What A Difference A Day Makes

What a difference a day makes

Esther 6 10/18/06

There is a Scripture found in Proverbs, I’m sure you have heard many times that reads, “Boast not thyself of tomorrow for you know not what a day may bring forth.” That is so true and I have seen it illustrated many times in my ministry.

Now with that, some people say there is no use in planning for tomorrow. That is not what the verse is teaching. It is teaching us that God is in control of tomorrow and when we make plans we should say if the Lord wills. We should always make plans to do something for the Lord tomorrow and the next day as long as He gives us a day here on earth.

Now we have said so many times in our studies of this book that the name of God is not mentioned in the entire book but He is seen all in the book. The providence of God is seen in the shadows of every page. The providence of God is God doing His thing in the history of time. Now in the providence of God and the history of time, timing is important. Things that seem so small to us can be the very thing God uses to bring about His plan.

I think about the life of Moses and his place in history that God used his so mightily. His mother built a little ark and placed him in the ark and into the Nile River. A daughter of the Pharaoh came down to the river to take a bath and saw the ark. She sent one of her servants to fetch the ark and when she opened the ark little Moses cried. Who knew that with the cry of that little baby that a nation would be led from slavery out of Egypt?

Does God work in little things? Yes, He sure does. When we come to the sixth chapter of the book of Esther we see that clearly God works in little things. We also see just how important the timing is in God’s plan. It reads in verse 1 on that night. That sounds rather natural doesn’t it? Just a regular night in the palace of a king; but on this particular night, the king could not sleep. Now do you think that is my accident or by divine appointment? I believe it is by divine appointment. Even though it seems like a small thing as the king could not sleep, we see the providence of God all over this.

Do you ever have times that you cannot sleep? I do every once in a while and when I do, I do a lot of praying. I have gotten up because God will give me a thought maybe in a sermon I have been working on or a theme to a series of messages and I need to write them down because I might forget them by day. Many times God just runs faces before me and I begin to pray for them, you as I lay there awake.

On this particular night, the king sent for the chronicles to have them read to him. The chronicles were the things that had been going on written down to have a copy of them for the future. Can you imagine how many things that the king could have done to have been entertained? But this time he wanted the records, the chronicles read to him. The servant read about five years prior to the time now how that Mordecai had saved the king’s life by stopping an assignation. With all the volumes that could have been read to the king, we cannot help but to see the hand of God all over this.

After being reminded of how that Mordecai had saved his life, the king asked, did we do anything to honor Mordecai? The servant said no, we did not. As we look at the series of things that are to take place in our text, I want us to see first that the king made a DETERMINATION in the night. The king determined that he would do something to honor Mordecai.

This of course speaks volumes of the timing of God. I was thinking about the man named Joseph in the Old Testament. Joseph interpreted two dreams of some inmates that were in prison the same time he was. One was hanged and the other joined the Pharaoh and Joseph asked him to remember him before the pharaoh when he was reinstalled. You know the story; the man forgot and for 2 years Joseph was left in the prison. Then in God’s timing Joseph was restored back in the palace where he would save all his family.

Here we have the timing of God illustrated again in the pages of time. If Mordecai had been rewarded 5 years prior to this, then he would have been forgotten. But now, 5 years after he had saved the king’s life, he is about to be recognized for what he had done.