Book of Esther - Part 10

Park Meadows Church

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Lord, we thank you so much for a time to come together to fellowship together, to be strengthened by your presence and by our mutual faith.

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And Lord, we ask you once again that your Holy Spirit might be our teacher, that we could grow today and not just leave here feeling good, not just come in to try to make ourselves happier or anything like that.

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The main goal is that we might grow spiritually. And so we ask that you would accomplish that work in our hearts today.

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And we ask it in Jesus name. Amen. All right, well, we have been in the book of Esther and we've come to this place where Haman was raised up by King Ahasuerus to like the number one position.

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And Haman is the progeny of Esau in the Bible. If you go all the way back and find out who his father was, his kinfolks go all the way back to Esau, Esau is a type or a picture of the flesh.

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And he hates Israel. So Haman hates Israel. And he's been placed just at the right place at the right time in order to think that he's actually going to destroy an entire nation.

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And Satan has inspired his mind to think that he should do just that. He hates

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Mordecai because Mordecai will not bow down and worship him. All the other people are doing it. Mordecai would not do it.

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And so because of that, Haman's wrath comes upon this man and he decides rather than just destroy this one man, he'll just take the whole nation out, take it as an opportunity.

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So if you remember last time we talked about how he went into, I think, Esther chapter three and verses seven and following, he went into the king and convinced him.

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In around verse eight, that these people were dangerous, that these people had laws of their own and their laws in the

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Hebrew language, it's the word for perverted, their laws are perverted and different and they're dangerous.

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And it's not best for you, it's not profitable for you that you even let them live. Now, that did not come from Haman.

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That was inspired by Satan and Ephesians. It says we battle not against flesh and blood, but against principalities and powers in spiritual wickedness in high places.

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So this was not coming from Haman. It was inspired by Satan. And Haman brings out this idea to the king and the king receives it and then they go have some drinks together and send the post out.

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In other words, the messengers out across the entire known world to each province to tell them that you will kill all the

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Jews in your area and we will pay you to do it. And they set aside money in the budget to pay people to kill the

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Jews. Now, this is the situation that we find the Jews in and Mordecai in at this point where we are.

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Now, what's interesting about it is, you know, that Esther has been placed in exactly the right place at the right time also.

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In fact, this whole book is a book about the providence of God and how he orchestrates our whole lives.

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And it applies to you and to me just as much as it does to Esther and Mordecai. But Esther was chosen by this same king as the one young lady in the entire known world that he wanted to marry.

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So now she is his wife living in the palace with him. He does not know she's a

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Jew because her father said, don't tell anybody that. Don't tell anybody any more than they need to know. That's a good thing.

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Brother Otis taught me about 12 years ago. Don't give people any more information than will help them.

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That's a good thing to live by. So she didn't tell him she was a Jew, but she is. And God has her in that place.

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Now, that gives us some of the background. Now, what's interesting about it is we took what as we so much like to do, we took a little bit of a tour out through the

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Bible on a rabbit trail to talk about how this same mindset that Satan put into Haman was also put into Adolf Hitler during World War Two and he killed eight million

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Jews. And the Bible indicates very clearly that this same mindset is going to be put into a man's mind in the end of time, many men, but one man in particular.

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And we call him the Antichrist. And he will have this same desire to destroy the

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Jews. And he will add to that the Christians because he will consider them to be the progeny of the

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Jews that came out from the Jewish nation. And so this is coming in the future as well.

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So we went into Matthew chapter 10 and some other places and we were reading some of the things that it talks about that goes forward in history, whereas Esther is looking back in history.

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But it's the same personage that it's coming from and it's Satan and he doesn't die.

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So he is still here just as he was in the days of Esther and Mordecai. He is still on the planet.

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He is still hating God, hating God's children. And he is the ultimate

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Arminian. And you know what I mean by that. Arminians are people who believe that we do everything.

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And some people call the other side of that Calvinists, which believe God does everything.

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And on both ends of that, you have people who are kind of messed up doctrinally. And the truth is somewhere in the middle.

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But I will tell you, it's way closer to the sovereignty of God's side of it than it is that we do everything. That that's totally false.

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Satan believes that, though. And that, by the way, is where that doctrine comes from, is from Satan. Satan believes is even though he has read this

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Bible, every page of it for thousands of years, he still doesn't believe it will end like it says it will, because he thinks he's in control.

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You see, that's what an Arminian thinks that or in the secular world, a secular humanist believes that he's in control.

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It's interesting. Jeffrey talked about that a little bit in Sunday school this morning about how the person who thinks

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God doesn't do everything, he thinks he does everything. So it's like everything has to he has to be the center of the universe and everything comes out from that person.

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That's a secular humanist. And the religious side of that is called an Arminian. It's a person who believes that we do everything and God has to respond to Christians.

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And that is totally foolish, totally untrue. But like like Jeffrey said, they must have thought nothing happened before they were born, you know, because if everything comes from me, then it could have started till I got here.

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I hadn't figured all that out. But that, you know, that's that philosophy. Now, go with me. Keep your hand there. And Esther, we're going to be back in a minute.

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But go to Matthew chapter 10. And we were in this passage and I'm going to need someone to make sure

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I have that written down right, because I noticed I didn't I is that right? OK, Matt, Matthew chapter 10.

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Let's pick it up here with verse 21. Now, this is looking forward in time to a day that's going to be almost identical to the day that Mordecai is living in.

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And brother shall deliver up brother to death and the father shall liver deliver up the child and the children shall rise up against their parents and cause them to be put to death.

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And ye shall be hated of all men for my name's sake, but he that endureth to the end shall be saved.

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Remember that this was talking about five groups of people. And to figure out who

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Jesus is speaking to, you have to ask who are the groups and we know he's speaking to his apostles, but the secondary application is that he's speaking to another group to figure out who that is.

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You have to figure out that by elimination, he named four groups that are not the group he's speaking to.

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One was the Jewish leaders. That's not who Jesus was talking to here. The other are just the Jewish people. And the third was the leadership of the

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Gentile nations. He wasn't talking to them and the Gentile people not talking to them.

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So who's left? The only group left is Christians, the church. In other words, God's people, which is comprised of Jewish and Gentile believers who are born again into the family of God.

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We know that that actually goes all the way back to the Abrahamic covenant, but people who are born again, that's who he's talking to.

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So that's who this is talking to in this passage here in Matthew chapter 10. So it says you will be hated of all men.

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That phrase all men includes all four groups. He listed the Jewish leadership. They'll drag you into their synagogues, it says, and beat you and kill you and the

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Jewish people and the Gentile leaders. That's going to be the kings and the governors, as it listed here, and the

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Gentile people who are not saved, people not born again, people, those four groups are going to hate you.

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And it says this will happen, though, for Jesus's namesake and those who endure to the end shall be saved.

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That end is a reference to the end of this age, which some people call this the church age. Some people mistakenly think that the church age ends seven years prior to the second coming, which is false.

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That is that is not true. The church age has to last until Jesus comes back or else you have people in limbo for seven years.

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They can't get saved any normal way. And it's just nonsense. OK, if you really study it out.

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Also, if you look at Jesus's chronology in Matthew chapter 24, he listed perfectly. Just go back by his.

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Why not go by Jesus's chronology of the end time? Don't you think that might be a smart way to do it?

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Daniel gives the same chronology. The apostle Paul gives the same chronology. And anyway, that is the way it comes to pass.

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So sometimes we have to rethink things when we are taught things by books or mentors.

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Sometimes as adult people of God, we just have to take the scripture and go back and say, I'm just going to lay that all aside.

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I'm going to read it and see what it says. I'm going to read it and see what it plainly says. Now, as it moves on here, it says, but when they persecute you in this city, flee ye to another for verily

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I say to you, you shall not have gone over the cities of Israel till the Son of Man be come.

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So he's coming again. If they come into your city and the governors of that city say we're going to kill

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Christians, he said flee. So there is a great word for us towards the end times as it gets worse and worse.

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He did not say stand against them and fight them. He said run from them.

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You know why he said that? Because you can't beat them. If you try to stand and fight them, you're going to lose yourself, your life, your family, your wife, your kids.

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You're all going to be slaughtered. So he said flee to the next place and to the next place. There are some places where it even says flee to the mountains.

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And so this is the game plan that God gives us. This is the word of God. It says to flee.

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Then verse 24, the disciple is not above his master. Now we covered this little passage. Jesus is saying, look, they crucified me.

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Why do you think they're going to spare you? You're not higher than I am. Now, this doctrine that's been around my whole lifetime, that is so popular that the church is just going to be raptured and we're just not going to be here for any of it, is false.

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It's easily proven in the scripture. Let me just ask one question. How many last trumps can there be?

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The Apostle Paul said that he comes, that the rapture happened. The rapture happens at the last trump.

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Go study the trumps, see where the last one is. There's one clue. But the point is, the devil comes up with this elaborate lie that takes four

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PhDs professors to even explain it to you. A child or even a teenager, a young person wouldn't even be able to read the

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Bible and come up with that theory. So I don't think God writes the Bible that way myself. I don't think he wrote it for some kid.

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I don't think he wrote it for seminary professors. I think he wrote it for you. I think he wrote it for me and for the children in the room and the young people.

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So it's plain. Listen, if you ever come across a doctrine that takes four PhDs to explain it, it's probably false.

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All right. God wrote the Bible plainly. I love the way Dr. Ryrie said a long time ago that don't say that you interpret the

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Bible literally, say that you interpret it plainly. It's written plainly. Read it plainly.

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Just see what the Bible says. That is a great way to interpret it. Now, Jesus is saying, look, he said, you're not greater than your master.

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If they would do this to me, they're going to do this to you, which implies to me you're going to be here. So you need to have some information about what to do.

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Now, I know there is a rapture and the rapture happens before Armageddon that I can assure you the scripture teaches, but I'm not sure how much of this stuff happens before the rapture.

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So we need to be ready for some things. And that's all I'm going to say about it because I'm not trying to be divisive. But the

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Lord says, now, look, if they call me Beelzebub, how much more will they call you also?

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So they're going to be calling you and me devils. You see, because the way

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Satan is going to do this is the same way he did it with Mordecai and Esther through Haman, he's going to inspire, inspire the leadership of the world to believe that everything would be peaceful if it weren't for those loudmouth

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Christians and Jews that are always stirring up trouble. Everything would be peaceful without them. So if we eliminate them, it'll be peaceful.

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That's the lie. It's been around. It's not new, but it will be coming back this direction.

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But look what he says in verse 26, fear them not, therefore, for there is I don't want to read the passage because it's review.

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But fear them not is what I wanted to give you this morning on that. And he goes down and talks about how he cares for us in verses 29 through 31 and so forth.

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Now, look at verse 39, he that findeth his life shall lose it.

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He that loses his life for my sake shall find it. We talked about that last Sunday in the

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Greek. It helps a lot to understand this, that the word his in the Greek is the word self. So where you see the word his in your

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Bible in verse 39, you might want to write the word self. And it makes more sense. He that finds the self life will lose a life.

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In other words, if you live a selfish life, you're not even living, Jesus says. But if you lose the self life, then you find true abundant life.

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That's what that verse is. Now, that brings us to verse 40. He that receives me receives. He that receives you receives me.

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Now, look at this. This is in the context of the end times when Satan has inspired the leadership of the world to hate you and to call you devils and to make everything be your fault.

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You will be the ultimate scapegoat. And at such a time as this, he says, number one, fear them not because all they can do is kill the body.

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You really should fear the one who could kill the body and the soul and the spirit. And that's God. That's the only one we should fear.

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We should not fear men. That's the number one thing that we're told. But now notice this comforting word that he gives us in verse 40, that anyone who will receive you is receiving

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God. Anyone that receives you is receiving Jesus Christ. And anyone that receives me,

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Jesus said, receives him that sent me. So if anyone will receive you and not call you a devil and bring you into their care and perhaps protect you and feed you and take care of you, they're doing that to Jesus and they're doing that to God, Jesus said.

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Now, listen, you cannot have a greater connection than that. You have a place where you remember when the king gave

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Haman his ring and took it off and gave it to Haman and that allowed him to seal these documents that made it to be law that they would kill the

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Jews. The king gave him the ring. Guess what? Our king just gave us his ring. You see what I'm saying?

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Our king is greater than Haman's king. He that is in us is greater than he that's in the world.

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And Jesus Christ, our king, just handed us his ring and said, wear this. And people that will receive that ring, it's mine.

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If they receive you, they're receiving me and they're receiving the father. And ladies and gentlemen, that's power. There is no greater power than that.

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Satan may want to pretend he's powerful and he is, but he may want to make you think he's all powerful, but he's not.

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He's not omniscient. He's not omnipresent. He is not God. He is a creature. He's a very bright one, but he's a creature.

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In fact, his name is the son of the morning. But he's just a creature. We serve the

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I am. We serve the one who spoke everything into existence out of nothing.

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We serve the one who says, if you go back in time as far back as you can go,

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I am there already. That's who we serve. And he gave us his ring this morning in verse 40.

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He goes on and he says, he that receives a prophet in the name of a prophet shall receive a prophet's reward.

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And he that receives a righteous man in the name of a righteous man shall receive a righteous man's reward. And whosoever shall give to drink unto one of these little ones, talking about his children, us, give us a cup of cold water only in the name of a disciple.

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Verily I say unto you, he shall in no wise lose his reward. So what he's saying is.

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People who treat you well will be rewarded by him and people who don't will be slaughtered by him. Is that amazing?

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Now, let's go back into Esther chapter four. Do we have a little time left?

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Let's move forward a little bit more. Esther chapter four, verse one.

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It's interesting how you can take the things happening in Esther, you know, 2800 years ago, and then you can go into Matthew and see what's going to happen out in our future.

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No telling how far out, maybe nearer than we think. And it's the same.

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And the reason is it's inspired by the same being, Satan. But look at chapter four.

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When Mordecai perceived all that was done, Mordecai rent his clothes and put on sack cloth with ashes and went out into the midst of the city and cried with a loud and a bitter cry and came even before the king's gate, for none might enter into the king's gate clothed with sackcloth.

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And in every province, whether so ever the king's commandment and his decree came, there was great mourning among the

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Jews and fasting and weeping and wailing and many lay in sackcloth and ashes.

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Now, do you remember us discussing this not that long ago that my view of the end times is that the tribulation period, the seven year tribulation period accomplishes three things at one time.

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God is not just trying to accomplish one thing with it. And I say trying. He doesn't try anything. He is accomplishing.

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But he's not going to accomplish one but three. He's going to deal with the world system, the

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Gentile nations. He is going to deal with his nation Israel, the physical nation of Israel, which is still there, many mostly scattered all over the world, but they do have their own nation.

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He's going to deal with that nation and he's going to deal with his church. And a lot of people debate that part about the church.

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They say he's not even going to be here. Some say what's leaving halfway through. Some say we don't know. Some say that none of that's going to happen.

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The Bible is so clear on it, really. I don't know why the debate. But but here's the thing.

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My view is that Jesus's chronology is the accurate chronology. Pretty good view to have,

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I think. And he says after the tribulation of that those days, will

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I send my angels to gather my elect, which to me is the rapture when he says I'll gather my elect from the four corners.

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So I think what is happening here is where in the book of Revelation, it teaches so clearly that it says the bride shall cleanse herself.

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She shall make herself white. Obviously, a teaching on positional righteousness.

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I'm sorry, on experiential righteousness, not positional righteousness. Positional righteousness comes to us from Jesus as a gift because he did all the work on the cross to make us be righteous.

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And we can't change that. He has clothed us with his own righteousness. We know that.

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But the Bible also teaches experiential righteousness again and again, all through the scripture, whole books written about it, such as the book of James, where it says that now

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Jesus has cleansed you on the inside, given you a new heart. Therefore, walk that way. Walk that.

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Be who you are on the inside. Don't be hypocritical. Walk like who you really are. You are a child of the king.

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He's given you his ring this morning. Walk that way. And so we're commanded to do that.

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Now, the Bible says part of that command is that the church will make herself white and clean.

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Now, look around you today, not in this congregate. This is a pretty nice congregation.

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But go anywhere in your nation today and just look around at the people living around you in this nation, many of whom claim to be

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Christians. Look at the megachurches in every city of this nation celebrating and dancing and having multimedia situations where it's just like better than a movie.

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And yet they go back home and nothing has changed in their city, nothing has changed. You still have the bars being opened by the dozens, the topless joints being opened by the dozens.

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Internet pornography everywhere, you have athletes doing things, you have senators doing things that are despicable all out in the open.

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And now you have situations where whole states are making gay marriage lawful so that now it becomes out in the open and it's accepted.

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And you have that everywhere in this nation. And we think we're in revival. And you see all of these things happening and you realize that the church is not making herself white.

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She's doing the opposite. The church is a harlot. The church is a whoring, as the

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Bible would say, after everything that's out there in the world and not loving the one true groom that she has, which is

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Jesus. That's the church. If you want to see the picture of the church, I just gave it. The church is unfaithful.

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How is she going to ever get to the place where she's not that way and she cleans up her act and she presents herself clean?

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I believe it's going to take tribulation. I believe we're going to have to get to the place.

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Now, what do you think about this? What if you just heard what if word just went out across the television set when you got home that President Obama, and I'm not no reflection on him, if it had been

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Reagan in office, I'd say the same thing right now. But President Obama, since he's the president, he's sent out a proclamation that we're going to incarcerate all

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Christians and Jews just for the time being, just so they don't cause trouble. We're going to take their land and confiscate it, give it to the government, and that will help us pay off our debt, the national debt.

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And that's how we're going to do it. Now, would you go home and just have just a regular Sunday afternoon like we always have and plan out the week like next week's planned out?

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Or would it be more like this? When Mordecai perceived all that was done, Mordecai rent his clothes and put on sack cloth with ashes and went out into the midst of the city and cried with a loud and bitter cry.

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And every Jew did this all across every province of the entire nation. And the decree went out and great mourning was among the

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Jews and fasting and weeping and wailing and many lay in sackcloth and ashes praying to God.

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They were quite faithful at that moment, weren't they? And we will be too someday. That's the whole teaching here that's quite amazing.

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And we're just about out of time. I think I'm going to take you into one more little passage here and then we'll stop this morning.

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Let's see if we can go out to Isaiah chapter three just for a moment. Also, not only a picture of the past, but also a fore view of the future.

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Isaiah chapter three. Verse one, for behold, the Lord, the

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Lord of hosts, doth take away from Jerusalem and from Judah the stay and the staff, the whole stay of bread and the whole stay of water.

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That is a picture. He's going to take the bread and the water. That means he's going to remove the prosperity.

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Even down to the necessities like bread and water are going to be removed.

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Verse five says, look at verse four. I'll tell you what,

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I'm going to read down through verse five, I'm going to try to leave a little bit of this out, but it's fascinating stuff.

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The mighty man and the man of war, the judge and the prophet and the prudent and the ancient.

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Now, notice he said he is going to take away the staff, the bread and the water.

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And there's not a period after verse one, it's a comma and in the Hebrew you don't have either. But my point is, it's a continuation of the same sentence.

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He's also going to take away the mighty man. That's the military strength. He's also going to take away the man of war and the judge.

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The judge is those who run the nation with justice. He's going to remove them and he's going to take away the profit.

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So the preachers are going to be preaching nonsense. Is that amazing? He's going to also remove the prudent.

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That means anyone who would be wise and make great decisions with the national money, for example, the budget and all that, he's going to remove those people.

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And he's also going to remove the ancient. In other words, the elderly people, then the wisdom they normally have, they won't have that wisdom or they are either that or they won't exist.

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He's also going to remove the captain of 50 and the honorable man and the counselor and the cunning artificer.

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So you're not going to have people that can even build buildings beautifully like they once could. And he's going to remove the eloquent orator and the guys that are running for president, for example, aren't going to be able to give a good speech.

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They're just going to fumble around. You won't want to be led by these people. And I will give children to be their princes.

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So you're going to have very young leaders in their 18, 19, 20s, early 30s, rather than men who are experienced.

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We have one of those right now, as far as I'm concerned. And babes shall rule over them and the people shall be oppressed, every one by the other and every one by his neighbor.

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And the child, look at this, shall behave himself proudly against the ancient. The children will not honor the older people.

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They won't obey them. And the base against the honorable. And then look down at verse eight, for Jerusalem is ruined and Judah has fallen because their tongue of their tongue and their doings against the

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Lord to provoke the eyes of his glory. The show of their countenance does witness against them and they declare their sin as Sodom and they hide it not.

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Now, look at that. The people get to the place where it's not enough just to sin in secret.

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They are proud of it and they want you to know what they're doing. So look at the point in time when

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God says that he begins to take away the wisdom, take away the leaders, take away the military, take away the bread, take away the water.

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It's the point in time when they show with their countenance and it witnesses against them and they declare their sin as Sodom and they hide it not.

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Woe unto their soul, for they have rewarded evil unto themselves.

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Say ye to the righteous that it shall be well with him, for they shall eat and the fruit of their doings.

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But woe unto the wicked, it shall be ill with him, for the reward of his hand shall be given him.

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As for my people, children are their oppressors. Women rule over them.

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Oh, my people, they which lead thee cause thee to err.

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So the leaderships cause us to be to make unwise decisions. As the people and those that lead them destroy the way of thy paths, they totally destroy the society and the history of our nation so that no one even knows who we are anymore.

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The Lord standeth up to plead and standeth to judge the people. So God is at work in all of this.

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He's not just sitting back, waiting to see how it turns out. He's at work in it, watching it and actively participating in this judgment.

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Verse 15, what mean ye that ye beat my people to pieces? God's saying from his point of view, why are you telling me?

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You know, people are asking God, why are you beating your people to pieces and grind the faces of the poor?

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They ask God and God answers with verse 16. Moreover, the Lord saith, because the daughters of Zion are haughty and they walk with a stretched forth neck and wanton eyes.

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You know what the word wanton means? It's a sexual word, wantonness. The mind is like right before the flood, it says their thoughts were only on evil continually.

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And it had to do with unclean sexual activities outside of marriage. So they walk this way, they have their necks stretched out.

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It specifically talks about the women of the society, the daughters of Zion, the women get to the place where they're this way and the women become wanton and they have wanton eyes and they're walking and mincing as they go and making a tinkling with their feet, little bracelets and things on their ankles.

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And I'm not saying that's bad, but I'm just saying there is a there is a wantonness and a lasciviousness about the women of such a nation.

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Therefore, the Lord will smite with a scab the crown of the head of the daughters of Zion.

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Now, what young lady here wants your hairdo to be messed up and God puts a big scab on the top of your head where the hair won't grow and it's just oozing?

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Wouldn't that be nice for a lovely young lady? And this is the picture. Now, God's talking about his people.

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He's picturing his people as a young, pretty lady. And all of a sudden she gets smitten with this disease and her hair won't grow and she's got a scab on top of her head.

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That's a that's not a nice picture, but this is how God is picturing the nation that gets to the place where it just flaunts its sin like this.

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In that day, the Lord will take away the bravery of their tinkling ornaments about their feet, their calls and their round tires like the moon.

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They had a little funny things they wore around their hips. They call it round tires. Anyway, the things that the women dress like to look just great and all of the prideful things the guys are doing in a society like this, it says

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God will bring it to pass that these things will be taken away and so will their haughtiness.

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God will deal with the pride. And it goes all the way down to verse 24.

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And it reminds us of the days of Mordecai and it shall come to pass that instead of the sweet smell, there shall be a stink.

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Instead of a girdle, there will be a rent, in other words, a tear in the clothing.

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And instead of well -set hair, there will be baldness.

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And instead of a stomacher, a girding of sackcloth and burning instead of beauty.

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The men shall fall by the sword and I, mighty in the war, shall fall and her gates shall lament and mourn and she being desolate shall sit upon the ground.

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Isn't that something? So God will accomplish three things with this time period.

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He's going to deal with the ungodly world, the Gentile nations that just don't know him and reject him. He's going to deal with the nation of Israel to bring them back to himself.

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And all of the Jews who are still alive at the second coming shall be saved, the Bible says, and be ushered right into the millennial kingdom.

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And he's going to deal with his church. And the dealing with the church is what's going to make her get to the plate.

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Where she desires to make herself presentable to the groom.

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So let's stop there. We don't have any further time. And let's go Lord in prayer. Father, we thank you for your word.

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It is a sombering message that you give us this morning about our nation, about your church, about the whole world.

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And we see things unfolding before our eyes. And we ask that you would make us to be prepared and to be ready.

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Help us to draw closer to you. Help us to lay aside the weight and the sin that death so easily beset us and to want to walk clean before you so we might be ready when you come.

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And Lord, we ask you to go with us into our time of fellowship. Bless our meal together. And we ask it in Jesus name.