Transcript Esther - Making a Difference

Welcome to Sha Tin Baptist Church
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Esther
Making a Difference
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Background
• Place: Persia
• Date: 483-473 B.C.
• 114 years after deportation of Jews in Esther’s clan
• 55 years after the 1st return of the Jews from
captivity (led by Zerubbabel in 538 B.C.)
• 22 years before the 2nd return
(led by Ezra in 458 B.C.)
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Unusual Book
• Written in Persia and probably censored
• God’s name not mentioned
• But God's acts and sovereignty could be
easily seen in the whole story
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What we can learn today
• God is with us even if we are away from our
homeland
• We can trust God in difficult times
• Our lives can make a difference too
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Esther’s Circumstances
• Orphan
• Raised by older cousin Mordecai
• Possibly tempted to complain
or feel sorry for self
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The Proud Pagan King
• King Xerxes shows off his
wealth for 180 days
• King Xerxes gives big 7 day
party with lots of wine
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The Party Pooper
• King gets drunk on 7th day
• King summons Queen Vashti to
show off her beauty
• Queen Vashti doesn’t obey King
Xerxes
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The Party’s Over
• King burns with anger
• King banishes Queen
Vashti from the royal
Persian palace
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King Xerxes seeks a new wife
• Searches all 127 provinces for
beautiful young virgins
• Brings all contestants into his
harem for the contest
• Esther taken because lovely in
form and appearance
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Esther’s Rags to Riches story
• One of many in the harem
• Won the favor of everyone
who saw her
• Won king’s favor and approval
more than any of the other virgins
• Made queen
Note: no coincidence;
God allowed all this
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Crisis
• Mordecai won’t compromise his faith
• Mordecai chooses to bow down
to God only and not to Haman
• Haman devises evil plot – asks
the king to have all Jews killed
• King agrees & issues decree
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Esther 4:1
Sorrow & Humility
When Mordecai learned all that had
been done, he tore his clothes, put on
sackcloth and ashes, and went out
into the midst of the city and wailed
loudly and bitterly.
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Esther 4:5
Query
Then Esther summoned Hathach
from the king's eunuchs whom the
king had appointed to attend her and
ordered him to go to Mordecai to
learn what this was and why it was.
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Esther 4:6,7
Report
So Hathach went out to Mordecai to the
city square in from of the king's gate. And
Mordecai told him all that had happened
to him and the exact amount of money
that Haman had promised to pay to the
king's treasuries for the destruction of the
Jews.
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Esther 4:8,9
S.O.S.
He also gave him a copy of the text of the
edict which had been issued in Susa for
their destruction that he might show
Esther and inform her, and to order her to
go in to the king to implore his favor and
to plead with him for her people. And
Hathach came back and related
Mordecai's words to Esther.
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The Challenge
• Someone from the Jews had to beg
the king for mercy
• The king did not know that Esther
was a Jew
• What if the king hated Jews?
• Would the king hate her?
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Esther 4:10,11
The Excuse
Then Esther spoke to Hathach him to reply to
Mordecai: "All the king's servants and the
people of the king's provinces know that for any
man or woman who comes to the king to the
inner court who is not summoned, he has but
one law, that he be put to death; unless the
king holds out to him the golden scepter so that
he may live. And I have not been summoned to
come to the king for these thirty days."
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Esther 4:12,13
Exhortation
And they related Esther's words to
Mordecai. Then Mordecai told them
to reply to Esther,"Do not imagine
that you are in the king's palace can
escape any more than all the Jews.
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Esther 4:14
Responsibility
For if you remain silent at this time, relief
and deliverance will arise from 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?"
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Esther 4:15,16
Step of Faith
Then Esther told them to reply to
Mordecai, "Go, assemble all the Jews
who are found in Susa, and fast for me:
do not drink or eat for three days, night or
day. I and my maidens also will fast in the
same way. And thus I will go in to the
king, which is not according to the law;
and if I perish, I perish."
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God works for His people
• King accepts Esther’s entry
• King offers her up to half of his kingdom
• The king has insomnia and
reads that Mordecai once
saved his life
• The king honors Mordecai
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God works (continued)
• Haman humbled
• Haman makes king angry
• King has Haman hanged
• King hires Mordecai as #2 man
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God works (continued)
• King asks Mordecai to help
him write a new decree in
behalf of the Jews as
seemed best to him!
• King had edict written to
all 127 provinces!
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God works (continued)
What the Jews were allowed
to do on the appointed day
(13th day of Adar)
• Assemble & protect themselves
• Destroy, kill and annihilate
anyone who might attack them
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New Celebration - Purim
• 14th and 15th days of Adar
(last month of Jewish calendar
– usually in Feb. or March each year)
• A continual reminder of God’s
deliverance and Esther’s heroism
• A celebration of the resting of the Jews
from the oppression of their enemies
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What we can learn today
• God is with us even if we are away from our
homeland
• We can trust God in difficult times
• Our lives can make a difference too
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Application 1
Thanksgiving & Praise
• Sincerely thank God that He is sovereign
in our lives – even in our less-than-ideal
situations
• Acknowledge that God does not make
mistakes - our lives are not the result of
chance; He designed them
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Application 2
Deal with Difficulties in a Righteous Way
• Pray (and possibly fast)
• Seek godly counsel – people who:
1. Know God and His Holy Word
2. Know God’s purposes
3. Understand the situation
4. Think & live a life set apart from the world
• Choose to do what is right
• Trust God for the outcome –
whether pleasant or unpleasant
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