April 30, 2023 / God Gives Real Hope

Welcome to Walk in the Truth podcast.

This season of messages takes us through some of the great comeback stories in the Bible.

Pastor John Metter of Cross City Church will show us how God can take any situation in

any life and bring hope and victory out of hardship.

These messages will inspire you to trust God in your own challenging seasons.

Well, I love the title of this book and this message series, God's Not Done With You.

And I hope that that resonates in your heart and mind because God is not done with you.

If you still have breathing ability, if your heart is still beating, you're still alive,

God is not done with you.

Even though sometimes we wonder if God's done with us if He hasn't spoken to us in recent

days.

He hasn't worked in a powerful way in recent seasons of our life.

I promise you He's not done with you.

Please take your Bibles this morning and turn to the book of Esther today.

The book of Esther, you'll find Esther just to the left of the book of Psalms and Job

and so there it is in the early part of the Old Testament.

Esther chapter number four, we're going to read about several verses out of Esther chapter

four, but we're going to look at the whole book of Esther today for just a few moments.

God gives real hope.

You know, whenever I was compiling all these stories, I was looking for a contemporary

example of someone that fits or parallels Esther's life.

And I couldn't find a contemporary story.

I don't know of anyone that's gone through the kinds of things that she's gone through.

I don't know if anybody has faced the kind of threats that she has faced and come through

on the other side in that incredible way that the story ends with.

I couldn't find a contemporary example.

And then I realized that some of the examples in the scripture like Job and like Esther

are what I would call blanket examples.

That is, they go through so many different things that none of us really go through all

of those, but underneath that blanket illustration, we find our own place and we find those circumstances

that we go through that are extremely difficult, extremely challenging, and in this case, those

circumstances that seem to have no hope at all.

So if you find your place in Esther chapter four for just a few moments, let me give you

some background.

The very first chapter of the book of Esther is a book that really spells hopelessness

all across the board.

Babylon's culture, this is where she is living at the time as an exile in Babylon.

It's one of paganism and patriarchy.

It's sexist, it's drunkenness, it's war that she faces every single day in that culture.

She's a minority woman with no husband, no one to look after her, hated by so many as

a Jew, and there is a nemesis in this whole book named Haman, a man that's wicked to the

core, he wants to put every Jewish person to death in Babylon.

And his plan is to exterminate them, and he's got a good plan.

He's got the influence that's necessary with King Ahasuerus to actually bring that about.

Well, King Ahasuerus in the first chapter has sponsored this drunken orgy of all of

his captains before they go to war.

He's called Queen Vashti to come and parade her beauty in front of all of them, which

is a lewd request.

She refuses him, she's deposed as queen, and his counselors say, now here's what you need,

you need a new queen.

And you need to ask all the beautiful women in the land to step up into this beauty contest

over the course of about a year, and you need to select a brand new queen.

Well, Esther finds herself without choice in the middle of that scenario.

She actually is prepared for and has a knight with the king, and later is crowned queen,

again without choice.

Hopelessness, because she's one of those that Haman is determined to put to death.

Despair, because she has no choice.

Her morality, her values, her future, her life, all those are being threatened.

And now, as we are about to read in chapter four, she's about to make an appeal before

this pagan king that will end up either saving her and her people or exterminating her and

her people.

It's a big moment in the life of Esther, chapter four.

Would you stand with me as we read these several verses?

And these verses will kind of form what we understand to be the way God works when we

don't see him work, when we don't hear what he says, but still he's at work.

So Esther speaks to the messengers, and she says to Mordecai, who is her adoptee father,

he is the son of her uncle and later on adopts her.

We'll tell that story in just a moment.

And she responds to him in verse 11.

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's 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.

In other words, for me to go speak on behalf of the Jewish people, my life is in danger.

They related to Esther's words to Mordecai.

This is her righteous uncle, this great man that we'll learn about.

And Mordecai told them to reply to Esther, do not imagine that you in 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.

But 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, night or day.

I and my handmaidens will also 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.

Those are famous words in the book of Esther.

So Mordecai went away and did just as Esther had commanded him.

Incredible book, incredible scenario, a really key moment in that conversation.

If I die, I die.

She is trusting God whom she has not seen, whom she has not heard from.

God's name is not even mentioned in the entire book of Esther.

What would you do if you couldn't hear from God, if you couldn't see God at work?

Could you trust God the way Esther did?

Father today, our prayer is that you'll help us trust you the way she trusted you.

In spite of maybe times and seasons where we don't hear from you, seasons where we don't

know what you're doing, don't understand what's behind the scene.

Father, I pray that you will give us faith and strength in your greatness and your goodness

as you gave her.

I ask this in Jesus' name.

God's people said amen.

Please be seated if you would.

Man, I love this book in so many different ways and I realize this book is filled with

hopelessness.

It's filled with this question mark of what is God gonna do?

How is God going to redeem this whole circumstance?

It's also an incredibly important book because this is the one book, the one narrative historical

account in the Bible where God's name is not mentioned.

Nowhere in the book of Esther will God's name be mentioned.

There are no prophets speaking to Esther during this period of time like there are in so many

other accounts of scripture in the Old Testament.

But what you have is the unseen hand of God working behind the scenes where you don't

see him working.

And what she sees on one side of the picture is a mess.

And what God is weaving on the other side of the scene is a perfect picture of his redemptive

power.

That's often what it's like in life.

I thought about the idea of a tapestry as I was preparing this message.

Some of you know what a tapestry is.

I had to look it up to make sure I had my wording right on the tapestry part.

But on the back side of a tapestry is the confusing part.

By the way it's woven you see a picture that's visible on one side but on the back side of

that tapestry is a picture of confusion.

I have a picture of one that is on the back side.

Now can you make any sense, rhyme, or reason about what the picture on the other side is

going to look like of that particular piece of tapestry?

My answer would be I don't think so.

I certainly can't see what that looks like on the other side.

You just have to believe that there's something better than that picture on the other side,

right?

And then all over you see another picture and that picture has definition.

It has clarity.

The name of it is unfinished sky and it has a sense of beauty and order about it that

you didn't see from the other side.

Now the reason I show this picture to you is because this is like the life of Esther.

Total chaos on one side.

Confusion as to why God is letting things happen in a certain way as they are happening

and yet on the other side God is weaving something that's very, very powerful.

Let me just tell you a line that I believe is important for us as we walk through this.

Hopelessness is what she's experiencing and hopelessness is when we no longer believe

a situation or a purpose or a person can be redeemed.

It's when we don't think that God is going to be able to salvage our circumstance.

I don't know how many of you have ever been in a situation like that but I've been in

a situation like that many times.

Any volunteers in here, have you ever found hopelessness to be what's just ahead of you?

Raise your hand if you've experienced that just a little bit in your life.

Because you don't have answers, because nothing makes sense, because you don't know how God

is going to intervene or what God is going to do, things seem somewhat hopeless.

And that's the life of Esther.

That's the book of Esther.

A hopeless scenario where God is still working even though you can't see him work, you can't

hear what he's saying but he's nonetheless working and in the end you'll be able to see

it.

That's where hope comes in.

The life of Esther shows us how to find hope and how to have courage when God is silent.

So I want you to listen to me today as I talk about how to find hope and how to have courage

because both of those are so vitally important to our lives and to our life of faith.

First of all, how did Esther have faith in God?

How does she hope at all?

A few things I'm going to observe as we walk through this book for these few minutes today.

First of all, hope rises when we remember God's history of intervention.

Now stay with me here for just a few moments.

Hope rises when we think back to how God has worked in time past.

When we remember God's habit, historical habit of intervening into people's lives.

You'll go back and read the Old Testament and you'll see story after story of God's

intervention into the lives of those who are his followers.

He does it over and over.

If you look at Esther chapter two, verse five, you'll learn something about this man named

Mordecai who has a prominent place in the story of Esther.

And in chapter two, verse five, it says this about his life.

Now there was, that's a Citadel in Susa, a Jew whose name was Mordecai.

That describes him in various ways, but also a Benjamite.

What that tells us about this man named Mordecai is that he has a significant background.

He's actually a descendant of King Saul.

And during this era of time, the Jewish people were experts at passing on the oral tradition

of how God worked in previous generations.

So as a descendant of Saul, this man, Mordecai, would know about the stories of God's intervention

into the life of the Jewish people.

He would know God as someone who leads and rescues and intervenes, not just a God that's

invisible and not even just a creator God, but he would know him as the creator God who

is bigger than all, but who often steps into scenarios and into lives and into nations

and changes things and rescues his people.

That's how Mordecai knows God.

And because Mordecai eventually adopted this woman named Esther, we know that Esther also

has that same kind of heritage.

She would have heard stories about God's miraculous intervention.

Now let me say this to you because you've heard the same stories.

We've even sung some of those today.

The God of David, the God of Jacob, the God of Isaac.

Why do we remind you of all those things?

Here's why.

Because remembering God's intervening ways sets us up for hope.

If I believe God is the God who intervenes, I have hope he will intervene into my life.

If I believe he did that for David or Jacob, if he did that for this woman named Esther,

then I know that he can do that in my life as well because that's his capability.

That's his ability.

And there's so many stories, so much rescue in the Old Testament.

All you have to do is open up the first few books of the Bible as you read, which most

of us do as we start to read the Bible through in a year, every year we get through Genesis

and Exodus and we get through the first five or six books, don't we?

And if you just get through the first five or six books, you're going to remember that

God intervened into Adam and Eve's life and rescued them from sin.

And you're going to remember that God rescued Noah from this perversion that was going across

the world and from the flood of judgment as well.

And you're going to remember that God rescued Isaac from sacrifice and he rescued Joseph

from imprisonment and everything else.

Just read the first few books of the Bible and you've got example after example of the

fact that our God intervenes into people's lives.

Now I for one am glad about that.

I'm glad he's got a record of doing that.

I'm glad he's got a history of doing that.

That makes my hope rise.

When you get to the book of 1 Corinthians chapter 10, there's a great, great reminder

1 Corinthians 10 · chapter mention

of why we need to read the Old Testament.

By the way, you need to read the Old Testament.

The Old Testament cannot be unhitched from the New Testament.

It can't be separated from the New Testament.

It's all the Bible for a reason.

It works together.

And here's what Paul said.

He said, now these things happen to them as an example and they were written for our instruction

upon whom the ends of the ages have come.

That should be enough motivation for you to read the Old Testament books of the Bible.

And when you need hope, you need to remember God's intervening ways, small and large in

lives that have gone before you.

The hope rises when we remember that God does these things.

Secondly, I want you to notice that hope rises when we see God's compassion through others.

I know it's a tough thing, but sometimes when we don't see God move and work, then we question

his love for us.

God, why are you not helping me?

Why are you not intervening?

Why are you not sending provision?

I mean, do you love me?

Do you know if I'm here or not?

Sometimes we don't see it directly, but we see it indirectly that God and his compassion

are demonstrated through other people.

And in Esther's case, Mordecai was that other person that first demonstrated to her the

amazing love of God.

Chapter two, verse seven, it says more about Mordecai and Esther's relationship.

It says this, he, Mordecai was bringing up Hadassah, that is Esther, his uncle's daughter,

which would have been a distant cousin from her, for she had no father or mother.

When her father and mother died, Mordecai took her as his own daughter.

Now there's so much in this verse, if you dig into it, it's an unusual adoption and

a trying situation.

Can you imagine Esther as a young girl?

She's broken, she's alone, she's without protection, she's vulnerable to exploitation and a perversity

of culture.

She has no one, she's a foreigner in the land, no one to speak up for her at all.

And regarding Mordecai, she's not in his immediate family.

He could have ignored her or seeing her beauty, he could have married her.

Instead, he showed compassion and he adopted her without which there is no story here.

Mordecai became her encourager.

He became her reminder that God loved her with an everlasting love.

It's an amazing picture that God demonstrates his love through Mordecai to this woman named

Esther that helps hope rise up inside of her that God knew about her, that God was taking

care of her and protecting her and that God would intervene in her life.

By the way, adoption is a compassionate, redemptive response to an otherwise hopeless situation.

How many in this room today have been affected personally in a positive way by adoption?

Did your adoptive parents, you were adopted or you have someone in your family that has

experienced that?

Would you raise your hand?

There's a number of people in the room that would raise their hand and say, man, that's

something that happened in my family and my life and you ought to be thrilled with that.

I commend those who understand that it is a compassionate act on the part of a loving

God to work through you to adopt someone else.

We have an increasing number of people that have experienced that and we want to continue

to support that in the biggest possible way.

And that's what she experienced.

Now as an adoptive daughter, this man was watching her even as she goes through that

preparation phase where the king has selected her to be among many, many other young women

and preparing her, the king was, for this possibility of her becoming queen.

But I notice in chapter two, verse 11, that every day Mordecai walked back and forth in

front of the court of the harem to learn how Esther was and how she feared.

And how frightened she must have been all by herself behind that wall.

But when she looked up, Mordecai was always checking on her.

He was always wondering about her.

She didn't see God, but she saw the compassion of Mordecai being demonstrated to her as an

adoptive father, both of them believing in a compassionate God.

But she saw that in this man's life and it brought hope to her.

Hope was rising inside of her because of the compassion of Mordecai.

Now that's a really important thing because compassion reflects the heart of God.

You know that, right?

You know that God is a loving and compassionate God.

In Psalm chapter 25, verse six, the psalmist said, remember, oh Lord, your compassion and

Psalms 25 · chapter mention

your loving kindness, for they have been of old.

In other words, you have eternally been compassionate.

That's who God is.

One of my favorite chapters is in Psalm 103.

Psalm 103 talks about the benefits of following God.

And one of those benefits is in verse four, who redeems your life from the pit, who crowns

you with loving kindness and compassion.

If you have experienced God in any way in your lifetime, let me just tell you, it's

because of the compassionate love of God that you've experienced him.

If you know Jesus Christ as Lord and Savior, it's because of the compassion of God to send

his son to die on the cross to pay for our sin.

We know something about the compassion of God that should fill us with hope.

Jesus lived his life with compassion.

He was moved by compassion.

He led people to have compassion.

He felt compassion.

He had compassion on the multitude, the Bible said.

I mentioned years ago, Spiro Sodiatis had this little line he used a lot.

He said, compassion wins every time.

I love that line.

When you have a choice in how you respond to something, compassion wins every time.

Choose compassion above every other response to people around you.

It wins every time.

And we really ought to pause for just a moment and talk about the most powerful, most visible

act of compassion that God gave us, and that is the sending of his son, Jesus Christ.

Most famous book in the Bible is John 3.16.

It's everywhere.

But it also says a lot about the compassion of God, doesn't it?

Play it with me.

It's on the screen now.

Here's what it says.

Are you ready?

For God so loved the world that he gave his only begotten son, that whoever believes in

him should not perish but have eternal life.

You see how that starts?

God so loved the world.

He had such compassion on the world that he gave his only begotten son.

When I look at Mordecai's love and compassion for Esther, I'm reminded of Jesus' compassion

for us.

It's a great moment for us to recognize that when we see compassion, let it remind us of

the personal love that God has for us.

I'm so aware that there are people in the room that never experience that kind of love

in their biological family.

They don't experience that love from day to day with people around them.

Sometimes it's hard for us to even conceive of the fact that we are loved individuals.

Sometimes we feel very much hated, very much rejected, very much left out.

But I'm telling you, when you see compassion in those lives around you, for you, that's

an indicator of a God of compassion who is working in your life.

He's placing people around you to help you realize he loves you.

That's what was going on in Esther's life.

Mordecai was there to remind Esther in part of the incredible love of God.

So recognize it.

Recognize compassion.

When you see it, let it remind you of God's presence.

But also show compassion.

Because if God loves you, it's important for you to love others in the same way that

he loved you.

It's a great, great thing that we have in our life.

When you see compassion, remind yourself God loves me.

But not only this hope rising thing happening in Esther's life, she has to learn to have

courage.

It's one thing to hope.

It's another thing to act in a way that's so courageous that it defies all odds.

It defies reason sometimes.

But courage is what this woman needed in order to move forward.

God was requiring her to trust him, to walk by faith.

But how do we have courage?

Now let me just say these things to you based on Esther's life.

First, have courage in God's sovereignty.

The fact that God is on the throne and we have seen him on the throne in times past,

have courage in that.

Now go to chapter four for a moment.

We start in chapter four, this conversation between Mordecai and Esther as Esther is preparing

to go into the king to make an appeal.

And notice what's said here in verse 14.

Mordecai said, 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.

It's a life-threatening moment.

Haman has a plan hatched to kill all of them and he's being successful so far.

Things don't look good.

But Mordecai is reminding Esther that God will rescue his people one way or another.

And the reason he knows that is because God has always done that in the past.

And so he says this to Esther, if you don't do this, God will rescue his people but another

way.

And you and your father's house will perish.

But if you do this, you will experience how God rescues your people directly through what

you do.

In other words, God is sovereign one way or another, he's gonna win.

We don't know how the game's gonna be played out.

We don't know exactly how all the characters will respond but we do know that in the end,

God will win.

Basically Mordecai is saying to her, I know God redeems, I know he rescues.

I look at history and I see that.

I know he's able, I'm not sure how.

How about you, when he's going to do it, but the end is not in doubt.

If I could say anything to you today, it would help build your faith and give you courage.

It is this, I don't know how it will end but I know the end is not in doubt.

I don't know the how-to's and the wins and the particulars of your life but I can tell

you in the end, God wins in your life and he's a victorious God and he will win.

He does it over and over and over again.

Remember this.

Remember this.

One of the few people who have the kind of troublesome, hopeless situations that Esther

had was a guy named Job.

And you know the story of Job.

We may not read all of Job very often but we know enough to say the problems that Job

had were a lot.

He lost everything.

He lost everything.

And yet in chapter 42, Job makes a statement to God.

At the end of all those troubles, he says, I know that you can do all things and that

no purpose of yours can be thwarted.

He's saying to God, God, I know that you're on the throne and I don't understand why I've

lost so much but I know in the end, you will, when nothing can be taken away from you, you

will be able to restore all that I have.

And if you keep reading the last part of the book of Job, you know that his latter days

were blessed more than the former days.

Job did have a good completion in mind for Job.

Or I read about those three young Hebrew boys that are thrown in the fiery furnace, Meshach,

Shadrach and Abednego, you remember them.

And in Daniel chapter three, they're saying basically the same thing.

Our God whom we serve is able to deliver us from the furnace but even if he does not,

we are not going to serve your God's worship to go to Nimitz.

In other words, I don't know how this is gonna end but I know this.

God is faithful to the very end and I'm gonna trust him with this.

Well, that's what Esther is faced with and often that's what you're faced with.

Well, I trust God the way Job did.

Well, I trust God the way Meshach, Shadrach and Abednego did.

Well, I trust God the way that this woman Esther did.

Mordecai is just simply saying, Esther, I know God and I know history and God intervenes

over and over and over.

It's almost as though Mordecai is saying to God, God, I know you're on the throne.

I'm convinced of it.

I'm not sure exactly what you're going to do but I wanna be in the middle of it and

that's where Esther found some courage to face the king.

But you can also have faith in the testimony.

You can have courage in the testimony of other people.

If you look in verse 14 of chapter four, this is what he says to her, and who knows whether

you have not attained royalty for such a time as this.

So now we're finding Mordecai putting the spotlight on Esther for a moment.

It's not just about God and his intervention in the past but now he's saying to Esther,

will you take courage from this testimonies and will you do your part at this time?

I wanna remind you, there's nothing romantic about the book of Esther.

Even though the king did fall in love with her, this is coercion all the way.

This woman has been taken out of her comfortable environment and put in the worst of scenarios.

She's made a spectacle in so many different ways.

But here she is doing her best to walk faithfully through all those uncomfortable, difficult

kinds of things.

She's in a dangerous, life altering moment that Mordecai says, look at it from this perspective.

Maybe God has you here to rescue the nation this time just the way he did with David or

Joseph or Moses before you.

Esther, what's your part in this story?

I think the story changes whenever we come to the place of saying, what's my part in

this story?

Most of us are gonna look at Esther or all these other figures of the Old Testament and

say, well, I'm not an Esther and I'm not a Joseph and I'm not a Moses.

No, you're not, not exactly.

But you're still a child of God and God works through your life.

And you have a part to play in the life that you're in.

It's such an important, important issue.

I don't know what God's got in mind for you, but I know he's got you at this place in time,

at this situation, at this moment.

And he wants to work through it in a powerful way, just like he did with all those in the

past.

Now think about the testimony of others.

Let's go back to the Old Testament for a moment and spend some time there.

Abraham and Sarah had no hope of having a child, but God gave them Isaac.

Moses murdered an Egyptian and ran 40 years to the backside of the desert.

He was there at 80 years of age thinking he would never make it back to Egypt, but God

brought him back to Egypt and brought about the Exodus.

Deborah was a woman in a man's world and had no hope of Israel's success, but God used

her alone to rescue the nation.

David had no hope in a battle against Goliath, but God gave him the ability and the skills

with these five small stones to kill the giant, Goliath.

Daniel had no hope of surviving the lion's den, but for some reason the lions weren't

hungry that day.

Meshach, Sadrach, and Abednego had no hope of surviving the furnace, but they did.

Now keep this in mind, Esther knew about all these stories.

So when Mordecai is saying to Esther, what's your part?

Then Esther is starting to realize, I have a part to play in this story and God is going

to give me the courage I need.

Now let me just pose a personal question to you.

What's your part in God's story where you are and your circumstances that you're in?

What will God do in your life?

In what significant ways will he show up for you, look for him to do that?

Have courage.

Have courage when it doesn't seem to come naturally.

There's something else here though.

Have courage when you see details emerge.

By this point in Esther's life you're starting to see some details emerge that say, well

God's going to put me in this place, this position that I didn't ask for.

You see it in chapter two verse 17 when the king actually selected her.

The king loved Esther more than all the women.

She found favor and kindness with him more than all the virgins so that he set the royal

crown on her head and made her queen instead of Vashti.

You've got to ask the question, how did she get here?

So unlikely.

She must have wondered what God was doing and watching the details emerge as to where

she was at that moment, knowing she had no influence, knowing she was a foreigner and

the king didn't even know it, knowing she had never been chosen otherwise, she's got

to be saying, I don't know how I got here but I've got to believe God placed me here

for a reason.

She is placed strategically to save her whole nation.

Not a comfortable place to be but that's where she is right now and she realizes it's no

coincidence that I'm here at this moment.

Over the past number of decades, my wife and I have this little saying that we use a lot.

It's a statement that says, it's like a turtle on a fence post.

I like the statement because of what's behind it.

Years ago, Joe Stowell spoke for Moody Radio quite a bit and he would use this phrase from

time to time.

He would say it like this.

He would say, if you saw someone, if you walked down the highway and you saw a turtle sitting

on a fence post, what would your thought be?

Did he get there on his own?

And the answer would be no.

If you see a turtle on a fence post, you realize somebody put him there.

Somebody put him there.

Such a simple kind of truth.

And then he made an application.

When you look at your own life, how did you get to where you are?

Did you do it on your own?

And the answer is usually no, not on your own.

Somebody put you there in that place.

Somebody put you in a place of influence.

Somebody put you in a crossroads of decision making and that's somebody, it's usually God,

who places people where he wants them to be so that he can work in a powerful way.

And we're all in that position in some sense of the word.

And you may, like Esther, not be able to hear what God says or see what God is doing, but

what you may need to realize is that God is still on the throne and the people around you

and the place where he has put you is an important place.

So you don't need to run.

You don't need to be fearful or worry.

What you need to do is find out why God placed you in that strategic position in life and

trust him and have courage in him.

There's one more thing that gives us courage and that is have courage in moments of decision.

Chapter four, verse 16, she's at that moment of decision.

It's really the climax of the book in so many different ways.

She has seen hope rise from all these things we've talked about, Mordecai's encouraged

her every step of the way.

She realized that it's up on her shoulders in order to make the appeal to the king.

So she said, go assemble all the Jews who are found in Susa and fast for me.

And thus I will go into the king, which is not according to the law.

And if I perish, I perish.

Now that sounds like such a hopeless statement.

If I die, I die.

Wow.

We usually don't say those kinds of statements with a smile.

We usually say that with a lot of grief and heartbreak.

But here's what I see in the statement.

It's both a statement of hopelessness and a statement of hope.

I know it's hopeless from the human perspective, but I trust God and have courage enough to

know that I have hope that he would use it in a powerful way.

Now that's what faith is like.

We have faith and faithlessness at the same time.

Do you remember the man that came to Jesus?

And Jesus said, if you believe, you may be healed.

And he says, I do believe, but help me in my unbelief.

We all have this part of our lives where we can't believe fully, don't believe fully at

the moment.

But like that man, help me in my unbelief.

Jesus helps us in our unbelief.

And that's exactly what's happening with this woman right here.

And as she steps into the king's palace to make this request, it's incredible and almost

unbelievable how all the circumstances begin to fall into place.

And I'm gonna frame this with what I call the language of coincidences that other people

have done.

Using the phrase, it just so happens, even though I don't believe anything just so happens

to take place.

How many in the room are firm believers that everything in life is just a coincidence?

Would you raise your hand?

Please do not raise your hand.

Either you didn't hear the question or you're in a different time length than I am, a different

place.

If there's a God who's creator God, who is sovereign, who sits on the throne, are there

really any coincidences?

Nothing just so happens.

It all happens because God allows it to happen in a way that can later be redeemed in a powerful

way.

Let me try to tell the story in brief form.

It just so happens that Mordecai had earlier thwarted an uprising and it was recorded in

the king's book.

This took place before this encounter that we read about in chapter four.

It just so happened that Haman began to grow in pride.

This is the nemesis, this is the arch enemy.

He wants to put them all to death and he thinks that he's got the king on his side.

But it just so happened that the king couldn't sleep one night and had his servants read

the king's book, a history book.

It just so happens that Haman's story was right there when the servants opened up the

book to read about it.

It just so happens that the king had never rewarded him and that night decided, I'm going

to reward Mordecai for his good deed to me, but I need somebody to give me counsel.

It just so happens that Haman was in the court at that very moment to talk about his plan

to hang Mordecai and exterminate the Jews.

It just so happened the king asked Haman to honor and parade Mordecai to the whole city,

much to Haman's dismay and embarrassment.

And it just so happens that this delay in time gave Esther a chance to speak to the

king.

And she pointed out Haman's evil plot and the king stormed out.

Haman fell upon Esther, the queen, begging for mercy.

And it just so happens the king came back in to see Haman at Esther's feet and returned

at that precise moment.

It looked like Haman was assaulting her.

So while he was wondering what to do with evil Haman, it just so happened that one of

the eunuchs saw fit to mention that Haman had constructed gallows to be built upon which

to hang Mordecai.

And it just so happens that the king was told they're ready at this moment.

It just so happens that the king decided, hang Haman on it instead of Mordecai and I

will listen to Esther and save the Jewish people.

The language of coincidence.

It just so happens.

You should have none of that.

But you should have the sense that God can take complicated scenarios, like the back

of that tapestry, and be weaving something so much more clear, so much more powerful,

so much more redempting than you could ever possibly imagine.

I mean the book of Esther and the message is unmistakable.

God is there even when you can't see him, even when you can't hear him.

Even though you may not know what in the world God is doing, he's working everything according

to the counsel of his will.

It's only left for you to trust him.

He doesn't miss a detail.

He doesn't waste an experience.

He takes everything and molds it together for good.

And it may stress your faith to believe this and it may be really difficult for you to

believe that God causes all things to work together for good.

But I can tell you, it sure is the ground I'm standing on today.

God is going to be faithful to honor all of his promises and you can trust him the way

Esther trusted God to rescue her and her people.

You may only see the backside of your life until one day God flips it and shows you the

front side of your life.

And my prediction is it will be a beautiful picture if you just wait to see it.

Find hope.

Have courage even when you cannot see and hear God.

He is there working behind the scenes to create an amazing story in your life.

Yes.

You know the most important step that you take will always be a step of faith.

The first step is a step to put your faith and trust in Jesus Christ as Lord and Savior.

I mean God is demonstrating compassion through Jesus for you.

He's demonstrating the opportunity to have sins forgiven, the opportunity to have the

gift of eternal life, the opportunity for the Holy Spirit to live inside of you and

lead and guide you through every part of life.

With life so complicated don't we need a guide like the Holy Spirit to lead us through?

Don't we need someone to constantly encourage us and direct us and convict us and help us

keep from going the wrong way and help us stay on the right path?

Don't we need Him so bad and that all begins by placing His trust and faith in Jesus Christ

and then walking with Him day by day by day.

If you're going to clap sister go ahead and clap.

We'll all just do that together.

If you're going to clap you've got to commit right?

Priscilla you've got to do it.

I'm going to give you an invitation today.

That invitation is three-fold.

First of all we have decision stations that are here at each point of exit of our worship

center.

It's an opportunity for you to stop and talk to someone about putting your faith and trust

in Jesus Christ.

There were five people that were baptized earlier today that stopped at that decision

station just a couple of weeks ago and said I want to make sure that my relationship with

God is right and as they stopped they were counseled, they were walked with, prayed through

that decision and they joyously follow the Lord in baptism today.

We'd love to talk to you about that kind of decision.

So that's my first invite.

Please stop by one of those decision stations.

Put your faith and trust in Christ today.

The best thing you could possibly do.

Secondly if you're a guest I would invite you to come back to our guest reception center

right outside the center exit doors across the hallway.

I'd love to meet you personally and tell you a little bit about our church and I'll be

back there for a few moments but make your way back there.

You're a welcome guest here at our church.

Thirdly I invite you to take an invite card with you as you leave today at our exits and

bring someone back with you.

I'll be walking through these different stories each week pretty much in alignment with the

chapter headings that you'll see in the book, God's Not Done With You.

So many people need the hope and the encouragement of knowing God's not done with them and God

gives that message so plainly in so many different ways.

Would you stand with me for a word of prayer as we close?

Father I am so very grateful today that Esther's life was a life lived with such hope and such

courage in spite of the circumstance.

Father I pray today that you would encourage us through her life.

I pray for those today that don't know where they stand before you in terms of a relationship

with you.

Father I pray that you'd draw them to yourself because of your great love through Jesus.

Help them make that very important decision of placing their trust and faith in Jesus

Christ alone as the first step of faith.

And then Father I pray beyond that each of us will walk by faith day by day.

Thank you so much for what you're doing, what you'll do.

We ask this in Jesus name, amen.