God's Hidden Hand In Our Waiting | Esther

Providence family, it's a joy to see you and to sing with you.

Let's pray together, okay?

Father in heaven, we bow before you, our Maker.

We acknowledge your presence with us.

We want to open your word, and we believe that your word is power.

That when you speak in history, things have changed.

And so as we open your word now, we pray that you would not only open us, but change us and reform us, transform us.

Awaken our hearts to the truth of your word.

Give us courage to apply what we find.

God, would you also give us a holy curiosity to find unusual interest in what you have written and recorded and preserved?

We're grateful for the Bible, and we are dependent upon your spirit to make it clear to us.

And so would you please help us?

Help those who are tired of waiting.

We look to you in faith.

We pray in Christ's name.

Amen.

Amen.

Well, Providence, again, it is great to see you.

If you're a guest with us here, um, we're honored that you have joined us.

Um, as a church, our mission is to glorify God.

We do that by seeking to introduce people to Jesus Christ and then to grow them up to love and worship Him.

And so if you don't know Christ as your Savior and Lord, you need to know that we have intent.

And one of the things that we hope is going to take place, and I've been praying would take place this week, is that in response to God's word, when you hear the gospel, is that your faith is going to go out to Christ and you are going to be changed today.

Some of you do not know the Lord, you've never been introduced to the Lord.

You don't know what is about to happen in your life, but God is going to move in some of your hearts.

And I would just incline for you, if you're looking for someone in the world to commend your worth, if you're looking for someone to delight in you, you're looking for something in the world that if you imagine that if you receive that, then I would be happy and satisfied and content.

I pray that you will pray, that you will walk out knowing the answers to those questions, that you could know that someone delights in you and it happens to be the king.

For those of you who have put your trust in Christ already, our prayers the Lord is going to use this word in my hearts and in yours to grow our faith, to grow our worship and our love for Jesus Christ.

So if you have a Bible, turn with me to Esther chapter 5.

Esther 5 · chapter mention

We have the task this morning of looking at chapter 5 and chapter 6.

Esther is a pretty amazing story, just like all the stories of the Bible that points to Jesus Christ.

It's important to know that early in the Bible, when man sinned against God, God made a promise to send a Savior to reconcile us to God.

He said that this Savior would be born of a woman, it would be a son, and we're told that he would come through the Jewish line.

And therefore, throughout the Old Testament, what we find is that God, in order to keep his promise, he had to keep this Jewish line alive.

Most of the time, what we find is God's visible hand in the Old Testament.

He's using signs and wonders to save his people dramatically, but in Esther, we find hidden hands of God saving his people providentially.

Or God's hidden hands moving in time and space powerfully, sovereignly, to bring about his saving purposes for his people.

This is what Esther is about.

And Esther is set in Iran, Persia.

It has a king.

And in chapter one, we read about this king.

His name is Ahiswerus.

We know him as Xerxes.

And in chapter one, he throws two feasts.

The second feast on the last day, he gets drunk, and he orders his wife, Queen Vashti, to parade herself, her body in front of a bunch of drunken men.

She refuses, and so he removes her as queen.

Chapter one, just like most of the chapters, there's a lot of things in it that are pretty despicable.

In chapter two, the king needs a queen.

So his young advisors say, This is what we can do.

You have 127 provinces from India to Ethiopia under your command.

Let's just tell the officials to seek out beautiful virgins, to take them, to gather them in Susa, your capital city in your harem, and then they can beautify themselves for one year, and then they'll each get one night with the king, and the king will then choose his queen.

And he chooses this young, beautiful woman named Esther.

The king nor anyone else knows that she is a Jew.

When we get to chapter 3, we're introduced to the villain of the story.

His name is Haman, and we're introduced to him at the very time, same time that he is promoted as second in command of the whole Persian Empire.

Very powerful man, and the king ordered all of his servants that anytime you see Haman, you have to bow before him.

Well, Esther had a Jewish cousin named Mordecai.

And he was there at the king's gate and he refused to bow down to Haman.

And Haman hated him and eventually found out that he was Jewish and he hated the Jewish people.

And then he goes to the king and he convinces the king to sign an edict that 11 months from the day that anyone in the Persian Empire could look at their Jewish neighbors, and on this day, 11 months away, they could go and they could annihilate, kill, and destroy all the Jews, and they could plunder their goods.

So we get to chapter 4, and in chapter 4, Mordecai is devastated, as you can imagine, as are all the Jews.

And Mordecai goes to Esther and convinces Esther that she needs to go, even uninvited, into the throne room in order to appeal to mediate on behalf of the Jewish people, her people.

She fasts for three days and then she enters.

This section of the Bible is very important.

Because it answers a very important question that literally plagues all of our attention, and that is, what is God doing when we're waiting?

When we're waiting for things that are wrong to be made right, when we're waiting for doors to open, when we're waiting for burdens to go away, when we're waiting for blessings to come, what is he doing?

Two chapters is quite a bit, so we're going to break it into three sections, okay?

Starting in verse one.

On the third day, Esther put on her royal robes and stood in the inner court of the king's palace in front of the king's quarters, while the king was sitting on his royal throne inside the throne room, opposite the entrance to the palace.

And when the king saw Queen Esther standing in the court, she won favor in his sight, and he held out to Esther the golden scepter that was in his hand.

Then Esther approached, and she touched the tip of the scepter.

And the king said to her, What is it, Queen Esther?

What is your request?

It shall be given to you even to the half of my kingdom.

And Esther said, If it please the king, let the king and Haman come today to a feast that I have prepared for the king.

And then the king said, Bring Haman quickly, so that we may do as Esther has asked.

So the king and Haman came to the feast that Esther had prepared.

And as they were drinking wine after the feast, the king said to Esther, What is your wish?

It shall be granted you.

What is your request?

Even to the half of my kingdom, it shall be fulfilled.

And then Esther answered, My wish and my re and my request is, if I have found favor in the sight of the king, and if it please the king to grant my wish and fulfill my request, let the king and Haman come to the feast that I will prepare for them, and tomorrow I will do as the king has said.

The first thing, if you are a note taker, is God is providentially working even when decisions create a delay.

It may be your decisions, it may be someone else's.

Entering the king's throne room uninvited was illegal.

He cared about his privacy and his security.

And so if someone entered in uninvited, one of two things would happen to them.

One is they were immediately killed.

Or two, if the king looked within his heart, found mercy, and looked upon somebody who had come in with that much courage and showed favor to them, he would dip his golden scepter toward them, indicating that they had received his mercy to be able to live.

So you can imagine the holy hush that fell over the room, all the attendants and all the security guards when the queen entered uninvited.

If I want to talk to my wife about something that's important, I just go talk to her.

We talk frequently.

She calls it pillow talk, where we sit there, we're in bed, we're just looking up, and we start talking to one another.

That was not their marriage.

In chapter four, we were told that the king had not invited her into his presence for 30 days.

He had a whole harem of supermodels that he would just be with them, and she could only come into his presence when he invited her.

And now, all of a sudden, though, she had a task to mediate for people, to protect her people from dying.

Well, the king knew after, of course, he had extended to her.

In fact, in verse 2, it says, it says that she won favor in his sight, and he held out to Esther the golden scepter.

But the king would have absolutely known that you don't risk your life for nothing.

She has a request, and so in verse 3, he asked, What is your request?

It should be given you even to the half of my kingdom, which was not a literal statement.

It was hyperbole, simply saying, Look, my heart is predisposed to you.

I recognize your courage.

I recognize that there is something within your heart that has to substantiate that kind of courage and motivation to come into my presence.

There must be something really big on your heart.

My heart is for you.

What is it that I can do for you?

And instead of unloading her burden, she says, verse 4, let the king and Haman come today to a feast that I have prepared for the king.

Now you notice I have prepared his past tense.

This is important.

She did not know when she went in that she was going to receive mercy, but she was prepared if she did.

And why this is important is some people look at even this first feast and think, oh, she chickened out.

She could she had her shot.

Just like, go ahead and say it.

No, this was plan A.

Plan A for Esther was fill the man's belly before you fill his ear.

And so they meet.

The three of them eat.

And after dinner, they're drinking wine.

And the king thinks, I know she didn't risk her life today to have dinner for three.

And so he says to her once again, and asks, What is your request in verse six?

Even to the half of my kingdom, it shall be fulfilled.

Don't you see all the lights are green?

They're in a good mood, good food, good wine, open checkbook.

What do you want?

My heart's already saying yes.

What's on your heart?

This is the moment.

And what does she say?

Verse 7 If I found favor, let the king and Haman come to the feast that I will prepare for them.

Tomorrow I will do as the king said.

And I wait, what?

What?

What just happened?

Well, it seems like one of two things happened.

And neither Esther, this book, nor the rest of the Bible, comments on it, so we don't know exactly.

Either she got really afraid in that moment, thought, oh, let's just do this again tomorrow.

Maybe tomorrow I'll have a little bit more courage to be able to say what I need to say, or God put a check in her spirit.

It's not prepared.

Tomorrow's banquet is not prepared.

The first banquet was, that was her plan.

The second is not prepared.

And isn't it true there are times?

I I imagine it's not just me.

There are times when I know I need to say something that's really hard to somebody, and we're sitting there, and it's like, I don't think I could do it.

And I punt.

And then there's other times.

Isn't it true for you?

That I don't feel any fear whatsoever, but for whatever reason, I feel like the Lord puts a check on my spirit, and it's just like, it's just not time.

It's just not time.

The fact is that we don't know exactly what took place in her heart, but we do know this that Esther had to feel the pain of waiting all night.

And we also know that God's plans grew clearer in the delay.

Before we move on, let's think about an application here.

Let me encourage you to stretch to trust God's providence as we wait.

To trust his providence is one thing.

To stretch to trust it is another.

And the reason it's important to stretch is because sometimes we give ourselves a license not to trust him if we don't immediately trust him.

Sometimes we have to fight for our trust.

We have to go to the Lord and say, I believe, but help me with my unbelief.

That's straining to trust the Lord.

Let's just get something very clear.

Waiting is awful.

I mean, it really is.

None of us enjoy it.

And at times the pain is acute.

You see, if you have a burden in your life, something like anxiety or broken home, broken marriage, broken friendship, there's something that's a burden.

You have cancer, you have something in you that's like, I cannot wait for this to not be a part of my life.

It's hard to wait.

Similarly, it's also hard to wait when you know there's a blessing that's coming.

Some of us imagine, you know what, one day I'm gonna get married, one day I'm gonna have kids, one day I'm gonna retire.

We have something out in front of us.

We say, one day when that gets here, but it's hard to wait until that time.

It's also hard when there's injustice in the world and we're waiting for justice.

It's hard during uncertainty.

Do you know there are people right now, maybe even in this room, I know at Providence right now, I've seen a few even already this morning, to where they've been diagnosed with cancer, they've gone through the treatments, they finished their last treatment, now they have to wait a month or two until one more scan to see the effect of the treatment.

And that last section, it may not be harder than all the others, but it is still really hard to wait in that uncertainty.

Waiting requires hope.

That's why all through the Psalms, anytime you find someone waiting, hope, the word, is really close to it somewhere.

And the reason is because we stop waiting when we lose hope.

But isn't it true that hope begins to erode over time?

Which is why Proverbs 13, 12 says that hope deferred makes the heart sick.

If you keep waiting, you keep waiting, hope it gets thinner and thinner and thinner that it's actually gonna come to pass.

And as a result, many of us stop waiting and we start sinning, settling, and rushing.

But God is never in a hurry, friends.

God always uses his delays to mature the time and the person.

You remember how many times Jesus' disciples said, Is it time now?

Is it time now?

How long, O Lord, is it now?

Is it now that the Christ, you, the Christ, you're gonna do your work?

And what he kept saying, my hour is not yet come.

What does that mean?

It means the time had not yet matured, but it will.

And not only that, the disciples needed to mature.

You see, God is always at work and he knows that sometimes that we need to mature by holding on to that burden that's close that we want to leave, and there are other times that he knows that we're not ready to secure the blessing that is coming.

Some of us in this room right now, we want to be married so bad, and yet God looks and he says, You're not ready.

I could put the right person in your life, but if you're not the right person to absorb that person, you're gonna make the right person a bad marriage.

So it's always has intent, always has intent in the waiting.

So what we have to do is be faithful in the waiting.

And we have to strain to trust his providence in the waiting.

How do we do that?

A number of ways.

Number one is we hold fast to his promises.

We run to his promises, we open up the Bible and we say, God, what have you promised?

Because you never lie, you always fulfill what you say you're going to do.

When you open up the Bible, what happens is your trust or your hope that has been thinned because of the waiting, it gets thicker.

Your trust gets more dense, full, and strong.

So we have to run to his word.

We also need people in our life.

If you remember what she did, she fasted for three days, but she fasted and called every Jewish person in Susa to fast with her.

She had all these people by her side rooting for her, waiting for her to do what she was doing and going to the king on their behalf.

And sometimes we simply need people to pray with us.

We need people close to us.

We need community.

We need people to remind us of the promises of God.

We need people in our life.

We also need to pray.

That's another way to strain to trust the Lord.

And you know what?

Unlike Esther, who had to go before a king and not know if she was going to live once she got there.

The Bible tells us that because of Jesus Christ and his work to give us access to God Almighty, he says to us, let us then with confidence draw near to the throne of grace that we may receive mercy and find grace to help in time of need.

The last word that I often think about when I'm trying to strain from my own hope and trust in the Lord is the word prod, and that is, I ask the Lord to prod.

There are some times I need to let Him do the work, and I need to wait for Him to do the work, and there's other times when He says, actually, there's something for you to do right now.

And so for me, the fact is I have a personal life just like you.

I have a family like many of you, like all of you.

I also, there's a church, there's all of all of you, lots of burdens.

The fact is that every time I heard someone with a burden, I'm running after that burden.

The fact is I'm running everywhere, and you just can't live that way.

So what I do is when I once a quarter, I go in because I just can't remember all of it.

I can't carry it all, and I'd say, God, here's the things that burden my heart.

And I make a long list.

And I say, Lord, this is my prayer list.

I'm asking you to do it.

I know that you can fix everything here without me having to do anything.

If it's still there in a quarter, I know it's on me.

But in between now and then, if there's anything you want me to do, anyone you want me to call, just prod my heart.

Tell me what to do.

Don't let me sleep.

Put their name in my heart.

Force them to call me.

Waiting on the Lord.

So he's providentially at work, even when there's these lengthy delays.

Verse 9, we pick up the story again.

And Haman went out that day, joyful and glad of heart.

But when Haman saw Mordecai in the king's gate, that he neither rose nor trembled before him, he was filled with wrath against Mordecai.

Nevertheless, Haman restrained himself and went home, and he sent and brought his friends and his wife Zarish.

And Haman recounted to them the splendor of his riches, the number of his sons, and all the promotions with which the king had honored him, and how he had advanced him above the officials and the servants of the king.

Then Haman said, Even Queen Esther, let no one but me come with the king to the feast she prepared.

And tomorrow also I am invited by her together with the king.

Yet all this is worth nothing to me, so long as I see Mordecai the Jew sitting at the king's gate, then his wife Zarish and all his friends said to him, Let a gallows fifty cubits high, that's 75 feet, be made.

And in the morning tell the king to have Mordecai hanged upon it, then go joyfully with the king to the feast.

This idea pleased Haman, and he had the gallows made.

The second thing I want you to see is that God is providentially working even when the wicked are strutting.

It's irritating to watch wicked, proud people strut about.

But God is working even in that time.

Let me show you.

During this unsatisfying pause between Esther's first and second feast.

The camera pans to this man named Haman who is emotionally volatile.

Look what it says in verse 9.

He went out that day, joyful and glad of heart.

It's a pretty good day he's having.

When he saw Haman, I'm sorry, when Haman saw Mordecai, that he neither rose nor trembled.

It says that he was filled with wrath.

At one point of the day he's full of joy, and another point of the day he's full of wrath.

It's really interesting when it says full of, what it means is there's no room for anything else.

His wrath at the moment that he saw him, all the blessing and his memory of the blessing eviscerated within his heart, and all he could feel was wrath.

There is no doubt that Mordecai was the fly in Haman's soup.

I mean, he's got a whole life of blessing.

The only problem he has is there's one man who has no power, who won't bow and doesn't tremble when he walks by.

Such an arrogant man strutting about.

But verse 10 says that he restrained himself and he went home.

And notice it says he sent and brought his friends and his wife Zerish.

I underline that because they weren't waiting for him.

He had to send for them.

Do you see that?

He sent and brought.

That means they weren't there like, hey, how was it?

Tell me all about it.

No, he went home, they weren't there, and he says, I need to, I have something I want to do, and so there's nobody here.

I need to send and bring them in.

And what makes it so amazing is what he did when they got there.

And that is verse 11.

He recounted to them the splendor of his riches, the number of his sons, and all the promotions with which the king had honored him.

In other words, he throws his very own Haman Awards.

It was hosted by Haman himself.

It's like, let me tell you, okay, I'm a really rich man.

Let me tell you how rich I am.

There's four nominees.

They're all named Haman, and the winner is Haman.

I'm so rich.

This is how rich I am.

He says, this is amazing.

He says he boasted about how many sons he has.

To his wife.

To his wife.

It's crazy.

And then he's boasting about his titles and his promotions.

And he goes, and you're not going to believe it.

Three people in the whole empire got to got to go to this feast.

The queen, the king, and me.

His favorite, her favorite, it's me.

Now enough about me.

What do you love about me?

I mean, it was just so full of himself.

And then he says, verse 13, but this is worth nothing to me so long as I see Mordecai sitting at the king's gate.

Now, this is amazing.

Friends, this is so important.

Hatred creates an insatiability.

And some of you you've been hurt really bad.

And if you do not forgive, then what happens is that hurt turns into bitterness, and that bitterness turns into resentment.

That resentment turns into hatred, and that hatred will rob your life of every good thing.

It won't be because good things aren't there.

It's that your heart will not be able to absorb and enjoy them.

He says, notice what he says, all of this is worth nothing to me so long as I see that man and he's still alive.

And some of us we are blessed beyond measure, but we have hatred in our heart, and therefore we feel ourselves impoverished.

Repent and forgive.

As the Lord has forgiven us, so we must forgive those who sin against us.

She and her friends, his friends, they advise him to build a set of gallows.

We'll talk about the gallows, what they built, because it was different than what you probably imagine next week when they're used.

75 feet tall.

In chapter 7, we're told that Zarish this request, this idea, it's going to allow him to go.

This is amazing.

Go kill a man, and then you can go to the next feast happy.

But you know what's crazy?

Chapter 7 says that this was built in their backyard.

So this is a wife saying, you know what would go real good next to the petunias?

A gallow 75 feet tall that we can hang a man on.

And it makes me think of Proverbs 14:1, it says, The wisest of women builds her house, but folly with her own hands tears it down.

Proverbs 14:1

A man, sure enough, will be hanging from these gallows soon, but not the man that she supposes.

So let me encourage us to consider before we move on God's long record towards pride and humility.

Friends, it was Jesus, the Son of God, our creator and our final judge, who came to the earth and said, Come to me, all you who are weary and heavy laden, and I will give you rest.

Learn from me, for I'm humble in heart.

Think about that.

Your judge, the one who's going to look at your life and character and determine your everlasting future, says, You learn from me that I'm humble.

I'm humble.

Did you know there's not a religion in the world except for the gospel of Jesus Christ that features a humble God?

It's uninventable.

If you sat down and said, I'm gonna create a God that Marvel is gonna make a comic and then movies out of, you wouldn't go, what's his central attribute?

Humility.

It doesn't come out of us.

Pride comes out of us.

But this is the same God who says to us, This is the one in Isaiah 66, whom I look at and regard.

He who is humble and contrite in spirit and who trembles at my word.

This is the same God who says in Matthew 23, whoever exalts himself will be humbled, and whoever humbles himself will be exalted.

You see, he knows things about pride.

He knows how pride is so harmful to us.

It's harmful to us personally.

Pride is personally harmful, and this is why.

We're never so empty as when we're full of ourselves.

And you don't have to be boasting to be full of yourself.

You can be self-loathing all day long.

The fact is, there's a commonality between someone who walks around saying, I'm amazing, and someone else who says I'm terrible all day long.

And that is, they're both thinking about themselves.

And therefore, both people live a very empty day of life.

It's harmful to us personally.

It's also harmful to us socially.

In fact, in James, it says, wherever you find selfish ambition, it creates evil, chaos, and disorder.

It breaks relationships up, this pride, but it's also historically harmful.

See, friends, the very first sin in the world, it was pride that led Satan to rebel against God in heaven.

And then in the garden, it was pride that led humanity to rebel against God.

And Proverbs 16 says, pride goes before destruction and a haughty spirit before a fall.

I realize today there are wicked people strutting about, proud people strutting about, proud people who are very wealthy and who have great position and sometimes sit in the highest places of government all over the world.

And you think, well, what about them?

It seems like God's just letting it happen.

Friends, let me tell you something: the proud will be humbled.

You just have to wait for it.

And we see that next in chapter six.

On that night, the king could not sleep.

And he gave orders to bring the book of memorable deeds, the chronicles, and they were read before the king, and it was found written how Mordecai had told about Big Thana and Terish, two of the king's eunuchs who guarded the threshold and who had sought to lay hands on King Ahasuerus.

And the king said, What honor or distinction has been bestowed on Mordecai for this?

And the king's young men who attended him said, Nothing has been done for him.

And the king said, Who is in the court?

Now Haman had just entered the outer court of the king's palace to speak to the king about having Mordecai hanged on the gallows that he had prepared for him.

And the king's young men told him, Haman is there standing in the court.

And the king said, Let him come in.

So Haman came in, and the king said to him, What should be done to the man whom the king delights to honor?

And Haman said to himself, Well, whom would the king delight to honor more than me?

And Haman said to the king, For the man whom the king delights to honor, let royal robes be brought, which the king has worn, and the horse that the king has ridden, and on whose head a royal crown is set, and let the robes and the horse be handed over to one of the king's most noble officials, and let them dress the man whom the king delights to honor, and let them lead him on the horse through the square of the city, proclaiming before him, Thus shall it be done to the man whom the king delights to honor.

And the king said to Aman, Hurry, take the robes and the horse that you have said, and do to Mordecai the Jew who sits at the king's gate, leave nothing out that you have mentioned.

So Haman took the robes and the horse, and he dressed Mordecai and led him through the square of the city, proclaiming before him, Thus shall it be done to the man whom the king delights to honor.

Then Mordecai returned at the king's gate, but Haman hurried to his house, mourning and with his head covered, and Haman told his wife Zarish and all his friends everything that had happened to them.

Then his wise man and his wife Zerish said to him, If Mordecai before whom you have begun to fall, is of the Jewish people, you will not overcome him, but will surely fall before him.

While they were yet talking with him, the king's eunuchs arrived and hurried to bring Haman to the feast that Esther had prepared.

The third and last thing I want you to see is that God is providentially working to exalt the humble and humble the proud.

In Proverbs chapter 22, we're told that God Almighty providentially directs the thoughts of the king just as he directs water down a stream.

Proverbs 22 · chapter mention

He wouldn't let the king sleep.

Sometimes that happens.

And so they bring in a book, an old book, of deeds, the chronicles, to read to him.

Maybe it was really boring.

I thought this'll help.

This will help put him to sleep.

We don't know exactly.

But they happen to turn to the very page of an event that featured Mordecai.

How in chapter 2 he saved the king's life.

Two of the king's servants wanted to kill the king.

He overheard them talking about their plot to assassinate the king.

He made it known, save the king's life.

These lines were written down, but he was never rewarded.

So the king asked the question Well, what honor and distinction has been bestowed on Mordecai for this?

And they say, You haven't done anything for him.

And about that time, Haman came to seek permission to kill Mordecai.

So we have two men who want to both talk to each other about the same guy.

But the king is the king, so he gets to talk first.

And he says, Let me ask you something, Haman, what should be done to the man whom the king delights to honor?

You can imagine Haman sitting there thinking, Well, you know, king, I really have some pressing matters, but this sounds pretty juicy and fun.

So let's go with yours first.

Assuming that he was only wanting to honor himself, Haman gave his wish list.

Let royal robes be brought, which the king has worn, and the horse that the king has ridden, and on whose head the royal crown is set.

Lead him on the horse to the square of the city, proclaim before him, thus shall be done to the man whom the king delights to honor.

And the king says, That is such an incredible idea.

Now go do that to Mordecai.

Man, can you imagine how bitter those words taste coming out of his mouth on that city street?

This is the man the king that delights to honor.

God exalts the humble and he humbles the proud.

Haman hurried to his house, mourning, his head covered, he gets home.

And his wife and friends it's really amazing.

They pronounce doom upon him.

And suddenly there's a knock at the door because Esther's second feast is ready to be served.

We'll talk about that next week, but before we close and take the Lord's Supper, I want us to consider something, and that is on the basis of what we just read, let's consider the longings of our own heart.

One of the most important things that you can spend time thinking about is this if the king said to you, What honor should I give to the man or woman that the king delights to honor, and you were convinced it was you, what would you ever ask for?

Because that is a window into the unmet desires and needs of our heart.

It tells us what we think we could be happy, how we could be content and be at peace if we had those things.

You see, friends, Haman was more than a villain.

He was a man made in the image of God.

His villainy was sprung from unmet desires in his heart, just like ours.

You see, for a king to use his robes and his horse that has been on his back and put it upon another man's back was to tell all the people the king delights in this man.

And so Haman wanted to be delighted in by the king.

Haman thought, if people knew that I was loved by the king, they would know my worth, and therefore I would know my worth.

Some of you want so badly to know your worth.

You'll only know it if you look to Jesus.

You see, Haman's request literally was what we all want: a king to tell us that he delights in us and commends our value to others.

Haman's problem was really not his request.

It was he went to the wrong king.

For the book of Esther, just like the entire book of the Bible, points to Jesus, the true and better king, the greater king, the true Savior who would come.

And you can do what I'm about to do with this section in five lines with any story in the Old Testament.

Think about it.

Xerxes could see as far as the front door from his throne.

But Jesus, the King of Kings, sees all things, for all creation is his own.

Xerxes could not be approached without a decree.

But Jesus opened the way to heaven to the Father for you and for me.

Xerxes sat on his throne on earth and extended his golden scepter.

But Jesus left his heavenly throne in order to bring us something infinitely better.

Esther mediated between the Persians and the Jews as a Persian queen and a Jewish woman, but Jesus mediates between God and man as fully God and fully human.

Haman sought a robe of honor, hoping that all would see, and Jesus was stricken naked, nailed and crucified to a tree.

But friends, on the third day, the true king rose from the dead to prove that his death was not to pay for his own sin, but it was to pay for ours, to prove that he had the power and the authority to defeat death and sin itself.

And when he rose from the dead, he extended an invitation that if we would put our faith in Christ, if we would acknowledge that we have a sin problem and a debt with God that we can't pay, that we would believe in Christ and his death and resurrection, confess him as Lord, take the reins of our life, the control of our life, and hand it to him and saying, I surrender to you and you alone.

The Bible says that we will be forgiven, given eternal life, given his righteousness, justified before God, but even more so, adopted into his family.

And now what happens when you're adopted into his family?

Well, God the Father one time looked at his son and said, What?

This is my son with whom I'm well pleased.

He delighted in him and he commended to everyone else his worth.

And what does he do to his adopted children?

You and me.

He says to us, This is my son and daughter with whom I'm well pleased.

He delights in us in a public way, and he commends to one another our worth.

And friends, you will be straining to be delighted in, and you will be straining to be commended of your worth until you come to Christ.

You can't make enough money for people to care about you.

You have to come to Christ.

And many of us, like Xerxes, became so pre who became so preoccupied with life that he couldn't see a good deed from Mordecai done to himself.

Many of us are so preoccupied that we cannot see the ultimate good deed of Christ that was done on our behalf.

Friends, I want you to know there is no greater king.

He was stripped that we would be robed, and he was wounded that we would be healed.

And so I urge you today to put your trust in Christ.

Put your trust in Christ.

In a moment, we're going to take the Lord's Supper.

And for those of you who have never put your faith in Christ, the Bible tells me to say, don't take it, because to take it is to indicate to other people that you treasure the body and blood of Jesus, your Savior, that we're seeking to remember and proclaim when we take it.

He tells those of us who have believed in Christ to never take it unless we confess our sins.

So I'm going to give you a moment right now to do that.

But friends, listen, if you're here and you've never put your faith in Christ, I would encourage you to stop listening and start calling out to him.

If you believe, you say, I believe, use this prayer time, use this prayer time right now to say, Christ, I see, I believe.

I believe that you are the way, the truth, and the life.

I have a sin problem.

I believe in you, and I confess you as Lord.

And the Bible says that you too will be forgiven.

I urge you, I urge you to commend you to Christ.

So let me give you a moment to pray, just you and the Lord.

As they have called out to you in faith, I pray that you would give them peace in their heart.

You would speak your joy and delight into their heart by your spirit.

And you give them courage to walk before you all the days of their life.

In a manner that is fitting, full of faith, looking to you as their leader and guide.

Thank you, Jesus, for forgiving us of our sin and for shedding your blood to make it possible.

We pray in Christ's name.

Amen.

On the night Jesus was betrayed, he took bread and he broke it.

It was a symbol of his body that would be broken the next day.

And he told us that we're to do this to remember his sacrifice for us, but also to proclaim to one another without words that we believe it.

That's what we're about to do.

When we take this bread, you're telling other people, I'm a Christian and I am not ashamed to follow Jesus Christ.

So if you know Christ as your Savior and Lord, then take and eat in remembrance of Him.

And then He took a cup that had wine in it that looked like blood.

And he took the time to talk about how the blood wasn't going to be wasted on the ground, but rather it was going to begin a new covenant, that his body was going to bleed so badly as it was broken, that he would die.

He said the beauty of the blood is it's going to begin a new covenant that your sins won't simply be covered, they'll be completely removed from you.

And so if you know the joy of being forgiven, truly forgiven, and you know it's because of Jesus' willingness to bleed on your behalf, to take and drink in remembrance of Him.

Father in heaven, we love you and we are grateful.

We are amazed at your love for us.

And we love you.

Jesus, we ask that you would give us by your spirit the power to wait and to endure in faith and to stretch our faith, to stretch our trust, to pursue humility, and to consider the longings of our heart.

And now we pray that you would help us to sing as people who believe.

We pray in Christ's name.

Amen.