Sermon Transcript
From Esther chapter 2 and chapter 3.
When the virgins were assembled a second time, Mordecai was sitting at the king’s gate. But Esther had kept secret her family background and nationality, just as Mordecai had told her to do. During the time that Mordecai was sitting at the king’s gate, Biggnatha and Teresh, 2 of the king’s officers, who guarded the doorway became angry and conspired to assassinate King Xerxes. But Mordecai found out about, about the plot and told Queen Esther, who in turn reported it to the king, giving credit to Mordecai. And when the report was investigated and found to be true, the 2 officials were impaled on poles.
All of this was recorded in the book of the annals in the presence of the king. After these events, King Xerxes honored Haman son of Hamanatha the Agagite, elevating him and giving him a seat of honor higher than that of all the other nobles. All the royal officials at the king’s gate knelt down and paid honor to Haman, for the king had commanded this concerning him. But Mordecai would not kneel down or pay him honor. Then the royal officials at the king’s gate asked Mordecai, why do you disobey the king’s command?
Day after day they spoke to him, but he refused to comply. Therefore they told Haman about it to see whether Mordecai’s behavior would be tolerated, for he had told them that he was a Jew. When Haman saw that Mordecai would not kneel down or pay him honor, he was enraged. Yet having learned who Mordecai’s people were, he scorned the idea of killing only Mordecai. Instead, Haman looked for a way to destroy all Mordecai’s people, the Jews, throughout the whole kingdom of Xerxes.
Then Haman said to King Xerxes, there is a certain people dispersed among the peoples in all the provinces of your kingdom who keep themselves separate. Their customs are different from those of all the other people, and they do not obey the king’s laws. It is in the king’s best interest not to tolerate them. If it pleases the king, then let a decree be issued to destroy them, and I will give 10,000 talents of silver to the king’s administrators for the royal treasury. So the king took his signet ring from his finger and gave it to Haman son of Hamanathadah and the Agagites, right, the enemy of the Jews, saying, keep the money and do with the people as you please.
Then on the 13th day of the first month the royal secretaries were summoned. They wrote out in the script of each province and in the language of each people all Haman’s orders. Dispatches were sent by couriers to all the king’s provinces with the order to destroy, kill, and annihilate all the Jews. Yet young and old, women and children, on a single day, the 13th day of the 12th month, the month of Adar, and to plunder all their goods. A copy of the text of the edict was to be issued as law in every province and made known to the people of every nationality so they would be ready for that day.
The couriers went out, spurred on by the king’s command, and the edict was issued in the citadel of Susa. The king and Haman sat down to drink, but the city of Susa was bewildered. We’ve been studying the book of Esther, and so far we have seen the Persian King Xerxes send away his wife, Queen Vashti, simply because she wouldn’t dance around in front of a bunch of his drunken officials, which was the right thing for her to do. But the king dismisses her. After that, Xerxes holds a contest for all the young ladies in the land for one of them to replace Vashti as the new queen.
A young Jewish girl by the name of Esther impresses the king more than anyone else, and she is crowned as queen. Now Esther, we learned, has an adoptive father named Mordecai. Esther’s own parents passed away sometime time before the story began, and Mordecai adopted her. He raised her. Mordecai is also Jewish, of course.
They are 2 out of the community of Israelites living in Persia at the time. Now, why are the Israelites in Persia? How did that happen? Ah, well, because previously Israel had been defeated and taken captive by the previous world power, Babylon, when Babylon sacked Israel. But then Babylon is sacked by Persia.
And Persia frees some captives, at which point many— most even— Israelites return to Israel. But many also stay in Persia. They continue to have children. They make a life where they are. Esther and Mordecai are 2 of the people of that pretty large but still very minority group in Persia.
And now, lo and behold, Esther ended up up as queen, which you might think is a great day for all the Jewish people in Persia. You know, being a minority group in the kingdom, now they’ve got one of their own married to the king, right? They’ve risen in power. You might think they feel finally represented for the first time, like they’ve got an advocate in the palace. It might seem like a big deal, but it’s not a big deal for a couple of reasons, or at least not yet.
First, Esther hasn’t told anyone in the palace that she’s Jewish. Mordecai told her to keep quiet about it, and she listened to him. So she’s not visibly practicing her faith. She’s not keeping kosher. Most commentators assume she’s not keeping the Sabbath.
No one knows she’s Jewish, which means she’s certainly not petitioning on behalf of her people for anything. She’s not representing them at this point. And even if she did, the position of queen in that kingdom doesn’t actually carry any power. You know, the previous queen Vashti was removed from office the second that she stepped outside of one of the king’s wishes. So in Xerxes’ eyes, queens were just another one of his subjects who he could do with as he pleased.
So for the Israelites, having someone from their tribe as queen wasn’t automatically going to give them influence in the palace. But it might, it might be a card they could play, especially if their community finds itself in the middle of some kind of giant problem and the king remains head over heels infatuated with his new queen, as he seems to be here at the start. Her being in the palace might just be enough enough to help if needed. So that’s where we pick up the story today. We’re closing out chapter 2 and looking at all of chapter 3, and as we do, we will see where the giant problem for the Israelites living in Persia starts, how it grows from a tiny problem to a giant problem, and then what the solution will be.
So where the problem starts, how it grows, and the solution. So first, where the starts. Ego.
The giant problem begins small with bruised egos. At the end of chapter 2, Mordecai gets wind of a plot to assassinate King Xerxes. We don’t know exactly how Mordecai knows. Maybe he overheard it. Maybe he was copied on an email by accident.
I don’t know. Doesn’t matter. Mordecai learns it, and he passes on these 2 guys are plotting to kill the king. He passes it on to Esther who reports it to Xerxes, and Esther, when she tells Xerxes, says— not only says there is a plot to kill you, but she says the person who figured this out is Mordecai. An investigation ensues and Mordecai was right.
His intel was accurate. The king’s life is saved and the 2 men who plotted against the king were executed for treason, which might make us think Mordecai would be celebrated as some kind of hero. I mean, he is the guy who saved the king. Maybe he’ll get a parade. But instead, his reward for turning in, you know, the most valuable type of intel, Mordecai was given by the king absolutely nothing.
Mordecai doesn’t get a thank you letter. Mordecai— or Xerxes doesn’t mention Mordecai in a speech.
Nothing. Saved the life of the king, rewarded with zero.
Silence. Worse, the very next verse, beginning of chapter 3, the king honors someone else, which means Xerxes does honor people from time to time. He knows how to do it. It’s not like anyone never gets— no one ever gets any recognition in this kingdom. Kingdom.
Some people get recognition. It’s just Mordecai doesn’t get any recognition. The whole account is written in a way that, like, as readers we’re supposed to be shocked. If you start at the end of chapter 2 and then move into chapter 3, it flows: Mordecai saved the king’s life, and after these events, Xerxes honored Who? What name do we expect to see?
It’s Mordecai, right? But that’s not who Xerxes honors. Xerxes honors a man named Haman.
Haman gets a seat of honor higher than any of the nobles. Whenever Haman walks by, everybody needs to bow down and pay Haman honor. Where’d that come from? But we’re not told what Haman did to receive recognition, but we can be pretty sure it wasn’t anything as important as saving the king life, Haman’s honor feels random. It’s out of the blue, maybe even a little unjust.
It feels like, hey, if anyone should receive honor, it should be Mordecai, but he got nothing! And that’s the point. We’re supposed to think that’s not right, because that is apparently exactly what Mordecai thought. Apparently, Mordecai thought, I should have the honor, not this guy. He’s jealous.
He’s angry. He takes his anger out on not the king, but on Haman, the guy who is recognized. Mordecai refuses to bow or kneel before Haman because Haman’s honored. It’s kind of petty, really. I mean, even though Mordecai, he has a legitimate beef that he should have been honored.
He should have been. Right about that. But it’s not fair for then Mordecai to go vent those feelings on the one who is appreciated. That’s just jealousy. He can’t bring himself to celebrate Haman’s accomplishment, whatever it was.
His ego is bruised. His ego prevents him from handling his pain in a healthy way. Mordecai could have confessed to Haman. He could have said, look, it’s hard for me to see you as recognized when I was not recognized. I realize that’s petty.
I’m sorry. Just because I wasn’t recognized doesn’t mean you shouldn’t be. I should celebrate with you. I apologize. Could have said that.
Didn’t say that. Instead, when Haman walks by and everyone else bows, Mordecai stands in defiance.
Imagine being in a room where dozens or maybe 100 people bow before you, but one guy conspicuously conspicuously doesn’t. He has a look of disgust on his face as you look over at him, like when, you know, you’re driving and somebody’s crossing the street in front of you walking and they’re taking an hour and a half to cross the street in front of you, and not only do they take an hour and a half, while they’re crossing the street they’re like staring at you the whole time. It’s conspicuous. He’s conspicuously defiant. So, not surprisingly, Haman becomes upset with Mordecai, right?
From Haman’s point of view, all he knows is everybody else bows, Mordecai doesn’t. It’s hard not to take that personally, right? So, like Mordecai, it’s fair that Haman is upset, but again, like Mordecai, it’s not fair what he does with it. Haman becomes enraged. He has an ego too.
His ego prevents him from handling his hurt feelings in a healthy, restorative manner. I mean, if Haman didn’t have an ego, he could have sat down with Mordecai, heard his frustrations. He could have organized an appreciation dinner for Mordecai. Haman’s obviously pretty important in the kingdom. He would have had the leverage to do something, but he doesn’t do that.
Instead, he’s enraged because he also has an ego. Their egos collide, and when egos collide, everyone dies.
That’s how it started. Now second, how the problem grows. Haman believes all of your kind is like this. Haman escalates from being enraged with only Mordecai to being enraged with everyone from Mordecai’s tribe. Haman thinks something like, all you Jews are like this.
The problem isn’t just Mordecai, it’s all Jewish people. Now before this confrontation, Haman didn’t even know Mordecai was Jewish. Mordecai had kept that secret. But Mordecai, for some reason, finally reveals his ethnic background while he is being questioned for why he wouldn’t bow. But it’s unclear why Mordecai would have revealed it at this this moment or ever, right?
It doesn’t seem like he was trying to get some kind of religious exemption for bowing, because this type of bowing or kneeling wouldn’t have interfered with his faith. It’s not like Daniel where everyone is supposed to bow before the golden statue as an act of worship, right? Of course Jewish people wouldn’t do that. This is different. This honor to Haman is more like a soldier saluting a superior officer in a military or bowing if you meet the King of England, right?
That’s not an act of worship. It’s how you respect them. I mean, people who faithfully follow the God of the Bible salute and bow to others all the time. It doesn’t mean they’re worshiping the King of England if they bow to him. They may not even like him.
So, Mordecai probably didn’t bring up his Jewish background to try to get a religious exemption from bowing. It probably just came out in the course of the confrontation, but now that Haman knows it, he expands his specific anger at Mordecai to Mordecai’s entire tribe. He says, all you people are like this. He says, no wonder you’re disrespecting me. You’re Jewish.
That’s what all you people do, which isn’t fair. It isn’t right, it’s prejudiced, and it’s easy to do. You don’t have to raise your hand, but do you recognize any hint of that within yourself? You’re mad at someone. They offended you somehow.
They took credit for your work, they didn’t recognize you, maybe they just cut you off in traffic, maybe he left his shoes on the stairs for the 400th time this week, and in your heart you say something like, all men are like that.
All women are like that. All Republicans are like that. All Democrats are like that. All evangelicals. All millennials.
All Gen Z. Everyone from that ethnicity. We see one member of a group do something and we say, they’re all like that. They’re all the problem as a group. Any hint of that in your heart?
It’s easy to fall into, but it always escalates the level of anger. It never helps the situation. It always makes it worse. It makes it harder to reconcile, because now instead of working through a specific grievance with a specific person, right, which normally you could work out. You have an issue with someone at work, you can talk to HR, get it resolved, right?
Haman could have done that, worked through it. But now the problem is beyond that. Now the problem isn’t just with Mordecai, it’s with all Jewish people. And if the problem is all of them, if that’s what you think, there aren’t many ways to fix that. Which is why once someone starts believing the problem is them, it doesn’t take long to conclude we need to get rid of them.
We shouldn’t hire them. They shouldn’t live in our neighborhood. I don’t want them around my kids. They should be barred from our institutions. All the way to the most extreme reaction, exterminate them.
Genocide. It still happens today to different degrees. It’s not always max reaction, but this isn’t just ancient history, right? We have not evolved past this. One group feels justified attacking another group, usually not genocide, but somehow they feel justified targeting another group because they believe believe that group is the problem.
Religious people can attack nonreligious people. Nonreligious people can attack religious people. But religion or nonreligion isn’t the problem. It’s just one of the ways that the problem can manifest itself. But the same problem could be just as— could just as easily erupt through race, economic status, politics, anything.
And it has throughout world history. Whenever we say the problem is those people, then we pretty immediately feel justified in targeting them. And that’s what Haman does. He says— he goes most extreme. He says, let’s kill all of them, all the Jewish people in Persia.
He tells Xerxes, if we do this, one, we’ll have less problems around here because this group doesn’t follow your laws. I mean, that’s not true. There’s only one guy who didn’t care about one law because his ego was bruised. That’s irrelevant to Haman. He says, they’re all defiant.
The only solution is to wipe them out completely. And bonus too, King, if we do kill them, not only will some problems be solved, but then we can plunder them too. Verse 13, this will enrich us. Like win-win, right? Get rid of them and get a bunch of money.
So, the king gives the order that all Jewish people will be exterminated. Just tragic, unbelievable, you know, inexcusable. And yet, it’s not the only time in world history such an order has gone out specifically against Israelites. In fact, it’s pretty shocking how often Jewish people have been targeted by some other group. There seems to be some particular prejudice against them.
Going back all the way to ancient Egypt. Pharaoh says, kill all the Hebrew babies. Then King Herod in the New Testament makes a similar decree when Jesus is young. He says, kill all the boys under 2 years old. Fast forward to the Middle Ages in Europe, Christians began blaming Jews for the death of Christ, and as a result Jews were one of the victims of the Crusades.
For example, there is the Rhineland Massacre in Germany, 1096, part of the Crusades, around 2,000 Jewish people were killed. Following that, Edward I in England banned Jewish people from the Kingdom of England in 1290. Then Jews were blamed as one of the causes of the Black Death. Europeans said, Jews are the reasons we have this plague. That led to the Strasbourg Massacre in 1349 where thousands of Jewish people were burned alive.
Israel didn’t fare any better in the Arab world. I mean, it wasn’t just Europe treating them them that way, it’s really everybody. When Muhammad rises to power, he either expels Jewish communities, or slaughters them, or subjugates them. Those are the only options. Same story continues in the Arab world when the Ottoman Empire comes in.
And it’s not just Europe and Ottoman Empire, it’s Russian Empire too. Russians started in the late 1800s, began something called pogroms. Sorry for my American accent for anyone who speaks Russian, but pogroms were, it’s a Russian word, state-sanctioned violence against Jewish people. Mobs, riots, lynchings, slaughterings, all officially approved. That continued past the 1920s, 1930s.
So, of course Jewish people in Russia, some of them think, let’s get out of here. Let’s flee. But where are they going to go? They are in Russia. They attempt to flee to Russia’s neighbor and enemy, the Ottoman Empire, thinking, hey, if Russia hates us, maybe the enemy of our enemy will be our friend.
But that didn’t work out. The Ottomans and the Russians didn’t agree on much, but they agreed on one thing: Jewish people are bad. So, when Jews started showing up in the Ottoman Empire who looked Russian, spoke Russian, but were leaving Russia because they were Jewish and were persecuted, the Ottomans just thought, hey, this is 2 of our enemies rolled into one. So, those Jewish refugees were not received well, but where else could they go? What was the other option?
There really wasn’t wasn’t one. The European countries, the U.S., Canada, all of us, we had limits for how many Jewish people would— we would receive as immigrants or refugees. We, we didn’t allow very many of them to come in. A few Jewish people could escape from various places of persecution, but certainly not anything close to the majority of them. Then the problem gets worse, of course, when Hitler rises to power in Germany, and even more masses of them want flee from Germany while they’re also wanting to flee Russia, while they’re also trying to flee the Arab world.
Who’s going to take them in? No one opened their doors wide.
And then most tragically, of course, Hitler, like Haman, tries to exterminate all the Jews in the world in World War II, kills 6 million of them. Eventually, praise God, the Allied forces come in. We stop the killing, provide food and clothing. But after the war, all the people who had been in Nazi concentration camps, they’re still displaced persons living in camps. I mean, now they have necessities, they have food and shelter, but they don’t have a home.
They can’t make a life in those refugee camps. And still no one was really willing to take them in. The Western countries, us, Europe, the U.S., Canada, we did not increase our limits for how many Jewish people were allowed to immigrate. And the Arab world, of course, didn’t want them either. 1930, before the war, Jewish people were about 25% of the population of Baghdad.
1 out of every 4 people was Jewish in 1930 in Baghdad. By the early 1950s after the war, there were zero Jewish people in Baghdad. They were kicked out. There was nowhere in the world for them to go. There were actually conferences of nations that got together and talked about what are we going to do about the Jewish immigration problem.
And basically the whole world told the Jews, don’t know where you’re going to go, but you can’t come here.
It was one of the contributing factors to the decision of, hey, let’s give them their own country. Problem, of course, was that the other people living on that plot of land didn’t love that idea. And as soon as Israel gained statehood, they were immediately attacked and really have been attacked pretty much ever since. Move forward to modern day, of course, Hamas and its supporters want to finish what Haman and Hitler couldn’t— total elimination of Israelites. Israel’s history is largely one of refugees, immigrants, displaced persons, and persecution.
And it’s like we’ve all had a swing at them— Eastern Europe, Western Europe, Russia, Arab world, US, Canada, none of us are innocent. We’ve all contributed in varying degrees to their plight, even if it was only, hey, you can’t come here. We contributed somehow. Not to say that Israel hasn’t persecuted others as well, right? They aren’t always the victim.
They have definitely also been the victimizer, and none of that is okay. We’ll never celebrate any kind of oppression by anyone, but if you’re looking at the total history of every people group ever, it is hard to find a group who has been targeted more often by more nations for more millennia than the Israelites have been. And yet, they remain. It’s rather amazing. Why haven’t they been wiped off the face of the earth with so many efforts to have done so.
With the amount of times that very powerful enemies have tried to take them out, or assimilate them, or just conquer them, or totally exterminate them, or just tell them to go away, you’d think they would have gone away, but they’re still here. It’s pretty incredible. It’s almost like God is always going to provide a way when it looks like there is no way. And we certainly see that here in Esther, which brings us to the solution. It was already in place.
There are actually 2 solutions in Esther that God had already set in motion to save the Israelites from Haman before Haman ever said anything. Or to be more accurate, God’s provided one solution and probably another solution. The first is Esther herself, and the second, probably other one, is the general population of Susa. So, first, Esther hasn’t revealed it yet, but she is, of course, Jewish, and the king is pretty fond of her. So, how do you think it’s going to go?
Even without reading the rest of Esther, even if you don’t know anything about this book, Just how do you think it’s going to go for Haman when the king finds out that Haman wants to kill his sweetheart because of her ethnic background? How’s that going to go? Not great for Haman, right? If this was a movie and we watched Haman tell his plan to King Xerxes, you know, and then we see Xerxes approving it, I imagine somehow the camera would cut to another room in the palace and we would see Esther. And the music would somehow clue us in that Haman’s request to kill all the Jews will actually be to his own demise.
We see before Haman ever created a problem, God had one solution sitting in the palace before Haman ever even said anything. But there another probably solution out in the city, and it’s the general population of Susa, verse 15. Apparently the whole city of Susa, not just the Jewish population, the whole city feels aghast over the decree to kill all the Jewish people. It seems most of Persia loved their Jewish neighbors, even though, I mean, they’re certainly enemies of the Israelites throughout the kingdom as well. That’s definitely true.
It seems most of Susa was not an enemy. Seems like they love Jewish people being there. They are upset about the decree, bewildered it says. Now we’re left to guess why Susa loves the Israelites like they do. It doesn’t tell us.
But it’s a safe assumption that they love the Israelites because the Israelites must have done a good job loving their Susan neighbors. And that assumption is not totally unfounded because way back before Israel went into exile under Babylon and then remained into Persia, about 120 years before Esther became queen, God told the Israelites through the prophet Jeremiah, He said, when you are taken into exile— so you’re going into exile, nothing you can do about that— when you’re taken into exile, seek the good of the city where you are taken. Promote the welfare of everyone around you. Yes, they took you into exile. Yes, there’s They’re your enemy.
They did not do you right, right? But be good citizens there anyway. Pray for the city, because as its welfare increases, your welfare will increase. God told them that way before Babylon ever defeated them. Fast forward 120 years later, Israelites are living in Susa.
Presumably, they must still be reading Jeremiah. And listening to him. It seems Israelites had worked enough for the good of the city that Susa in general liked them being there, and they were upset, bewildered about this order to exterminate their friends.
So what do you think might happen when a relatively small but powerful group tries to destroy a beloved demographic in Susa? How do you think the general population is going to respond if swords break out?
The Israelites are probably going to have help. That’s what would probably happen. Because they’ve been good neighbors, others will be good neighbors to them, probably.
I wonder if that kind of strategy could improve tensions today.
I wonder if loving your neighbor as a nation could help anything. I know it wouldn’t change anything, you know, this afternoon or tomorrow, but I wonder if, say, 20 years ago or longer, I wonder if Israel had looked at Gaza, for example, and said, we know you’re not really part of our country, right? I mean, technically Hamas is in charge of you now. They were elected. And it, like, and it’s obvious, we know they aren’t going to care for you, right?
And it, and it turns out they haven’t. I mean, the only thing Hamas has built in nearly 20 years in Gaza is tunnels. That’s it. They haven’t improved society whatsoever. But what if 20 years ago or longer ago, Israel looked at Gaza and said, your own leaders aren’t going to care for you.
What’s the maximum we can do to promote your welfare as your neighbor? Instead of making life harder for you, how can we seek your good and your prosperity? How can we seek your welfare? How can we seek the good of your city even though it’s not our city? What if they’d done that 20 years ago or longer?
Do you think that would have any effect on today whatsoever? Do you think it’d be any amount different? I don’t know what that would look like. I don’t know what’s possible. Possible.
Israel obviously has to always defend itself like every nation does, but I do know what God said through Jeremiah is still true. Seek the good of those around you, even if those around you are your enemy, even if those around you have carried you into exile. Seek their good. Pray for them. Be a good neighbor.
As their welfare increases, so will yours. The more you seek your good, the fewer problems you will have. That’s still true.
And the Israelites living in Susa had done it. They had done it to the extent that apparently Susa loved Israelites.
So before there was ever a problem, God had in fact 2, or one and probably another solution in place. Before Haman ever anything. God had already accounted for him. And that is always the case. It was the case in 5th century BC Susa, and it’s the case for us.
I don’t know what problem you’re facing. It might seem huge. It might seem small. But I do know that God saw it coming before you ever did. It did not surprise him when it popped up in your life.
He was not scrambling for an answer. He already had the answer staged before there was ever a problem. He stacked the deck before the cards were dealt, like He did with Susa. He knew how to answer your problem 120 years ago, and actually He had a solution in place all the way back to the foundation of the world. Did you know that our biggest problem God had already solved in pre-existent eternity?
Revelation 13:8, Christ was crucified before the foundation of the world. Before there ever was a world, before there was Adam and Eve, before there was sin, God knew what He was going to do about sin. In other words, God did not respond when humans rebelled. In fact, respond isn’t ever the best word for anything God ever does. Instead, God implements in time what has always been in his mind.
And even our biggest problem, the world’s biggest problem, he knew what he would do about it from eternity past. He knew he would carry our sin on his shoulders on the cross that we may be restored to him long before we ever rebelled from him. He knew how he was going to reconcile us to him, how to reconcile us to each other, and ultimately how the world could be totally healed of the darkness that we have brought into it. He knew all that before there ever was darkness.
He has a plan for your problem. He already has a solution in place, which means you can rest. Let’s pray. Father, we thank you you that you are sovereign and that you are good.
We thank you that you love us to prepare a way before us in advance of there ever being a problem. We thank you there’s never been a problem you didn’t see coming and that you didn’t already know exactly how you would handle it. I pray you increase our faith today, Lord. Lord, our faith in you and what you have done through Jesus Christ, who has made it possible for us to be reconciled to you and for all the darkness in the world to be healed. We pray those things in his name.
Amen. Amen.
