Esther. Esther. It's right before the book of
Job. That'll help you find it very quickly. The book of Esther. I covet your prayers for me right
now. It's a very difficult story to
tell, and to bring out everything in it is impossible. But I do
want you to see some things here, if God be pleased. The book of
Esther. Could be you've heard something,
someone preach from this, perhaps Brother Jim or someone. But every
time I've heard it, I've just been tremendously blessed. And
I ask your undivided attention. If you have a Bible, you must
look at your Bible in order to follow along with this story,
because we're going to go through the whole book. So you have to
You have to have a Bible in front of you in order to get anything
out of it. The Book of Esther, as I said,
there's so much here. There's so much gospel here that
it's just impossible to bring it out in one message. I talked
to Brother Danny Blair on the phone yesterday and told him
that I was going to preach from this. And he said, are you going
to do a series of messages? I said, no, just one. He said,
well, have at it. I'm just going to give you an
overview of the whole book, really, of Esther. There's so much gospel
here. I'm just going to touch on some
highlights here. And even reading it this morning, I saw some things
I didn't put down and some things I didn't see before. There are
four principal characters in this story in the book of Esther,
four principal characters. There's the king named Ahasuerus,
the king of Persia, which was a mighty kingdom in these He
reigned over 127 provinces, I believe, from India all the way over to
Ethiopia. 127 provinces, a huge kingdom
of Persia. That's the king, Ahasuerus. And
then there's his queen, Esther. Esther. And then there's a man
named Mordecai, who is a Jew, just a nobody, a Jew. And then there's this man named
Haman who is the lieutenant or ruler of this king. Now Ahasuerus,
bear with me. I want to give you a brief introduction
here. Ahasuerus, this king, was an
absolute monarch. An absolute monarch. We don't
know anything about this today. Kings in our, there's a few kings
left in our day. The Queen of England. There is
no king yet. Prince Charles will be. But they're
just figureheads. They really had no power. But
back then, kings had all power, that is, on earth and in their
kingdom. What they said went. They could
dislike somebody. Say, if I disliked Stan, I could
say to one of my chamberlains, Henry, cut his head off. I don't
like the way you just looked at me. This is the way absolute
monarchs reigned and ruled, didn't they? They didn't know anything
about it. They could just dislike somebody and say, I don't like
this guy, get away, rid of him. Or countries. I want this country. This is what King Saddam Hussein
is trying to do today. But back then, this fellow had
power over a huge kingdom. And one day he had a party. He
had a party, and back then they threw parties. I mean, this party
lasted a week. And about the seventh day, Rick,
after he was good and sassed, for lack of anything better to
do, you know, what could you do for seventh straight day?
Well, the seventh day he said, bring in the queen. I'm going
to show her off. Bring in my little wifey. I'm
going to show her off to everybody. Tell her to put her crown on,
her robe, dress up, get on her best buds and come in here. my
friends here, my queenie, well, she was indignant, you know. She thought, this is awful, I
can't, I'm not going to do this. So she refused him. Well, and
this is what happened. The princess, all of his governors
and his rulers that were with him at this festival, they said,
now you go ahead and take care of this little woman. If you
don't do something about her, our wives are going to rise up
against us. And this is good advice, man. And this is what
the king said. It's exactly what he said. He
said, you're right. We'll have an insurrection on
our hands. The women will rise up against us if we don't show
our authority. And so he said, I'm going to
get rid of the queen. This is what they advised him
to do. Get rid of her. Get rid of her.
And so, he thought up a plan to get him a new queen. He said,
I'll have a beauty pageant. I'll parade all the beautiful
maidens throughout the land, and I'll just take my pick as
a king. I'll take my pick, all the beautiful
maidens. So, look at chapter two with
me. Chapter two. So, many came before him, many
beautiful young maidens, and he judged them. And finally,
this one young Maiden came named Esther verse 15 and when the
turn of Esther the daughter of Abahail the uncle of Mordecai
and it's it's This is significant Esther didn't have a mama or
daddy This woman came before him Mordecai
had raised her her uncle and She came in she required nothing
but what the king's chamberlain, the keeper of the women, appointed."
She didn't need anything special, in other words, to make her beautiful.
She was beautiful already. And look at it, "...and Esther
obtained favor in the sight of all them that looked upon her.
And Esther was taken into King Ahasuerus into the house royal
in the tenth month." Now verse 17, "...and the king loved Esther
above all the women." She obtained grace and favor in his sight
more than all the virgins, so that he set his royal crown on
her head and made her queen instead of the first queen." You know
who that's speaking of already, don't you? I don't have to tell
you. One of the kings, so Esther was
the queen, he made her the queen, and he didn't know this, but
she was a Jew. Esther was a Jew. Now, the Jews
were captive people to the Persians, the Babylonians, they were captive.
But she was a Jew and she didn't tell anybody, but she became
queen. The king appointed her queen.
Well, one of the king's lieutenants, this fellow named Haman, he hated
Jews, hated them. And he despised them. And every
day this Haman would go to work. Every day he'd get up and go
to work and through into the palace, wherever it was he worked,
into his office. And he'd pass by this one place
and everybody, wherever he went, everybody would bow to him. Hail
Haman. Most high and mighty and noble
Haman. You're wonderful. You're glorious.
Everybody. And he'd parade through there and bow. Thank you, thank
you. But one little old fella named
Mordecai, a Jew, wouldn't bow to him. He'd sit there in the
corner, hold his head up. He wouldn't bow to him. This
Mordecai was a Jew. He worshipped God only. He knew that God alone
was to be bowed to. Mordecai wouldn't bow. He wouldn't
bow to Haman. And Haman, every day he'd pass
by that little fella, he'd see he wouldn't bow. And it made
this guy mad. It made Haman so mad. And he
thought, I'm going to do something about this. He hated, he got
so vindictive against Haman, because he wouldn't bow, that
he decided to destroy all Jews because of this one fellow. Just
to get to this one fellow, he was going to destroy all Jews. One day, one day, he went home. This is how much this fellow
bothered him. One day, he went home and told
his family. He said, everybody bows before
me. I've got a great kingdom and
a throne and I've got lots of children and a palace and goods,
royal goods and all of these things. And they said to him,
you must be happy. You must be awfully happy. He said, no, I
can't sleep at night because of this Mordecai. That reminds
me of me. Does that remind you of you?
I mean, everything can be going great. You can have forty nine
people love you and one person. have a sour look on their face
or whatever. I don't know how often I do this. The whole congregation,
practically, can be rejoicing in the message, but one person
be stone-faced, and I'll say, I can't sleep that night. And that's us. God blesses us
supremely, doesn't he? With everything we could possibly
want, and one thing go wrong, one thing cross us, can't stand
it, I'm going to go crazy. Well, this is what old Haman
did. He plotted to destroy the Jews,
and Mordecai in particular. He got the king. He finagled
and swindled and got the king to sign a statement to destroy
all the Jews. And his family, his family talked
him into erecting a gallows just for Mordecai. You erect this
gallows just to hang Mordecai and set him up as an example
to all those that want to bow. So on such and such a day, all
the Jews were to be destroyed. Now, stay with me. On such and
such a day, all the Jews were to be destroyed. And I thought
about this. More than just a story, this
actually happened. And right now, this is actually over our
heads, the judgment of God. I'll get to this in a moment.
But I thought, how did these Jews feel when they heard this
story? How did they feel when they heard
that they were going to be destroyed? Well, they were weeping and gnashing
and wailing, gnashing their teeth and wailing. They were children,
men, women, children, everybody was to be killed. Killed. And Mordecai, this devout Jew,
this man of God, he heard about it, and he mourned every day
and wept and prayed to God and fasted and put on sackcloth and
so forth. And Esther, being isolated in
this kingdom up in the royal palace, She heard him mourning.
She heard about what her uncle was mourning, her cousin. And
she sent and asked Mordecai. Now look over chapter 4 with
me. You've got to stay with me now to get a lesson out of this.
She sent and asked Mordecai what was wrong. Look at chapter 4,
verse 8. And they sent through this messenger,
and the messenger gave the copy of the writing of the decree,
that is, to kill all the Jews. to destroy them, to show it unto
Esther. Mordecai sent this copy to declare
it unto her and to charge her, tell her, you've got to go into
the king to make supplication unto him, make requests before
him for her people. And then he came back and told
Esther the words of Mordecai, and then Esther sent a message
to him. Look at it. You've got to look
at this. This is a key verse. She gave a commandment, a letter,
to send back to Mordecai. Now, all the king's servants
of the people, this is what it says, all the king's servants
and the people of the king's province do know that whosoever,
whether man or woman, shall come into the king, into the inner
court, who is not called, there is one law of the king,
and that is to put him to death, except such to whom the king
shall hold out the golden scepter that he may live. And I've not
been called to come in to the king these thirty days, Esther
wrote back to Mordecai. Well, she said the king hasn't,
we're doomed to death, but the king hasn't called me and everybody
knows that whoever tries to come in to the king, that the king
doesn't call, they'll be put to death. Now, I just told you
a while ago that the king here was an absolute monarch. You
don't just rush into the presence of the king. You don't just come
up and say, hey, king, I got something, you know, me and the
good, me and old Hasu Eris, we're good buddies. I'll go in and
say, no, goodness gracious. Even now we know a little bit
of this. The president, you can't get close to the White House.
Two guards will apprehend you. This is a picture of our holy
God, who's unapproachable. You can't just rush into the
presence of God Almighty. He can't do it. He's holy. He's
sovereign. He's just. He's unapproachable.
He can't be approached by mere mortals like us. Well, look at
verse 14 with me. This is beautiful. And old Mordecai
wrote back and said to her, look at the last part of verse 14.
He said, Now who knows whether or not you'll come to the kingdom
for such time as this? Who knows? Esther, you may be
right in there in the kingdom, just so you can go into the kingdom
for us. Well, Esther bade them, told
this messenger, to go back and answer Mordecai, verse fifteen,
verse sixteen. And she answered, Go, gather
together all the Jews that are present, gather together all
of my people, and get them together, and fast for me, and neither
eat nor drink three days and Three days and nights, and I'll
do it also, fast likewise. And then I'll go unto the king, which is not according to the
law, but I'll go." Look at it, verse sixteen, "...if I perish,
I perish." So Mordecai went his way and did according to all
that Esther had commanded. Now, the king, Austen Harris
here, represents God. No doubt about it. God, who is
the Almighty Sovereign King, Almighty Monarch, Absolute Monarch,
King of Kings, Lord of Lords, doing as He will with whom He
will in the armies of heaven and among the inhabitants of
the earth, and none can stay His hand or say unto Him, What
are you doing? He does as He will with whom
He will. Who art thou, O man, that should reply against this
King? this God. He's the King. He's
unapproachable, too. He's on a throne. Terry, you
can't get near Him. You can't get near Him. You can't
come unto this God. You can't do it. Before the Lord Jesus Christ
came, He'd take His name on His lips. He'd smite you down. He'd
touch His ark like an oozer. He'd kill you. God is the sovereign,
unapproachable King. He's the King of kings. He's
sovereign. He's holy. He dwells in a place just like
this king. He dwells in a place no man can go to, into the inner
court. He's just. He's made a law, a law of the
land. You've got to abide by his law
perfectly or you'll not get into the king. And everybody knows,
the Scripture says, all have sinned and come short of the
glory of this king, haven't they? Everybody knows that, like Esther
said. Everybody knows. Everybody knows that the law
must be fulfilled. And you can't come to this God,
at least you ought to know, that you can't come unto this God
but how? Only if he calls you. Right? There's only one way you
can get into this, King, and that is if he calls you. He's
got to give commandments to his chamberlain. Go call Stan Anderson
by my gospel, by my word. You go call Charles. You go call
Nancy. She can't. She won't. She can't
and she won't. Come to the king, accept the
king by his Holy Spirit through his word. Call her. Right, Nancy?
Go and do it. And there's something else that's
got to be done here, though. He's got to call, and then when you
get there, he's got to hold out that golden scepter. What does
the Scripture say that scepter was? A scepter of righteousness
is his scepter. He's got to hold out his righteousness.
He's got to impend the righteousness of his son before you'll be accepted. He's got to robe you. clothe
you in the royal robes of Christ and His perfection before you
can go before His holy throne. Get to put on you, John, a crown
of salvation, a helmet of salvation before you can get in. The Queen
just couldn't come in her nightgown, you know. Hey, King A, no, got
to have on the royal robes and the crown, got to be looking
her best. And that's us. I got to come before the King
looking our best, not our best, His best, the best He's got,
looking just like His Son. The Lord Jesus Christ. And only
those that will come in there are the ones he called. Now, we're under sentence of
death. You know, Esther was a Jew. She was a Jew. And Christ came
down here and took upon himself the form of a servant, was made
in the likeness of sinful flesh. Not a sinner, but made in the
likeness of sinful flesh. He took upon himself a body of
a man. He was a Jew, Terry, like us. A Jew. A Jew. And we're under
the sentence of death. And Esther, that's what he said
back there in verse 13, Mordecai said, you can't escape. If you're
going to be a Jew, if you're a Jew, you can't escape. If He's
going to save us, He can't save Himself. They said to Christ,
hang on that crop. If He's going to be a man, He's
going to come down here. Verse 16, He's got to perish. If I perish, I perish. And the whole race, our whole
race is doomed because of our representative Adam. It's doomed. And because of Haman. Haman represents
Satan here. You remember Satan went in the
garden? Satan in the garden deceived Eve, and then Adam willingly
took of that fruit and rebelled against God. But Satan started
this thing. He started this whole ball of
rolling. Because of Satan, what sin that Satan brought into this
world and this universe, because of him, God laid down the law.
Just like this story. God laid down the law because
of Satan. The soul that sins will surely die. Everybody that
comes short of my glory Want to die? Want to die. The wages
of sin is death. And we're all under this condemnation
of sin and of the sentence of the law. But many people, I said
it this morning, many people out of desperation, they'll call
upon God, but you can't come to God. But one way? He's unapproachable. There's only one way to approach
the King. And just like Esther here in
approaching the King, she had to be found favorable. Somebody
for the Jews. Somebody had to go in for the
Jews who was favored by the king. Highly favored by the king. Beautiful to the king. He paraded
all these women before him and he chose her. She said, she's
the most beautiful. She's mine. She's the one I delight
in. The only one I'll have. The only one that's fit to be
my queen. She's her. And the Jews had to
have somebody go into this mighty king who was favorable to the
king. whom the king loved, somebody to represent them, someone whom
the king would hold out the scepter readily, somebody whom the king
was willing to accept. And this is Christ. This is Christ. Christ is the highly favored,
approved, well-beloved Son of God. The Scripture says he's
beautiful in his holiness, beautiful in holiness. And the Scripture
says he's identified with me. He's a Jew like me. A Jew. And he went into the Father.
He knows me. He was identified with me. He took upon himself
my likeness. Became a man, yet he was still
a king. Esther was a Jew, but she was
still a queen. Christ was a man, but he was still the king. And
he went in for me, to represent me to the Father. And you know
what? He's able to save. For these Jews, somebody had
to go in who pulled some weight, right? Somebody was able to get
the job done. Esther could. She had favor with
the king, and Christ is able to save to the uttermost things
that come unto God by him. He's able. He's able. And you
know what else? Esther had to be willing, didn't
she? What if she said, I, y'all just
fend for yourselves. I'm going to save my own skin
here. What if she had said that? No, she didn't. She said, I'll
do it. And if I perish, I'll perish till I love my people.
And Christ is willing. He was willing, and he said that
when the Father and the Holy Spirit and the Son got together
to make that covenant to save God's people, to go down into
this pit of corruption, to save the people, to go to the cross,
He set His face like a flint to go to that cross, to die that
ignominious death. He was willing, willing. He said, I'll do it because I
love my people. And if I have to perish, I'll
perish, but they'll go free. That's exactly what happened.
He perished. Because he died, we live. In
his death, we live. But Christ wasn't a victim. He
was a sacrifice. God's lamb. God put him on that
cross. He wasn't just a victim. It wasn't an alternate plan.
God didn't look around and say, well, how are we going to do
this? Because the first one didn't work, he'll come up with another
one. No, he was a lamb slain before
the foundation of the world. God had this thing planned. Look
at chapter 5. Stay with me. Chapter 5. So Esther approached the king
this day. Verse 1. It came to pass on the
third day Esther put on her royal apparel and stood in the inner court
of the king's house. Christ came down here. Just like
he promised his disciples, he said, son, a man is going to
be taken. He came down here, just like the scripture said,
to fulfill the scriptures, to live a life, to live before the
Father and before the people, seven days like a lamb, to be
examined, to be examined to see if he had spot or blemish. He
lived thirty-three years, a full life as a man. And then he went
to the cross and suffered that death, poured out his blood.
unto death, and then he went in the grave. And just like he
told his disciples, he said, now I'm going to the cross. They're
going to kill me. I'm going to be buried. And on
the third day, I'm going to rise again. I'm going to rise again. And like he said to them, we've
been studying it all along, he said, I'm going to go to the
Father in my glorified state, with my royal robes on, with
your hope, with a good hope, with my blood, with a basin,
A spiritual basin of my blood and my righteousness with my
robes on will go before the King for you." After the third dance,
that's exactly what he did, Nancy. Exactly. Remember when he rose
from the grave and he came to Mary? And Mary said, Oh, Master,
and started to touch him. Touch me not. I have not yet
ascended to the Father. Now, I don't know. Maybe right
in there, there's speculation. But maybe right in there he went
to accomplish that transaction of pouring the blood out on the
mercy seat. and so forth with his salvation. Who knows? But
anyway, after Christ lived here and married and died and rose
again, he went after the third day, just like Esther, put on
his royal apparel, glorified, exalted, no longer just a mere
mortal man, Terry, no longer, but the exalted King, Lord, Savior,
Sovereign, Ruler, Majesty, accepted, beautiful. When God took a look
at him, look at it with me. Verse 1 again, she stood in the
inner court of the king's house over against the king's house,
and the king sat upon his royal throne in his royal house over
against the gate of the house. And it was so, look at verse
2, when the king saw Esther. Did all the people, with all
the people in there, with all the Jews, let's all get together.
Maybe he'll be impressed by numbers. If we get enough of us to get
together in here, Esther said, if all of you back me up and
everybody's weeping and wailing and pleading with the king, if
all of us go in there and beseech him, maybe he'll... No. Just
Esther. She walked in. Beautiful. I'd like to sing this one. Beautiful. The king took one look at her,
Terri, and he saw everybody else. One look at Esther. Esther was
the only one that the king saw. And Christ is the only one that
needs to be seen. He can't see me. He can't look
upon me. But when he looks upon Christ, he sees me, because I'm
represented in Christ. I'm accepted in the Beloved. And verse 2, And she obtained
favor in his sight. Well done, thou good and faithful
servant, God said to his son. Well approved, you've done a
good job. It's my son in whom I'm well pleased, highly favorable
of my son. And the king immediately, look
at it, held out to Esther the golden scepter of acceptance. This also meant reign and rule.
She gave him the right hand of fellowship that was in his hands. So Esther, look at it, verse
2, Esther drew near, drew near, and he held out that scepter.
And not only did she draw near, but she grabbed ahold of it. You remember over in Revelation
5, isn't it, where John wept? He wept. He said, when he saw
the woman sitting on the throne, and he had a book in his hand,
and he wept, and nobody was able to open the book. Who's worthy?
No man is worthy to open this book. Who can do it? We must
read the contents of the book. Everybody's name's in the book,
but nobody's worthy. Oh, yes. Yes, there is. There's
one who is worthy, the lion of the tribe of Judah. He'll open
the book, and he walks right up into the presence of God,
who is the one who sat on the throne, this one high and mighty,
and grabbed ahold of the book and opened it right up. And not
only that, John, but he sat down. Sat down beside the king. I'd
say he's favored and accepted, wouldn't you? Accepted. Touched the top of
the scepter. Do you see that? The top of the
scepter. the top of it, didn't lean down and kiss the bottom,
touch the top. In Christ, he reaches the standard
of God's righteousness, the top, the pinnacle. All the righteousness
of God is in him, the fullness of God. Well, if you're with
me, so Esther came. This thing gets better. Esther
came to the king with her petition, and she asked something of the
king. Verse 3, the king said unto her, What wilt thou, Queen
Esther? What is thy request? It will
be given to you, the half of my kingdom. I love you so much,
lady, that whatever you want, you'll get from me. Whatever
you ask me, you'll get it. And that's our Lord and Jesus
Christ. He said the Father loves the
Son. He always hears the Son. He gives the Son what He wants
because He loves Him and favors Him. Well, verse 9, let's go
on down here. She said to the king, I want
you to come to a banquet that I'm going to have for you in
Haman. Bring Haman with you. Bring Haman to this banquet that
the queen is going to set in honor of the king. Does this
sound familiar? The marriage supper of the lamb?
For the glory of God? Invite his people? She said,
the king and Haman, verse 9, so when Haman heard about this,
oh, he was so happy. He was so happy. He said, the
queen is going to honor me this day. Oh, Haman. And he went home
to tell everybody about it. He went home to tell everybody
about it. He said, the queen has invited
me, just the king and me, to a banquet. I'm highly favored
of the queen. And everybody said, well, this
is great. You're a holly. This is great. This is wonderful.
We're so happy for you. He said, oh, this avails me nothing
as long as that Mordecai is sitting over there. There he is again. That's us again. Just because
old Mordecai was bugging him. I mean, that's us too, Stan.
Got the unsearchable riches of Christ. Been promised to be joint
heirs with the Son. Had one little Mordecai, one
peanut head, mad at us. And it tears our world apart.
Well, that night, Esther told the king, all in chapter 6, she
told the king how that she was a Jew. She came to the king and
said, I'm a Jew, but you love me. And she told the king how
Haman did this. You can't let this Haman destroy
your queen and your people, can you? And the king was upset. And the king, so the king that
night of the banquet, the king walked outside on his porch.
And this really happened. This is what happened. Haman
was outside listening. He heard the queen confess to
the king and heard the king being upset about it and walk outside.
So Haman rushed in to where the queen was and threw himself on
her bed, begging The queen, please have mercy on me. Don't make
the king mad at me. Please have mercy on me." And
while she was laying on her bed, while Haman was laying on her
bed, the king walked in. And there she was in bed with
his wife. This is exactly what happened.
And he said, What will you force the queen right in front of my
eyes to? And this must have been what
the father said about Satan when he was tempting his son. Satan
messed up his world according to his will, his purpose and
all, his creation and all, and God put a plan in motion to destroy
Satan, to come and tempt his son and do all of this to his
son. So the king determined from that day forward he was going
to get Haman. He knew Haman hated Mordecai,
too. Now listen to this. The king couldn't sleep that
night, and he commanded Somebody come in and read a bedtime story
to him. They said exactly what happened. Get the Bible and bring
it in here and read it to me. And they came in and started
reading the Bible to him, Henry. And they read the records of
a man who stopped the plot to kill the king. It was Mordecai. Mordecai found out that two fellows
were going to kill the king. And they put this, reported all
this. And the king said, When he heard
about this, he said, what's been done for this Mordecai? They
said, nothing, nothing. He said, well, I'll tell you
what, we're going to have to reward this fella. We're going to have
to reward him. Let's get him and let's put a
crown on him. He said, let's get some advice
about this. We called Haman in. He said,
Haman, I've got a mind to, I've got a mind to exalt and to reward
one of A man in my kingdom who's done me great good, great honor. What do you think ought to be
done to the man that's done me such honor? And Haman thought,
it's me. It's exactly what happened. It's me. He said, honor me. He
said, I think you ought to put a crown on his head. Put the
finest robe, put the king's robe on him. Put him on a white horse,
parade him through the town, make everybody bow in front of
him. And the king said, all right, go get Mordecai and do it to
Mordecai. You know what? Haman? Oh, you
can imagine what he was doing by this time. This is Satan! Satan, the one man, he thought
he destroyed mankind by a man, licking his chops, you know?
And finally God sends a man. And someday Satan's going to
have to bow before us, Mordecais, men, and do our bidding. The ones he's out to get, to
destroy. Henry, he's going to have to
bow. We're going to become kings and priests with our God. That's
exactly what happened in Mordecai. Exalted to the throne of a ruler.
And that's us. Although we're under the God
of this world for a time, we're under his dominion, under his
rule, under his threat. Someday, this glorious king,
because of Esther, because of Christ, is going to exalt us
to reign. Well, I'm getting ahead of myself
here, but the theme of this book, the theme of the book of Esther,
is God sovereignly reigns and rules in all things. The proverb says, God hath made
all things for himself, even the wicked one, for the day of
evil. The devil's his devil. We saw
that in our study on predestination. All things are working according
to his counsel, according to his will. All things put forth
for his glory and our good, the salvation of his people. And
the salvation of God's people, the theme of this book is. The
salvation of the Jews was in Esther. It was in Esther representing
those people. And the salvation of God's people
is in Christ. You know, God can use a woman,
Sherry, to represent Christ. We can't put God's gospel in
a box. He used Esther, the book of Ruth. It's ironic to me that these
two books that bear women's names to me are two of the clearest
gospel pictures in all the Scriptures, Ruth and Esther. But even the
devil and his demons will work to God's designed end. And look, I want you to notice
a few things with me and I'll quit. I haven't been very long anyway.
I've got lots of time. Well, stay with me. I want you
to ask Esther saved her people. Now, there was a lot of people
that were under the jurisdiction of the captivity of this Persian
kingdom. A lot of people. A lot of people. And this whole
world is under the dominion of the God of this world. Right? Under the dominion of God and
the God of this world, Satan. But Esther went in to represent
a particular people, didn't she? Not the Jebusites or the Moabites
Enomatsu, or whatever writes, the Jews. And she saved her people,
Henry. Whoever was Jewish was represented
by Esther, right? And he is a Jew which is not
one outwardly, but inwardly. Circumcisions of the heart. And
Christ went in, John, to save His people. Not all men. His
people. His people. And they were saved.
Every Jew was saved because of Esther. She came, Christ came
to live for His people, to die for His people, to represent
His people, to intercede for His people, and God said it about
Him. So you call His name Jesus, for He shall save His people
from their sins. His people. So Esther went in there, and
she represented the people, and she saved her people. And then
the enemies were destroyed. Look over chapter 7 with me.
Chapter 7, look right down to verse 10. You know those gallows
that that Haman had erected for Mordecai. Verse 10, they hanged
Haman on the same gallows that they had prepared for Mordecai. The enemy destroyed. Old Haman
was hung on the gallows. God said, Vengeance is mine,
saith the Lord. I will repay. I'll repay. I'll take care of them. And we
need this for bad, too, in light of what I've been saying. We
don't have to be bothered. Let no man bother me," Paul said. God's our Father. He's our King.
We need not take care of our own problems. And you know, here
Haman pictures the devil here. Old Satan, like I said, Satan
plotted and planned to destroy man, but he ended up, he's going
to end up being destroyed himself someday. Well, that woman's seen,
and he's bruised. that he'll turn around and crush
his hand, kill him finally. Let me tell you this little story
real fast. There was a man, a large landowner, who had, you may have
heard it, I don't know, but there's a large landowner, plantation
owner, and he had an enemy, a little fella who hated his guts. And this fella had a huge, beautiful
plantation, and on this plantation were huge, large oak trees and
and hickory trees and just huge beautiful trees, hundreds of
years old. He loved these trees, he loved this plantation, he
loved his possessions. And this man
that hated him plotted somehow he could get at this fella. So
he picked out one of the most beautiful trees on that whole
piece of property. Great big ole oak tree, must
have been 300 years old. He thought, I'm gonna cut that
thing down. So one night, he got with his chainsaw or his
axe or whatever he used and started whacking in a cut and he worked
all night long, worked a long time to cut that tree down. And
finally, just as the morning was about to break, sun about
to come up, that thing started to thaw. And he was so happy
that he got that tree down, but it fell on him. He didn't kill him yet, but he
was laying there under that tree. Here come riding up the landowner
on a wagon with several of his servants with him, him riding
up. And they saw this fellow laying under the tree, his enemy,
arch enemy. And the enemy laying under that
tree, pinned, bound, chained, as it were. Laying under that
tree and said, I've got you now. I don't know. I've got you. I
may die, but I've destroyed everything you've worked for. It's your
favorite tree. I know what it is, isn't it? Yeah, cut her down.
Well, the landowner says, well, sir. He said, we were just coming
to cut that tree down. Because I'm going to build a
house right here, and you've just done the job for us. Thank
you. That's Satan. He's bound under
chains. He does God's pity. He thinks
he's got Him, doesn't he? He put Christ in that tomb, and,
I got you now! Look there, I got you, son! You
did what I intended for you to do. You saved my people! Satan thought, what have I done? Somebody said, with every stroke
that Satan beats upon his people, he conforms them. the image of
Christ. He hit him over the head and
said, oh, that wasn't what I meant to do. That wasn't it either. That God is sovereignly manipulating
and ruling and controlling even Satan himself. Isn't this thrilling? Doesn't it? Phew! That nothing can befall us but
what God is sovereignly in control of. Nothing! Even evil! All things work together for
good. I create good, I create evil.
Moral, not moralism, but bad calamities and this and that
and the other. Satan thinks he's behind it. The world thinks he's
behind it, but no, the great landowner is behind it. He says,
you've done what I intended you to do, thank you. And when he's
done with him, he'll wipe him up and get rid of him when the
house is built. Well, then the king's wrath was
pacified. It was pacified when old Haman
was killed and the law was fulfilled, and we've been reconciled to
God by the blood of Jesus Christ's cross. He's just as satisfied.
Christ destroyed sin, death, and hell. His law was honored.
You know that the king here, Ocasio-Cortez, he didn't shave
his law in it. He didn't say, oh, let's forget
that old law. No, he didn't do that. He couldn't. The laws of
the Medes and the Persians now stood. It's written like a pin
of iron in a rock. It had to be fulfilled. He didn't
say, no, we're not going to kill any Jews anymore. He said, I've
changed my mind. No, he didn't do that. He didn't
do that. You know what he did? He gave
the Jews, not only did Esther come in to represent him, to
represent the Jews, but he gave the Jews weapons. He outfitted
and fitted the Jews with weapons to fight the ones coming to kill them. Does that make any sense
to you? God Almighty has equipped us. He's given us armor, Ephesians
6, to fight the enemy with that's coming to do battle with us.
Right? Right. God can't alter his law
one decree. He said you must through much
tribulation. The soul that sinneth must surely
die. Death. Death. We're all going to die.
Everybody in here is going to die. Physically. But because
of Esther, because of Christ representing us, we're not going
to die spiritually, but we are going to die physically. We're
going to suffer. And the Jews had a battle to
go through. But none of them were lost. None of them. Because
of these of their warfare and so forth. And look at this. You've
got to see this. This is glorious. Look at chapter
8 with me. Look at verse 1 and verse 2. On that day did the
king Hasuerus give the house of Haman, the Jews' enemy, unto
Esther the queen. Doesn't it say that Christ reigns
over things in heaven and things under the heaven? Even hell itself? Yeah, even hell itself, death
itself. Look at verse 1 again. And Mordecai came before the
king because Esther told what he meant to her. You see that? Mordecai came to the king, too,
because Esther had told the king what Mordecai meant to her. I
love this man. He's mine. He's my cousin. He's my brother. And Christ,
we come to the Father too, Nancy, by Him. And He tells the Father
what we mean to Him. We mean to the Father. Verse
2, And the king took off his ring, that really meant a sign
of approval, took off his ring which he had taken from Haman,
and gave it unto Mordecai. What did the father say about
the prodigal son? Kill the fatted cat, bring out
the ring and the robe. gave it to Mordecai, and Esther
sent Mordecai over to the house of Haman." And that's us. Look down at verse 15. Verse
15. And Mordecai went out from the
presence of the king in royal apparel. We don't look like much
right now, do we? But we got on royal apparel.
Royal, the righteousness of Christ. Blue and white, that's sovereignty,
that's royalty and purity, with a great crown of gold, salvation,
of a garment of fine linen, My, my. And the people were blessed,
were blessed by the representation of Esther. Look at a couple more
things with me. I got to see these. Like I said,
the whole chapter. If you preach the God of the
Bible as He is, you preach the gospel as it is, you don't need
to do anything else. That's it. That's all you need.
Like this story here. You just preach this story. God
the Holy Spirit will use it upon people. You don't have to resort
to gimmicks and this and that and the other. He preached the
God of the Bible, and the fear of the Lord will come upon people.
Verse 17, look at this, in every province, in every city, verse
16, the Jews had light. They had understanding. They
could see clearly. Verse 16, and gladness, oh, gladness,
and joy, and honor, acceptance, and in every province, wherever,
in every city, wherever the king's commandment and his decree came,
wherever the gospel is preached. The Jews had joy and gladness
and feast. A good day. I don't know about
you, I had a good day already. A good day. And look at it. And
many of the people of the land became Jews. For the fear of
the Jews fell upon them. God moves people to fear through
this gospel and through your witness and even through your
lives. And finally, over in chapter
9, verse 22, they got complete victory. Verse 22 of chapter
9 says, ìThe Jews rested from their enemies, and the month
which was turned unto them from sorrow was now joyful, from mourning
unto a good day.î Good day. Thatís a good greeting. We can
greet one another, ìGood day.î Good day. Yeah, itís a good day.
This is the day the Lord has made. the day of salvation. We'll rejoice and be glad in
it, won't we? Verse twenty-eight, and I'll quit. And they said
that these days should be remembered and kept throughout every generation,
every family and every province. Does that sound familiar? For
a memorial, a memorial. We did this last Sunday night.
We remembered our great king who went before the King for us, and represented
us, and perished for us, shed his blood for us, that we might
have acceptance with the King. And we're accepted in that, in
the King, in our Esther, in Christ. And we do this for a memorial,
and we have rest from our enemies. Someday, and we're made kings
and priests to our God, and someday we're going to reign and rule
with him, forever at rest from our from our enemies, because
of our representative, because of him alone. I hope somebody
in here got something from that. Somebody. It may have been for
me, I don't know. Okay, stand with me and I want
to sing this song. you