Truth in Love- Esther 4

Statesmen who stand by principle rather than seeking their own comfort and welfare are rare, they are needed, and we need to train up our children, men, women, and children who have the moral guts and have the moral character to stand strong, even if everybody else is against them.

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Yeah. So how you doing, Dan? Good. I had a fairly restful

Lord's Day, a great time at church tonight, even though it was like 86 degrees and we don't have air conditioning inside the church.

So it was pretty warm this evening when we went back, but it was good.

It was a good time. I enjoyed being there with the church tonight. And you got to preach this evening and you've already posted on the

Truth and Love Network page. Yep. So everybody go out there and check out Dan's sermon.

Yeah, we'd really appreciate it. I think you'll thoroughly enjoy it. So go check out

Dan's sermon from this evening. That's already been posted. Let's go ahead and jump in.

Before we get to Esther, we want to open up with a current issue that's hitting our day. And of course, there's really no option, no discussion about what that may be.

Last Friday, just a couple of days ago, our Supreme Court made a decision to overturn a decision that the

Supreme Court made almost 50 years ago, which was to overturn Roe versus Wade. And as Christians, I think all

Christians, no matter where you stand on the issue, well,

I want to take that back. All Christians, whether on the side of pro -life or abolition,

I want to say we celebrate that decision of overturning

Roe versus Wade because I have Christian friends that fall on the other side, that it should remain a

Supreme Court decision, remain legal. I don't understand how they get to that point of view, but I do have

Christian friends that hold that view. But for the most part, pro -life abolitionists, we celebrate

Roe versus Wade being overturned. Dan, I want to give you my point of view, and I want to hear your reaction to this.

I feel like consistently, and I will make the blanket statement of all, most, the majority of Christians have this issue, have this problem, and I do as well, the problem of apathy.

I think about when major events happen that have happened in our lifetime, happened throughout history.

You think about 9 -11, and right after 9 -11, what happened? Churches were flooded with people.

And then, I don't know how long it took, but probably even the next Sunday, numbers began to dwindle back down.

And eventually, it got back to where it was, and we just got back into our place of apathy.

And I know, even in my own life, I look at circumstances, and I feel like it's true for most

Christians. If it is not personally affecting me, then I'm really not pulled a whole lot to get involved.

I see tragedy on the news, and I say, oh, that's bad, and then

I just continue to watch the news, or I flip the channel, unless it personally affects me, and then we're doing the memorial services, lighting the candles, community prayer vigils, because we're personally involved.

But as Christians, we need to get off our laurels and repent of this apathy, really, because it's not the way of Christ to remain apathetic toward things that He hates and things that are evil in this world.

And I'm afraid that, as we celebrate

Roe versus Wade being overturned, that, hey, we rejoice, and we're climbing this mountaintop.

But I think we're going to peak, and I'm afraid we're going to peak, and then go back down on the other side and go back into this place of apathy.

When really, there's no better time than now because of this overturning.

All of us, to some degree, have been apathetic so far, but now's the time to turn that around, because the fight continues.

It continues on the state level. So what do you think about my assessment? There's a lot there.

I share a lot of what you're saying. It's wonderful that now there is no federal protection for abortion in America.

It's federally not protected, but it is not federally abolished either.

So they just kicked it back to the state, saying, y 'all do whatever you want to.

Now, some of the laws that are in place are looking fairly good. Some of them need to go further. If you're looking at my state, absolutely nothing has changed.

They codified abortion right up to the moment of birth, I think, in New York.

They didn't go as far as Virginia was trying to go to with letting them die on the table after they were born.

So I don't know. It's going to be easier for people who are going to see abortion almost completely abolished to sit back and think that something's been accomplished.

Because really, it has. But people in states like California, Oregon, Washington, New York, we have absolutely no delusions that this has saved any child's life in our state.

We're still very happy that the feds are like, no, it's not something we're going to get involved with. I wish they would have gone a little bit farther and say, yeah, this is heinous and you shouldn't be doing it.

But I also don't want to pick on folks who are engaged in other battles.

So while we should have some sort of effort going forward towards the abortion issue, for instance, in my state in particular, the counties that I live and work in, there's no abortion clinic around.

The closest one is like an hour and a half away, I think. The way that you fight the issue changes.

We don't have a clinic to go out in front of. We don't have a place of attack to go to.

Now, people an hour and a half away from us do. But we still have the responsibility to provide, say, a crisis pregnancy center or something like that, to provide resources to help mothers, try to make it unnecessary, which it is anyway, education, all of that jazz.

I would be a little hesitant to force, say, well, if you're not doing this, then you're not right.

But at the same time, since it is like the issue of the day, we should be doing something at the very least praying for folks who are in a position to do something.

With that said, Albany is only like an hour from here. It's like the devil's lair up there.

I'm sure they'd say the same about Sacramento or whatever the capital of the

United States are. I'm not in state capital mode right now. We're definitely rejoicing that the federal government at least took their hands off the situation.

It's easier to fight against people that you live and work next to in some respects, because now you don't have an excuse for not being able to get to D .C.

No, the capital is only an hour from here. We can do something or at least support someone who is doing something.

Right, right. We know where to fight the fight now. Yeah, we can fight it locally.

We can fight it with people that we're going to see on a regular basis. We don't have to feel lost in a sea of federal bureaucracy.

We get to go to a smaller local level where we can actually really affect some change.

There's been things with immigration, sanctuary cities, sanctuary counties, stuff like that.

There's no reason why we can't do the same thing with the abortion issue. This is a sanctuary county for the unborn here in Delaware and Otsego County.

We may not have any clinics, but we're not going to let there be any. Something like that.

There's going to be some fights. We've got several large colleges, a lot of left -leaning people.

We're a solid red county. Delaware County is. Otsego County is blue, blue, blue, because they allow the colleges to vote there.

I don't know if that actually answered your question or not. Oh, yeah, that's cool. Just some ramblings. What you were talking about is describing a ministry that I work with called

Personhood Alliance. That's their primary focus is the local level, the city and county.

They use that language, making it a safe or sanctuary city or county.

I would check out Personhood Alliance.

That's a ministry that I work with and endorse. I totally agree with what you were saying, too.

I hope and pray that I won't be guilty of that.

It's something that's pretty popular. I guess people don't realize that they're doing it, but I think people have labeled it ministry shaming.

If you're not doing what I'm doing, then you're not as good of a

Christian as I am, or you're not a Christian at all. You need to repent because you're not doing this or you're not doing that.

We can't ministry shame other people because God has called us all to different ministries and different parts to play.

I totally agree with that. I agree with the fact that with this issue and with other issues that we should care about as Christians, there are things that we can do, whether it be pray or be on the street and all things in between.

There's things that we can do besides ministry shame to be involved in this process.

We need to get involved in the local level and we need to get involved on the state level because that's where the fight is.

You said something interesting about the federal level and the decision that the Supreme Court made.

You talked about how they took their hands off the issue and said, we don't have a say in this anymore.

We're going to send it back to the state level. Something just dawned on me when you said that.

Correct me if I'm wrong, if you disagree. I feel like they could say something on the positive side of things.

I think I heard this in a newscast that the Supreme Court is basically saying that the

Constitution doesn't speak to a person's right to an abortion. Of course, that's true, but the

Constitution does say something about life. I think that's why the personhood argument and the equal protection argument is so important.

It's because the Constitution does speak to life.

We have the famous quote, we are endowed by our creator with unalienable rights to life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness.

There it is, life. The personhood argument is tremendously important because who's a person?

A person is a person from conception to natural death. I think they could speak positively to that, if they wanted to, because the

Constitution does speak to life. I don't know enough about it to speak.

I'm not a lawyer, constitutional lawyer, or anything like that. I don't know if this particular case gave them a place to say anything about that or not.

I don't know. It may have, it may not have. What you would really need is somebody with the fortitude, we'll just go with that, to arrest someone for performing an abortion and charge them with murder.

Because what that would do, you would be charging them on the basis of something.

You would start something in the court system, which could then be escalated to the Supreme Court. Then you would be left with this.

Is what happened here considered murder?

Yeah. Is this the ending of a human life? Then you would have a ruling.

You would have a clear -cut case where you could rule on whether or not it is, the

Constitution does speak to that end. There's a responsibility of the people who say the

Constitution is not explicit. We have legislators whose job is to make those things explicit.

We need to make an amendment to the Constitution. We need to make another amendment to the Constitution that says that Jesus is

Lord anyway. We should go ahead and make one that says that killing little babies is wrong too.

Related to what you're talking about, one of the main arguments against our position is the different circumstances.

What about a person in this circumstance or that circumstance? In a murder trial, within the law, there are labels, different degrees, first degree, second degree.

There's understanding within the law of different circumstances already. That's really a non -argument because the law takes care of those different circumstances.

Abortion because it's murder needs to be criminalized, but the law has already set up.

You're not guilty of murder if it wasn't your fault, if it wasn't intentional.

Right. That's one of those things that I think people just don't want to hear.

They're trying to say that people are going to get arrested and put in jail for life for miscarriages and ectopic pregnancies.

It's so bizarre because that's not even been on the radar for anyone.

Everyone knows that an ectopic pregnancy is not a viable pregnancy. It doesn't mean that you have to go in and kill the baby, but it does mean that you need to do what is necessary to save the life of the mother.

You remove the baby from the fallopian tuber or wherever it is.

It probably will not implant itself in the uterus and will probably die, in which case it's a miscarriage.

There's no need to call it an abortion in the same level as there's a fully formed baby that we're just going to snap his neck and suck him out with a vacuum cleaner.

It's not the same thing. It's a miscarriage. It's something that's sad and tragic that wasn't wanted by anyone.

It's not anything that somebody would prosecute. And if they do prosecute, we on the pro -life side should go and say that is dumb.

We're not trying to criminalize the birthing process.

We're trying to criminalize what should have already been criminalized, which is murder. Right. That's right.

I don't understand that. I also don't understand why they're coming at Christians saying that now y 'all need to take care of these children because you're not pro -life, you're just pro -birth.

And then you look at the different resource centers and charities and stuff, and like 90 % of them are run by Christians.

That's right. That's right. The adoptions that happen, most of them are by Christians. I mean, it really shows just the level of the lack of thinking through something, the incredible blindness that sin has caused to come over the eyes of these people.

Even Christians who try to advocate for safe, legal, and rare abortion, they just don't see what it is that they are advocating for.

It's just kind of ridiculous. If there was a time to have misinformation squashed,

I mean, now would be the time to actually do something about it. Absolutely. I wish conversations could be had so that those things could be squashed.

Misinformation and false statements and false accusations could just be squashed and people would listen on both sides.

I think right now, at least for the next couple of weeks, emotions are going to be running so high on either side that you're going to hurt feelings that normally wouldn't get hurt.

Yeah. Let's face it, the cage stage isn't just for Calvinists.

It's out there for abortion abolition advocates as well. Yeah, that's true.

They need to remember these are real people, real issues. They've obviously come to a crisis moment where they feel like this is the only option they have or have been lied so much to think that this is just a regular, normal option.

These are people who have serious things to think through. It shouldn't be the way that it is, but there's still people who need to be treated with love and compassion, shown the forgiveness of Christ, and steered away from doing something horrible.

Yeah. Let me read two passages before we go on to Esther.

Our pastor, he preached a timely... I wasn't prepared.

I just felt like I needed to read these verses. But our pastor, he preached a timely sermon this morning on just one word, kindness, this morning.

And his text was from Colossians 3, verses 12 -13. So, as those who have been chosen of God, holy and beloved, put on a heart of compassion, kindness, humility, gentleness, and patience, bearing with one another and forgiving each other, whoever has complained against anyone, just as the

Lord forgave you, so also should you. And I think that's exactly the point that you were trying to make, is that we need to remember the gospel, and we need to be kind to everyone.

And he looked at the verses about, you know, pray and love your enemies, those who persecute you, those who hate you.

And then Titus 3 is the last one that I wanted to read. And I think it just...

I don't know the words that I want to use, but it spoke to my heart. It just touched my heart this morning to hear these verses.

Titus 3, verses 1 -2. He said, be peaceable, gentle, showing every consideration for all men.

And I think that's the attitude that we're talking about having towards all men. Our blood relatives, family, our family in Christ, our neighbor, and even our enemy.

Kindness, don't malign, be peaceable, be gentle with everyone. And that should be our attitude as Christians.

Yep. Absolutely. So that way when they accuse you in courts of doing stuff that's wrong, maligning them, badgering them, abusing them, they'll be shown to be foolish.

Right. Was that from Peter, 1 Peter 3? I can't recall.

Maybe right. Let's jump on to Esther, unless you have any last thoughts on Roe vs.

Wade. Oh, I got tons of them, but we need to get on Esther. Yeah, we need to get on with Esther.

So we're in Esther, chapter 4. We're going to try to hit the whole chapter, verses 1 -17 tonight.

Just to recap, the end of chapter 3, or chapter 3 as a whole, to lead us into chapter 4.

Haman's got this broad idea that he wants to extinguish, to eliminate the

Jewish people as a whole, every single one of them, man, woman, and child. Because Mordecai chose not to bow down to him and show honor to him.

And we've talked in the past episodes about how this lineage hatred has come up between Mordecai and Haman because the ancestors of Mordecai were supposed to eliminate, by God's command, to eliminate the

Amalekites. And they did not. They disobeyed the Lord. The Amalekites were the sworn enemies of the throne of the

Lord, scripture says. And so Haman is a descendant of the

Amalekites, sworn enemy of Israel, enemy of the throne of the Lord.

And here Haman is, and here Mordecai is, sworn enemies of each other. It's revealed that Mordecai's a

Jew. He doesn't honor and bow down to Haman. And so all this is coming to a head.

And because of Mordecai's stubbornness, Haman wants to go after the entire people group, the entire

Jewish people group. And he goes to the king. He devises this plan.

And he says that there's this people scattered abroad, your kingdom, and they have their own law.

And they don't honor the king's law, and they're just going to be disruptive and not profitable for your kingdom.

Let me eliminate them. I'll bring you silver to fill up your treasury.

And the king gives him his signet ring, basically saying, you're the chief prince in charge.

You have my authority with my signet ring. Go get them. So he rolls the dice to decide which day.

He writes up a decree. He writes it in all the different dialects and languages. He sends it out to all the provinces that the king,

Hashewaris, is over. And on this day, they plan to take out all of the

Jewish people. And I looked it up. I don't know if you recall last time that we were together, that I was trying to remember.

We were talking about Haman and promising silver to the king. And I was trying to recall, because we talked about it in a program in the past, where it was

Cyrus who released the Jews out of captivity. And if you go to Ezra in the first chapter, he sends with them silver, gold, and beast.

And then you have Ezekiel, I think it's 38, where Ezekiel is prophesying that the armies that are going to come after the

Jews, that they're going to claim silver, gold, and the beast that were mentioned.

And so that's what I was referring to when I looked at Haman. And so you have in Ezekiel first, the prophecy, and then you have

Cyrus releasing the Jews with all these goods, gold, silver, and beast to help rebuild the temple, to help them establish themselves as they go back to Jerusalem.

And then you have here in Esther, possibly the fulfillment of what

Ezekiel is talking about, wanting to capture those goods back that they were given and give that silver back to the king.

So that's kind of what I was referring to last time, and I couldn't remember the context or the textual reference.

So let's jump into chapter four. Mordecai, he's gotten one of these decrees.

He has caught wind of this plan. That Haman has introduced to the king.

So let me read these first three verses. When Mordecai learned all that had been done, he tore his clothes, put on sackcloth and ashes, and went out into the midst of the city and wailed loudly and bitterly.

He went as far as the king's gate, where no one was to enter the king's gate clothed in sackcloth.

In each and every province where the command and decree of the king came, there was great mourning among the

Jews and fasting and weeping and wailing, and many lay on sackcloth and ashes.

It's like they knew what was coming, or knew what they thought was coming. Sackcloth and ashes is their traditional way of showing mourning, of wailing.

A lot of times they would fast and put on sackcloth and ashes when something bad is going to happen, or they feel like something's out of control, or if they were repentant of something.

What was it, David, when he knew of the child that may not live? Sackcloth and ashes.

Here, something bad is going to happen. We're all going to be destroyed. Sackcloth and ashes. And they weren't quiet about it either.

It's not like they just played dress up with a little bit of dust and some potato sacks. They were wailing.

I mean, you heard it all over the countryside. Every town you went in, there was

Jews screaming, saying something. I don't know what they had going on.

But yeah, they were not pleased and they were not quiet about it. And that's okay. Yeah, it's all right.

Well, like you said, this is traditional for them. I mean, this is something that has been practiced for a long time.

Yeah, it's a cultural thing. Yeah. And even though Esther doesn't mention God, I think this is probably one of the places that's as close as it gets, because we know what's going on there.

We know what sackcloth and ashes means. They're mourning and they're crying out.

And culturally, traditionally, they'd be crying out to God. So even though it doesn't mention his name, this is probably the closest that it gets to a reference to him, because we know what they're doing.

Crying out to God. Yeah, here in verse 14, if you keep silent at this time, relief and deliverance will arise for the

Jews from another place. But you and your father's house will perish. Basically saying, hey, if you don't stand up and do something about it,

God's going to preserve us anyway. He just won't use you to do it. You know, those two places would be about the two most pointed points where you may not be named, but you can see the shadow, you know, type of thing.

And whenever we get to verse 14, I posted an hour or so before the program started tonight, making reference to Mordecai's attitude that I wanted to have with this

Roe versus Wade situation. And moving forward, I want to have the same attitude as Mordecai.

And that's where I get it from verse 14. And I want to talk about that when we get there. But before we move on to the next verses, if you ever get a chance, you can go to Sermon Audio.

Check out Philip Kaiser, K -A -Y -S -E -R, to anybody that's listening.

He goes through and explains these texts really well. He has a great, great sermon series on Revelation.

But in Esther, and this is one of the main reasons that we wanted to tackle

Esther, is to show its relevance in the Old Testament. Its relevance for us reading it and learning about what's going on in Esther, because it's lumped in with Ezra and Nehemiah as part of the leaving the exile.

Daniel prophesied that, or Jeremiah prophesied that it would be 70 years. Daniel saw that the end was coming up.

And then Ezra, Nehemiah, Esther, this is the time period of them returning from exile where Cyrus had let them go.

There's tons of relevance there. And then not only that, but another relevant point in Esther that I keep bringing up, that I want everybody to understand, that I think has been left out for so many years in so many of our churches, is this connection between Esther and prophetic history.

People look at Ezekiel, and they want to throw all of Ezekiel into the future. But if you study it, a good place to study it is going to Sermon Audio, Philip Kaiser, and listen to how he explains the situation.

He makes a strong connection between Ezekiel 38 -39 and Esther. And just some of the points that he makes is how you'll see the words slightly different, like Gog, Magog, or Hamangog.

He points out that, I think it's in Esther, they use probably the

Persian pronunciation or spelling, and then in Ezekiel it will be the Hebrew, but it's the same.

And Agag is where the Amalekites come from, which we talked about earlier.

And Agag and Gog are basically, if you look at the language, basically the same.

Or Agag and Magog, I can't remember which one, but one of those two is basically the same word.

And then you have in Ezekiel, you have that all these provinces are going to be coming against Israel, and then you have that in Esther.

And that's the plan of Haman, he sends out this decree to all the provinces that are under Hesuerus.

Agag is in Numbers 24, 1 Samuel 24, Agag can be used as any leader of the

Amalekites. So when it references Agag, you definitely could be speaking about him.

Prince, in Ezekiel 38, I know we talked about this before, Rosh is not

Russia, but it's chief prince. And then in Esther chapter 3, Haman becomes the chief prince of all the princes.

So you have that connection. Yeah, you'll even see that word used for modern diplomats of Israel.

You see Rosh on there, it just means head of or top of. Right, exactly.

Let's see here. So you have the

Jews returning, which, like I said before, Ezekiel was about 70, 75 years before all this happened.

And he's prophesying that the Jews will return, they return. And this battle has to take place while Jerusalem is unwalled, because that's what

Ezekiel prophesied. Well, at this time, Jerusalem is unwalled until about eight years later when

Nehemiah rebuilds the walls. And then from the time of Nehemiah, it has walls.

So, you know, instead of looking for a future event, 2 ,000 years later, whatever, here's the time period where they were unwalled.

And that's what Ezekiel calls for in his prophecy. Ezekiel prophesies of plunder.

That's what, you know, Haman is going after. Let's see here. It just goes on and on.

I thought this was, I thought this was very interesting. So Ezekiel, and this will be the last one, last connection,

Ezekiel calls for a seven month wait. So they're going to bury the dead in the

Valley of Haman Gok. And there's going to be a seven year waiting period. He says the reason there's a seven year waiting period is because from the time of Purim, which is the celebration that comes from Esther, there's a seven month waiting period between Purim and the

Feast of Tabernacles. And so why do they need to wait those seven months? I hope I said seven months before, not seven years, but seven months.

Why does there need to be a seven month waiting period? It's because for cleansing purposes, they needed this waters of cleansing.

And these waters of cleansing come out of this Feast of Tabernacles where they took the ashes of the red heifer and mixed it with water.

And that become the water of cleansing. And so they would use that to go cleanse. But they couldn't get it until the time of the

Feast of the Tabernacles, which was seven months later. And so it fits perfectly with Ezekiel.

And he just continues to make points like that, points of connection from Ezekiel to Esther to point out how they're connected.

So you're saying that the red heifer has nothing to do with the end of time.

Yes. You're about to smash a sacred cow. They had a red heifer.

They burned it and used the ashes to make their cleansing water. Yeah, I remember growing up hearing that there could only be like three hairs of a different color and they found the 10th red heifer.

Yeah, yeah. Yeah, they found it, but then it died. So they got six. They couldn't use it.

So they're looking for another one. Had to have a priest, a rabbi, something. So the world's going to end within 10 years.

And I mean, I'm like 37 now. I must have been 10 then. So I don't know. They were a little off on that.

Yeah, exactly. And when you study scripture in context and let the scripture speak for itself, you don't have to pull these things out and try to make them say something they don't say.

Ezekiel and Esther harmonize in tremendous ways. And there's so many other connections that we could go over, but that was just a few of them.

So let's go on to our next set of verses. Verse number four, then

Esther. Well, I wanted to say this too. The reason

I emphasize this, because I found it so fascinating. Haman is calling for the death of Jews.

And here Mordecai is. He's going out in the streets. He's not hiding. He's screaming and crying with a loud voice with sackcloth and ashes.

I mean, he's not going in a closet. He's not hiding. He's like, here I am.

Yeah, he had the hide in plain sight mentality. That's right. Well, maybe, you know, what was that?

The old briar rabbit approach. No, no, don't throw me in the briar patch.

Because I say, let me get loud. Somebody hear me and come rescue me. All right.

Verse four. Then Esther's maidens and her eunuchs came and told her and the queen writhe in great

English. And she sent garments to clothe Mordecai, that he might remove his sackcloth from him.

But he did not accept them. Then Esther summoned Hat -Hatch from the king's eunuchs, whom the king had appointed to attend her.

And ordered him to go to Mordecai to learn what this was and why it was. So Hat -Hatch went to Mordecai to the city square in front of the king's gate.

Any comments on that section? Yeah, just one little one.

It seems like Esther wanted to see what was wrong. She couldn't because she wasn't leaving the king's facilities.

And Mordecai, having the sackcloth on and the ashes, wasn't allowed to go in.

So she wasn't able to get to him. So she sent him clothes, not to tell him to stop mourning, but saying,

Hey, for a second, put these on, come talk to me, tell me what happened. Then we'll be on about our business.

He's like, no, it's too big of a deal. I'm not even going to stop taking it. I'm not going to change my clothes, just come talk to you. You need to get on the ball and figure out what's going on here.

So it just shows the seriousness of the situation. That makes perfect sense.

I'm glad you said that. So she didn't want to stop his mourning, his crying, his repenting, his crying out to the

Lord. She just wanted him to come talk to her because he couldn't come into the gate or inside the gate wearing sackcloth.

Yeah, I think that's important. I appreciate you bringing that out. That's really, really good. All right.

Where did we stop? Verse seven. Mordecai told him all that had happened to him and the exact amount of money that Haman had promised to pay the king's treasuries for the destruction of the

Jews. He also gave him a copy of the text of the edict which had been issued in Susa for their destruction that he might show

Esther and inform her and to order her to go into the king to implore his favor and plead with him for her people.

Hach came back and related Mordecai's words to Esther. Yeah. She sent him out and said, hey, what's wrong?

He sent him back with a piece of paper. That's wrong. Read it and weep.

Yeah, pretty much. I got to stay with my people because we're in trouble here.

So this is why we're so upset. This is why I won't take off my sackcloth and ashes. For good reason.

Yeah. All right, verses 10 through 14. Then Esther spoke to Hadhash and ordered him to reply to Mordecai.

All the king's servants and the people of the king's provinces know that for any man or woman who comes to the king, to the inner court, who is not summoned, he has but one law, that he be put to death unless the king holds out to him the golden scepter so that he may live.

And I have not been summoned to come to the king for these 30 days. They related

Esther's words to Mordecai. Then Mordecai told them to reply to Esther.

Do not imagine that you and the king's palace can escape any more than all the

Jews. For if you remain silent at this time, relief and deliverance will arise for the

Jews from another place. And you and your father's house will perish. And who knows whether you have not attained royalty for such a time as this.

Oh man, I just realized something. Mordecai kind of just outed her to everybody in the king's palace that she was a

Jew. Yeah. Yeah, oh man. Yep. Yeah, he's putting the pressure on her.

Yep, absolutely. She's like, well, you know, I can't really go there. He hasn't asked me for a month.

So I can't really just go there or he'll kill me unless he hands out the scepter.

Heck of a husband, that guy. So he says, well, this is what's wrong.

Brings the list and then he tells the king's eunuch.

He's like, I don't think you're going to be saved when all the other Jews are getting killed. You're going to get killed too.

You're one of us. Now all of a sudden the king's eunuch is like, oh, I didn't know that. Let me go back and tell the king.

Now I don't know if he did or not. I don't want to mess up your train of thought, but that leads to a great question.

So Mordecai, I mean, in his statement, he's trusting in the sovereignty of God. I mean, he trusts in God's prophecy.

You know, he, if he, he's looking back at Ezekiel, you know, they're, they're going to come and attack, but it's going to be reversed.

And that's another commonality that, that Philip Kaiser brings up that they're going to come and attack from all sides, but it's going to be reversed and Israel is going to be victorious.

So he trusts in that. He knows it's going to happen. Yet he sees this means and this opportunity that he wants to use.

Right. So how, how should we, how should we read that?

How should we apply that to our lives when it comes to making decisions? You know, trust, trusting

God's sovereignty and just not do, do anything or look for these means and opportunities.

And trusting God's sovereignty. Yes. Really what you're looking at here is you're looking at God making certain promises to his people.

No, he brings up, no, you're not going to escape either.

You might as well do something. Who knows if you weren't brought here because this is

God's means of saving us. Now, she may not have been.

Right. But God is working. We work. If we're wrong,

God will make it abundantly clear that we're supposed to be doing something else. Yeah. But who knows that God didn't call us together, give us all the information and show us and put us in a certain situation.

So that way, when something arises where we can just simply be faithful, we can be faithful.

Yeah. You think of Mary, Mary, just little old

Mary, you know, reputation about to be shot down for being a loose, loose woman, you know, getting pregnant all young and clothed.

Right. Yet knowing that an angel came to me and told me

I was going to get pregnant magically. Mm hmm. Believable, right? Right.

Like everybody's going to put her aside. There's going to be some it's going to make life hard for her.

But she was just faithful. Yeah. If this is what the Lord wants, this is what the

Lord gets. I'll be the Lord's servant. Find Esther here in this situation where she has an opportunity to potentially deliver the

Jewish people. If this is what the Lord wants, this is what the Lord gets. You get put in a situation where you may lose your job or you may lose a house or you may lose this, that or the other thing, even up to family, friends, health, whatever life.

If you have an opportunity to be faithful, you take it because who knows that God isn't going to use that particular faithful action to do something big.

But even if he doesn't, God will use that particular faithful action to overcome sin, death and the devil and to see your salvation brought to you and to others through the means of the gospel being brought into the world.

That's what it means in Romans 8 when it says that, you know, height or depth or any other creatures to separate us from the love of Christ.

I'm convinced, you know, none of these things, no, in all these things, pain, sword, famine, whatever comes your way, that we in all these things, we are more than conquerors.

We are super conquerors. Conquerors got nothing on us. We were a step higher than them. Why? Not because we did anything, but because in Christ we're faithful.

That was brought to us. It was given to us as a gift from God. We walked in that faith and God did something miraculous.

Even if it means we get killed, it doesn't really matter. Even if it means we get persecuted or slapped down or we lose stuff, it doesn't matter.

Because God is using every single thing that happens for our good and for his glory.

So Esther, in this situation, you're put there. You have an opportunity.

Who knows? You may go before the king, maybe having a bad day, may not want to talk to you, may say, well,

I got rid of this other one. I can get rid of you and find a new one too. I kind of avoid the process of finding me a new queen anyway.

So, you know, throw her off to the side. It may be what happens. And in that case, that's fine.

You were being faithful. You'll be rewarded for it when you get to heaven. But who knows?

Maybe God will use it for a different reason, a different purpose. Maybe you'll see all the

Jews saved because of it. That was exactly what we see happen. Not to give it away, but if you haven't read it by now, look ahead.

It's a great story. I think it was really, really important. In answering that question, you pointed out

Mordecai's language there. Mordecai says, we don't know, but God put you as a

Jew and made you queen. It kind of looks like you're in a pretty good position.

God put you in a pretty good position. We don't know if that's exactly what he's put you in there for, but it looks like you've been working all along.

He said you can either die being quiet or you can die trying. Don't give up.

Die trying. And she didn't die trying. She was preserved because the king liked her.

Pretty old Jewish girl. What's not to like? Did you have any other thoughts on that section?

I know I cut you off earlier. No, we're good. I did want to point out verse 14 and why

I wrote what I wrote earlier about having the same attitude as Mordecai has, and we've been talking about it.

Mordecai has this attitude, and he expresses it to Esther. He's like, relief and deliverance will arise from the

Jews from another place, and you and your father's house will perish if you remain silent.

He trusts in God. He trusts in the prophecy that God's already laid out. He trusts in the prophecy and the promise of God because he knows that God has promised to protect and preserve his people.

That's what the prophecies were about. That's what the promises were about. Esther is fulfilling all that, and Mordecai trusts in that.

And so how do I relate that into the situation that's going on today with Roe versus Wade being overturned, and we're all looking and working and praying for the complete abolition of abortion?

So how does that relate to that? One day it will happen.

Jesus promised that he's reigning and ruling as king right now, and he is putting all of his enemies under his feet, and the last enemy is going to be dead.

And we are in that kingdom. We are in that process where he is putting his enemies under his feet, and one day there will be an abolition of abortion.

That will happen. And so in that meantime, Mordecai is, if I can say it this way,

Mordecai is speaking to us. Where has God put you in this fight, in this battle?

And it may not be specifically in the battle of abolishing abortion.

It may be in some other, as Dan was speaking of earlier, some other ministry, some other battle that is needing fought, where Jesus is putting his enemies under his feet.

So it may be God may be having you in this place at this time, and he does.

He has a purpose for everything that he does. So like Dan said, join in, in that battle through prayer and through action, through obedience, through holiness, and be a part of that kingdom work of Jesus putting his enemies under his feet.

We know that relief and deliverance is going to come. It's going to come. But look where God has you to be working.

And put your feet, put your boots on, and put your boots on the ground, and we all can be at work somewhere.

Would you agree with that? Yeah, that's a great takeaway. Good deal, good deal.

It's also good to note that if you have a way to kind of press people on towards action that some people may find a little unfair, it's okay to do, and here's what

I mean by that. Don't go overboard and slander folks or be rude or belligerent or anything, but look at what

Mordecai does here. Relief and deliverance will rise for the

Jews from another place, but you and your father's house will perish. Why did he say and your father's house?

If you remember, it was it. She's the last one.

He's trying to spur her on, saying, if you have any chance of your father's name living on, of your lineage, of your bit of the

Jewish people living on, of reclaiming the land that belongs to your family that should come to you when we all go back to the land, if you want any part of the promises of God to our people, you need to be faithful.

You and your family are about to lose everything. Everything is at stake.

I mean, did he have to say all that? No, but it was okay to tighten screws a little bit.

There was something that went on in our presbytery recently, and I'm not going to get into specifics or anything, but one of our pastors was raising an issue about something, and he was about the only one raising the issue.

I mean, there may have been a few others, but my pastor called him up and said,

I don't want to put any undue pressure on you to change your mind. He said, but I do want to call and put some due pressure on you to change your mind.

He wasn't trying to, I'm not going to wreck your life for no reason here.

We're still friends. We're still people on the same side here.

Let me put a little due pressure on you to do the right thing in this situation.

I think that's what Mordecai was doing. I'm not going to shame you or belittle you or anything, but let me put a little due pressure on you to do what is right, to stand up, to be faithful, to do what is scary.

You've only got the one life. She's still fairly young. She hasn't thought through everything quite yet, and here she is ready to potentially lose everything.

Maybe a little bit of pressure is what she needed. Yeah, and related to that, I don't think it's completely self -serving.

Who knows to what degree if it was at all, but Mordecai says we're family.

There's a connection here. I'm a part of that household too, and if I go, you go.

If you go, I go. Your family's gone.

Right. Yeah, that means you and your father's house are gone. My brother's name is going to be snuffed out if you don't do this.

Yeah. Uncle Mordecai, go a little easy on me here.

All right, let's look at verses 15 and 16 and 17. Then Esther told them to reply to Mordecai, go assemble all the

Jews who are found in Susa and fast for me. Do not eat or drink for three days, nights, night or day.

I and my maidens also will fast in the same way, and thus I will go into the king, which is not according to the law.

And if I perish, I perish. So Mordecai went away and did just as Esther had commanded him.

Hey, if you're going to put the pressure on them, and they come back at you and say, I'm scared, but I'm going to do it anyway.

Let me figure out, let me do some fasting. Let me do some praying. Let me get ready and I'll go do it. They say, hey, go over there and fast and pray for me.

Okay. And that's the thing that we need to remember in our own situations.

If we're going to apply this, apply this out. You have people in situations where they can do some good, where they can stand up and just potentially lose just about everything in order to do what's right.

You better believe that we better be praying for those folks. For people who are, you know, governors, county commissioners, people in businesses, jobs, people who have clout and power, or people who are just in a certain situation at a certain time.

You know, what exactly can I do? It may cost me everything. Would you pray with me? Yeah, man.

We got you. John Piper had the old analogy for missions, that you may not be the one who will go down the hole to rescue the people, but you can hold the rope.

Yeah. You may not be the one who's actually going to go and do the dirty work, but you can support them by giving them a lifeline, by praying for them to the

God who has all power. Right. So, yeah, that's what

I will take away from that. Oh, absolutely. And just like we looked at before where Mordecai himself, and then it says all the

Jews in all the provinces that had caught wind of this were crying aloud in sackcloth and ashes.

We know what they were doing. And here is another example. They don't use the name of God, but we know what they were doing.

They were appealing to him in prayer and sackcloth and ashes because of the severity of the situation.

The extermination was imminent of the Jews, and her life was on the line to even walk into his presence.

And so this was – even if we pondered and meditated on this as deep as we could,

I don't think – there's so many of us that would never, ever be in a situation where we have an opportunity to risk our lives in that way.

And no doubt we can understand why she was calling for Mordecai and all the

Jews that were there in Susa to be fasting and praying for her, to intercede for her.

And she was calling on her maidens to do the same thing, to fast and to pray for her because she was going into this ominous situation.

And it was risky, but his words,

I guess, pierced her heart and her commitment to the

Lord and her commitment to her people. And the

Holy Spirit obviously intervened and gave her the courage to stand up and to walk into his presence, which we'll get to later.

But yeah, and I think you are exactly right.

You know, God has – as we've talked about already,

God has us in different places. God has given us different gifts. God has given people different platforms.

And some people, God gives the fortitude. God gives the backbone. God gives the platform to be in places of influence, of risk, and the ability to take those risks.

And those of us who do not have those platforms, who are not in those positions, you are exactly right.

We can be praying for them and ask the

Holy Spirit to give us a heart of soberness of the situation that those people are in, where they have the ability to intercede and the things that they have to face that we don't have to face.

We can think about our forefathers, whether you agree that revolutions and civil wars were appropriate and right.

We can have that discussion later. But there were men and there were women, and there's men and women today, same situation, put their lives on the line so that their ancestors, their children, their grandchildren could carry on in freedom and have rights and have liberties and would not be oppressed, would not be suppressed, and could live in freedom.

And they put their lives on the line, and many gave their lives so that we could be free and we could have this podcast that we have tonight.

And we can be fasting and we can be praying and we can have a sober heart towards our men and women in uniform, like you said, our legislators, our authorities, our officials, and Christians who have platforms to have influence with these people.

There's so many people that we can be praying for. Absolutely.

What a good passage tonight. What a wonderful God that we have, and what a wonderful people, spiritual ancestral lineage that we have, that we can celebrate.

It's a beautiful thing. It's a glorious thing, and we have so much to be thankful for.

And what we have most to be thankful for is the reason that we can have a spiritual lineage and spiritual hope for our future is because God sent

His Son to live the life that we couldn't live, to die on the cross, to pay for our sins, pay the punishment that we couldn't pay, that we deserve to pay, and face the wrath of God that we deserve.

Died on the cross, and then rose victoriously over sin and death.

Then He ascended into heaven, and He sits at the right hand of the Father where He has all authority in heaven and all earth. And we can be forgiven of our sin.

We can be saved. We can be born again. And we can be a part of this kingdom work that He has. And we can eventually see the end where all of His enemies are defeated.

Even death will be defeated, and we can live eternally. God promises eternal life where we can live forever in victory, celebrating and fellowshiping with the

Father and with the Son, Jesus Christ, and worshiping Him and working for Him and living forever in His glory.

And what a glorious promise. So our admonishment to you, if you do not know

Him, is to repent of your sins and put your faith and trust in Jesus Christ and be a part of this family, this family of kindness and grace that He offers.

Thank you guys for watching. Dan, would you mind to close us in prayer? Yeah. Dear God, we thank

You for Your provision, for protecting a people, for guiding them through a situation, to preserve

Your promises that You would come in the person of Your Son and die for sins.

God, we thank You so much for it. We pray that You would cause us to remember Your goodness and greatness and all the things that we go out and live in the truth of Your gospel.

Remember the victory that we have in You, that we return from our sins daily and unto

You for our salvation. In Jesus' name we pray. Amen. Amen. Thank you guys for watching.

We really, really appreciate it. We would love it if you would give us a share, a like and a follow and tell other people.

Hopefully they will be edified and encouraged by what we're talking about in these podcasts. But just remember as you go on tonight and throughout this week that Jesus is

King. Go live in the victory of Christ. Go speak with the authority of Christ. And go share the gospel of Christ.