Esther 2:19
So our reading will be Esther
chapter two, verse 19, through the end of three. I believe there’s
15 verses there. Let’s hear the word of the living
God together. It says, now when the virgins were gathered together
the second time, Mordecai was sitting at the king’s gate. Esther
had not made known her kindred, or her people as Mordecai had
commanded her, for Esther obeyed Mordecai just as when she was
brought up by him. In those days, as Mordecai was
sitting at the king’s gate, Bigthanon Teresh, two of the king’s eunuchs
who guarded the threshold, became angry and sought to lay hands
on King Ahasuerus. And this came to the knowledge
of Mordecai, and he told it to Queen Esther, and Esther told
it to the king in the name of Mordecai. When the affair was
investigated and found to be so, the men were both hanged
on the gallows. And it was recorded in the book
of the Chronicles in the presence of the King. After these things,
King Ahasuerus promoted Haman the Agagite, the son of Hamadatha,
and advanced him and set his throne above all the officials
who were with him. And all the King’s servants who
were at the King’s gate bowed down and paid homage to Haman
For the king had so commanded concerning him, but Mordecai
did not bow down or pay homage. Then the king’s servants who
were at the king’s gate said to Mordecai, why do you transgress
the king’s command? When they spoke to him day after
day and he would not listen to them, they told Haman in order
to see whether Mordecai’s words would stand for he had told them
that he was a Jew. And when Haman saw that Mordecai
did not bow down or pay homage to him, Haman was filled with
fury, but he disdained to lay hands on Mordecai alone. So as
they made known to him the people of Mordecai, Haman sought to
destroy all the Jews, the people of Mordecai, throughout the whole
kingdom of Asurus. In the first month, which is
the month of Nisan, in the twelfth year of King Ahasuerus, they
cast purr, that is, they cast lots before Haman day after day,
and they cast it a month after month until the twelfth month,
which is the month of Adar. Then Haman said to King Ahasuerus,
there is a certain people scattered abroad and dispersed among the
peoples in all the provinces of your kingdom. Their laws are
different from those of every other people, and they do not
keep the king’s laws, so that it is not to the king’s profit
to tolerate them. If it please the king, let it
be decreed that they be destroyed, and I will pay 10,000 talents
of silver into the hands of those who they have charge of and the
king’s business, that they may put it into the king’s treasuries.
So the king took his signet ring from his hand. He gave it to
Haman, the Agagite, the son of Hamadathah, the enemy of the
Jews. And the king said to Haman, the money is given to you, the
people also, to do with them as it seems good to you. and
the king’s scribes were summoned on the 13th day of the first
month and an edict. According to all that Haman commanded
was written to the king’s satraps, the governors all over the provinces
and to the officials of the peoples, to every province in its own
script and every people in its own language. It was written
in the name of the king, Ahasuerus, and sealed with the king’s signet
ring. Letters were sent by couriers to all the king’s provinces with
instruction to destroy, kill, and to annihilate all the Jews,
young and old, women and children, in one day, on the 13th day of
the 12th month, which is the month of Adar, and to plunder
their goods. A copy of the document was to
be issued as a decree in every province by proclamation to all
the peoples to be ready for that day. The couriers went out hurriedly
by order of the king. The decree was issued in Susa
and the Citadel, and the king and Haman sat down to drink.
But the city of Susa was thrown into confusion. This is the word
of the living God. I have four points I want to
make, and they all are the same. All four points are plot. So
point number one is plot, point number two is plot, point number
three is plot, and point number four is plot. There’s a lot of
plotting in this passage. But I wanna remind us of an age-old
battle. Remember when Adam and Eve sinned
against God and God called Adam and Eve into his presence and
he said to Adam, your work will be hard, you’ll sweat, you’ll
toil, thorns and thistles. Outside the garden east of Eden,
life will be hard, it’ll be futile. Eve, it’s gonna be tough to have
children. It’s going to be tough to be married. And then Satan,
you’re going to crawl on your belly. You’re going to eat the
dust of the earth. And the seed of the woman and the seed of
the serpent will battle, will duel it out. The greatest, what
we call the Hatfields and the McCoys, the greatest family feud
in the history of the world is Eve’s offspring, Jesus, versus
the offspring of the serpent. He will nip at the heels of the
church, but Christ will come and crush his head one day. And
so we’ve seen in church history, we’ve seen in the history of
God’s people, all the things that have made attempt to exterminate,
to extinguish the people of God, famine and foolishness and faithlessness,
living by the flesh, direct attacks, and all the wiles of the devil.
But remember, God has always redeemed his people. Now, something
you may not have caught in this passage, but I’m gonna tell you
about, you ought to notice it. This edict was decreed at the
time the Jews would select the Passover lamb. How ironic. You’re to be extinguished. You’re
to be killed. Your execution is set. But it’s at the time
when they will pick the Passover lamb and at that Passover meal,
they’ll remember their suffering in Egypt, their life in the wilderness,
their rescue by Almighty God. And can’t you think with them? Life is tough. but our God saves,
our God redeems. And so we want to think about
all these plots and how the people of God throughout the history
of Israel have been under attack. Now there’s a special connection
here to a particular event in the life of Israel where God’s
people were under great duress. Israel was in Egypt in the wilderness,
or they were in Sinai in the wilderness. They were at the
mountain. It was even before the Ten Commandments, chapter 17 of Exodus.
And the Amalekites came out against Israel. And remember Moses up
on the mountain, he held up his staff, he held up his hands,
and as long as he held up his hands, the people of Israel prevailed.
When his arms got tired, the Amalekites prevailed. And so
Aaron on one side held up a hand, Hur on the other side held up
a hand, they sat Moses on a rock, and he labored before the Lord
in prayer for the victory, and God gave them victory over the
Amalekites. Now fast forward, King Saul, first king of Israel,
destroy the Amalekites, wipe them out, get rid of them. King
Saul disobeyed, and so they were a continual thorn in the flesh
of the people. Fast forward several hundred
years, five, six hundred years to our time now, the Amalekites,
the offspring of Agag, giving Mordecai and the Jews in the
kingdom a great a great bit of angst here as they plot to them. So I want to think through each
of these plots and we’ll move quickly. The hour is late, I
know. The first plot, Esther is the wife of the king. She’s
in the palace. She’s not revealed her roots.
She’s not told anyone that she’s Jewish. Mordecai has commanded
her so, and she’s obeyed. That’s because of this ancient
battle, this hatred of God’s people. Mordecai is a servant
in the kingdom. It says he sits at the gate.
We might think of him as a loiterer. Why is he at the gates? He’s
just hanging out. He’s drinking coffee. It’s like
Biscuitville in the mornings. Everybody’s getting their sausage
biscuit and their coffee. They’re hanging out. He’s a servant of
the kingdom. He’s in civil service. And so he’s privy to things.
And he hears these two eunuchs, two guards of the king’s threshold,
two guards who have the leader’s life in their hands. And they
want to lay hands on Ahasuerus. And they don’t want to lay hands
on them in the sense of the elders laying hands and praying on somebody.
No, they want to lay hands and kill the king. This is a big
plot. This is, remember, the greatest
kingdom thus far, the most vast empire thus far in world’s history,
Ethiopia to India, 127 provinces. all the Satrapies, all the leaders,
all the conquering. It would have been bigger if
he could have beat the Greeks and some of the others, but they
want to lay hands on Ahasuerus. His wife is a little better than
he knew of her. He picked her because she was
pretty. But she and God’s providence finds this out and tells him
and protects him. And so, Right after Esther’s
rise to the position of queen, living life in this wicked kingdom,
she’s able to save her wicked husband and these two are hanged. It’s a plot, yes. But as part of the larger plot
of the story, we’re gonna see Haman hanged, even hanged on
his own gallows. And it’s a reminder to us, people
may plot, people may be against us, but there’s justice in this world
at times, and we see it here. Well, there’s another plot, and
it’s a bigger plot. But it’s immediately dark. Genesis
chapter 3 starts out, now the serpent was more crafty than
any other beast of the field. This chapter starts out, incidentally
it’s chapter 3, Haman, the Agagite, the enemy of the Jews, he is
promoted in the kingdom. We hear of a Supreme Court justice
being nominated or we see a campaign for somebody for office. We immediately
try to understand what are their views, what is their track record,
what’s their name, their kinship, where are they from? And we decide
whether we want them or not. And we campaign against them,
we smear them or we support them, that kind of thing. But you can
imagine there was probably in, at least in Sousa, a lot of groaning.
I mean, Heyman doesn’t, doesn’t seem to be a likable fellow.
I imagine there were people who kissed up to him, as we say.
But most people probably knew what he was. They probably hated
his guts, but as it happens, he gets promoted. And there’s
an edict written, you must pay homage to Haman. That’s what
he liked, people to bow to him, people to adore him. And so Mordecai,
he knows who he is. He’s an ancient enemy of Israel.
I will not bow down to him. I will not honor him. We don’t
know the reason, but we do know this, it enraged Haman. It enraged
him and it brought up this ancient battle between the Amalekites
and the Israelites, and so the plot thickens. Haman hates Mordecai. Now, we think of hate in a couple
ways. Now, hatred may be your neighbor who kicks your cat,
knocks over your trash cans, cusses at you, and shows you
their tall finger, right? But then there’s hatred, just
murderous hatred. I mean, seething anger, wish
you were dead anger. And that’s what Haman has for
Mordecai. And notice verse eight. If you
have a King James Bible, it’s a little stronger, but it says,
Haman told the king, it is not in your prophet to tolerate them. Or I think in the King James
to suffer them. It is not. to the King’s prophet
to tolerate them. Isn’t that the way of the world?
It’s not to your prophet to carry that baby to term. It’s not to
your prophet to take care of your aging parents. We’re living
in an age where we can put away the babies and we can put away
the older folks. They’re just trouble. So we have
abortion, we have euthanasia, and here this man treats the
people of God as something to be trashed. It’s not in your
profit to tolerate them. And so we see great hatred. We
see a desire to exterminate. Haman is a scorned man and he’s
exposed Mordecai. Do you notice they cast lots?
And it took about, oh, almost a year. They cast lots to see
when was the best day to put this plan before Ahasuerus. You know, Ahasuerus we’ve already
figured out is a pretty complex character. I’m sure he has his
good days, his bad days, his grumpy mornings, his happy mornings.
And so they cast lots, they cast lots, they cast lots, and finally,
almost after a whole year, this is the day. This is the day,
Haman, go in and put this plot in front of the king. And so the lots were cast. O King, live forever. O King,
there’s a people in your midst. This is a smear campaign, right? They don’t obey our laws. They’re
different. We just don’t want them anymore. And notice the
riches. that Hayman offers. Basically,
King, I’m gonna put 300 tons, that’s tons, T-O-N-S, that’s
600,000 pounds of silver into your treasury if you’ll pass
this law. If that’s not pay to play, or what did we spend the
whole other couple years listening to? Prid, quid, quid pro quo, yeah. If that’s not that, I don’t know
what is. But old king, 300 tons of silver. And this is not the
first time the people of God have been plotted against. Earlier
in the exile, when Ezra and Nehemiah and others returned, the people
who had taken over the promised land wanted Israel out. No temple,
no repopulating the land. And so they said, these are bad
people. They don’t obey you. This is what they said to one
of the other kings during the exile. But this edict comes on
Passover. It comes as they’re selecting
the lamb and you see the seriousness, the weight of this on the people
of God. And what does Ahasuerus do? What does Haman do? Let’s
sit down and have a drink. They’ve hatched their plan. It’s
done. So there’s these plots, the plots to kill Ahasuerus.
There’s this plot to kill the Jews. There’s this plot against
the people of God, but there’s a bigger plot going on and it’s
God’s plot. He’s the king of the story, the
writer of the story. It’s his providence that we see
all over the book of Esther. It’s his providence we see all
through the hand. of the days of human history,
it’s God’s providence we see in every moment of every day
of our lives. And you can write an edict, you can stamp your
signet ring on it, you can mail it out to the entire providence,
you can run couriers on horses and by foot, and you can make
all your best plans. And what does Psalm 2 tell us?
Isn’t it neat how morning and night flow together sometimes?
Makes it easier for the preacher. but it’s good for our souls.
He who sits in the heavens laughs and he holds them in derision
and he will break their teeth. He will shatter the enemies and
his throne on which his son sits will last forever. So they assure
us he’ll be stabbed in the back or something in a few years to
come. Haman will hang on the gallows, but the people of God
will continue. And Christ will come in the centuries
after this and rule and reign and die and live and give us
all the benefits of redemption. Now, we were reminded earlier
tonight of the suffering of other Christians around the world,
and it’s It’s bad advertisement, isn’t it, to say, come to Jesus
and all your problems will go away. That’s the American Christianity
we peddled. You don’t want to go to hell,
do you? So we get your get out of hell free card. And then come
to Jesus and all your problems will go away. Well, read church
history, read the apostles. They counted it a joy to suffer
for Christ. Read the book of Revelation.
A couple of years ago, we studied it. One of the most precious,
precious visions in the book of Revelation is under the altar
where the smoke and the incense is rising up, the prayers of
the saints is rising up before God, under the altar are the
souls whose lives were taken on account of Christ. And they’re
crying out night and day before God, how long, oh Lord, till
you avenge our deaths. And until Christ carries, we
will as a church suffer. The Apostle Paul says it so well,
we are filling up what is lacking in Christ’s sufferings. Christ,
as we’re studying in the book of Acts, he’s ascended to heaven,
he sits at the throne, but we’re here to carry on his mission
and the suffering and the hatred and the wrath of this earth that
is put at Christ. It comes on us. It comes on the
church. And I don’t know how American Christianity is going
to fare in the next 50 years, even a hundred years. I don’t
think it’s going to fare well because number one, we’re sissies. We cannot suffer. We won’t suffer.
And so I think the church will empty out. We’ll see who’s who
and what’s what. But if recent years are a harbinger
of things to come, the church will face hard times. The suffering
we pray for over there and over there and over there and in this
country and that country and this dark place and that dark
place, that will continue, I’m sure, but it will come here.
And so I think it would be wise for us to remember as God’s people
have been plotted against, the battle, the age old battle of
the seed of Eve and the seed of the serpent continues. We
need to remember the hope of Revelation. God wins. Christ
will come and he will put his foot on Satan. He will cast him
into outer darkness. All the wrongs and all the evils
of this world will be made right and the church will triumph.
But if on this earth, we and others around the world suffer,
it is for Christ’s sake. and we should count it a privilege,
but we see the hand of God, the hand of providence in this wonderful
story, and I think it ought to give us encouragement. God knows,
God sees, yes, God laughs, and yes, while he tarries, we may
suffer, and some in the generations after us may die for the cause
of Christ, but oh, what a joy to be counted worthy to suffer
for his name. Let’s look to him in prayer.
God, we thank you for these reminders, that evil men plot against you. Nation rises up against your
church. Judges may rule against us. The favor of the land may not
be for us, but we can be still and know that you are God. We
can be reminded that you rule and reign and that all the affairs
of men are, they’re from your hand. Everything is for your
everlasting glory, for our eternal good, and so we trust you. We
know the times are in your hand, so teach us to number our days,
to count it a privilege to serve you in peace and in hardship,
and go with us and guide us and give us the grace of the Lord
Jesus Christ and the love of God the Father and the fellowship
of the saints. We remember those around the
world now who call on your name, but do it with great injury to
their life, their livelihood, even face many hardships. Give them your grace. We pray
in the name of Christ. Amen.