Risking It All – Lessons From Esther

All I need to know I learned from Noah’s Ark, and it is quite amazing.

One, don’t miss the boat.

Two, remember that we are all in the same boat.

Three, plan ahead. It wasn’t raining when Noah built the ark.

Four, stay fit. When you’re 600 years old, someone may ask you to do something really big.

Five, don’t listen to critics, just get on with the job that needs to be done.

Six, build your future on high ground.

Seven, for safety’s sake, travel in pairs.

Eight, speed isn’t always an advantage. The snails were on board with the cheetahs.

Nine, when you’re stressed, float awhile.

Ten, remember the ark was built by amateurs, the Titanic by

professionals.

Eleven, no matter the storm, when you are with God, there’s always a rainbow waiting.

There are 4 major lessons we learn from the book of Esther:

1. God has a plan for your life.

2. Satan has a plan for your life.

3. You have a choice.

4. God has the answer.

We’ll start with the 1st point, “God has a plan for your life.”

As you know the Jews rebelled against God by serving other gods and God punished them by having them carried into captivity. The Northern Kingdom of Israel was carried into captivity by Assyria followed by Southern Kingdom - Judah which was carried into captivity by the Babylonians.

This wasn’t the end of the story for Israel, because God had a plan of salvation for them. His intention was to bring them back from captivity and the book of Esther gives us a glimpse of God’s plan of salvation.

In fact, God had in mind a much larger plan of salvation than just bringing the Jews back to their homeland, you see, God planned all along that a savior would be born in Bethlehem to a Jewish family, and that that child would grow up to be the savior of the world. His name - JESUS.

In order for Jesus to be born to a Jewish family in Bethlehem, God had to release the Jews from their captivity and bring them back to their homeland.

The account of Esther begins in 483 B.C. some 37 years before Nehemiah returned to Jerusalem to rebuild the city walls.

King Xerxes was throwing a big party that lasted 6 months.

His kingdom was expansive – ranging from India to Northern Africa, and he was entertaining all the VIPs from the 127 provinces that he ruled.

At the end of this opulent display of wealth, he had a final 7 day party/drinking binge and on the 7th day (when King Xerxes was half drunk) he ordered Queen Vashti to appear before him to show off her beauty.

The Queen refused and this caused King Xerxes to burn with anger. He asked his advisors what could be done and they advised him to divorce her – after all they couldn’t have all the wives of the kingdom rebelling against their husbands.

The King banished her from his presence forever and that was that until sometime later he began to miss her.

His palace officials were quick to offer a solution – a beauty contest. They would round up the most beautiful and desirable virgins in his kingdom and he could have his pick of a new Queen. Well, for some reason that idea really appealed to the king, so he told them to get on it right away.

Esther’s Hebrew name was Hadassa which means myrtal.

Her parents died when she was young and her cousin, a Jewish noble named Mordecai from the tribe of Benjamin raised her like his own daughter.

As the Miss Persia talent search progressed, Esther was selected as one of the contestants because of her beauty.

She was pampered, given special food and beauty treatments – she had a complete makeover.

When her time came to be considered by the King – he was so impressed with her that he made her the Queen.

Mordecai, however told her to keep her identity as a Jewess concealed, and so she did.

Xerxes probably didn’t care where she was from, hey – he was in LOVE and he had a new Queen.

Queen Esther must have helped Mordecai get a job at the palace, because the Bible tells us that while on duty at the palace he uncovered a plot to assassinate the King. Mordecai told Queen Esther who in turn informed the King and the assassins were caught and hung. The incident was quickly forgotten.

We’ll come back to this point that God has a plan for your life, but consider this…. God was setting in motion the plan of salvation for the Jews and he was using an unknown, virgin, Jewish girl to make it happen. Sound familiar? (Pause)