Pastor Steve Hall teaches from Esther 2 on God’s sovereign providence working through ordinary circumstances. This sermon reveals how God orchestrates events behind the scenes to accomplish His purposes even when His name is not explicitly mentioned.
Transcript
Please turn with me once again to the book of Esther. We’re going to look at most of chapter 2 today, because we’re expanding on this and taking a look at the book of Esther, considering particularly God’s providence and working in all circumstances of our life, in all circumstances of life. And so that’s really the goal. So we’re talking about how God uses some of the seemingly everyday events to to bring about ultimately the blessing for his children, for his people, and ultimately to his glory.
That’s what we looked at last week when we considered chapter 1. We looked at chapter 1 through verse 4 of chapter 2. And we that last week we looked at the rise of Xerxes. How Xerxes became really the most politically powerful man in the world. How his kingdom was vast. The Persian Empire was great, as it says in verse 2, over 127 provinces. It stretched all, you know, through the almost the whole known world at the time. And he didn’t quite take Greece. So he’s warring, he’s bringing about a war against Greece. So that’s what’s going on in chapter 1 mostly.
He’s displaying his wealth. He’s throwing these two pretty lavish parties, which shows how incredibly wealthy he is to all of his dignitaries throughout his empire. And then he wants to put his wife on display, the Queen Vashti, who is his most beautiful treasure and she refuses to come. He’s a bit intoxicated when he made that request, and he’s a bit intoxicated in the things that follow. And so after after she refuses to come, he ends up signing a decree which would depose her. She’s no longer to be allowed in his presence at all. And that was signed into the law of the Medes and Persians, which is something that not even the king, not even Xerxes himself, could revoke. So it was permanent law. That’s what’s taken place.
Then at the beginning of chapter 2, he remembers Vashti, I think, in his more sober moment. He’s no longer angry. He thinks about Vashti and how beautiful she was. And then he remembers what she did. And then he remembers what he decreed. And there’s a lot of regret there. And so he’s probably feeling sorry for himself. And one of his attendants suggests that they search all of the 127 provinces of his empire to bring the most beautiful women back to him. And he would choose out of one of them the queen, his new queen, and that pleased him. And so the things that come next begin to unfold.
And so it’s here that we are introduced to some very important people in this book. We are able to see a Jew whose name is Mordecai and his adopted daughter whose name is Hadassah or Esther. So we’re going to meet her in just a moment. I’m going to try to read this in sections. So I’m going to read verses 5 through 9. And then and then we’ll and then we’ll ask God’s blessing on all of his word. In fact, I’m going to do it in reverse order today. I’m going to ask God’s blessing first and then we’ll read this in sections.
Father, as we approach this passage today, we pray for your blessing and spiritual insight. We pray, Father, for the equipping power of your Holy Spirit to waken our hearts to truth. Father, to help us see why you have this in your word. The precious glory that it is to you, and the terrific good that it is for us. How we owe our salvation to our Savior, the Lord Jesus, to your works of providence through history. We thank you, Lord, for your kindness and grace in giving us this passage, which teaches us so well how you work. Life is so difficult, life is so difficult. We often don’t understand what’s going on. And yet, Lord, we know we can trust you. Strengthen that trust as we explore this book together, we pray, in Jesus’ name. Amen.
God’s Sovereign Selection
So I’m going to begin reading. This is God’s Holy Word, the book of Esther, chapter 2, beginning in verse 5. I’ll read through verse 9.
Now there was at the citadel of Susa a Jew whose name was Mordecai, the son of Jair, the son of Shimei, the son of Kish, a Benjaminite, who had been taken into exile from Jerusalem with the captives who had been exiled with Jeconiah, king of Judah, whom Nebuchadnezzar, the king of Babylon, had exiled. He was bringing up Hadassah, that is Esther, his uncle’s daughter, for she had no father or mother. Now the young lady was beautiful of form and face, and when her father and her mother, and when her father and mother died, Mordecai took her as his own daughter. So it came about when the command and the decree of the king were heard and many young ladies were gathered to the citadel of Susa into the custody of Hegai that Esther was taken to the king’s palace into the custody of Hegai, who was in charge of the women. Now the young lady pleased him, found favor with him, so he quickly provided her with her cosmetics and food, gave her seven choice maids from the king’s palace and transferred her and her maids to the best place in the harem.
That’s God’s word thus far.
So the first thing that we see in this chapter is God’s sovereign selection. The fact that he uses ordinary people to carry out his great purposes. God chooses people who are absolutely ordinary. In fact, in this case, when you’re talking about Esther in particular and Mordecai, you’re talking about people who were not in the most elevated places of power in the country and in that kingdom. In fact, when Mordecai is introduced to us in this in this passage, he’s introduced to us as Mordecai the Jew.
God sovereignly places his people where he wants them. He takes ordinary people and he uses them to extraordinary ends. So when this as this story unfolds, God has is working, bringing to for people who are absolutely common and ordinary. Mordecai is introduced as a Jew.
Now the word “Jew” is interesting. This is the first time it’s used I believe in the book of Esther, I’m pretty sure that’s right. It’s interesting because it’s used about 15 times in the rest of the Bible. And “Jew” and “Jews” is used about 52 times in the book of Esther. Does that sound kind of intriguing just in itself? Not all the rest of the in all the rest of the Old Testament. The word the word Jew and Jews, I think it’s about 15 or 16 times somewhere right around that. But in the book of Esther, it’s used 52 times.
And that’s because this book is showing something very something true about these people. They were brought into captivity, first through Babylon, and now they’re in Persia. They’re a subjugated people. They’re a people who in this in that nation of Persia were a marginalized people. They weren’t thought of well, generally speaking. You know, they were a defeated people who generally kept to themselves. They kept their own laws, even when those laws conflicted with the king. And so that’s an interesting thing to keep in mind. All of that you can find in the book of Esther, those very words almost that I just said.
And so it’s true, they are a people that and yet, you see, when when they were first brought into Babylon, the goal was to assimilate them. The goal of bringing the Jews the Jewish people that they brought into Babylon was so that they would become part of the kingdom. They they were forced almost to adopt the culture. They the focus was for them to to be to blend in, to be part of it, to actually to to melt into that community, you know, the melting pot idea. But that didn’t happen. The Jewish people remained a the Jewish people. They they didn’t intermarry. They they stayed faithful to themselves. Even though in this it becomes evident in the book of Esther that they are scattered all over this empire. They’re in pockets all over this empire, they’ve been scattered throughout the empire.
And so it’s interesting, they’re a marginalized people and they’re not liked. They’re not loved. And yet they’re so important. Do you remember the words of Jesus to the Samaritan woman at the well, he says, “Salvation is of the Jews.” It’s an important thing to keep in mind. The program of salvation that God has in the Old Testament is the ultimately for the good and salvation of everyone, every child of God who is going to come to to faith in God, in the church. And so it’s that he works through that to provide a Redeemer.
As this passage unfolds, there’s a storm brewing on the horizon. And there’s a great spiritual battle that’s about to break loose in the physical world. Satan is at work, devising and orchestrating a plan that that threatens all of the people of God at the time, all of the Jewish people, and God’s plan to bring redemption to the world. That’s what’s at stake. We’ll explain that next week. But but God is at work, and he’s positioning his people way before anyone knows anything about it. For for Mordecai, for Esther, there doesn’t seem to be a cloud in the sky, except for their own troubles. They don’t know anything is coming. But God does. And so he’s already at work, positioning his people to be at the right place and in the right time, so that he can accomplish his perfect purpose. That’s what we’re seeing as chapter 2 unfolds. It’s a it’s an incredible thing.
You know, I don’t know how many of you are familiar with the game of chess, but you may be at least familiar with the pieces. And the on a chessboard, you’ve got like five different kinds of a piece. You’ve got a king, which is the most important piece on the board. If it’s captured, the game’s over. You’ve got the queen, which is the most powerful piece on the board. You know, when you think generally speaking, you’re thinking of that, it’s the most powerful piece on the board. Then you have rooks and then bishops and knights, and they all have different power, and then you have a little lowly pawn, which is hardly that makes six, doesn’t it? A lowly pawn. Anyway, so you have you have those all those pieces. Now, the pawn, you know, people don’t respect pawns nearly enough.
That’s what we’re seeing here. These are the pawns. You know what’s interesting in a game of chess? That like, in the very opening of the game, the queen’s power is all just potential power. It can’t do a thing. In the first move of the game, it has no power at all. A pawn has more power than the queen. And later in the game, if the pawn is in just the right place, it is far more powerful than a queen. At the right place and the right time, any of those pieces, depending on where they are positioned, position is crucial. What what God is doing here is positioning his people. They’re not pawns in a game, I don’t mean to imply that, that’s just an illustration. They’re his people. He cares about them. That unfolds as you see the story unfold. But he is placing them just where he wants them in order to accomplish great, great good through them.
So there was a man, his name was Mordecai and he lives in the city of Susa, and he’s the son of Jair, the son of Shimei, the son of Kish, a Benjaminite. Now that’s that’s interesting to me too. The fact that his a descendant of Kish. He’s a Benjaminite and he’s a descendant of Kish. Now I meant to say before in the introduction a while ago that to call her attention back to to Saul in the Old Testament, because King Saul, if King Saul had been obedient to God, we wouldn’t have the book of Esther. It wouldn’t be necessary. The bad events that are about to happen wouldn’t have taken place. Maybe something else would have happened, but this would not have happened.
And so it’s interesting to me that you have this name Kish in the line of Benjamin. You remember Saul is a Benjaminite. And you remember who his father is? His father’s name is Kish. You remember him, don’t you? Kish, the man of Benjamin, the son of Abiel, the son of Zeror, the son of Bechorath. I’m having a little trouble reading my 6 point type that I’ve got. Anyway, you remember that Saul’s father, a mighty man of valor, was this man named Kish. And here reading this, Mordecai’s grandfather, at least, is named Kish. It may be more than that. I’m going to argue, and I can’t argue this 100%. I mean, it may not be the most likely thing, but I find this really intriguing, because I started exploring it to see if it was possible. And it is possible what I’m about to tell you. And that is this reference here to Kish might be the father of Saul. That might be exactly what the the point of this passage, that it’s bringing us back to Saul. And if that’s the case, then here’s how it works.
When you when you see a genealogy in the Old Testament, like this one, there is no Hebrew word. It’s a very cumbersome thing for them to talk about a grandfather, because there’s no word for grandfather in the Hebrew language in the in the Old Testament. And so when they talk about sons, they meant they can mean the whole line. We’re all the sons of Adam, the daughters of Eve, you know, in the C.S. Lewis configuration of that. It’s exactly the same way in the Old Testament. You can you’re you’re your grandson is your son, you know, that’s the way the language flows. And so it’s quite possible and sometimes happens that significant figures in the line are pulled out when giving a genealogy. I think that is likely what’s happening here. I don’t know that certainly.
So let’s argue against it for a minute. See the strong argument against what I’ve just said is true. And if you’re going to look at that, what’s the problem with that view? Well, look at verse 6, “Who had been taken into exile from Jerusalem with the captives who had been exiled with Jeconiah king of Judah.” Well, who who does that who refer to? What’s the antecedent of who? What what does the who refer to? Well, the first possibility and strong possibility, just grammatically, would be Mordecai. It’s it could he could Mordecai was had been taken into exile from Jerusalem. You know what the problem with that is? If Mordecai was taken into captivity in Jerusalem, then he would be at least 120 years old. And not just that, but Esther would be at least 70 years old. It just didn’t seem really probable to me. And I don’t think it’s likely, so it’s not Mordecai. The who doesn’t refer back to him.
Well, the next most likely possibility is Kish the Benjaminite, which would be like his grandfather. Well, it could be. He could be a man named Kish, his grandfather, who was taken into captivity. It couldn’t be readily speaking, Kish the father of Saul. And the reason would be, by the time Kish lived to the time when they were taken into captivity, about 500 years passed. So Kish would have to be 500 years old when he was taken into captivity. So that seems highly improbable. But you see, there’s there’s one more interesting thing here, and that is that that is a collective reference. In Hebrew, sometimes this whole passage is talking about the whole family was taken into captivity. Yeah, began way back there, but their family line. What happened to this family line? Well, they were brought into captivity. That’s a real possibility. It’s a grammatical possibility in Hebrew. In fact, it is the way the Hebrew, it’s the primary way that people understand when the Jews translated this book into the Greek language during the a couple hundred years before Jesus. That seems to be the way this passage reads, that it’s it’s the family line that’s considered. So it’s a possibility. If it’s the family line that’s considered, then that leaves room for my first thesis.
But either way, God chose a Benjaminite. Quite possibly, possibly, someone who’s very closely related to Paul’s line, I mean, Saul’s line, Saul and Paul, Saul’s line. And and if not if not a descendant of Saul, I think that’s intriguing. The other thing that fascinates me here is that if it’s true for him, it’s probably very true for his cousin, whom he adopts, Esther. Esther is an orphan. He has pity on her. He adopts her as his own child. This this he he’s much older. He’s a cousin, but he’s much older and he takes pity on this child. You know, she she was the least of the least when she was born. Her chances of survival there, what are they? Nothing. If Mordecai hadn’t hadn’t taken compassion on her. So he takes compassion on her. And she is a child, and one of the first things that’s said about her is that she is a beautiful, a beautiful child. She’s a beautiful girl. And that becomes evident and a key factor as the story unfolds.
Why I think that’s interesting is because she she’s obviously of the tribe of Benjamin. She could possibly be a descendant of Saul. You remember how Saul’s introduced in the Bible? Kish, a mighty man of valor, had a son whose name was Saul, a choice and handsome man. Isn’t that interesting? You know why Saul was so readily accepted by the Jewish people, by the Jews to be their king? It’s because he was tall and handsome. That’s why. It’s it’s it’s what the scripture says. He was tall and handsome, and they were attracted to him, and he gains power because of that. Now, a potential great, great, great, great, great granddaughter, whose chief thing that’s mentioned, first thing, is that she’s incredibly beautiful. She’s amazingly beautiful. I just think that’s kind of interesting.
So here she is, Esther, born, being brought up. Her name was, her Jewish name was Hadassah. They would give names, usually after a god. Esther could be Persian for star, or it could be Ishtar the goddess. But they did that just like with all of the, Mordecai’s named after Marduk, probably. Those aren’t those are pagan names. See. And the reason that they’re pagan names is because the goal was for them to assimilate into culture, so they were given these names. They didn’t choose those names for themselves. And and so just like Daniel’s named as Belteshazzar, he’s named after a god. Hananiah, Mishael and Azariah were given pagan names. Shadrach, Meshach and Abednego. Yeah. So you have you have that principle going on, because they were supposed to be assimilated. They didn’t assimilate. They stayed Jews. They stayed to themselves, they stayed true to themselves. And this is what’s happened here. And so this beautiful girl, who’s named Hadassah, which is she’s named after the most beautiful tree in Israel, which was the myrtle tree. She is orphaned. And so she is thought probably less than of any value. She’s the least of the least. But not to God. He cares about her. And not to Mordecai, who takes pity on her and takes her in and raises her. So she’s raised by Mordecai.
It came to pass, it says, when the king’s commandment and decree was heard, that she was taken into the king’s court. And the idea here, the implication there, is that she didn’t have a choice in this. She was taken. This is not like, oh, here’s an announcement, here’s a great beauty pageant, and you want to enter? That’s not what’s happening here. No. No, she the his his his people went through the whole empire, gathering the most beautiful women to take back to him, and they had no choice in it. They had no choice. Can you imagine what this would be like for a young Jewish girl, who is they see her, they say, you’re coming with us, you’re coming to the king’s palace, and she knows what’s ahead of her, and it is not good. The most likely thing is she’s going to be a concubine of the king, and who wants that? It’s it’s a terrible thing. It’s it’s slavery. It’s horrible. All of her plans. If she had a dream of a particular young man, she was going to form a family with, that was gone. Her dreams of a family life, a normal life, all of that was gone. All the things that she expected would happen and in her greatest hopes is dashed, and she doesn’t have anything to say about it, because that’s the power of Xerxes. That’s the political power of the day. And so she’s carried away, she’s carried away to the king’s palace. They take her. She’s taken to the king’s court.
God’s Refining Work
You know, all sorts of things in life are miserable. Sometimes they’re messy and wicked. In those times in life, it’s important for us to trust God’s God’s goodness, his power, and his control. God can work in the most amazing things, and God works in messy situations, and he deals with very messy people. And so he can he can bring about good in unexpected ways.
So God God brings her to the to the palace and immediately she finds favor with the palace eunuch, who’s in charge of the women. His name is Hegai or Hegai. And she’s taken to the palace, and it says, “The young lady pleased him, found favor with him.” So her beauty, her character, her demeanor, won her favor. God’s already working, showing grace. Kind of reminds you of Joseph, taken into captivity. In Potiphar’s house, he finds favor with Potiphar. He gets into trouble there, of no fault of his own, and ends up in prison. He finds favor with the with the head of the the prison. And so forth. This is what’s happening with Esther. It’s God’s hand at work here that brings the favor. We don’t we don’t know what why God does the things that he does, and brings us through the things that he brings us through, and causes us to be in the positions that we are in. Sometimes it feels pretty miserable where we are placed. But we need to trust him in the in the difficult places, because he places his people where he needs them and uses that experience to bring good ultimately to his people, to bring about the good things that are necessary, so that we can can be blessed and that he can accomplish his purpose purposes through us. Sometimes it’s a time of preparation.
And that’s what’s happening here. God didn’t just place his people, he also refines his people. So let me continue reading in verse 10, beginning in verse 10.
So Esther did not make known her people, or her kindred, for Mordecai had instructed her that she should not make them known. Every day, Mordecai walked back and forth in the court of the harem to learn how Esther fared. Now, when the turn of each young lady came to go to King Ahasuerus, after the end of her 12 months, under the regulations for the women, for the days of their beautification were completed as follows: six months with oil of myrrh, six months with spices and cosmetics for women. The young lady would go into the king and in this way, anything that she desired was given to her, to take with her from the harem to the king’s palace. In the evening she would go in and in the morning she would return to the second harem, to the custody of Shaashgaz, the king’s eunuch, who was in charge of the concubines. She would not again go to the king unless the king delighted in her and she was summoned by name. Now, when the turn for Esther, the daughter of Abihail, the uncle of Mordecai, who had taken her as his daughter, came to go to the king, she did not request anything except what Hegai, the king’s eunuch, who was in charge of the women, advised. And Esther found favor in the eyes of all who saw her. So Esther was taken to King Ahasuerus to his royal palace in the tenth month, which is the month of Tebeth, in the seventh year of his reign. And the king loved Esther more than all the women, found favor and kindness with him, more than all the virgins, so he set the royal crown on her head, made her queen instead of Vashti.
What you see taking place, there was a year of preparation. You know, Esther needs. I mean, if she was taken away from her home and brought directly to King Xerxes, I don’t think it would have gone well, because she needed to come to terms with her condition. I mean, she had to be brokenhearted. She had to be grieving. She had to be upset and angry. And so she needs time where nothing happens except, you know, she’s able to receive these treatments, you know, the cosmetics that she receives for all treatments and various things like that. No doubt, she’s trained in the in the rules and laws of the court, the customs of the court. And all these things are taking place for her, that prepares her. It’s it’s highly probable this takes a year, and if you remember, Xerxes is conducting a war, so he goes off for a little over a year about this time. So all this makes perfectly good sense historically. But there’s a year of preparation, all these women are prepared, they benefit from all these oil treatments and all these various things, and they’re staying in the house of the virgins. When the time comes for them to go to the king, they go to the king and spend the night, and then they don’t go back to the house of the virgins, they’re taken to the house of the concubines. That’s a pretty miserable thing. That’s a pretty horrific thing to think about. This is where Esther is. She’s brought to the king, and it goes quite differently. It goes quite differently.
I think God has been at work with Esther for a year now, preparing her, equipping her, enabling her to be the to to be at just the right place where God wants her to be, at just the right time. And so it tells us a couple of very interesting things. First of all, it tells us that Esther didn’t make known her people or her kindred, because Mordecai had instructed her not to make them known. This is true for her at the beginning, it’s true for her, you know, when that that’s one of the things that when you read commentaries is often criticized, by the way. These people, they say, Mordecai and Esther couldn’t be true good Jews. For one thing, because of this decree from from Mordecai to don’t make known your Jewish background. You know what people do, Christians do when they live in an oppressed society? They have strategies to cope. You know, Hard-Cry Missionary Society has missionaries that they support, whose identity they do not reveal. Do you know why they don’t reveal it? Because they would be put to death, or they would be sent away, and they wouldn’t be able to do their work. Their identity in the larger community is not known. They’re not identifying themselves as Christians. They’re Christians when when you’re an oppressed people or a marginalized people, there are times when it is wise. We’re to be wise as serpents to to plan a good strategy. Yes, you make it known when the time comes, and the right times and places, you don’t hide from that. But but there you there’s a place to be wise. This isn’t deception. This is discernment. This is wisdom.
And so that’s exactly what Mordecai has had advised her to do, and she’s listening, taking and heating his advice. And she’s doing it because she knew he loved her like a father. In fact, the next verse, verse 11, says that Mordecai walked every day before the court of the women’s house. He’s he’s trying to get a bit of news. How’s she doing in there? Is she okay? He loves his daughter. He’s doing exactly what we would do if it were we were in a place like that and had no other say. So God places people God gives his people. God gives us Mordecais from time to time. People who have wisdom to give us advice and to encourage us, to bless us, to love us. We need to listen to them and be encouraged by them. God gives us churches filled with people who have unique gifts from the Holy Spirit. And as they are gifted, we need to to bend to their will. We need to benefit from the spiritual gift that they that God has given them so that we can grow.
So God refines his people, equipping them through difficulties and through times of preparation, even in times when we don’t understand it. And finally, this last part of this section, Esther’s elevated by the grace of God. Esther found favor in the eyes of everyone who saw her. She gains the king’s favor, and he gives her the crown. The scripture says, this passage says that the king loved Esther above all women, so he set the royal crown upon her head. See, God is the one who placed her here. Let’s let’s talk about odds for just a second here. Talk about probability, a mathematical probability. What’s the probability that this woman Esther would be chosen? The king had sent out to his kingdom with more than 10 million women to find the best throughout the entire kingdom. Throughout all these provinces, and they brought the best of the best back to the palace. And they brought Esther to the palace.
When you start doing the math, and I did, I’m not going to take the time, I don’t have the time to go through it. But her chances of being selected mathematically is way less than one in a million, way less than one in a million. And yet, she’s there. The person that God wanted, this descendant of the family of Saul, is there in the palace right at this time. And that the fact that she’s a descendant of the family of Saul, there’s a connection there. That’s important. We’ll see that next week.
God’s Deliverance
So she’s she’s elevated by the grace of God. God refines us. He does things to to help us, to strengthen us, to teach us patience and humility. Esther exemplifies all these things. She’s raised to the place where she is the queen of Persia. And so that’s where this this little orphan girl has ended up as the queen of Persia. And then the final thing is that God positions his deliverers. And so God didn’t just prepare people to do his work of deliverance, but he strategically places them in key positions at the right time to accomplish his plan. That’s what happens. Esther becomes the queen of Persia. This Jewish orphan becomes the most politically powerful woman in the world. That’s something to think about, isn’t it?
And so the king gives a royal banquet. I should read this. 18 to 20. I’ll do that.
The king gave a great banquet, Esther’s banquet, for all his princes and his servants. He also made a holiday for the provinces and gave gifts according to the king’s bounty. When the virgins were gathered together for a second time, then Mordecai was sitting at the king’s gate. The king had not yet made known her kindred or her people, even as Mordecai had commanded her, for Esther did what Mordecai told her, as she had done when under his care.
So God has positioned Esther. She’s now the queen of Persia. The king gives a royal banquet to to announce to the to all throughout his whole kingdom to announce that Esther is now the queen. He makes some sort of provision so that there’s a holiday through the provinces, giving gifts according to the king’s bounty, the text says. And so the banquet was made public, acknowledging through the whole nation that the the queen’s new position, Esther’s new position as queen. And so God works in such a way. He’s he’s brought, just like he brought Joseph to power in Egypt, he’s brought Esther to power in to a place a position of of some authority. Some authority in Persia.
And one of the interesting things is that Esther continued to be obedient to Mordecai. That’s spelled out here for us. She she’s not just not just a married lady. She’s the most powerful and influential woman politically in the in in all the world, really. Should she listen to Mordecai? Well, obviously she should. And so she’s come to power. God has placed her where he wants her to be, and she is still humble. She’s still listening, she’s still listening to Mordecai.
We need to remain humble even when we’re doing well, we’re being blessed. Need to have a sense of humility. Mordecai, Mordecai is positioned as well. When when the second gathering takes place, and this could be like the announcement. When the second gathering of the virgins takes place, this could be a gathering where there were the announcement is that that Esther is the queen. I’m not it’s a difficult passage, but that’s a likely possibility. When that takes place, Mordecai is seated at the king’s gate. And that means that he has been elevated to a place of prominence in the kingdom. He has he has he is he is now serving as an official in the Persian court. And so that’s the the point of setting at the king’s gate. And so that takes that brings us to this final thing here, and that is that while Mordecai is there, something remarkable happens. He overhears a couple of guards making a plan. They they hate Ahasuerus, Xerxes. They hate Xerxes, and they and they want to put him to death. And he overhears it. He hears it, and he tells Esther. He tells Esther what’s going on, and Esther reports it to the king in the name of Mordecai. He want she wants Mordecai’s the one that discovered this. He should get the credit for it. There’s these two people that are about to kill you, planning to kill you. And they checked that out. It proved to be absolutely true. So they dispatch these two guys. They they executed these two guys, and they wrote it down in the annals. Let’s read that section.
In those days, while Mordecai was sitting at the king’s gate, Bigthan and Teresh, two of the king’s officials from those who guarded the door, became angry and sought to lay hands on King Ahasuerus. But the plot became known to Mordecai, and he told the Queen Esther, and Esther informed the king in Mordecai’s name. Now, when the plot was investigated and found to be so, they were both hanged on a gallows, as it was written in the book of the chronicles, and it was written in the book of the chronicles in the presence of the king.
So here’s an interesting story. Mordecai does this great deed. It’s written down, the king hears it, it’s written down in the chronicles, you would expect the next thing to happen is that he would be rewarded. He saved the king’s life. But, you know, the king’s a busy guy, and there’s a war going on. He’s got a lot of distractions. And so that just didn’t happen. He’s not he’s not given any reward or anything from it. There’s a you know, when you when you watch a mystery story, or you see a play, it’s kind of interesting, because usually, there’s all sorts of little things that can happen, but when something of of where you can’t see the point of it happens, and they call attention to it, you should pay attention to it. Anton Chekhov, the playwright, gave advice to his writers and and they said he said he told them, if you introduce a gun in Act One, it needs to go off by Act Three. You know, if you’re calling attention to it, you don’t just point out, oh, there he has a nice shotgun over the over the over the fireplace. But if you do that in a play, there’s needs to be a purpose to calling attention to it. And if you ever watch a mystery story, that happens all the time. They introduce a little thing, it seems incidental. It’s crucial later on. That’s following Chekhov’s advice.
Well, here, this little story is Chekhov’s gun. That’s exactly what this is. This is something, this little story. You say, you when you read something like that, why is it here? How does this further the story? Why did he, well, you can say, well, it tells us that Mordecai was loyal. It does. It tells us some things that are true about Mordecai that he’s been elevated to a higher position. That tells all those things are good. But this that’s not, but the story just seems to have no other point. Well, this is a crucial story. This is Chekhov’s gun. If you want to find out why this is crucial, and why this is the turning point of the story ultimately, have to follow along. You have to go back and read the book again. Or you have to come back so we can talk about it in next week or in the week that following.
So that’s exactly what’s happening here. Mordecai’s discovery of the assassination plot seems to not further this story. But God is going to God is at work here, and his his invisible hand is always at work. And this event that came about through God’s providence. Mordecai happened to be there at just the right place, just the right time to hear this plot, and then to expose it. God’s at work behind the scenes, even when it’s not obvious. And Mordecai and Esther didn’t choose their placements. God brought them into these places. So God’s invisible hand is always at work. She didn’t know she’s being prepared for a great deliverance. Mordecai’s act of faithfulness seems insignificant. But God would use it in as far as the development of this, but God used it later to change history. Changed saving history. If these things didn’t happen, and the plan against them was carried out that we’ll look at next week, not only would the Jews be gone, but there would be no provision for our salvation, in the way that God had prescribed in the Old Testament, his way said it wouldn’t couldn’t come about. You see, it’s not just the lives of the Jews that’s concerned here. It’s the lives of all of us that’s crucial here. This is a powerful story. It’s a true story. It’s God’s story. So God is the author of this story, and like a a good author, he works things out to an ultimately beautiful end. God places and refines and positions his people for their glory.
You may be frustrated where you are right now. And you might feel overlooked and unnoticed. But God’s at work. God’s at work putting you where he wants you. And if we trust him, for faithful to him, he’ll use us to his glory. Proverbs 3:5 and 6 says, “Trust in the Lord with all your heart, lean not into your own understanding. In all your ways acknowledge him, and he’ll direct your paths.” Let’s pray.
Father, thank you for this beautiful history, this incredibly story that you wrote in the pages of history and have given and preserved to us through this book of Esther. Thank you that it gives us encouragement to our hearts, to help us deal with all the struggles that we face in life, the difficulties that are hard for us to understand, trusting your goodness, trusting your plan. Help us, Lord Jesus, in these ways to strengthen our faith. And Father, help us realize your purposes through our faithfulness to you. We ask this in Christ’s name. Amen.