Esther
Jim Clements · Tidal Church Moncton · July 30, 2023 · Give Me a Break series
Jim Clements walks through the book of Esther to challenge us to stop living two separate lives. Esther lived one life of obedience to God's purpose, and He used her to save His people. We are invited to choose one life of faith.
More from Jim Clements · The Give Me a Break series
Topics: Faith, Purpose, Discipleship
Transcript
[0:00] Well, good morning, everyone. It, usually when you get a message and it's coming, you think about, okay, how many points, are all the letters gonna be the same in the points? Well, I'm here to tell you today that it's not one of those kind of messages. So it, I have this acronym, I use it at staff called BLUF, B-L-U-F, which means bottom line up front. So what I'm gonna do is I'm gonna tell you what the message is about today and it's about a challenge of how you're living your life. So we're gonna get into the book of Esther, but it's a challenge of how you're living your life. 'Cause I want you to begin processing as you hear what it is that the Holy Spirit may be telling you as you listen. So if you ever had a secret and you just like kept it to yourself and, and it's so hard to keep secrets, and you're like, you're just busting at the seams, so you think, there's this one friend I know I can trust, that if I tell 'em the secret, that I just, I know it can stay a secret, I just know it. But what happens is something similar to this video, after you tell them.
[1:13] And they tell two friends, and they tell their friends, and so on and so on and so on. So maybe you've experienced that the best kept secrets are ones that are never told. For example, what about the Hapsburg napkin fold? Have you ever seen this? Apparently only two people in the world know how to fold the napkin that way. And when I looked it up, I'm like, these guys have never heard of YouTube. Because if you go on YouTube, they'll show you how to do it. What about KFC and the secret ingredient, right in their, in the coating they put on their chicken. I used to work at Judson Foods over on Emberg Drive, and it was there, and we used to supply KFC's secret recipe, and it came in a brown plain sack with nothing on it.
[2:02] You just knew that's the secret recipe. Like if I would've had cell phones back then, I could have went over and stood there and took a picture with this. There's me with the secret recipe. I could have taken a bag and shared it. Or maybe not KFC, maybe Area 51, the big secret. But now they're having meetings in the States 'cause everybody wants to know about the UFOs. But if you look at this picture really closely, one of the signs says, photography in this area is prohibited. Well, I guess they missed that note. And what about Coca-Cola's recipe? Right? Coca-Cola's recipe, it is so valuable that it was actually used as collateral for the gentleman to buy Coca-Cola for $25 million. And the recipe moved from Atlanta, Georgia to New York City in a vault.
[2:51] And after it was paid off, it moved back to Atlanta, Georgia, where now if you go, you can actually get close to the vault and see it inside the vault where they keep the recipe. That's how valuable that secret is. Well, I had a secret that I thought was a secret when I first finished college and I moved back to the Moncton area. I got a good job and things were well, had my own place, and, and I met my wife Gisèle, and we started dating, but I just finished dating another person. So my mom and dad would always ask me kinda, where are you? What are you doing? Oh, I'm just hanging out with Richard, which is Gisèle's cousin, and never told her. 'Cause I didn't want him to think, oh, he's back dating someone already again really fast. I had this secret, but I had two secrets within one secret.
[3:40] So Gisèle and I went on a date one night and I said, Hey, we should go by my mom and dad's house. And she goes, oh, are they home? She's never met them yet. She goes, are they home? I said, oh no, they're not home. And she goes, well, why are we going there? Oh, you'll see. It's a secret. So we go into, I got a key, go into the house, mom and dad's not home. Go up to the pantry. I'm a full grown adult man who's got a full-time job in my own place. I'm now grocery shopping outta my parents' pantry with the grocery bags. They stuffed in that little thing that keeps the grocery bags, and I'm going through, oh, tomato soup. Look at all the potato chips, take some of, got all kinds of bags. I go back downstairs to get outta the house where I came in through, and I went, well, I should check the freezer out, in the freezer.
[4:30] Dad just had like a quarter cow slaughtered. And I'm like, oh, this is awesome. Right? I got steaks, I could buy this stuff. And I didn't think they knew that I did that. So I was getting away with it. Gisèle's like, this is crazy. Like I've not even met your parents and we're in, like, robbing their house. Perfect timing, as mom and dad drive up in the driveway. I have steaks in both hands. This is the coat Gisèle had on that you see in the picture. I said, open your coat. I'll put one under each arm. She's never met my parents. I took each steak, put it up on her, each arm, zipped her coat up. Don't move.
[5:25] Down the steps, come mom and dad, and they look at me, they look at this lady they've never met, and they go, Hey, Jimmy. I said, Hey, how's it going? And they go, and I go, oh, this is Gisèle. This is Gisèle. My dad goes, oh, hi, Gisèle, it's nice to meet you. Gisèle reaches out her hand and there is the finest cut of steak wobbling like a coin on the floor. And my parents looking at me going, what are you doing? But they knew. They knew they bought extra. Don't ask me why I did it. I just did it. As we proceeded to have a good laugh and they left, my secrets were revealed. But one of the cool things was a secret.
[6:18] My mom and dad had been praying for me to meet the right person. And as we left and they had a laugh after we left, my mom looked at my dad and said, any girl that's willing to stuff steaks in her coat for him is gonna marry that boy. 32 years this coming November we've been married. But sometimes when we keep secrets, especially today when I want to talk about the secrets of our faith, we're trying to live out our faith in our community and other aspects of our life. We tend to keep it secret. And we live two lives. We live a life when we're here in church or we're involved in ministry or in our small groups. And then we live a life of all the other days and other times that are out.
[7:06] And we live these two lives. I did research about eight to 10 years ago, had a hundred people in a room and asked them what was the hardest thing about their faith. And we interviewed them, and we went through the information, and we tallied all that information. At the end of the night, the top thing, by far over 60% of them, said, I don't know how to put my faith life and my unth life together. And that was their biggest struggle. Today we're gonna learn about someone who held onto his secret that would impact the group of people forever. And that person is Esther. What do we know about Esther? She's like a biblical woman of mystery. Esther wasn't her real name.
[7:52] Esther was what her name was changed to. Her Hebrew name was Hadassah, which is in reference to the myrtle plant. It was changed to that to hide her identity, because God knew what was gonna happen when she would be chosen as a candidate to become the queen of Persia. So she was kind of undercover. If you look at the name of Esther, there's three Hebrew root letters in the name Esther, and that's S, T, and R. And when you look at those root letters in Hebrew, and you try to figure out what it tells you, what it means from Hebrew, the name Esther then means to hide or conceal, passively. In a meaning, it means to be hidden. So now you can see the importance of her name and why it was changed.
[8:41] Esther was humble, unassuming, modest, and delicate. But yet Esther was about to be empowered and called upon by God to save Israel and to save her people. Well, let me unfold the story for you a little bit when you think about it. Now, this book of Esther, takes over a 10 year period for the whole book as it unfolds. The current queen. 'Cause if you read it, and I want you to go read all this 'cause I'm gonna go through it really fast. The current queen of Persia, she denied the king. He summoned for her to come, and she goes, I'm not going. And then he decided, well, what do I do? And so he did. Like any guy would do when his queen doesn't listen, he called the boys, he got all the wise men in, and he said, what do I do? And they said, well, just make her so she's not queen anymore.
[9:32] So the king issued a decree and said, because the queen wasn't obedient to him calling for her to come, that she was no longer queen. And so therefore they sent out a decree for all these candidates to come to be the new queen. And I just want you to know that when you get into the Scripture, you start digging into the history. It's when it really reveals some of the things that you can learn within it. And so like Esther, when she was chosen, she was one of over 1,400 candidates chosen to be considered for queen. And if you were chosen as one of those candidates, you had to spend one year being prepped to just go before the king, like beauty oils, all that kind of stuff to get you just perfect.
[10:18] And the first time I read that and understood that, I stopped complaining about how long it took Gisèle to get ready. How was she even chosen? She wasn't even Persian, right? When you think about it, but we'll get there in a second. What I wanna unveil within the book of Esther itself is that it is in a multi-layered story of secrets, surprises, and victories. First of all, Satan is hidden within this story. He's a hidden enemy. And yet another attempt, he is plotting of how he can wipe out Israel and the Jewish people and God. And by doing that, he is able to eliminate the birth of the Messiah that is to come.
[11:08] And so he's been trying to do this and trying to do it forever. He has developed a plot that's hidden within this scripture. But God is also in that scripture. God has a record of undefeated. He's forever the protector of His people, and He had a plan to ensure that the Messiah would be born and come forth. When we look at what Paul wrote in Romans 9:4-5, it says, "Theirs, which is Israel, is the adoption to sonship. Theirs is a divine glory. The covenants, the receiving of the law, the temple worship, and the promises, theirs is the patriarchs.
[11:54] And from them is traced the human ancestry of the Messiah, who is God over all, forever praised. Amen." We have been seeing through history a continuous rising of hatred for the Jewish people throughout times, attempts to wipe them out. So numerous attempts to wipe 'em out. It's just irrational for any one group of people. But there's more going on here than meets the eye. 'Cause see, God is serious about His plans, and He's going to carry them out because He's passionate about His people. And when you decide to be part of His family, you become part of His people, and He was gonna protect the Jewish people.
[12:42] He guarded them so fiercely that He even said that there would be a blessing to all people who bless them and there will be curse for people who curse them. Genesis 12:3, "I will bless those who bless you, and whoever curses you, I will curse, and all peoples of the earth will be blessed through." You see, there's a battle hidden under the surface. And God is about to use Esther and Mordecai, her cousin, in a powerful way to defeat Satan yet again. But when you look in the book of Esther, one of the things you're gonna notice is that God is hidden in there. You gotta read between the storylines. His name is not even mentioned once in the book of Esther.
[13:31] But yet when you look, there are countless clues that indicate that He is there, and He is active. In Esther's determination is where you can see Him, by when Esther asks her people to fast and pray, they're fasting and praying to God. The strength that Mordecai has is from God. And even, we'll find out later, the enemy's own household acknowledges the strength of God. Okay, back to Esther. What was her secret? Was it her beauty? Was it just her? Her looks, that everything that she had that would bring her to this most powerful point to be chosen, why a peasant girl would be chosen to be the most powerful queen with the most powerful king of Persia.
[14:18] The king was about to pass over 1,400 other individuals from 127 provinces of his own and other parts of the world. Maybe she had a secret we didn't know about that he knew about that he wanted to keep a secret. I don't know. But Esther was one that was gonna be chosen because of what God's purpose was. And Esther was one of four of the most beautiful Jewish women at the time. The other three were Sarah, Rahab, and Abigail. But it would take more than outward beauty or sensual appeal to captivate this king of Persia. Sometimes it's the commitment to the king that comes.
[15:05] But remember, even for Esther to be considered, she's an outsider. She's not born of nobility, and she's from an exiled people. She had no notable things going on for her. But somehow she was able to move prejudices and traditions away for a consideration for the king to choose her. See, Esther isn't living two lives. She's living one life. She's living a life that honors God and who she is every day in all of her decisions. Even in this call, she's still living one life and not two lives. And what we talked about earlier is the struggle that people have in living two lives and trying to get it to one life. We live in a hardship that makes this very difficult. What was her secret?
[16:03] Her secret was living in obedience to God's purpose. Living in obedience to God's purpose. In every way, in everything. In the generation we live in today, it is consumed with us looking whatever way we can look, the very best, the pay, whatever we can pay to have, whatever we can have that impresses the next person or the next person or the next person. And it doesn't end. And why? To what end? Because Scripture, as we know it, says it will all pass away. Jesus says this, when we're, so caught up in trying to finish the how we look and everything we have, Jesus says in Matthew 23:26, "First cleanse the inside of the cup and dish, that the outside of them must also be cleansed."
[16:54] See, here Jesus is teaching us that the inner self is what's most important, the inner person, not the outer. We can be polished up on the outside and not living at all on the inside the way that God wants us, if we're not living in obedience to His purpose for us. We're living two lives instead of one life. And it can be frustrating. Esther was beautiful, but at this moment she needed a difference maker in her life that would rise, raise her to be the queen of Persia. What she needed, she needed the favor and the inner character grace of God to reflect through her to everyone she came in contact with. That should be our desire.
[17:40] And the one life we choose to live is that everybody sees that inner grace and favor of God reflected, because whatever's inside, if it's not that of God, it will eventually come out. And I know enough of experiences in history that it usually comes out at a time you don't want it to come out. And so living one life is much, much easier, much, much important. So let's get on with Esther, and Esther 2:15-17. Now, when the turn came for Esther, the daughter of Abihail and the uncle of Mordecai, who had taken her as his daughter to go to the king, she requested nothing but what Hegai, the king's eunuch, the custodian of the women, advised.
[18:28] And Esther obtained favor in the sight of all who saw her. The king loved Esther more than any other woman, and she and all. And she obtained grace and favor in his sight more than all the others. So he set his royal crown upon her head and made her queen. See, Esther paid attention to what was going on. She paid attention to those that are around her. She paid attention to who was in charge of the situation with the eunuch. She wasn't full of herself, it wasn't all about her. She was humble, and she wanted the favor of God to reflect through her in this whole situation for her calling. And she had the full favor of God 'cause she was living one life. Her confidence wasn't in her outer beauty.
[19:15] It was an inner fragrance that captivated the king, of favor and grace and love from God by living in obedience with one life. She's never been living two lives. She's only lived one life through this whole story. Though Mordecai had told her not to reveal her true background. Like, you imagine, like, don't, like, gimme a break, right? I can't tell anybody who I am or how I'm living my life. Everything that I know I want to share about with God and the love that comes with it. And I can't share anything of that. But she lives one life in obedience for God's time and God's purpose. So let's speed ahead a little bit. When we look at what happens next in the story, Mordecai tells Esther not to reveal herself. And then Mordecai, he's hanging out by the gate 'cause he wants to keep close tabs and everything that's going on so he can know and know how to direct and guide and give that guidance to her.
[20:11] And so he's sitting right down at a gate, and he hears about a plot against the king. And so he tells Esther, gets the information to Esther, but what the plot is, and she tells the king, and against stop. But then one of the king's top men called Haman, he was disrespected by Mordecai because he thought he was high stature. He thought he was all that and a bag of chips and a pop, you know? And he went down, and Mordecai wouldn't bow to it, wouldn't submit to him. And so he plotted to wipe out Israel and the Jewish people because of this disrespect that Mordecai has showed him. So he went into the king, and he tells him about what he'd like to do. And he said, "There's this group of people, you know, that are really not following you and they're different than the rest of the people. And so, you know," They disrespect you, to disrespect everything he said.
[21:05] So why don't we just destroy them? And so the king actually agrees without even knowing and signs a decree for this to happen. But Mordecai finds out about the plot and tells Esther, and by this time Esther's queen. And she asks Mordecai to tell the people to fast and pray for three days. And she comes up with an idea to have a banquet. And so she has two banquets. She has the first banquet, and the king comes and Haman comes and he says, "Anything you want, even half the kingdom, you can have it." That's how much favor she had gotten with the king. And she says, "Well, just wait." And then she wines and dines 'em one more time.
[21:52] And while they're waiting to go to the next banquet, the king kind of wakes up and he has this realization. He goes, "You know what, I didn't even find out who the person was that told us about the plot that we could stop. That was against me." Like, who was that? And he discovers that it was Mordecai. And so here's a twist of fate that happens within the book of Esther chapter 6, starting in verse 3. "What honor and recognition," the king says, "should Mordecai receive for this?" "Nothing has been done for him." As the king's attendants answered, the king said, "Who is in the court?" Now Haman had just entered the outer court of the palace to speak to the king about impaling Mordecai on a pole that he had built and set up for him.
[22:43] His attendants answered, "Haman is in the standing court." "Bring him in," the king ordered. Then Haman entered, and the king asked him, "What should be done for a man the king delights to honor?" Now Haman thought to himself, "Who is there that the ki... sorry, who is there that the king would rather honor than me?" He thought. So he answered the king, "For the man the king delights to honor, have them bring royal robes the king has worn, and a horse the king has ridden, one with a royal crest placed upon his head. And let the robe and the horse be entrusted to one of the king's most noble princes. Let them robe the man the king delights to honor and lead him on the horse through the city streets, proclaiming before him, 'This is what's done for a man that the king delights to honor.'" "Go at once," the king commanded Haman.
[23:38] "Get the robe and the horse and do just as you suggested for Mordecai the Jew, right? Who sits at the king's gate. Do not neglect anything you recommended." Haman's living two lives. He's trying to play it at both ends. Mordecai's being faithful. One life. Esther's being faithful. Like, Haman's gotta be thinking, like, dude, like, give me a break, right? Like, I just wanted... I thought it was all about me. So what did Haman do? He got the robe and the horse. He robed Mordecai, he led him on the horse back through the city streets, proclaiming before him, "This is what is done for the man the king delights to honor." Afterwards, Mordecai returned to the king's gate, but Haman rushed home with his head covered in grief and told Zeresh, his wife, that all his friends, everything that had happened.
[24:29] His advisors and his wife said to him, "Since Mordecai, before whom your downfall has started, is of Jewish origin, you cannot stand against him. You will surely come to ruin." While they were still talking with him, the king's eunuchs arrived and hurried Haman away to the banquet Esther had prepared. What a twist of fate, even in there. Remember, I said previously, even in there, there's God hidden in there. When his wife, she says in here again, let me read it. She's aware of God and the Jewish people and is pointless to fight against Him. She said, "His advisors and his wife said to him, 'Since Mordecai, before whom your downfall has started, is of Jewish origin, you cannot stand against him.
[25:14] You will surely come to ruin.'" At the second banquet, she still has a favor of the king. And he encourages whatever she likes, up to half the kingdom. And finally, Esther reveals her secret and she tells the king about Haman's plot. Esther speaks up on behalf of her people. What a picture for a people to have an intercessor who was willing to live that one life, just live in obedience of God's purpose for their life, for the saving grace, not only of them, but for the Messiah. That was to come for all of us. She lived one call, one life. She had been living it out constantly, honoring God's call and the purpose, not her own. See, The thing is, I want to ask you, is God calling you to live that one life and not these two lives?
[26:14] 'Cause there really is only one life God is calling you to. And you've gotta make sure that if you're living that one life, that you can hear God. 'Cause I can tell you, in this other life, that's just Satan, and all he's doing is making noise, and he's just trying to distract you from all that you're doing. God called Esther to stand up and intercede for the Jewish people. And thanks to her courage, her wisdom, the people of Israel were saved. But the Messiah arrived and was protected. And Mordecai even warned Esther that if you don't do this, like, God's gonna find someone else. But think of it for your life. What an invitation. This would be like this. If God was to ask you to do this, what an incredible privilege it would be.
[27:01] If we were to have a similar invitation before us today, could we step up and do that? Could we do that in all of our life and every aspect of it, honoring to Him every day, to save someone else or to save a whole group? Could we live that one life in every aspect of our life? Esther prepared every day to live in obedience, trusting that even if she was unsuccessful, even if she was put to death, that she was doing the right thing. Remember in the beginning, and we've been talking throughout, two lives, most of us tend to live that life of faith and then a life outside of faith.
[27:46] The key to blending your life of faith with your other days and interactions and relationships is, you don't. You choose one. And if you choose to live two, you've already made your choice by not choosing to live one, because God called us to live one life, not two lives, but one life honoring to God. And obedience is the purpose. You just need to make the choice. There's no promise it would be easy. There's even direction given to us of being in the middle or lukewarm. We all know that scripture in Revelation 3:15-16, "I know your deeds, that you are neither cold nor hot.
[28:34] I wish you were either one or the other. So because you are lukewarm, neither hot nor cold, I'm about to spit you out of My mouth." Sometimes we read scripture and without context it's kind of, we try to figure it out, or we think we figure it out on our own. We do our own interpretation for it. Well, back in history when this was going on, in reference to this scripture and what it means, it was customary for people in ancient times to either drink a hot drink or a cold drink when it came to their festivals they had or religious sacrifices. And when you think about it, the reason they didn't do lukewarm, because lukewarm actually tastes awful. Anything you have that's lukewarm, and it also harbored a lot of diseases.
[29:19] And so therefore it was always one or the other. You think about it, if it's hot today, we drink something cold, it refreshes us. If it's cold, we drink something hot and it invigorates us. Some of you, you drink coffee every day and it invigorates you, right? So, but none of us, I mean, none of us really enjoy something that's lukewarm. Hierapolis in the time would supply Laodicea hot spring water through an aqueduct. And when the water finally arrived at the other city, if it was lukewarm, they would not use it because of the hazard of it. They would either heat it back up to use it or they'd cool it all the way down to use it. And I know that seems crazy, but that's what God is trying to tell us, in that lukewarm is not the place for us to be. There's nobody, you're you're not lukewarm. If you're lukewarm, you're sitting on the side watching everything go by. Someone that is hot, like in reference to the scripture, is engaged in their faith. They're on fire in their faith. If they're seen as hot, if they're cold, at least there's an opportunity for you to discover faith if you're cold.
[30:32] But if you're lukewarm, you're not resistant necessarily to faith, but you're not always receptive to it either. And that's why God doesn't want us to be lukewarm. You cannot live two lives. You have to choose one life or the other. And God wants you to choose the one that lives in His favor and grace every day. The greater thing you might want to think about in choosing your life is what person or what group of people are relying upon you to pick the correct life. Because if you're living in God's purpose, you've gotta be hot or you've gotta be cold. You cannot be lukewarm and anything you be accomplished, it's more than just about you.
[31:23] Esther did it and she found favor in the sight of God. She found favor in the king too. But more importantly, She found favor in the sight of God. She realized there was something greater than herself. So she kept her secret, but she kept true to who God was. We're gonna sing a song here in a second, and I'm gonna read some lyrics to you. So I want you to, everyone, stand right now, please. And a number of us have made decisions to follow Christ, and a number of us have made those decisions to live that one life.
[32:10] And maybe you did it recently, maybe you did it a few years ago, maybe you did it decades ago, and that's awesome. But maybe some of you haven't chosen that one life, and you've been living two lives, and it's been frustrating, and it's been chaotic, and you've been trying to figure it out. Well, today, I'm telling you, you choose one. You can't choose both. The lyrics of this song, it says this, So I yield to You into Your careful hands. When I trust You, I don't need to understand. Make me Your vessel, make me an offering.
[32:56] Make me whatever You want me to be. That's choosing one life as we sing this song. If you've made that declaration and you're living that one life, like I said, great, but if you haven't, as this song plays, think about it, pray about it, talk to God about it where you are. And if you so feel compelled, you can come forward, and the prayer team will be here to pray with you, to make a declaration to say, I'm choosing one life from this day forward, because that's the life God has planned for you, for eternity, and to live out His purposes for others that are yet to know Him.
[33:48] I challenge you to pick the one life God wants for you.