Esther: One Shot

Esther One Shot

Text: Esther 4:6-17

So recently I was talking with someone and he mentioned that one of the most interesting things about the Book of Esther was that the Name of God is never mentioned, and the voice of God is never directly heard. And that is interesting! But I also think that it is very helpful to us who are believers today, because just like Esther, we often don’t directly “see” God either. We can feel His presence, and we can be directed by the Holy Spirit, but God’s voice isn’t thundering down from heaven to us.

We might want to see Him in a burning bush, or a pillar of fire by night. We might want Him to audibly speak to us and consume our enemies with 10 plagues – or something like that. But the reality is that, just like Esther, we have to listen carefully for a still small voice. We have to be guided by His Word… and there are some Christians who feel that God isn’t speaking to them, or that God is silent… but they haven’t opened His Word in years. They haven’t dug into it, and read it, and studied it, and learned it. They desperately want some Moses-like mountain top experience, but don’t understand that the Bible contains everything… and I mean EVERYTHING that we need for our lives, and our faith, and our decision making. It’s all right here in God’s Word!

Another reason that I find the Book of Esther interesting is because, we too; like Esther are strangers in a strange land. We’re in exile so to speak. We live in a secular world where everything that comes out of this world system is in opposition to our faith, and against Jesus.

So this morning we’re going to be looking at the Book of Esther, and I’m going to be reading a short passage from that book, but I’m also going to give you an overview of the entire book so that we all understand the context and are able to apply the lessons we go over from it.

So let’s take our Bibles and open them up to the Book of Esther, chapter 4, and please follow along as I read verses 12 through 17 (READ Esther 4:6-17).

Now this story of Esther takes place roughly 470 years before Jesus was born, and it was a rough time for the nation of Israel. The nation was in exile and were under the control of the Persian Empire. The emperor of Persia is a guy named Xerxes… and he’s not a good guy. In-fact he’s a pretty wicked and evil guy. The reason they were in exile is because they – as a nation, had been unfaithful to God. They worshiped idols, they became enamored with the world and the world system… and so in essence, it was almost like God saying, “If you want the world so bad, you can have it.” And Israel gets conquered, then Judah, and the people of Israel are now living in the world they were enamored with. But there were some who were faithful, and who still trusted in God… they were in the world, but were trying their best to not be OF the world.

So that sets the stage for this book of Esther…

Now if you’ve read the Book of Esther before, you know it’s a great historical account of how God saves and preserves His people… but it’s also a literary masterpiece. It starts out with a party. Xerxes is throwing a party for his nobles, and he gets a wild hair and decides that he’s going to show off his wife – Queen Vashti. So he orders her to appear before her guests and dance. But Vashti wasn’t having it! She was like, “I’m not here for your entertainment, and I’m certainly not here to entertain all your buddies.” And she refused. Well, Xerxes didn’t like that so much, and so he had her banished. Well a little while later, he was thinking maybe that wasn’t such a great thing to do, and he was feeling a little down about it, so his advisors came up with a plan. They would have a beauty pageant, and bring in young girls from all over the Persian Empire so that Xerxes could pick a new wife to replace Vashti.

So that’s what they did. And out of all the young ladies all over the Persian Empire, a young Jewish girl named Esther was chosen to be Vashti’s replacement.

Now Esther was being raised by her cousin Mordecai. He was a few years older than she was, and being that her parents were deceased, that duty fell on him. And Mordecai also worked for Xerxes as a low level bureaucrat. Well it just so happened that one day Mordecai uncovers an assassination plot against Xerxes and he relayed that information on to Esther, so that she could warn Xerxes. Xerxes was thankful, and he had Mordecai’s name written down in the annals of the king, and told his servants that Mordecai should be rewarded.