Rev Jim Lyons_ Haman's Demise_22nd Mar 26

We continue in our series in the book of Esther. This time our Bible reading is from Esther Chapter 7 verses 1-10

Transcript

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To the book of Esther, chapter seven, as you know, we've been making our way through this book, mostly chapter by chapter. So we're in chapter seven this evening, just ten verses. So the king and Haman went to dine with Queen Esther, and on the second day, at the banquet of the wine, the king again said to Esther, What is your petition, Queen Esther? It shall be granted to you. And what is your request? Up to half the kingdom, it shall be done. Then Queen Esther answered and said, If I have found favour in your sight, O king, and if it pleases the king, let my life be given at my let my life be given at my petition, and my people at my request. For we have been sold, my people and I, to be destroyed, to be killed, and to be annihilated. Had we been sold as male and female servants, slaves, I would have held my tongue, although the enemy could never compensate for the king's loss. So King Ahazuerus answered and said to Queen Esther, Who is he? Where is he? Who would dare presume in his heart to do such a thing? And Esther said, The adversary and enemy is this wicked Haman. So Haman was terrified before the king and queen. Then the king arose in his wrath from the banquet of wine and went into the palace garden. But Haman stood before Queen Esther, pleading for his life, for he saw that evil was determined against him by the king. When the king returned from the palace garden to the place of the banquet of wine, Haman had fallen across the couch where Esther was. Then the king said, Will he also assault the queen while I am in the house? As the word left the king's mouth, they covered Haman's face. Now Harbona, one of the eunuchs, said to the king, Look, the gallows fifty cubits high, which Haman made for Mordecai, who spoke good on the king's behalf, is standing at the house of Haman. Then the king said, Hang him on it. So they hanged Haman on the gallows that he had prepared for Mordecai. Then the king's wrath was subsided. Amen, and we know the Lord will bless his word to us. We'll pray together, please. Father, we thank you for the privilege we have of reading your word, and also, dear Lord, of trying to explain it and apply it into our lives. Lord, we we know that this story happened so many centuries ago, but yet, dear Lord, we thank you that it's still relevant and there are timeless principles that come from it. Father, we pray that you will speak into our hearts through your word as we submit to your authority and the moving of your spirit for Christ's sake. Amen. I think we're having trouble with the screen, but we'll just run without the PowerPoint for now. If it comes, it comes. Virginia Proden was raised in Romania under a communist regime and experienced the ruthless rule of Nikolai Chausesco. When she applied to law school, authorities performed a background check upon her to ensure her views aligned with the government. They desired to know three things whether her parents had ever organized a revolt against the government, or had or had ever disclosed the anti-government activities of their children, and whether they were followers of Jesus Christ. Because her family didn't take any of the boxes, she secured a law degree. Fairly quickly she became disillusioned as she saw truth in defending Romanians from government harassment, intimidation, and possible imprisonment. At her lowest point, she just happened to encounter a Christian. The joy and the peace that exuded from this man's life left her dumbfounded and desiring to know much more. This in turn led her to attending church with him, and the church she discovered that the source of his peace rested in the person of Jesus Christ, who was the way, the truth, and the life. That one enlightening verse eventually convinced her to trust Jesus as her Savior and Lord. Not only did this commitment change her standing before God, but it also impacted how she practiced law. So, like Esther of old, she realized that God had strategically placed her to defend Christians and human rights cases. She bravely pushed forward to seek truth and expose lies, which didn't sit well, of course, with the communist regime that she was under. So therefore they arrested her, tried her, and tried to beat her into submission to the state. When they couldn't achieve this goal, they hired an assassin to silence her voice of truth forever. So the assassin met her, posing as a lawyer with some so-called legal questions. She realized not very long into that conversation his true intention, especially when he pulled a gun and pointed it at her head. With her knees shaking in fear and her heart pounding, Virginia said she heard the voice of the unseen God whisper to her, share the gospel with him. So she did. When she finished, the assassin relaxed his shoulders, dropped the gun from his head, from her head, and placed it on the table, and bowed by faith at the feet of the Lord Jesus. And after praying for the Lord's forgiveness and salvation, he said, Virginia, I will come to your church. As she recounted this story in a speech in February 2024 before the National Religious Broadcasters Convention in Nashville, she concluded with these following moving and also instructive words. So she says, So why am I telling you this? Because I want you to be confident that when you see only the evil one screaming at you, threatening that he will take your job, or that he will take your kids, or he will put you in jail, or whatever they will threaten you with, remember that God is working behind the scenes. She says we're supposed to walk by faith, not by sight. Therefore, remain faithful. We are conquerors in Jesus Christ. He changed Romania through me, and he wants to change America through each one of us. Eventually, President Reagan secured her release, and the common communistic regime fell because of the courage of people like Virginia. Virginia is a case in point, and long before her, this young Persian queen named Esther became the role model of how to seize a moment to advance justice, righteousness, and life. Standing for what she believed in meant that Esther had to stand against an evil regime under the well-connected and highly esteemed government official named Heeman. To thwart his evil plans, she had to risk her life and approach the king. This she did, and was accepted, and promised that he would do for her what she asked. She promised to tell him at the second banquet. The first banquet, of course, came in chapter five. But prior to this banquet now in chapter seven, came chapter six, and Haman's wicked, evil intentions to kill Mordecai. So he approaches the king early in the morning to get permission. But of course it didn't matter how early he came, he was far too slow for God. The king has been unable to sleep, so he discovers Mordecai has been unrewarded for his loyalty to him. This follows into the vindication of Mordecai and the humiliation of Haman, as he has to lead Mordecai around the city to receive all the applauding of the people because of the fact that he has saved the king from an assassin. So Haman returned home with his tail between his legs, but he wasn't home very long before the king's eunuchs called to escort him to the banquet with the king and queen. And now it's in this chapter that Esther courageously stands and exposes the enemy Haman. As we work our way through the chapter, we'll note the following three sections the petition in first four verses revealed, the anger expressed, verse five to eight, and the sentence passed, verse nine to ten. So, first of all, the petition revealed in the first four verses. We read in verse one that the king and Haman went to dine with Queen Esther. No doubt this is a very different Haman, same person, but he has a lot weighing upon his mind, given what has occurred in chapter six, and especially how it closed with those words from his wife and friends. Apart from plenty of wine on the table, the topic of conversation, which is no surprise, came in verse 2. With no screen, no? No screen? It's all right. Oh, you've got a screen. I don't have one there. I thought you just worked out to get out of a job tonight, Karen. Okay. We'll read verse 2. Which should come there, yeah. And on the second day, at the banquet of the wine, the king again said to Esther, What is your petition, Queen Esther? It shall be granted to you. And what is your request of the half the kingdom it shall be done? We'll remind ourselves again that the half the kingdom meant that the king just planned to be generous to order. It doesn't mean that he's going to give her half of his kingdom. He's going to give her what you asked for. And it's an encouragement to tell him what it is you want. If we were in Esther's shoes, we would have gone through this repeatedly. You know, when you've got to re you've got to give an interview or you've got to give a personal statement or you've got to do something very important. You don't just get up off the cuff. You repeat it, and you're probably standing before the mirror to see how you're looking and how your your expressions are looking. And so you're just going over and over and over it sort of be presented in the best way possible. And just in a practical note, it isn't always advisable to wing it and to speak off your head. There are times that we find ourselves thrown into a situation which we haven't been prepared for. I remember quite a few years ago when we were in faith mission. I, being a painter and decorator in the past, I was benting at the Bible College, and I got a call about four o'clock in the afternoon, and this was a minister in around the Hart Hill area, Glasgow area, and he said, Could you come and speak at our ladies' meeting tonight? The speaker has let us down. So I was probably over maybe an hour and a half or so away from it, and I was not very clean, and so I had a just continuing everything. And so he says this is a theme. And he gave me the theme for the year that they have for the ladies' meeting. And he says, if it's possible, could you could you somehow speak on that? And I went to the meeting and I and unbelievably God just undertook in such a wonderful way. But it's not always helpful just to speak off the cuff. But when we can, we must prepare well. And I'm sure Esther prepared as well. Esther isn't going to prolong this any further, but she's going to make a response to the king's request. And there has, of course, at the end of chapter four, before she goes into the presence of the king, she asks the maidens where they're going to pray, and asked the other Jews to pray for her. And so they're praying that she will know wisdom, not only in what to say, but when to say it. And the sex importance is that the second is important as the first in that. Now is the time and she knows in her heart, and Solomon tells us in Ecclesiastes 3 1 and 7, in everything there is a season, a time for every purpose under heaven, a time to tear and a time to sow, a time to keep silence and a time to speak. God's timing was perfect, and we must seek for that inner peace in our hearts, not only to know what to do, but when to do what we know we're going to do. We can't afford to lean on our own understanding if God is going to direct our paths. Esther has a green light. She now moves forward with confidence and even boldness as she now reveals her petition in verse three. The Queen Esther answered and said, If I find favor in your sight, O king, and if it pleases the king, let my life be given at my petition and my people at my request. Although he has written her a blank check, she doesn't tell him what to do. You don't tell the king what to do. She is wise enough to know that he's the king. He still deserves her respect. So she relies upon the king's favor and pleasure in this matter. We must not gather that by mentioning herself first, that this is somehow a selfish request. But the king needs to know that what she's about to reveal to him involves her as well. This wasn't an easy thing Esther had taken on. And it would be easy to feel intimidated because she is about to speak up and reveal the identity of the perpetrator who's sitting at the banquet with them. He was promoted by the king. So she would need to be courageous. She'd need to be extremely careful how she went about this. So not only is she starting to bring this to the king, but she fleshly says, out a wee bit more there in verse 4. For we have been sold, my people and I, to be destroyed, to be killed, to be annihilated. Had we been sold as a male and female slaves, I would have held my tongue, although the enemy could never compensate for the king's loss. She says, if it is the chaos of being sold as slaves, she says, Look, I wouldn't really bring that to your attention. That's not a big thing at all. Because we're in exile after all. God has taken care of us, God has watched over us through this time. So if it was slavery, I wouldn't bring it to your attention. It's far more serious than that. This was their situation already. God took care of them. But this was a genocide of the Jews that was planned. And that included her. And by letting the king know, this was to call his attention to the fact that this was an attack against the king's honor. And if you check chapter 3, verse 11, you will notice the three words Haman used in this letter is the same words that Esther used. She also highlights the revenue loss from the annihilation would be damaging to the king, and the promise that Haman made of recuperation to the king's treasury would never compensate for it. No doubt the king can put these pieces together and see how he has been duped into consenting to wide-scale murder without any real cause for doing so apart from pure unadulterated hatred. Esther took her stand and she did what she could. As she said earlier, I will go before the king, and if I perish, I perish. Utter abandonment and complete trust in God. We may never find ourselves in the palace, and we may not face a situation like this, with such a responsibility being led upon our shoulders. But this doesn't absolve us from taking our stand for the Lord. Naturally, we are fearful, unless we're absolutely downright honest. At times we are cowardly. In the context of our lives, there are moments that we are faced with drawing back as we are intimidated because of the crowd. Yet to follow Esther's example is something we must do. And so we take a deep breath and do the will of God. That might not be in a crowded classroom, it might not be in a crowded workplace, but it might just be across the hedge. It just might be talking to your next door neighbor, and the opportunity comes, and that's the time that we need to take our stand for the Lord. There's nothing more important than this, and Satan knows it, and he will fight us on it and seek to deter us from us. And so that's the first thing is the petition eventually being revealed to the king here at the banquet of wine. Then from this we have the anger expressed in verses 5 to 8. The king's you have a sweet, I'll have a drink. The king's anger is anger is expressed in this section. And it even notes that he left the banqueting table in wrath in verse 7. We're not informed as to every time this king lost his temper. And given what was seen of him up to this point in the book, we wouldn't be surprised if it was several times. At the first banquet in the book, which comes at the very commencement of it, he lost his temper in chapter 1. It was a time when he was well oiled, as we put it. And they sent, he sent, of course, or commanded that Queen Vashti come, yet she refused to come. The result in in it resulted in him becoming furious, and it says his anger burned within him. Now in chapter 7 he's angry again. It's happening again at another banquet. It's happening at a banquet where wine is poured. So maybe those things just so work together. After Esther has revealed her petition and explained the planned destruction upon her and her people, the king now responds in verse 5. So King Ahjawerus answered and said to Queen Esther, Who is he? You know, you can't just imagine it. Well, you tell me who he is, I'll go and sort him out. I think that's the kind of attitude he's got. Who is he? Where is he? Who would dare presuming it's hard to do such a thing? In response to this, Esther is very clear and definite about her answer. You know, she doesn't hum and she doesn't have. You know, or you know, the word today isn't, well, yeah. You know, it's the kind of words that we put in there when the truth is we really don't know what to say. And we're just filling up space. Esther's not doing that. She's clear, she's plain, and she's precise in verse 6. And she says that the instigator of this wicked dude is him. Can you imagine that? There's him and here's Esther. King at him. It's him. Now that required courage. That required a courage that only God could give. And impart to that, dear lady. Hilda and I knew a man who was well known for something when he was asked a question. He would go the long way round. Maybe you know somebody like that as well. So the answer we would receive, of course, was lengthier than the question demanded. Hence he was given the nickname Long Story, as brothers. Esther's not like that. She's straight to the point. She's not rude. You know, some people don't have a problem of confrontation. But they're rude. They're rude. And Christians should not be rude. She's straight to the point. You can imagine how tense the atmosphere must have been at that point. And no wonder it says Haman was terrified before the king and the queen. Possibly he didn't even know that Esther was a Jew. So what he has done is to plot an assassination of the queen. Not only that, but he knows about the anger of the king, and a couple with the anger of the king is the power of the king. So he has plenty of reason to be afraid. And of course, the power of a king is emphasized in two proverbs. The messenger and messengers of death is the king's wrath. The king's wrath is like the roaring of a lion. Maybe when the king heard the identity of the perpetrator, you can just imagine his jaw drop a mile, because it was him who put him into that position. Maybe he gave Heaman a stir. We're talking about eyes this morning and how we can send messages with our eyes. You know, some people stare at you, you know they're angry. And you know they haven't got your good in view. Maybe he gave Heaman a stir, puts fear into him. Is it possible that maybe the king thought that his prime minister really has sights for the throne? Was he part of the foiled assassination plot, as Warren Mearsby says, plotted by those men in chapter two, which Mordecai foiled? Signing the decree made the king part of this. So what he's really done is he has signed a death warrant of his own wife. This is how serious this was. And the reason he does what he does in verse 7, then the king arose in his wrath from the banquet of wine and went into the palace garden. But Haman stood before the Queen Esther, pleading for his life, for he saw that evil was determined against him by the king. King's got a lot of stuff in his mind. And I don't think it was what he's going to do with Haman, because even Haman could see that he has already decided my fate. The real dilemma was there was a decree signed and circulated. And we know how serious this was because we know the phrase so well. It's like the law of the Maids and Persians, unalterable. So Haman knew what the king had decided to do regarding him. So he thought he's only one course of action to take. Throw himself at the mercy of the queen. But it's all too late for Haman. Because but after Mordecai had been elevated and honored, what he should have done rather than returning home to lick his wounds, he should have gone and sought out the king and confessed his sin and begged for mercy. And can I just throw it in here that there is a time to make your peace with God? And that's in the here and now, because there will come a time when it will be too late. So as the Hebrew says, Today, if you hear his voice, do not harden your heart. So the time came for the king to return from the garden, back to the banqueting table, and we see what he witnessed in verse 8. When the king returned from the palace garden to the place of the banquet of wine, Haman had fallen across the couch where Esther was. Then the king said, Will he also assault? Will he molest the queen while I'm in the house? As the word left the king's mouth, they covered Haman's face. It's quite a turnaround here that we have a man who earlier planned to execute a Jew for refusing to bow and honor him. Yet here he is before bowing before a Jew, pleading for mercy. One ancient Jewish commentary suggests that the angel Gabriel give him a push at this point to the ground. What Haman did here was so unethical in the Persian context, as it demanded that any man must keep his distance between himself and the queen. What he did therefore was totally inappropriate, and of course the king interpreted it as if he was trying to molest his wife, which was a crime punishable by death. When the king spoke in Verse, his guards knew exactly what the tone of the king's voice meant. So they covered Haman's face, which really was a token of the death sentence. The final thing then is a sentence passed in verse nine to ten. It seems Haman and his pride has spread all around the place what he planned to do to Mordecai, to impale him upon that spike which is seventy-five feet high. At least it was known among the palace guard. For we read there in verse nine, now Harbonna, one of the eunuchs, said to the king, Look to Gallows, fifty, this this spike fifty cubits high, which was made for Mordecai, who spoke good on the king's behalf, it's standing at the house of Caman. The king thinks this is a no-brainer. So he passed sentence upon him that he would be executed, impaled on that spike. The proverb reminds us that the righteous is delivered from trouble, and it comes to the wicked instead. This was certainly true for Haman. And although everything looked great for him at one point, yet it not only changed, but it went totally against him, and he certainly reaped what he had sown. You may be fell familiar with the eighteenth century poem To a Mouse by Scottish poet Robert Burns, or maybe you're not, but you will be acquainted with a fresh, acquainted with a phrase in it. In the poem Burns reflects on accidentally destroying a mouse's nest while ploughing a field. He compares a mouse's plight to human struggles, noting that even the most well thought out plans can fall apart from unfart due to unforeseen circumstances, they can come apart. The phrase we're thinking of, which I have to give in English because I don't have the accent for it, the best led plans of mice and men often go awry. Burnt's use of mice and men emphasized that this concept applies to all living beings. No one is immune to the twists and turns of fate. How everything has turned for Haman, and those wicked acts have now come back to bite him. This is the Bible principle which is so true to life that we sow what we reap. Warren Wearsby said Haman sowed anger against Mordecai, and he reaped anger from the king. Haman wanted to kill Mordecai and the Jews, and the king killed Haman. And so Galatians 6 tells us whatsoever a man sows, that shall he also reap. If you sow to the flesh, you shall laugh the flesh reap corruption. If you sow to the spirit, you shall laugh the spirit reap life everlasting. So therefore, if we sow a life without Christ, we can't expect to reap an eternity with Christ. And wherever you are this evening in your spiritual condition, if you show a life without the Lord Jesus, you cannot for one second expect to reap an eternity with the Lord Jesus. But if you show a life with Christ, if you show a life in service for Christ, you will reap the reward at the end of it. And so the king's anger is expressed, and the sentence is passed upon Haman. But it's obviously still the problem. Yeah, Haman has gone, but that's not the end of the story. You still got this decree, unalterable decree by the law of the Medes and Persians. And so the rest of the book just deals with this problem. But here's this young queen, and God's hand has just been upon the whole situation, and put her into that place where God could use her. And that's the place where God wants to use me and you, in the place where he sets us down and says to us, that's exactly where I want you to be. It might not be the place you've chosen or you think, but that's where I want you to be. And that's where I want you to serve me. And when God set Esther in that position, God just opened the way for Esther. God put the pieces in place for Esther and used her for his honor and for his glory. Let's stand together and