Latest / Prophecy Watchers / They Demanded He Bow | He Refused | (Esther 3) | Matt Freeman

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They Demanded He Bow | He Refused | (Esther 3) | Matt Freeman · Prophecy Watchers

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Speaker 1: Okay, so this conspiracy and drama that starts to unfold
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Speaker 1: in the book of Esther, it's really a remarkable thing.
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Speaker 1: And as I've mentioned the last few weeks that we've
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Speaker 1: been going through this, the early church, many, many hundreds
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Speaker 1: of years ago, did not want Esther included in the
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Speaker 1: Bible because the name of God doesn't even appear in it.
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Speaker 1: The name of God, Jehovah, Yahweh, there is no name
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Speaker 1: of God in the whole book, but Esther's name actually
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Speaker 1: means something hidden. And there are a lot of deep,
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Speaker 1: deep hidden codes in the book of Esther. And it
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Speaker 1: really fills this gap for God's people, the Jewish people
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Speaker 1: at that time, when after they were allowed to go
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Speaker 1: back and rebuild their temple in Jerusalem, a lot of
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Speaker 1: them did not take Cyrus up on his offer. And
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Speaker 1: so they stayed in Persia And God's watchful hand was
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Speaker 1: over them the whole time. And in 167 verses, it's
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Speaker 1: amazing that the name of God doesn't appear once despite
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Speaker 1: a king, the name king, or the word king, I
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Speaker 1: should say, occurring 160 times. And God's name really is,
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Speaker 1: and we'll look at the, when we get through the book,
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Speaker 1: we'll look at the end at some places where God's
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Speaker 1: name actually does show up in the Bible, but it's
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Speaker 1: hidden beneath the text. And It's just a remarkable thing
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Speaker 1: looking back now. You can see why the Lord kept
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Speaker 1: this book in his word. Now, as you're going through
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Speaker 1: things like this, and I always share this with everyone,
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Speaker 1: but you have to lean on the Holy Spirit to
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Speaker 1: teach you all of this because the word of God
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Speaker 1: is not an exercise of intellect. It's not an exercise
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Speaker 1: of knowledge. Satan is the most wise and knowledgeable creature
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Speaker 1: ever created. but he has no understanding of the Bible.
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Speaker 1: He can just read it and he tries to use
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Speaker 1: it and twist it to attack, but he doesn't have
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Speaker 1: understanding that comes by and only by the Holy Spirit.
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Speaker 1: And that's what you need. You need understanding from the
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Speaker 1: spirit of the living God to fully understand the word.
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Speaker 1: And it's the only way that you can really deepen
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Speaker 1: your faith and grow within the Bible is by that.
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Speaker 1: And so if you lean on the Holy Spirit and
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Speaker 1: ask him to teach it to you as you're going
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Speaker 1: through it, he will build you up and you will
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Speaker 1: feel stronger in your faith over time. Now, it doesn't
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Speaker 1: always happen overnight, but over time and over the years,
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Speaker 1: you will see a big difference. So, like I mentioned,
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Speaker 1: the name Esther means concealed or something hidden. Proverbs 25.2,
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Speaker 1: one of my favorite verses in the Bible, that it
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Speaker 1: is the glory of God to conceal a thing, but
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Speaker 1: the honor of kings is to search out a matter.
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Speaker 1: And there are all of these hidden codes all throughout
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Speaker 1: the Bible that And Esther has a lot of them.
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Speaker 1: We've talked about the ones in the first five books
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Speaker 1: of the Bible of Genesis and Exodus. If you go
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Speaker 1: and you spell Torah and you go to the first
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Speaker 1: Ta and you count 49 letters, you get to an
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Speaker 1: O and then an R and then an H. And
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Speaker 1: then it does that going forward in Genesis and Exodus.
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Speaker 1: In Deuteronomy and Numbers, it does it, but it goes backwards.
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Speaker 1: And then in Leviticus on seven letter intervals, it spells
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Speaker 1: out Yahweh. And so you can see how what God
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Speaker 1: was saying there is the entire Old Testament, the five
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Speaker 1: first five books of the Torah all point to Yahweh.
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Speaker 1: And we've talked about math a lot. I won't go
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Speaker 1: through this again necessarily, but in the two main verses
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Speaker 1: in creation, Genesis 1-1 and John 1-1, Genesis being in
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Speaker 1: Hebrew and John in Greek, if you take the numerical
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Speaker 1: value of the letters, Genesis actually comes out to equal
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Speaker 1: pi and John 1-1 equals E or Euler's number It's
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Speaker 1: the natural logarithm used in mathematics, and it's a constant
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Speaker 1: in creation. But that's the formula, in case you're just curious.
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Speaker 1: If you want to go run that on your own,
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Speaker 1: I promise it does work out. I've done it so
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Speaker 1: many times with my very old calculator. But it does work.
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Speaker 1: But you take the number of letters times the product
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Speaker 1: of the letters, and you divide by the number of
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Speaker 1: words times the product of the words. If that formula
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Speaker 1: stays consistent, you get pi and e in those two verses.
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Speaker 1: which is just remarkable. It has about a one out
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Speaker 1: of eight billion chance that that would occur accidentally. But
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Speaker 1: there's stuff like this all through the Bible. We talked
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Speaker 1: about Yaakov Ramsel's discoveries out of Isaiah 53 with the
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Speaker 1: equal letter distance sequences that spell out all of the
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Speaker 1: different disciples at the cross and who is at the
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Speaker 1: feet of Jesus and all those different things. It all
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Speaker 1: all encoded, so to speak, in that one chapter, Isaiah 53. Now,
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Speaker 1: God's divine hand, the point of taking you through those
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Speaker 1: things over the last few weeks has been just to
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Speaker 1: point out that God's divine hand is on every letter
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Speaker 1: of the Bible. And all of it is there intentional
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Speaker 1: and by design. And in Deuteronomy 31, 16 through 18,
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Speaker 1: God warned his people that he would hide himself from
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Speaker 1: them for a season. And so what you see in
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Speaker 1: Esther is that starting to unfold, that the Lord had
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Speaker 1: kind of hidden himself in a way. He wasn't speaking
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Speaker 1: to them necessarily through the priesthood or these other methods
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Speaker 1: like in the past, but he was still working behind
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Speaker 1: the scenes on their behalf. And though he was hidden,
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Speaker 1: he was forever warring and fighting for them. And this
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Speaker 1: book really shows God is overruling all earthly and spiritual authority.
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Speaker 1: Satan was at work. trying to use Haman to blot
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Speaker 1: out the nation of Israel, exactly as once before he
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Speaker 1: had used Pharaoh for the same purpose. And in the
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Speaker 1: end though, Jehovah's council will always, it must stand, it
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Speaker 1: will always stand. He's not going to be displaced. And
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Speaker 1: he has to preserve the Jewish line for a lot
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Speaker 1: of reasons. One being at this time, the Messiah was
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Speaker 1: promised to come through through the line of Abraham, from
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Speaker 1: the seed of the woman all the way back in
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Speaker 1: Genesis 3.15, going all the way down to the virgin
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Speaker 1: birth with Mary. But also, he has to preserve them
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Speaker 1: today because the Jewish people are the reason Jesus comes
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Speaker 1: back at the end of the tribulation. After we are raptured,
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Speaker 1: they are pushed to the brink of extinction. At the
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Speaker 1: end of that seven-year period from Hosea 5.15, they have
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Speaker 1: to cry out to him, ask for forgiveness, and then
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Speaker 1: Jesus comes comes back from heaven, wipes out all of
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Speaker 1: his enemies at Armageddon, and rescues them. But his working
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Speaker 1: at this time in the book of Esther was somewhat
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Speaker 1: secret and hidden. And that's why the name Jehovah is
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Speaker 1: actually hidden secretly at least four times in the book
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Speaker 1: when you look at the letters of the book of Esther.
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Speaker 1: So after the book of Daniel, as a reminder, there
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Speaker 1: is this really small remnant that returned to Jerusalem in
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Speaker 1: So Cyrus comes, he offers all of these financial incentives. Hey,
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Speaker 1: you guys can go back and rebuild the temple. The
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Speaker 1: Lord has spoken to me and wants me to bless
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Speaker 1: you to go back and rebuild his temple. He is
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Speaker 1: the living God. So very few of them actually take
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Speaker 1: him up on that and go and do it, despite
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Speaker 1: the Lord imploring them to come out of Babylon. And
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Speaker 1: that's in Isaiah 48, 20, Jeremiah 29, 10, and et cetera.
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Speaker 1: A lot of them stayed behind, Esther included. Esther and
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Speaker 1: her family and Mordecai, her cousin. We looked at last
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Speaker 1: time how they came through the line and they were cousins.
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Speaker 1: Esther and Mordecai were cousins. So when Esther lost her family,
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Speaker 1: her care or well-being fell under Mordecai's responsibility. And so
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Speaker 1: that's why he takes her in as her cousin. But
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Speaker 1: the reason why God wanted them out of Persia was
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Speaker 1: to bless them in the land of his promise. And
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Speaker 1: yet God did not forsake those that stayed behind in Persia.
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Speaker 1: His supernatural hand of protection was upon them that whole time.
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Speaker 1: So if you look at the book of Esther, it's
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Speaker 1: pretty short. It's only 10 chapters. But there's the story
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Speaker 1: of Vashti, the queen. If you remember, the king holds
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Speaker 1: that banquet in chapter one for 180 days. He gets
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Speaker 1: very drunk. He wants to show off his wife to
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Speaker 1: all of his buddies. And she has a lot more
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Speaker 1: character than him and says, no, thank you. And then
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Speaker 1: all the guys and all of his counselors come around
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Speaker 1: and want him to make a decree against her and
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Speaker 1: basically kick her out of the royal family to show
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Speaker 1: all of the other people in Persia that women cannot
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Speaker 1: disobey their husbands. And they were trying to make an
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Speaker 1: example of her. And she refuses. He then goes to war.
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Speaker 1: And if you remember, about four years had passed between
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Speaker 1: chapter one and two. This decree was made against Vashti.
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Speaker 1: Artaxerxes goes to war against Greece. He gets his 2
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Speaker 1: million plus man army wiped out. That's the movie of 300,
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Speaker 1: if you remember that, was based kind of on some
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Speaker 1: of those wars. He comes back with very few soldiers,
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Speaker 1: is extremely upset and mad, and then remembers his decree
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Speaker 1: against Vashti And that's when he goes to search for
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Speaker 1: another queen, a new wife, and when Esther is made
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Speaker 1: queen despite hiding her Jewish background. So last time in
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Speaker 1: chapter two, we saw Esther. Esther went from being an
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Speaker 1: orphan that was basically destitute and homeless to being taken
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Speaker 1: in by charity with her cousin to being queen of
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Speaker 1: the known world empire, just all in a few years.
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Speaker 1: And so that's remarkable, but that is only by the
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Speaker 1: power of God. So in chapter three here, we're going
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Speaker 1: to see Haman and his conspiracy. Then chapter four is
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Speaker 1: the curse. of Esther of bringing deliverance. Chapter five is
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Speaker 1: the actual vengeance that is played out. Then the feast
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Speaker 1: of Purim, or Purim means lots in Hebrew. So it
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Speaker 1: was not a Levitical feast. Purim was casting the lot
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Speaker 1: or the die of and then the epilogue at the
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Speaker 1: very end. But the Feast of Purim was to celebrate
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Speaker 1: the deliverance of God. So the Jewish festival commemorating the
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Speaker 1: survival of the Jews who were marked for death by
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Speaker 1: Haman and Artaxerxes and all these other people. Or Xerxes,
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Speaker 1: I should say, not Artaxerxes. And remember one other thing.
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Speaker 1: So last time in Esther, when she was made queen,
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Speaker 1: remember she gets Mordecai promoted to the gate of the
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Speaker 1: city And Mordecai is kind of in the city council,
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Speaker 1: so to speak. And he hears of these two guys
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Speaker 1: in the king's court that want to murder the king
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Speaker 1: and take him out. And so Mordecai tells Esther about it.
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Speaker 1: She brings it to the king's attention. He then hangs
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Speaker 1: those two traitors. And it's written down in the Chronicles
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Speaker 1: of the King that Mordecai is the one that did that.
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Speaker 1: And then that book is basically buried. And so, but
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Speaker 1: that's going to become very important towards the end of
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Speaker 1: the book as we get to like chapter six or so.
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Speaker 1: That was marked in the Chronicles. Okay, so the Old
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Speaker 1: Testament timeline we've been looking at for a while. Daniel,
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Speaker 1: when we just finished Daniel, but the Babylonian exile. So
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Speaker 1: it was roughly, you know, call it 80 or 100
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Speaker 1: years later when the events of Esther are occurring post-exile.
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Speaker 1: So you can kind of see it these different timeframes
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Speaker 1: throughout the Old Testament and which books of the Bible
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Speaker 1: were written at what time, but Esther falling towards the
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Speaker 1: very end of the Old Testament, so to speak. Now,
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Speaker 1: let's just dive in. Esther chapter three, verse one here.
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Speaker 1: So after these things did King Ahasuerus promote Haman, the
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Speaker 1: son of Hamadatha, the Agite, and advanced him and set
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Speaker 1: his seat above all the princes that were with him
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Speaker 1: So Haman is promoted to the prime minister. Now, if
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Speaker 1: you remember, Haman is only in existence because Saul did
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Speaker 1: not kill King Agag many, many, many years before this.
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Speaker 1: Mordecai is in existence because King David spared Shimei years later.
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Speaker 1: So it's amazing how one mistake of Saul by sparing
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Speaker 1: a king that he was supposed to kill actually was counterbalanced,
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Speaker 1: so to speak, by David having mercy years later, not
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Speaker 1: killing a guy that really deserved death. So it's a
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Speaker 1: pretty amazing thing how the Lord orchestrated that. Okay, so
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Speaker 1: Haman is promoted here and this starts the attack on
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Speaker 1: God's people. So a satanically inspired man becoming very powerful,
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Speaker 1: and then working to wipe out the Jewish people. Now
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Speaker 1: that has occurred recently in our own modern history, just
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Speaker 1: 80 years ago. But Pharaoh did that, Sennacherib, Caesar, Hitler,
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Speaker 1: Ahmadinejad tried to do that, et cetera. The list goes on.
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Speaker 1: Saddam Hussein to a degree, you see it now with
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Speaker 1: the Iranian leaders. The list goes on and on and on.
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Speaker 1: It's interesting, the rise of Hitler to power during World
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Speaker 1: War II and before leading up to World War II,
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Speaker 1: if you go back and actually study what was going
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Speaker 1: on at that time, part of the issue was the
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Speaker 1: German churches remained silent. And this is really played out,
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Speaker 1: if you've ever heard the story of Bonhoeffer, that book,
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Speaker 1: it's a very long book. We tried to read it
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Speaker 1: as a family and got through, I think maybe the
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Speaker 1: first page of the prelude of And then it was,
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Speaker 1: the kids were just scattered. So we gave up. But
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Speaker 1: we did watch the movie with them on the Angel Network.
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Speaker 1: And it's a really good movie. It's very, it shows
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Speaker 1: it and displays it very well. It's an intense movie
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Speaker 1: of Bonhoeffer sticking just to the word of God and
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Speaker 1: standing up and saying, basically putting a spotlight on it going,
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Speaker 1: this is wrong. You know, the German church is bowing
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Speaker 1: a knee to this tyrannical, maniacal, satanic man named Adolf Hitler,
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Speaker 1: and he is totally corrupting the church. And all of
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Speaker 1: these silent churches just went with it. And so it
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Speaker 1: led to that whole event. But it's amazing how the
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Speaker 1: attack started in the small local churches. That was Satan's goal.
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Speaker 1: If he could attack the small local churches and get
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Speaker 1: them silent, then he could take out that plan. And
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Speaker 1: you see that he tried to do that again six
15:00
Speaker 1: years ago here in the U.S. by shutting down the
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Speaker 1: churches and calling them non, I can't remember the word, essential, non-essential, yes, non-essential.
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Speaker 1: But anyway, everything else could stay open but that. So
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Speaker 1: we're going to see that Haman, though, embodies this characteristic
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Speaker 1: that God abhors. And in Proverbs 6, 16 through 19 says,
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Speaker 1: These six things doth the Lord hate, yea, seven are
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Speaker 1: an abomination unto him. A proud look, a lying tongue,
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Speaker 1: hands that shed innocent blood, an heart that deviseth wicked imaginations,
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Speaker 1: feet that be swift in running to mischief, a false
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Speaker 1: witness that speaketh lies, and he that soweth discord among brethren.
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Speaker 1: So there's seven things there. Haman actually represents every single
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Speaker 1: one of those. Now, but it is amazing if you
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Speaker 1: step back and really think about, I know all of
15:59
Speaker 1: us have been in different churches for a lot of
16:01
Speaker 1: years and done different things. But that last one, he
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Speaker 1: that soweth discord among brethren, there has not been a
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Speaker 1: single different people group on earth that I've seen that
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Speaker 1: sow more discord against each other than the church within
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Speaker 1: its own walls. And it's heartbreaking. Looking back all the
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Speaker 1: way up to you know, when we were young and
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Speaker 1: living in Kansas City and going to different churches and things,
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Speaker 1: but the amount of just discord and infighting of just
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Speaker 1: some of the silliest things was really heartbreaking. But you
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Speaker 1: see a lot of those modern characteristics today, just overall.
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Speaker 1: In verse two, and all the king's servants that were
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Speaker 1: in the king's gate bowed and reverenced Haman, for the
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Speaker 1: king had so commanded concerning him, but Mordecai bowed not.
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Speaker 1: nor did him reverence. So since Haman was promoted, the
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Speaker 1: other nobles had to pay special respect to him, so
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Speaker 1: to speak. The command to bow is very similar to
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Speaker 1: that of Nebuchadnezzar. We saw in Daniel 3 to bow
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Speaker 1: to the golden statue or get thrown in the furnace,
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Speaker 1: the fiery furnace. Mordecai knows who he serves and he's
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Speaker 1: not paying homage to this evil man, Haman. So Mordecai
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Speaker 1: is refusing, much like Daniel refused Haman in the book
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Speaker 1: of Daniel, he and his friends refused. His friends actually
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Speaker 1: refused to bow down to the statue. Daniel refused to
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Speaker 1: stop praying to his God when he was commanded or outlawed.
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Speaker 1: And this happens to occur after Mordecai had saved the
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Speaker 1: king from an assassination attempt. So this is pretty remarkable.
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Speaker 1: The two would-be assassins were executed in chapter two that
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Speaker 1: we looked at last week. So this event was only
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Speaker 1: recorded in the Chronicles of the King, but Mordecai was
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Speaker 1: never rewarded. And that's later gonna be found out by
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Speaker 1: the king in chapter six. And he'll be shocked that
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Speaker 1: this man, Mordecai, saved his life and he was never
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Speaker 1: rewarded for it. So Mordecai was likely expecting some recognition
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Speaker 1: for it, but it didn't happen in his timing. And
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Speaker 1: you'll see that a lot in your life as you
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Speaker 1: do things for the Lord. Not that you're expecting to
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Speaker 1: be recognized for it, But the timing of which that
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Speaker 1: is celebrated or even recognized at some point later on
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Speaker 1: in your life, it's amazing how that's always in God's timing,
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Speaker 1: not in yours. And I'll never forget, my question there
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Speaker 1: at the end was a question that God asked me
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Speaker 1: in 2012, no, sorry, 2013. And it changed my life, actually.
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Speaker 1: So that question, are you working for the praise of man?
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Speaker 1: So I'll give you this short story real fast. We
18:47
Speaker 1: won't go down a huge rabbit trail, I promise. But
18:49
Speaker 1: it'll be a short story. So I was working on
18:51
Speaker 1: this really massive project. Doesn't really matter what it was.
18:56
Speaker 1: I was literally just burning the candle at both ends
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Speaker 1: and spending a ton of time away from my family
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Speaker 1: and really sacrificing a lot to make this happen. Well,
19:08
Speaker 1: the project got approved finally. And our CEO sent out
19:13
Speaker 1: this email thanking everyone that worked on the job to
19:16
Speaker 1: get it approved and all this. And he thanked these
19:21
Speaker 1: two other people and didn't include me in the email, okay,
19:24
Speaker 1: to the whole company. And I was sitting there. It
19:28
Speaker 1: was a Friday night, and I got home from the office.
19:31
Speaker 1: I was sitting there, and I just was reading the emails.
19:33
Speaker 1: I was getting ready to go downstairs and have dinner.
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Speaker 1: And when I read it, my heart, like, sunk completely.
19:40
Speaker 1: like four floors, you know, through the earth, it felt like.
19:43
Speaker 1: And I was sitting there and I was so heartbroken
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Speaker 1: because I was like, here I had literally seen slaved
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Speaker 1: and sacrificed my family for 18 months to make this
19:53
Speaker 1: thing happen. And it wasn't even noticed, you know, in
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Speaker 1: an email. And so God asked me that question. That's
20:02
Speaker 1: literally the question he asked me. He said, well, he
20:05
Speaker 1: said my name in front of it, but he said, Matt,
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Speaker 1: are you working for the praise of man? And that
20:10
Speaker 1: was the only thing he asked. And it changed my life, literally,
20:14
Speaker 1: after that one question. It just sent me on a
20:17
Speaker 1: totally different path, completely. So in verse three here, then
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Speaker 1: the king's servants, which were in the king's gates and
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Speaker 1: said unto Mordecai, why transgressest thou the king's commandment? So
20:28
Speaker 1: Mordecai's peers are basically pressuring him to just submit to
20:32
Speaker 1: the culture. Why should you be counter to the culture?
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Speaker 1: You know, it's what they're saying. Why aren't you bowing
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Speaker 1: down here? And if you just think about today, there
20:43
Speaker 1: are a lot of loud voices in the earth that
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Speaker 1: are trying to get you to go along with the culture, um,
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Speaker 1: a lot, you know, just go with it. Um, desecrate
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Speaker 1: the sanctity of marriage, murder your children. My gosh, I
20:57
Speaker 1: just saw in Minnesota, they, the governor up there, Tim Waltz,
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Speaker 1: just signed a bill that you can, um, basically abort
21:07
Speaker 1: a newborn child within a certain number of time, like hours,
21:12
Speaker 1: I think, of it being born. I can't remember what
21:15
Speaker 1: it was, but they literally, do you see how the
21:18
Speaker 1: goalpost just keeps moving? So now you can murder your
21:21
Speaker 1: child as soon as it's born. It doesn't have to
21:23
Speaker 1: be in the womb. And he just signed that into law.
21:26
Speaker 1: I saw two different city council meetings, one in Iowa
21:30
Speaker 1: and one in the state of Washington this last week,
21:33
Speaker 1: both opened up with a satanic prayer saying, And a
21:37
Speaker 1: guy in one of them got up to say, hey,
21:40
Speaker 1: we rebuke that in the city. What are you doing?
21:43
Speaker 1: And the city councilman shut him down. It was like, no, no, no,
21:47
Speaker 1: this is going to continue. But that is insane if
21:51
Speaker 1: you think about it. I mean, that we are to
21:54
Speaker 1: the point that city council meetings in small towns in
21:59
Speaker 1: Iowa are opening up with a satanic prayer to a
22:03
Speaker 1: dark God, they call. It's evil. It is an evil,
22:08
Speaker 1: evil assignment. And praise God for the guys that are
22:12
Speaker 1: standing up going, that's not happening in our city. We're
22:14
Speaker 1: not doing that here. And there's been a ton of
22:16
Speaker 1: backlash on it. So hopefully it gets shut down, but
22:19
Speaker 1: we'll pray for that at the end here, that that stops.
22:23
Speaker 1: But that's the kind of thing that the culture is
22:25
Speaker 1: leaning towards today. And I saw, I was reading an
22:30
Speaker 1: article one time about how one of Satan's tactics is,
22:36
Speaker 1: is to take over the culture. If he can win
22:38
Speaker 1: the culture war, he eventually can take over a nation.
22:42
Speaker 1: And the whole premise of the article was going back
22:45
Speaker 1: decades and decades ago to the 40s and starting getting
22:48
Speaker 1: socialism ingrained in the colleges and letting that take over
22:54
Speaker 1: over time and being fine with it taking 50, 60,
22:57
Speaker 1: 70 years if it means 100 years later that that
23:00
Speaker 1: nation falls. Because he always plays the long game. So
23:04
Speaker 1: you have to be aware of that kind of thing.
23:07
Speaker 1: But in ancient times, when they bowed down before people
23:10
Speaker 1: in authority, it was to show respect. Abraham bowed down
23:14
Speaker 1: to the sons of Heth in Genesis 23. The sons
23:17
Speaker 1: of Jacob bowed down before Joseph, thinking he was an
23:20
Speaker 1: Egyptian official in Genesis 42. David bowed down to Saul
23:24
Speaker 1: in 1 Samuel 24. Jacob and his family bowed before
23:28
Speaker 1: Esau in Genesis 33. The Jews even bowed to one
23:32
Speaker 1: another in 2 Samuel 14 and 18, which is interesting.
23:36
Speaker 1: But Haman was an Amalekite. And according to God's word,
23:41
Speaker 1: I think this is just so fascinating, he would have
23:43
Speaker 1: war with Amalek from generation to generation. And I don't
23:47
Speaker 1: know if Mordecai had this in mind necessarily, but in
23:50
Speaker 1: Exodus 17, 16, for he said,' Because the Lord hath
23:53
Speaker 1: sworn' that the Lord will have war with Amalek' from
23:56
Speaker 1: generation to generation.' So never forget, Mordecai did not forget
24:02
Speaker 1: where his allegiance was. And don't forget where ours is
24:06
Speaker 1: either in Acts 5 verse 29. Then Peter and the
24:11
Speaker 1: other apostles answered and said, we ought to obey God
24:15
Speaker 1: rather than men. And that is what you do. Unless
24:20
Speaker 1: they're asking you to do something that breaks God's law, yes,
24:25
Speaker 1: follow the laws of the land. And God talks about
24:28
Speaker 1: that in Romans. but you have to ultimately obey God
24:31
Speaker 1: rather than men. And Mordecai was not gonna bow to
24:34
Speaker 1: an evil, tyrannical man in an idol, in an idol, sorry,
24:41
Speaker 1: I'm tired today, in an idol type state with Haman.
24:46
Speaker 1: So in verse four here, now it came to pass
24:48
Speaker 1: when they spake daily unto him and he hearkened not
24:50
Speaker 1: unto them that they told Haman to see whether Mordecai's
24:53
Speaker 1: matters would stand for he told them that he was
24:56
Speaker 1: a Jew. So Mordecai did not succumb to this pressure
25:01
Speaker 1: despite these daily attempts, and they get really upset, so
25:04
Speaker 1: they turn him over to the authorities. Okay, a lot
25:07
Speaker 1: like back in World War II, a lot like you
25:09
Speaker 1: saw six years ago that happened a lot. People were
25:13
Speaker 1: turning people over for not having this or wearing that
25:17
Speaker 1: or just insanity. Mordecai's standing firm for the Lord. Now,
25:23
Speaker 1: standing firm on God's word as always is going to
25:26
Speaker 1: have headwinds. And that is important. So in verse five,
25:30
Speaker 1: and when Haman saw that Mordecai bowed not, nor did
25:33
Speaker 1: him reverence, then was Haman full of wrath. So Haman
25:38
Speaker 1: is obviously insecure and looking for his worth in the world.
25:43
Speaker 1: And this is a pretty famous quote from Walter Savage
25:47
Speaker 1: Landor in 17, he lived from 1775 to 1864, but
25:52
Speaker 1: He said, when little men cast long shadows, it's a
25:55
Speaker 1: sign that the sun is setting. And I always found
25:58
Speaker 1: that fascinating. But men work very hard to build their
26:02
Speaker 1: own kingdoms on the earth. And Haman was certainly trying
26:06
Speaker 1: to do that. In verse six, and he thought scorn
26:10
Speaker 1: to lay hands on Mordecai alone, for they had showed
26:13
Speaker 1: him the people of Mordecai, Wherefore Haman sought to destroy
26:17
Speaker 1: all the Jews that were throughout the whole kingdom of
26:21
Speaker 1: Ahasuerus or Xerxes. He's got a couple different names in
26:24
Speaker 1: the Bible. Even the people of Mordecai. So once again,
26:28
Speaker 1: it's just the classic strategy of Satan to kill the Jews.
26:32
Speaker 1: So these peculiar people have been the, frankly, the bane
26:36
Speaker 1: of the world's existence since Abraham. Zechariah, if you remember
26:40
Speaker 1: when we were going through Zechariah, prophesied that, that Jerusalem
26:43
Speaker 1: would be a bone in the throat of the nations.
26:47
Speaker 1: And Haman would seek to destroy all the Jews that
26:49
Speaker 1: were throughout the whole kingdom, as we just saw there
26:53
Speaker 1: in verse six, which would include those who went back
26:56
Speaker 1: to Jerusalem. So not just in Persia, but even the
26:59
Speaker 1: ones that went back to Jerusalem to rebuild the temple
27:02
Speaker 1: in the book of Ezra. Now you can track Satan's
27:05
Speaker 1: strategy throughout the Bible. And the more God reveals his plan,
27:11
Speaker 1: the more that Satan focuses his attack throughout the scripture
27:16
Speaker 1: in a lot of ways. So Cain's murder of Abel.
27:19
Speaker 1: So if you go all the way back, God prophesied
27:22
Speaker 1: that through Eve, that the messianic line would come through
27:26
Speaker 1: and the seed of the woman in Genesis 3.15. Well,
27:30
Speaker 1: from that point on, Satan then knew, okay, well, now
27:33
Speaker 1: I've got to wipe out mankind because the Messiah is
27:35
Speaker 1: going to come through all of mankind. So he tries that.
27:38
Speaker 1: He starts that with Cain murdering Abel Then the whole
27:42
Speaker 1: Genesis 6 thing with the fallen angels, all that kind
27:44
Speaker 1: of stuff through Adam's line, trying to literally discredit, and
27:48
Speaker 1: not discredit, but disrupt and wipe out genuine humans so
27:54
Speaker 1: that there was no credible line for the Messiah to
27:57
Speaker 1: come through. Then after that, when God calls Abraham out
28:01
Speaker 1: as the first Jew, and he starts to focus on
28:04
Speaker 1: the Messiah will come through this line of this man,
28:07
Speaker 1: this family, Satan focuses his attacks on Abraham. There's a
28:11
Speaker 1: famine in Genesis 50 trying to wipe out the Jews.
28:14
Speaker 1: If you remember that all the way down in Egypt
28:17
Speaker 1: and all of that, when Jacob and the sons came
28:19
Speaker 1: down with the famine. Then he had the destruction of
28:22
Speaker 1: the male line in Exodus 1. Pharaoh chases after them
28:25
Speaker 1: in Exodus 14, really in a very weird turn of events.
28:30
Speaker 1: The populating of Canaan before Joshua and the children of
28:34
Speaker 1: Israel go over Canaan. That happens all the way back
28:37
Speaker 1: in Genesis 12, but they start doing that. Then after
28:41
Speaker 1: Joshua and Caleb conquer the land and David, then God
28:45
Speaker 1: pronounces that it'll be through David's line that the king
28:49
Speaker 1: will come, the Messiah will come. In 2 Samuel 7
28:53
Speaker 1: is where God pronounces that. Then you have all of
28:56
Speaker 1: these attacks on David's line. Jerome kills his brothers in
29:00
Speaker 1: 2 Chronicles 21. Attila kills all but Joash in 2
29:04
Speaker 1: Kings 11 and 2 Chronicles 22. Hezekiah is assaulted in
29:08
Speaker 1: Isaiah 36 and 38. There's a blood curse on Jeconiah
29:13
Speaker 1: in Jeremiah 22, 30. And I bet at that one point,
29:17
Speaker 1: Satan thinks in some regard, he's got a victory. Because
29:22
Speaker 1: at that point, God pronounces a blood curse on David's line.
29:27
Speaker 1: And that's in Jeremiah 22, 30. And he says for
29:29
Speaker 1: Jeconiah or Jehoiachin, he's got a no man of his
29:34
Speaker 1: seed shall sit on the throne of David ruling any
29:37
Speaker 1: longer in Jerusalem. And so at that point, Satan probably thinks, okay,
29:42
Speaker 1: we finally, we have finally done it. We have cut
29:46
Speaker 1: off the line to the Messiah, but Satan didn't read
29:50
Speaker 1: back in Numbers that there's an exemption, that there's a
29:53
Speaker 1: workaround in the law in Numbers with the daughters of Zelophehad.
29:57
Speaker 1: And so if you had only daughters, you but they
30:00
Speaker 1: married within the tribe, then you could pass your inheritance
30:03
Speaker 1: onto your son-in-law as the father. Well, when you get
30:06
Speaker 1: down in that line of Jeconiah, it goes all the
30:09
Speaker 1: way down to Joseph, the legal father of Jesus. So
30:14
Speaker 1: it should stop right there. But because of that exemption
30:17
Speaker 1: in numbers and the daughters of Zelophehad, that because Mary
30:22
Speaker 1: married within the tribe and she was only daughter's, it
30:26
Speaker 1: could skip and pass on to the son-in-law, to Joseph
30:30
Speaker 1: from her side. And so that's how God overcomes that,
30:33
Speaker 1: that blood curse in Jeremiah 22, 30. Then you have
30:37
Speaker 1: Haman's attempts here in Esther 3. Remember Joseph's fears when
30:40
Speaker 1: he was with Mary when she was pregnant in Matthew 1,
30:43
Speaker 1: they had to flee. Herod kills all the babies that
30:46
Speaker 1: are two years and younger. At Nazareth, they tried to
30:50
Speaker 1: throw Jesus off the cliff. There were two storms at
30:52
Speaker 1: sea trying to wipe him out. The cross, Satan's ultimate
30:56
Speaker 1: strategy was to kill him at the cross, but he
30:58
Speaker 1: didn't know the church would be formed after that. Indwelling
31:01
Speaker 1: with the Holy Spirit, that was hidden in the Old
31:04
Speaker 1: Testament for a reason. So Satan didn't know that. But
31:08
Speaker 1: the World War II, et cetera, during the tribulations would
31:10
Speaker 1: be the same thing. They have to cry out for
31:12
Speaker 1: the Lord for forgiveness for him to return. And so
31:16
Speaker 1: Satan is going to try to wipe them out. And
31:18
Speaker 1: it's all summarized in Revelation 12. That whole story is
31:22
Speaker 1: summarized in that one chapter in Revelation 12, starting from
31:28
Speaker 1: Joseph's dream. Remember, he has the dream of the sun
31:30
Speaker 1: and the moon and the 12 stars and the woman
31:33
Speaker 1: giving birth to the man-child, but the dragon is there
31:36
Speaker 1: to consume him. And then he's taken up to his throne.
31:39
Speaker 1: In any case, you can go read that, but Satan's
31:41
Speaker 1: not through is the point. He's still very much at
31:44
Speaker 1: work today, just as he was throughout the Bible. So
31:48
Speaker 1: Mordecai could have conformed, but he trusted God. And that
31:54
Speaker 1: is what distinguishes great men in all generations. If you
31:59
Speaker 1: go through the Bible all the way from the beginning,
32:03
Speaker 1: there is man after man and woman after woman all
32:07
Speaker 1: throughout the Bible that they obey God and separate themselves
32:13
Speaker 1: from the world no matter how much of the earth
32:16
Speaker 1: turns against them. I mean, Noah was building a boat
32:20
Speaker 1: in his yard and it had never rained on earth.
32:23
Speaker 1: And he was doing it for 120 years, getting all
32:25
Speaker 1: this backlash of what are you doing? You're insane. And
32:29
Speaker 1: the laughing stopped as soon as the doors closed, you know,
32:32
Speaker 1: to the ark. But Abraham, Joseph, Moses, Joshua, Samuel, David, Elijah, Esther,
32:39
Speaker 1: we're reading about her cousin Mordecai, Paul, John, all of them.
32:45
Speaker 1: There are very few people in the Bible who, that
32:48
Speaker 1: live a life that God uses in a radical way
32:52
Speaker 1: that have it easy. Very, very few. And it's because
32:56
Speaker 1: we are walking through a very, very fallen world with
33:01
Speaker 1: a very real enemy that wants to take you out. Okay,
33:05
Speaker 1: so in verse seven, in the first month, that is
33:07
Speaker 1: the month Nisan, in the 12th year of King Ahasuerus,
33:11
Speaker 1: they cast purr. So in the Hebrew word, that means
33:14
Speaker 1: lot or they cast the dice, the lot. That is
33:17
Speaker 1: the lot before Haman from day to day and from
33:20
Speaker 1: month to month to the 12th month. That is the
33:22
Speaker 1: month of Adar. So Nisan and Adar are both Babylonian
33:27
Speaker 1: labels for these Hebrew months. So the month Nisan would
33:31
Speaker 1: be about April, May timeframe. For the Hebrews would be Abib.
33:36
Speaker 1: So if you take Nisan on the Babylonian kind of side,
33:40
Speaker 1: you would take it as Abib in the Jewish side.
33:44
Speaker 1: Haman is using a purr. So that word in Persian,
33:47
Speaker 1: it's a Persian word for the lot to decide the
33:50
Speaker 1: fate of the Jews. Now, the irony here is just
33:53
Speaker 1: incredible because of Proverbs 16 verse 33, the lot is
33:58
Speaker 1: cast into the lap, but the whole disposing thereof is
34:02
Speaker 1: of the Lord. So what Haman's not recognizing is that
34:06
Speaker 1: he keeps casting this lot trying to figure out when
34:08
Speaker 1: do I wipe out all the Jews and but he
34:11
Speaker 1: is literally doing it to figure out when his own
34:13
Speaker 1: demise is because the lot is cast into the lap,
34:18
Speaker 1: but the whole disposing thereof is of the Lord in
34:21
Speaker 1: Proverbs 16, 33. So the Persian religious system focused on
34:26
Speaker 1: fate and chance. They were very evil in that way.
34:30
Speaker 1: Lots of like fortune telling, you know, today you might
34:34
Speaker 1: think of it as the Zodiac does that a lot
34:37
Speaker 1: in terms of, or gosh, you just drive around different
34:41
Speaker 1: cities and you see these, you know, little buildings with,
34:44
Speaker 1: come get your palm read and all these different things.
34:47
Speaker 1: They relied on those very evil, very satanic systems. Do
34:51
Speaker 1: not do any of that, by the way. If anyone
34:53
Speaker 1: here is thinking, oh, I should go do that. No,
34:56
Speaker 1: do not. Do not go do that, okay? Don't read
34:58
Speaker 1: your Zodiac. Your fate is not in the stars or
35:01
Speaker 1: anything like that, okay? It's in the hands of God.
35:04
Speaker 1: So trust him and talk to him about it. Okay,
35:07
Speaker 1: but the fate and the chance, thus Haman was allowing
35:10
Speaker 1: the casting of the lot to determine when his attack
35:13
Speaker 1: on the Jews would occur. So this occurred just more
35:16
Speaker 1: than four years after Esther became queen. So in 478 BC,
35:20
Speaker 1: that was in chapter two last time, verse 16. This
35:24
Speaker 1: was the first month, Nisan, in the 12th year of Xerxes,
35:28
Speaker 1: which would be 474 BC. So four more years had
35:32
Speaker 1: passed by. The month chosen by the lot, was the
35:37
Speaker 1: 12th month or February or March on our calendar, which
35:40
Speaker 1: would be almost a year later. So the day selected
35:45
Speaker 1: was the 13th day of the 12th month. So that
35:49
Speaker 1: is the day in the lot that was cast that
35:52
Speaker 1: Haman goes, okay, this is the day that all the
35:55
Speaker 1: Jews will be killed. The 13th day of the 12th month.
35:59
Speaker 1: It's amazing how God does this a few times in
36:03
Speaker 1: the which I think is where we get the legend
36:06
Speaker 1: for Friday the 13th, because the death of the firstborn
36:11
Speaker 1: in Egypt happened on that. So on the Jewish calendar,
36:18
Speaker 1: when you take it to the Egyptian calendar, on the
36:21
Speaker 1: Egyptian calendar, it was actually occurred on Friday the 13th.
36:24
Speaker 1: That's when the death angel came through. So again, you're
36:28
Speaker 1: seeing the day that was selected, the 13th day of
36:30
Speaker 1: the 12th month, is gonna be the day that once again,
36:34
Speaker 1: God's enemies are destroyed, not his people. And so there's probably,
36:38
Speaker 1: that's where it's rooted probably. But the Pur is the
36:41
Speaker 1: basis of the name of the Feast of Purim. So
36:45
Speaker 1: Esther 9, 26, which celebrates the deliverance of the Jews
36:49
Speaker 1: in the book. Okay, in verse eight here, and Haman
36:52
Speaker 1: said unto King Ahasuerus, there is a certain people scattered
36:56
Speaker 1: abroad and dispersed among the people in all the provinces
36:59
Speaker 1: of of thy kingdom and their laws are diverse from
37:03
Speaker 1: all people. Neither keep they the king's laws, therefore it
37:07
Speaker 1: is not for the king's profit to suffer them. If
37:10
Speaker 1: it please the king, let it be written that they
37:12
Speaker 1: be destroyed. Pretty straightforward. And I will pay 10,000 talents
37:18
Speaker 1: of silver to the hands of those that have the
37:20
Speaker 1: charge of the business to bring it into the king's treasuries.
37:25
Speaker 1: So in Persia, silver was valued more than gold. and
37:30
Speaker 1: it was used as its monetary standard in the kingdom
37:33
Speaker 1: of Persia. 10,000 talents of silver would be about two-thirds
37:38
Speaker 1: as much wealth as the entire kingdom of Persia had
37:42
Speaker 1: before Xerxes lost it all to fighting wars against the Greeks.
37:47
Speaker 1: So they didn't have this money, is the point. Haman
37:51
Speaker 1: was offering this as a reward, likely expecting that when
37:56
Speaker 1: he murdered all of the Jews... they had it and
38:00
Speaker 1: he would take it from them and give it as
38:02
Speaker 1: a reward. So Haman was exploiting his access to the
38:07
Speaker 1: king to get this whole wicked plan in place. Now
38:12
Speaker 1: he chose to falsely accuse the Jews to have all
38:15
Speaker 1: of them throughout the kingdom massacred, including those back in
38:19
Speaker 1: Israel trying to rebuild the temple. And just remember this
38:23
Speaker 1: is Satan's ways don't change by the way. Um, he
38:27
Speaker 1: pretty much tries to use the same tactics a lot.
38:30
Speaker 1: In Revelation 12, 10, he's an accuser of the brethren.
38:33
Speaker 1: So Satan is an accuser. He was an accuser then,
38:36
Speaker 1: he's an accuser now, but he is an accuser of
38:39
Speaker 1: the brethren. Now, Haman was so determined to wipe out
38:42
Speaker 1: the Jews that he was willing to bear the cost
38:46
Speaker 1: of carrying out the manhunts, the executions, always one key
38:51
Speaker 1: indicator of satanically inspired acts, okay? 10,000, just put in perspective, 10,000
38:57
Speaker 1: talents of silver in today's value, it'd be about 13
39:01
Speaker 1: million ounces or, you know, just call it 795 billion
39:05
Speaker 1: or not billion, million dollars, just roughly, you know, in
39:08
Speaker 1: today's dollars. So that's what he was offering. He's offering, hey,
39:12
Speaker 1: whoever does this, I'll give you $ 795 million to wipe
39:16
Speaker 1: out all of the Jewish people. That was his goal.
39:20
Speaker 1: And the king took his ring from his hand and
39:22
Speaker 1: gave it unto Haman, the son of Hamadeth, the Agite,
39:26
Speaker 1: the Jews' enemy. So notice the Lord now refers to
39:29
Speaker 1: Haman as the Jews' enemy. There probably was a point,
39:34
Speaker 1: several points along the road, that Haman could have stopped, repented,
39:38
Speaker 1: changed his ways, been forgiven, and have still been alive
39:43
Speaker 1: in those days. But he didn't. Now Xerxes is allowing
39:47
Speaker 1: the Jew's enemy to send out a declaration throughout the
39:50
Speaker 1: empire under the king's authority. So the signet ring would
39:54
Speaker 1: be pressed into wax or clay. If you've ever seen
39:58
Speaker 1: this kind of dramatized in movies that take place in
40:01
Speaker 1: old times. But it would be, if they wrote a decree,
40:06
Speaker 1: they would seal it with like wax or clay or something.
40:08
Speaker 1: And then you press the ring into it and make
40:11
Speaker 1: this symbol that was indistinguishable or It couldn't be cheated
40:17
Speaker 1: or forged, basically. So they did that to prove, okay,
40:20
Speaker 1: this was given by the king himself. Now that's in
40:23
Speaker 1: Genesis 41, 42. Pharaoh does that. He took off his
40:27
Speaker 1: ring in his hand and put it upon Joseph's hand.
40:29
Speaker 1: Remember that authority was passed to Joseph. Then Daniel 6, 17,
40:35
Speaker 1: when the stone was brought and laid upon the mouth
40:37
Speaker 1: of the lion's den, remember? The king had to go
40:40
Speaker 1: seal it with his own signet ring saying, hey, I've
40:42
Speaker 1: made this decree. So you see this happen a lot.
40:45
Speaker 1: Haggai 2 verse 23, in that day, saith the Lord
40:49
Speaker 1: of hosts, I will take thee of Zerubbabel, my servant,
40:52
Speaker 1: the son of Sheetal, saith the Lord, and will make
40:55
Speaker 1: thee as a signet, for I have chosen thee, saith
40:58
Speaker 1: the Lord of hosts. So it appears that Xerxes is
41:02
Speaker 1: once again easily influenced by those he had surrounded himself with.
41:08
Speaker 1: And he apparently does not even know which people Haman
41:12
Speaker 1: is even targeting. one of them being his very own
41:15
Speaker 1: wife that he now has because Esther kept it concealed
41:20
Speaker 1: that she was a Jew. And he's not even aware.
41:23
Speaker 1: He's just letting Haman kind of get his way. He's saying, sure, yeah,
41:27
Speaker 1: you can kill all these people. That's fine. And Haman
41:30
Speaker 1: did not disclose that in the entire earlier discourse with
41:35
Speaker 1: the king. He did not even disclose that it would
41:36
Speaker 1: be the Jewish people he's trying to take out. Remember
41:39
Speaker 1: he said, it's the strange people that obey different laws.
41:42
Speaker 1: So he's trying to take advantage of them. Haman is
41:45
Speaker 1: now referred to by God as the enemy of the
41:48
Speaker 1: Jews five times in the book. Chapter 3, 10, 7, 6, 8, 1, 9, 10,
41:53
Speaker 1: and 9, 24. Five is typically thought of as the
41:56
Speaker 1: number of grace, but you know, grace for whom here?
42:00
Speaker 1: It's not going to be for him. So in verse 11,
42:02
Speaker 1: and the king said unto Haman, the silver is given
42:06
Speaker 1: to thee, the people also to do with them as
42:09
Speaker 1: it seemeth good to thee. Okay, Xerxes says the silver
42:13
Speaker 1: is given to thee. Whatever Haman collects minus the king's
42:17
Speaker 1: cut is his to do with them as it seemeth good.
42:21
Speaker 1: So Haman's kind of working out this plan here to
42:24
Speaker 1: try to plunder the Jews and become rich off of it.
42:27
Speaker 1: The same method was used in the Spanish Inquisition. Remember,
42:31
Speaker 1: people would turn other people in for money. During Nazi Germany,
42:35
Speaker 1: they did it. Today, over the last 10 plus years,
42:38
Speaker 1: there's been some very unique ways that's occurred. But at
42:42
Speaker 1: this point, the king does not know that his queen
42:46
Speaker 1: would be included to be killed by Haman in Haman's plot.
42:51
Speaker 1: So they post this, okay, just about finish here in
42:54
Speaker 1: verse 12. Then were the king's scribes called on the
42:57
Speaker 1: 13th day of the first month. And there was written
43:00
Speaker 1: according to all that Haman had commanded unto the king's lieutenants,
43:05
Speaker 1: And to the governors that were over every province and
43:08
Speaker 1: to the rulers of every people of every province, according
43:12
Speaker 1: to the writing thereof, and to every people after their language,
43:16
Speaker 1: in the name of King Ahasuerus, was it written and
43:19
Speaker 1: sealed with the king's ring. So the decree is sealed,
43:23
Speaker 1: at least from man's perspective, their fate is sealed. God
43:27
Speaker 1: has a different decree to be unsealed shortly, which is amazing. God...
43:33
Speaker 1: praise God, he can turn any decree of man on
43:36
Speaker 1: its head. So Haman wanted to kill all the Jews,
43:38
Speaker 1: including men, women, and children. And he desired to rid
43:42
Speaker 1: the world of God's covenant people and then take the spoil.
43:47
Speaker 1: The Persians in those days had this communication system where
43:51
Speaker 1: they had these posts stationed throughout the empire, where they
43:55
Speaker 1: would post important messages for quick communication. Kind of like
43:59
Speaker 1: if you go to any college town and on the
44:01
Speaker 1: light poles, they staple, you know, with the little things
44:04
Speaker 1: they cut on the end of if you want guitar lessons,
44:06
Speaker 1: pull this thing. It's kind of like that. I'm thinking
44:11
Speaker 1: about making some of those and putting Mason's number on
44:13
Speaker 1: it and just like going around posting it and getting
44:16
Speaker 1: some guitar lessons, get people to call them. But so
44:19
Speaker 1: they have this system where they post these decrees all
44:21
Speaker 1: throughout his kingdom. And the letters were sent by post
44:25
Speaker 1: into all the king's provinces to destroy, to kill, and
44:29
Speaker 1: to cause to perish all Jews, both young and old,
44:33
Speaker 1: little children and women in one day, even upon the
44:37
Speaker 1: 13th day of the 12th month. Remember that's when the
44:40
Speaker 1: lot fell with Haman, which is the month Adder and
44:42
Speaker 1: to take spoil of them for a prey. So when
44:45
Speaker 1: the decree was dispatched, they had almost a year to
44:50
Speaker 1: get ready for this. So both the enemy and the Jews. Okay.
44:55
Speaker 1: So they, can you just imagine being, living in a
44:58
Speaker 1: society where it's decreed on a, on a pole somewhere,
45:02
Speaker 1: that 12 months from now, you're gonna be executed. I mean,
45:05
Speaker 1: just kind of, it's hard to wrap your head around
45:08
Speaker 1: that in a way. Verse 14, the copy of the
45:12
Speaker 1: writing for a commandment to be given in every province
45:15
Speaker 1: was published unto all people that they should be ready
45:19
Speaker 1: against that day. The post went out being hastened by
45:23
Speaker 1: the king's commandment and the decree was given in Shushan,
45:27
Speaker 1: the palace. Remember, Daniel spent a lot of time there.
45:29
Speaker 1: And the king said, And Haman sat down to drink,
45:33
Speaker 1: but the city Shushan was perplexed. So the people were
45:37
Speaker 1: completely confused about the decree, which says something given all
45:42
Speaker 1: the cruelty they'd seen previously. They were utterly shocked. Xerxes
45:49
Speaker 1: was completely indifferent and Haman was satanically inspired. So you
45:53
Speaker 1: can imagine the uncomfortableness of the various ethnic groups throughout
45:58
Speaker 1: the kingdom. Would they be next? Is this just the
46:01
Speaker 1: Jews or are our people next? What about the decree
46:06
Speaker 1: being made by leaders today? If you think about it,
46:10
Speaker 1: who is the real target? Over 70% of all UN
46:16
Speaker 1: actions are against the nation of Israel. Just think about that.
46:21
Speaker 1: I mean, here's this group of the most sophisticated nations
46:26
Speaker 1: on the world that are supposed to get together and
46:29
Speaker 1: harmony and kumbaya and all this stuff to better mankind
46:33
Speaker 1: in some way. And all they do is sit around
46:37
Speaker 1: and argue about this little piece of land that's one-tenth
46:40
Speaker 1: the size of the state of Oklahoma. With this people
46:44
Speaker 1: group in it who, they're not running into markets with
46:47
Speaker 1: suicide vests on, you know, jumping walls and slaughtering people.
46:53
Speaker 1: All they do is have some of the greatest medical
46:56
Speaker 1: advances and defense advances on earth and technological breakthroughs. They're
47:00
Speaker 1: the chief exporter of fruit to the continent of Europe,
47:04
Speaker 1: this little sliver of land. And all they do is
47:07
Speaker 1: sit around and make decrees against them constantly. It's exactly
47:11
Speaker 1: what you're seeing in Esther. So as we close here,
47:15
Speaker 1: my challenge for all of you is that God did
47:20
Speaker 1: not make a mistake on where he placed you, where
47:23
Speaker 1: you are, what he's equipped you to do, the gifts
47:26
Speaker 1: he's given you, the talents he's given you. And in
47:30
Speaker 1: Esther chapter four, verse 14, it's one of my favorite
47:34
Speaker 1: verses in the Bible. Remember Mordecai's imploring Esther, you've got
47:38
Speaker 1: to go and save your own people. And he says
47:41
Speaker 1: in verse 14, for if thou altogether holdest thy peace
47:44
Speaker 1: at this time, then shall their enlargement, meaning the Jews
47:48
Speaker 1: deliverance and deliverance arise to the Jews from another place.
47:54
Speaker 1: but thou and thy father's house shall be destroyed. And
47:58
Speaker 1: who knoweth whether thou art come to the kingdom for
48:02
Speaker 1: such a time as this? And God has something he
48:06
Speaker 1: wants you to do in your life. He's got a
48:09
Speaker 1: call on you. The first place the enemy will attack
48:12
Speaker 1: you in your life is your gift, whatever that gift is.
48:16
Speaker 1: Every single person in here has a different gift that
48:18
Speaker 1: they are equipped with. The enemy's first place to attack
48:22
Speaker 1: is is to get that gift shut down. Because you
48:25
Speaker 1: reflect a different side of what God wants to do
48:30
Speaker 1: in the earth in these days with that gift. And
48:33
Speaker 1: the enemy wants to shut it down. But if you
48:37
Speaker 1: remember this, Investor 414, you have been called to this time.
48:43
Speaker 1: Everything you've seen over the last 10 plus years of
48:47
Speaker 1: that beast system getting established, the foundation for it being laid,
48:52
Speaker 1: the advances of AI and technology that allow everything God
48:56
Speaker 1: has talked about in the book of Revelation for 2,000
48:59
Speaker 1: years now almost, is in place that that can happen now.
49:04
Speaker 1: That could not have been said 100 years ago, 200
49:07
Speaker 1: years ago, 1,000 years ago. I mean, heck, it probably,
49:10
Speaker 1: it could have been said really in the 90s even,
49:12
Speaker 1: if you think about it. How would at that time
49:16
Speaker 1: someone sitting in Israel know that I didn't bow down
49:19
Speaker 1: to his statue in Lawton, Oklahoma? You know, he wouldn't have.
49:23
Speaker 1: There wasn't a way to. There is now. You can't
49:28
Speaker 1: see the world getting wiped out with cannons, but you
49:33
Speaker 1: can with the weapons that we have today. And when
49:37
Speaker 1: you just sit back and you think about how time
49:39
Speaker 1: is accelerating and what's really happening in the earth right now,
49:44
Speaker 1: you have been called to this time, this day. It's
49:48
Speaker 1: not by accident. It's not a mistake. God didn't mess
49:52
Speaker 1: up on when you were born and where you were born.
49:56
Speaker 1: And he wants you to do something in this time.
50:00
Speaker 1: And that could be as simple as being a prayer
50:03
Speaker 1: warrior in your closet, every day for one hour for
50:06
Speaker 1: the rest of your life. It doesn't always mean that
50:10
Speaker 1: you're out publicly facing or doing something in the city
50:15
Speaker 1: council or in the town square, so to speak, but
50:21
Speaker 1: he wants you to do something. And so my challenge
50:24
Speaker 1: to all of you is that the best way you
50:27
Speaker 1: can figure out what that is, is to build your
50:29
Speaker 1: faith and to get into the word of God. and
50:32
Speaker 1: ask him to speak to you and show you what
50:35
Speaker 1: it is. So when you build your faith, according to
50:39
Speaker 1: Hebrews 11, six, without faith, it's impossible to please God.
50:44
Speaker 1: And so you've got to get in the word of
50:46
Speaker 1: God to do that. Romans 10, 17, faith comes by
50:48
Speaker 1: hearing and hearing by the word of God. And you've
50:51
Speaker 1: got to do it daily, according to Acts 17, 11. Now,
50:55
Speaker 1: if you're here, if you don't know the Lord, it's
50:59
Speaker 1: very simple. If you're out there and you have found
51:02
Speaker 1: this years down the road and there are a lot
51:05
Speaker 1: of people missing in Oklahoma City, just know that you
51:09
Speaker 1: get saved today exactly like you did in the days
51:12
Speaker 1: of Adam. And it hasn't changed. And it won't change
51:16
Speaker 1: in the tribulation or elsewhere. You are only saved by
51:21
Speaker 1: the blood of Jesus. And that is it. And it's
51:24
Speaker 1: a salvation by grace through faith alone with the confession
51:28
Speaker 1: of your mouth that Jesus is Lord and that he
51:33
Speaker 1: died for you and that he had you in mind
51:36
Speaker 1: on that cross. And your sin is then buried forever,
51:42
Speaker 1: washed away, cleansed, and you are born again in the spirit,
51:47
Speaker 1: never to be without the Lord ever. That you will
51:50
Speaker 1: get saved the same way in the tribulation as you
51:53
Speaker 1: do today. And that is miraculous. if you will yield
51:59
Speaker 1: the strongest member of your being, your tongue, to the Lord,
52:03
Speaker 1: he will save you. So Father, we come before you
52:06
Speaker 1: right now. Lord, there is a darkness encroaching in the
52:13
Speaker 1: earth right now. God, there is an attack on your
52:17
Speaker 1: people all over the world, on your church, on the
52:22
Speaker 1: body of Christ. Lord, there are Millions of Christians being
52:31
Speaker 1: slaughtered throughout Africa and the Middle East and Asia right
52:35
Speaker 1: now just simply by carrying a Bible and having an
52:40
Speaker 1: app installed on their phone. And Lord, we are praying
52:45
Speaker 1: and pleading the blood of Jesus over the lives of
52:48
Speaker 1: your people wherever they are in the earth right now.
52:55
Speaker 1: And God, as we look on the horizon, we see
52:59
Speaker 1: the pages of the Bible coming alive. And Lord, it is,
53:12
Speaker 1: the spiritual attack on your people continues to ramp up.
53:19
Speaker 1: And so Lord, we are just praying and pleading the
53:22
Speaker 1: blood of Jesus over the doorframes of our own lives,
53:26
Speaker 1: on the lives of our children, on the lives of
53:31
Speaker 1: our family members all across this nation and around the
53:35
Speaker 1: world as brothers and sisters in Christ. Lord, it always
53:41
Speaker 1: seems to get dark in this high occultic month of October.
53:47
Speaker 1: And Lord, right now, I just pray that all of
53:51
Speaker 1: those people that unknowingly are putting up demonic symbology and
53:58
Speaker 1: things in their lives and their family. Lord, we are
54:00
Speaker 1: praying that you would just tear those down and that, Lord,
54:05
Speaker 1: you would come and meet those people and tell them
54:09
Speaker 1: exactly who you are. Not this dark, false God that
54:15
Speaker 1: they're trying to pray to in city council meetings. God,
54:21
Speaker 1: we pray that you, as the true king of the earth,
54:27
Speaker 1: would come forward with your sword drawn and that you
54:30
Speaker 1: would go to war against the enemy. Lord, just as
54:37
Speaker 1: when Michael was battling Satan over the body of Moses
54:40
Speaker 1: from Jude, he said, the Lord rebuke you. So Lord,
54:44
Speaker 1: we are praying that you rebuke the enemy right now.
54:49
Speaker 1: And we are pleading the blood of Jesus over this land. Lord,
54:52
Speaker 1: there are so many abominations being written into law by
55:00
Speaker 1: people that are truly being used by Lucifer. Lord, the
55:06
Speaker 1: murder of innocent children and our babies in the womb
55:10
Speaker 1: and children that are born is so evil, it's indescribable.
55:15
Speaker 1: And Lord, we just pray that just as Daniel did
55:18
Speaker 1: in Babylon, that you would forgive this nation. Lord, we
55:25
Speaker 1: pray that you would forgive this land, forgive this nation
55:32
Speaker 1: for even allowing it to get to that point. And Lord,
55:37
Speaker 1: we pray that you would overturn all of those decrees
55:41
Speaker 1: just as we are studying here in Esther. God, overturn
55:45
Speaker 1: those decrees and let your word stand and boldly stand.
55:51
Speaker 1: And God, we pray for anyone out there that is
55:55
Speaker 1: even considering doing that, that Lord, you would stop the avenger.
56:01
Speaker 1: And Lord, that you would turn back those thoughts and
56:04
Speaker 1: that you would meet with those people and that you
56:07
Speaker 1: would share with them how that child from Psalms 139
56:12
Speaker 1: is fearfully and wonderfully made. And God, we are just
56:17
Speaker 1: praying that you would give your church strength right now
56:23
Speaker 1: in these days across the land And that Lord, your
56:26
Speaker 1: church would not back down, but stand firm on your
56:31
Speaker 1: word and be a light to the earth right now.
56:34
Speaker 1: And God, again, we are so thankful for your word
56:38
Speaker 1: that is inexhaustible. So be with us in the week
56:41
Speaker 1: ahead and be with our families and speak to us
56:46
Speaker 1: and show us exactly why and what you have called
56:50
Speaker 1: us to in these days, God, in Jesus's name, amen.