. I wanna encourage you this morning, what is the promise that
you are holding onto? What is the promise that God
has made to you this morning? Think about it. We can live in God's promises. We can live in his covenant through Jesus. He is ordering our daily
lives, for his eternal glory, every part of it. How wonderful it is to
live in that confidence. Our confidence is in
his faithfulness, amen? (amens from audience) Let's pray. Father, we look at these
chapters, we look at this book, and we look at what it says about you. We see that you're a providential God. We see that you are a God who
works through human vessels, whatever you choose, and not
only do you choose to use us, but you equip us. We see through this book
that you are a just God. We see that you are a
God who is not mocked. We also see that you are a God who is the keeper of your promises. You're the keeper of your covenants. God, you promise to protect Israel. You did then and you do now
and you promised to protect us, your children, and you
are faithful to do so. Lord, as we talked about this
morning, Haman's counsel, Lord, help us to surround
ourselves with people that would help us to
become more like you, people that point us to you and also, Lord, help
us to be those people. Lord, we talked about Haman's pride. Lord, every time pride makes
its way into our hearts, Lord, help us to remember your truth, that yours is the greatness,
yours is the power, Lord, yours is the glory, yours is the majesty and the splendor, for everything on heaven
and earth is yours. We wanna boast in saying that we know and understand you, Lord. Lord, forgive us of any
pride that has crept in on our lives this morning. We wanna be more like you, Lord. We wanna be humble servants,
ready and available for whatever it is that
you call us to, Lord. In Jesus' name. Lord, we also wanna pray for this offering that we're gonna be
receiving right now, Lord. We thank you for these funds in advance. Whatever we have, Lord,
it already belongs to you. And, Lord, we give back to
you, trusting, knowing, Lord, that these funds will be
used to further the gospel in this generation, and,
Lord, we know we need it. So use these funds, Lord, for your glory. In Jesus' name, amen.
