Esther - Prayer Meeting — Leonard Ravenhill

The Book of Esther and the Hidden Providence of God

Just go down the book, just past Brother Ezra, and when you get past Brother Ezra, you'll get down to Esther, Ezra and Esther. Martin Luther said some wonderful things, he said some funny things too. He said for instance, the epistle of James is an epistle of straw.

He must have read the NIV, that abomination. But do you know what he said about the book of Esther? It's a very beautiful book. He called it a book of bloody revenge. It's a unique book in this sense that it does not mention the name of God.

It's a unique book in this sense that it is not referred to in the whole of the New Testament. In many ways it's a unique book. Remember the historic setting is that these people are being carried away into captivity in Babylon, and then the Medes and Persians came and took over.

I'm going to skip over it just, otherwise we won't have to stay a week here. Queen Vashti was the queen. The king has a clumsy name, Ahasuerus. I'm glad you've all been Christian, you Ahasuerus. I like dough better than Ahasuerus brown, sounds better.

Maybe not as musical, but it sounds better. Well you know women have always been rebels, and see chapter 1 verse 11. They ordered Queen Vashti, the queen, to come before the king with the crown royal to show the people, and the princess was beautiful, she was fair, she was exceedingly attractive, the Hebrew really says.

And he wanted to show her off, and she didn't want to be showed off. I said to a lady yesterday, you know, poor old Schofield, he says the church is going to be raptured, then it's going to be put into shape in heaven.

And that's not true, that's a lie, among many other lies that he told. The bride hath made herself ready. And I said to the lady, did you ever see a girl come to the altar with curlers in her hair? She said, these days they come in anything.

I think they would. But I've never seen a girl at the altar with curlers in her hair. I've never seen a man decorating her fingernails. I've never seen her come in a dirty old dress, you know. And then another says, darling, stand a minute, and she throws a cloak over her, snow white, beautiful gown, you know.

I was going to say dressed in China, that wouldn't fit her. What do you call it? Dresses lace. No, you'd better get your wedding garment down here. There are no free ones up there. One man got into the wedding without a garment.

Boy, he went to outer darkness. Now you fix that up. If you don't know where it is, ask Dale after the meeting. But he went to outer darkness. Again, as I said in my prayer, and I say it often to myself, this life is only a dressing room for eternity.

That's all it is. We're not only here to make money, we're here to make character. Again, we're born with disposition. This is my philosophy. We're born with disposition, but we make character. We make it by our decisions.

We make it by what we accept and what we reject. Well, here's Queen Vashti. Verse 12. The Queen Vashti refused to come to the king's commandment by his chamberlains. Wherefore was the king very wroth, and his anger burned in him.

Verse 17. This deed of the queen shall come abroad to all the women, so that they shall despise their husbands in their eyes when it shall be reported. The king Asahoras commanded Vashti the queen to be brought before him, but again she refused to come out.

Esther Is Raised for a Providential Purpose

Jump over to chapter 2, verse 1. After these things, when the wrath of king Ahasuerus was appeased, I think I'm going to call him Jack for the rest of this story. When king Jack was appeased, he remembered Vashti and what she had done.

You know, it's much easier. Do you remember in Daniel it says, at what time you hear the sound of the sack butt and the dulcimer and the timber and all those things? We had a man in England, he didn't read very well.

He was a tremendous man of God, a tremendous man of prayer. But they asked him to read that one night. And he came to it and he said, and the band played. That's the best way to get over it, isn't it?

The band played. So king Jack, listen now. After these things, when the wrath of king Jack was abased, he remembered Vashti and what she had done and what she had decreed against her. And what was decreed against her.

Then said the king's servants that ministered unto him, Let there be fair young virgins sought for a king. And let the king appoint officers in all the provinces or states, we would say, in his kingdom, that may gather together all the fair young virgins to Shushan the palace, to the house of the women, into the custody of Hegi, the king's chamberlain, keeper of the women, and let their things be given to them for purification.

And let the maidens which pleased with the king be crowned queen instead of Vashti. Now there's a plot here, as you know, I guess. The bad guy, as we would say, is Haman. The good guy is Mordecai. And you find he maneuvers so that this Jewish girl can get into the court.

Go to verse 10. Esther had not shown her people nor her kindred, for Mordecai had charged her she should not show it. Why? Because she was a Jew. Now the good man, in verse 5, again, is... In Shushan the palace there was a certain Jew whose name was Mordecai, the son of Jair, the son of Shimei, the son of Kish.

Now who else do you remember in the Old Testament was of Kish? Saul, the son of Kish. Well it says this man was the son of Kish, a Benjamite. Do you remember Paul holds on to that? And of the tribe of Benjamin there were a particular peculiar wonderful people and the tribe of Benjamin and the seed of Abraham.

OK, let's go to the next chapter. Or maybe in your page, I'm on the same page. Chapter 2, verse 15, the end of it. Esther obtained favour in the sight of all them that looked upon her. So Esther was taken into the king Jack in his house in the tenth month, which is the tenth month Teba, in the seventh year of his reign.

And the king loved Esther above all the women and she obtained grace and favour in his sight, more than all the virgins. So that he, this is important, he set the royal crown upon her head and made her queen instead of Ashton.

Haman’s Pride and the Threat Against God’s People

Chapter 3, verse 1. After these things, when all these marvellous young women had been brought from all the provinces and she had been selected as the queen of the whole lot, she had already had the royal crown put upon her head.

After these things did King Asahoras promote Haman. Now who's the bad guy? The son of Hamabetha, an Agagite. Well does that take you back to King Saul? An Agagite? What did God say to Saul? He said, slay all the children of Aga.

All the Agagites should all be slain. He didn't slay them. He spared one, but that's all that mattered. He tried to commit suicide by putting his sword in the ground and falling on it and he didn't die.

And a young man came and wiped him out. He said, who are you? He said, I'm an Agagite. You see, if God claims something in your life, he won't let you go, he'll kill you at the end anyhow. Verse 2, all the king's servants that were in the king's gate bowed and did reverence to Haman.

For the king had so commanded concerning him. You see, he had exalted him. He had advanced him, it says in verse 1, above all the other people that were there, all the regents, all the rulers, all the princes.

This man was exalted above them all and it went to his head. He became conceited. All the king's servants that were in the king's gate bowed in reverence to Haman. For the king had so commanded. But Mordecai bowed not.

Isn't that great? Somebody dares to be unfashionable, somebody dares to get out of step. Like the lady in England that watched the army go past. Three hundred and fifty men marching and they asked her what she thought of it.

She said, wonderful. She said, but they were all out of step except my John. See, her son was the only one in step. But you've got to step out of step sometime. John the Baptist was out of step with a section of the church that was out of step with God.

And it's got to come to that before too long. Verse 5 says, When Haman saw that Mordecai bowed not, nor did in reverence, then was Haman full of wrath. And verse 8 says that Haman said to the king Ahasuerus that there is a certain people scattered abroad.

If this isn't a company of bridegroom company, what is? If this isn't part of the bride. They are scattered abroad and dispersed among the people in all the provinces of thy kingdom and their laws are diverse from the people.

Now they keep they the king's laws. Therefore it is not for the king's prophet to abide them or suffer them. If it please the king, let it be written that they may be destroyed and I will pay ten thousand talents of silver.

You see his hatred. See this man is going to be another Hitler. He's going to liquidate the Jews. I think I remember the other week. That man, what was his name? Oberfeichmann that liquidated six million Jews.

And he said, I should be happy to jump into my grave knowing I almost wiped out the Jewish nation. That's not his problem. The problem is when those six million jump out of the graves that the gentleman seen.

He has to face them. Nobody gets by with anything. We fool ourselves. Because God just today, we forgot that the checkout counter is at the end of the line. And all people, it doesn't matter who they are.

Rich, poor, wise or otherwise. We're all going to stand at the judgment seat of Christ. I'm trying to write a book on that now. And it stirs me, it breaks me up. This man is prepared to pay what? Ten thousand talents.

That's an awful sum of money. You know we talk about people having a talent. You say that young lady has a lovely talent. She plays the piano. He has a talent. No, no, no, no, no. Talents in the word of God are always money.

Talents of gold and talents of silver. The others are gifts, not talents. But he's going to pay out ten thousand talents of silver to those that are in charge of the business to bring into the king's treasury.

And the king took his ring from his hand and gave it to Haman, the son of Hamabethiah, the Agag out. And it drew his enemy. And the king said unto Haman, The silver is given to thee, the people also. Do with them as you will.

Now here's a man who's going to liquidate them. And he's going to pay for the joy of doing it, to have the satisfaction that all his enemies have been wiped out. But look now at chapter 4, please, verse 1.

Mordecai’s Mourning and Courageous Identification

When Mordecai, the man of God, perceived or he understood all that was done, Mordecai rent his clothes. But the scripture says don't rent your clothes, rent your heart and not your garments. But wait a minute, they're included in the verse.

Mordecai perceived all that was done. And he rent his clothes and put on sackcloth with ashes and went into the midst of the city. That's the most stupid thing you could do. But you can't have your lights under a vessel.

Meet the devil where he is, go in the middle of the city. He's the marked man for God. And he's not afraid of the enemies. It's the valley of the shadow of death for him. But then he goes into the middle of the city.

And he got behind a post and whimpered. Is that what it says? It says he cried with a loud voice. You remember Esau? When he lost that blessing, he cried with a bitter cry. Ask thou but one blessing, bless me.

Why is he crying with a bitter voice, with a bitter cry? And he came even before the king's gate. And none might enter the king's gate clothed with sackcloth. What does he care about kings? Come on, let it sink in your mind, you young guys.

One man with God is a majority. If the devil and all herald against him, what does it matter? When the devil fell, he only took a third part of the heavenly host, therefore two-thirds must be on our side.

With the Father, the Son, the Holy Ghost, two-thirds of the crowd up there and all the promises of God. Well, in God's name, why aren't we conquering the world? What are we sitting in the back corner whimpering as though, you know.

Some people think, if we get some good, if Pat Robinson runs and Jerry Falwell runs at the side, where will they run us? They run us in the ground, that's all they'll do. They won't run us to safety. You see, God has an issue with America and he's going to settle it.

We are blessed, we know the many of the nations in the world, we know Bibles, we know there are three, there are six. What is it now? What's the population of America? Two hundred... Pardon? Two hundred and thirty million?

Well, there are three Bibles for every person in America, not every home, every person. Nobody in the world has that. We've no Bible schools in any other nation in the world. We've no radio programs that at least give a bit of the gospel every day than anybody else in the world.

But to whom much is given, much is expended. Do you know how much we give to Muslims? Yes, I'll tell you what, we give about a tenth of what we spend on dog food and cat food. He went to the midst of the city and cried out aloud.

Can you imagine him saying, hey, look who he is? That man's a Jew, he should be destroyed. He'll go down the road, he'll get mugged or killed, he doesn't care. What should I fear what man shall do to me?

Doesn't the Word of God say there's going to come a day when you don't care, you defy kings, you defy laws, if you're doing the will of God. And don't fear those who can destroy the body. A good Lord, put me near the wall and show me, that's the quickest way to heaven.

If they put you in prison for twenty years like you have in Russia, it's very different to let you rot and rot and rot and rot. The quickest way, shoot me, shoot on. He came before the king's gate, where none might go, in sackcloth.

And in every province with his brother, the king had commanded, it was decreed there was great mourning among the Jews and fasting and weeping and wailing. Come on. Are we going to have to, I've said to you often, I'll say it again, I think our option right now is to concentrate on prayer or pray in concentration camps.

So when you're in a stinking concentration camp, remember I told you that. That's our option. They're weeping and wailing because they've been carried away captive into Babylon and then they've been released for a little while.

Say, come on, let's be honest. Would you like to live in a neighbourhood where everybody went in the street one day and started howling and weeping and groaning and shouting? Boy, they'd lock us and put us in an insane asylum.

People say, we want to go back to Pentecostal, I don't think we do. Do you want to go back to a service where Sunday morning, the first thing the pastor does is, before we sing, All hail King Jesus, I've got a couple of deacons I want to kill.

Wouldn't that be a sensational way to start a Sunday morning service? All down in the essence of paradise, stinking old hypocrites, they brung the hearts of the last six pastors and the church priests.

I went to a church one afternoon, I prayed for a man. He's about 90 years of age and he's very near to death and he's our oldest deacon and he's brought so many things for the church. Of course, he's the most cantankerous man we've ever had.

He brought the hearts of the last three pastors. Would you pray with us? I said, sure, I'll pray, God will kill them tonight. The lady said, you mean that? I said, sure, get the old hypocrite out of the way.

He's a good prince. You know, it didn't look as bad if he's been sick for three months. Get rid of him. Why are we such hypocrites? The worst thing is to be hypocritical in prayer. You know, when God comes with Holy Ghost power, He's going to do some things that we'd never dreamed of.

We're going to go to meetings that will be so revolutionary. You'll hardly dare mention it after you get out of the sanctuary on Monday when you go to the bank. Well, I was convinced. Do you think nobody care loved his people?

He has mourning and weeping. He shouts with a bitter cry, a loud and a bitter cry. There was fasting and weeping. And many lay in sackcloth and ashes. God, I'd like to see that. Where was it? Come on, Dick will get me out of here.

Where was it? Nineveh, where they put sackcloth on the animals? Dear God, the animals had more sense than we have. Animals with sackcloth on them. Hmm. Sounds like you're getting serious, doesn't it? Because we'd have white sackcloth.

We'd have embroidered sackcloth. We'd have a church sign on the side of a fish or something. I don't like that fish thing. It's a bit familiar to me. I want to emphasize it here because it got to my heart when I read it.

It's not mourning. It's great mourning among the Jews and fasting and weeping and wailing. And many people were prostrating in sackcloth and in ashes. So Esther's maids came and her chamberlains came and told her.

Then was the queen exceedingly grieved. And she sent Raymond, she sent Cloth. Oh, well, the scene's up before here. And what for? So Esther's maids and her chamberlains came and told it to her. Then was the queen exceedingly grieved.

And she sent Raymond to Mordecai to take away his sackcloth from him. He says, not on your life. I'm not going to escape trouble. I'm not going to escape torment. Leave my sackcloth on me. It's my identification.

I'm willing to be considered poor and ridiculous. I'm not taking your royal garments. Take them back to the queen. I want to be identified with the people that mourn and travel. Blessed are those that mourn.

See, it gives beauty for us. It's the oil of joy for mourning. But we don't want the oil of joy for mourning. You ladies want oil of the lay. You'd rather have that. Oil of joy for mourning. But you can't escape the mourning, brother Keith.

If you don't have the joy of the Lord, you can have silliness, you can have frivolity, you can have fun. But what in God's name is that? I'm talking about the same joy that Jesus had and the cross was before Him.

And it says He endured the cross. He didn't enjoy it. He endured it. Why did He endure it? Because it was the will of His Father. I love the hymn of Barnabas. Go labour on, spend and be spent. Thy joy to do the Father's will.

It is the way the Master went. Come on now. Why do you expect better treatment from this world than Jesus got? Are you so holy? Are you beyond Him? It couldn't tolerate Him. It couldn't listen to Him.

It spit on Him. It was mad against Him. All the days of His life, from the moment He left His mother's womb, He had the shadow of illegitimacy over Him. And I think we forget that. Didn't they say when He stood in the synagogue, we know whose father and His mother?

They didn't. They knew His mother. They didn't know His father. Don't they think all His life, they said He's a bastard? Of course they did. Some German theologian said that a few years ago, that there was an invasion of Germans in that area at the time Jesus was born.

And He was fathered by a German. Well, we know that's not true. Go to the end of verse 4 again. The Queen sent raiment of cloth to Mordecai. Do you think she sent him some junk? She sent him some royal robes.

She sent him something with distinction. And he says, no, I'm sticking here. This is why God wants me. I'm not going to be decorated. I'm going to stay with the humble and the meek and the lowly and the despised and rejected.

Nowadays you want to be accepted. Everybody wants to be accepted. God pity you. Get to the place where you knock your arms and say, Lord, let me be rejected as you are rejected. Let me be despised as you are despised.

You see, if He won't comfort you, unless your heart is broken. You hear people say, I don't answer the Lord. I mean, that meant my darling daughter-in-law said a while ago, an experience she'd gone through.

And she said to Martin, I just felt the arms of Jesus around me. He's so benign in His love. Why? Because she'd been through a kind of Gethsemane. You see, we want to wake up in the morning with some bubbly, exciting experience.

And God says, no. I counsel thee to bow of me. Oh, you can't buy anything from God. Grace is free, sure it is, but rewards are not free. We only get what we've laid up treasure in heaven for. Bow, bow, bow of me, Raymond.

Bow of me, gold. Gold is typical of divinity. I bow through my willingness to walk a different road from the other guys. The other day I got a photograph of our team that used to walk, we walked the length and breadth of England.

I'm looking at all those men there. Almost all of them are dead now. Stupid preachers as far as I'm concerned. I looked at some others. When I was at college, which I was there six months as you can tell.

But when I was there, they said, well, why were you on the Dean's list? We didn't even have a Dean at the college, it was so poor. I'm glad we didn't. I'd have never made the list. I had a very important place on the list every week when the examination test came out.

I was at the bottom holding all the others up. But do you know what? I'm glad you used to laugh at three of us because we spent more time in prayer. They'd pray more, we went down by the river to pray.

We'd have a night of prayer while the other fellows were fooling around. And I look at those men, stupid intellectuals many of them. And they got into ordination, which is a step downward anyhow. There's only one ordination, that's the ordination of John 15, I have ordained you.

Or as God said to Jeremiah, I ordained you when you were in the womb. That's the earliest ordination I know of. Do you know when I lived in that case? Well, you're as ignorant as I am. He doesn't know.

That's good. The ordination of God, no man can take it from you. If you walk in the light, you'll keep that ordination, or if you like, unction. Or divine anointing, as long as we're obedient. I want to get on here a bit.

I want to take his sack off from him. But he wouldn't take it. It would have given him a chance to escape. He didn't want to escape. Verse 11 of chapter 4 still. Come on now. As the scriptures say, many are called, but few are chosen.

They were all legally belonging to the kingdom, but unless they were called by the king, they could not go into the place where the king was. We sang that lovely hymn tonight, Jesus calls us by thy mercy, Savior, may we hear thy call.

There are periods in your life where you have to get to a crossroad, and you hear a very distinct call. And the word of God says that God will call us when we're in the way. He won't call you sitting in a chair.

He'll call you when you're doing the will of God. When you're going right ahead, and suddenly you hear a voice saying, not this, go right or go left. The most precious thing in the world, I think, is to be conscious of the voice of God, which can come in that mysterious way in our spirits, or it can come again through the word of a living God.

But no man or woman can go to Him who is not called. There is one law of His that shall put Him to death, such to whom the king shall hold out a golden scepter that he may love. But I have not been called to come into the king for thirty days.

Come on! What happened to you when you didn't hear God's voice for thirty days? God, sometimes can't we be lonely thirty hours? When God is driving you to your knees, driving you to intense prayer, and He shuts off communication.

This is the only way to get our attention. We're going along so blessed, so happy. Oh, every morning I get a varied, you know, streams in the desert, or squirts in the wilderness, or something. Oh, it's so nice, I so enjoy it, the Lord is so good.

Come on, get out of it. You've been reading that thing for thirty years. Come on! He's a living God. And I can only live as He pours His living life into me. I can't live on my theology. You can't love theology.

If I'm a Baptist, I love Baptist doctrine. You can't love Baptist doctrine, or Pentecostal doctrine. You're going to love a person. Doctrine won't help you too much. I have not been called to come into the King these thirty days.

How do you think she felt? She's in a court where everybody despised her. Every other woman in the harem, that's what it was, envied her. And yet for thirty days, she's been left outside with a crowd.

It doesn't say she's wearing a crown even, though she's been given a crown in the previous chapter. But the King hadn't called her in. Well, has he gone sour? Is he going to get rid of me? Got rid of Vashti?

Is he going to get rid of me? You know, when the Lord stopped Saul on the road to Damascus, have you ever noticed what he said? You know, the Lord pitched him up his horse. He must have been on a horse.

He wouldn't have been going to Damascus that way, or that way walking, taking the rest of his life. And he's down in the dust. He bouts the dust. And he didn't say, Lord, why? He said, Lord, what? You've suddenly put a roadblock here.

What is it? And the Lord sent down a man, and he said, go and tell him what, what he must suffer. No, he didn't say that. Tell him what great things he must suffer. Oh, it's bad psychology to tell this young guy.

I mean, he may be the best softball pitcher in the church league, which of course gets you a special crown in heaven if it's in the church league. And the girl whispered in his ear, listen, son, I want to tell you something.

Go on and be a professional goal port if you like, but right now God is calling you. I'm telling you what he's calling you, he's calling you to hardship and sacrifice. You're going to be hungry up the river Amazon.

You're going to be bitten by a bug. There's a precious lady, what was that lady, Martha, that came from the Amazon? Sophie Muller. I'd wanted to see that woman for years. I went to a conference, they said, Sophie Muller's coming.

And I was sitting at the end of the seat, and somebody says, she's coming, and she's at the door, she's coming in. I looked past, do you know? Don't throw your handbooks at me. She's got the most beautiful legs I've ever seen.

She's about 55. Do you know what they look like? They look as though down their stockings she'd golf balls all the way. Big, big bumps, bitten with bugs. Bitten with all kinds of things, her whole body was out of shape.

And then she goes up the Amazon where men won't go. She gets men to paddle her up the river, and then she puts a screen up and teaches the youngsters and the other people to learn their language. The government, I won't say which one of them.

The Catholics got so upset at the people who were being saved. You see, when they got saved, they quit their running around with women, they quit their drinking, they quit their fooling and fighting. And there was such a transformation, the priest got mad.

He said, we're not his girlfriends yet. He was living in his adultery and wickedness and drunkenness. And the new stead, Sophie Muller, I looked at that precious little woman, where were we? Just outside of Chicago there.

Sixty odd years, and she's back there now. You can't keep her at home. She's taught the alphabet to so many people, so many Indians. I better, where's Spencer? Oh, Spencer. We'd better get with her, boys.

Or we bring her up to your tribes. You see what can be done? She refuses to accept the king's garments. That blessed woman, isn't anything worth five bucks? Oh, oh, my dear wife, our pastor's wife, always wears designer dresses.

Well, if that won't get you heaven, what will? You know, the vanity of the world has just about swallowed the church up today. Who have to dress and show off. You know, I went over on this coat years ago.

I've had it about five years, and I put it on the other day, a moth has eaten the dirty thing. Look, it's made a, it's bitten a big hole. And I got a new one and put it in the same closet, and it ate that.

Boy, if I get it, it's life's finished, I'll tell you. I don't eat any more of my stuff. The king hasn't called me for 30 days. Come on, don't panic. God isn't speaking with him, but his word seems dry.

Poor is dry. So what? Has God changed? You've changed. Your emotions have changed. You go up and down according to what somebody says to you. You don't think you have stayed on God. Have you seen that lovely hymn?

Stayed upon Jehovah, hearts are fully blessed. Hidden in the hollow of his blessed hand, never foe can follow, never traitor stand. The only one who can change God's opinion of you is you. Doesn't matter if people lie about you, say you're a cheat, or a whoremonger, or a prostitute, it makes no difference.

He shouldn't worry you that much. Oh, well, I have a reputation. I'll take it to the cross, get rid of it. Reputation will kill you. Reputation is what men think you are. Character is what God knows you are.

Now, what are you going to worry about? Reputation? That doesn't mean that you're going to take Playboy and sneak after some dirty film. No, you're not going to do that. Because the more the love of God is shed of God in your heart, the more you'll love him.

And the other things I see seem to magnetize us. I said to my darling wife, I think it was like, or some of you were, well, anyhow, I think you know what it was, but I won't tell you. Here is a man, you talk about a lunatic, a wealthy man, a man with a colossal intellect, the greatest brain in the world in his day, and he says, I take pleasure in the Olympic Games.

Remember the Olympic Games 400 years before Jesus was born. Paul refers to the running races and all the rest of it. Wrestling. What does he say? Oh, I went and I saw the championship, heavyweight championship.

It doesn't say that. He says, I take pleasure in infirmities, in reproaches, in necessities, the very things we scream to God Almighty to keep us from. And so it doesn't keep us from all those very things that don't mean a hell of things.

I take pleasure in everything this world despises. I despise those who despise the Gospel and the purest sense of the world. Thirty days God hasn't spoken. But if it's coming to you, you'd better learn that lovely hymn that, I'll write it now, the founder of the China Inland Mission, his favorite hymn, Hudson.

Hudson Taylor, thank you. Jesus, I am resting, resting in the joy of what thou art. You know, the psalmist says, my heart is fixed. You'd better be watching it. In these days, we're going into the most serious trouble America's ever been in.

If your heart isn't fixed, you'll go to pieces. You know, when we get in trouble, we either go to pieces or we go to praises, one of the two. There's no middle ground. The world's going to crack up round about us.

But the psalmist says, my heart is fixed. My emotions aren't fixed. My circumstances aren't fixed. My financial situation isn't fixed. My heart is fixed. I was raised a Methodist, you know. And boy, I'll be used to seeing relicking hymns.

My heart is fixed, eternal God, fixed on thee, fixed on thee, and my immortal choice is made, Christ for me. He is my prophet, priest and king, who did for me salvation bring, and while I breath, I mean to sing Christ for me.