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God-s-Surprising-Sovereignty-Part-1 · INSIGHT FOR LIVING: Biblical Wisdom For Everyday Living

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Speaker 1: Did you know that God's name is never mentioned in
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Speaker 1: the Book of Esther, but we can see his obvious
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Speaker 1: handprints marking every page of Esther's story. Today on Inside
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Speaker 1: for a Living, Juck Sundahl continues his study of this
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Speaker 1: fascinating Old Testament heroin. In this next portion of our study,
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Speaker 1: we'll discover that although God's name isn't identified, He's quietly
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Speaker 1: orchestrating events, people, and circumstances to clearly illustrate his control.
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Speaker 1: Maybe you're struggling to see God's hand in your life
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Speaker 1: story right now. Chuck titled this reassuring message God's surprising sovereignty.
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Speaker 2: I've never met a person who didn't feel pity for Job.
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Speaker 2: I mean, here was a man, godly in heart and
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Speaker 2: righteous in life and life style who had his entire
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Speaker 2: world crash in on top of him for no apparent reason,
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Speaker 2: and the pain became unbearable, and all because of Satanic
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Speaker 2: cruelty and God's strange allowing of it to happen. The
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Speaker 2: man became like a tiny wounded mouse in the paws
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Speaker 2: of a big cat, almost played with the hardest part
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Speaker 2: of it all was not the pain that was bad enough,
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Speaker 2: but it was this mysterious sense of God's silence, which
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Speaker 2: played out in Job's life as God's absence. It occurred
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Speaker 2: to me that it must have been like swimming on
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Speaker 2: a vast lake and getting about one hundred one hundred
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Speaker 2: and fifty yards off shore toward and suddenly a freak
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Speaker 2: fog rolls in over the lake and surrounds you, and
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Speaker 2: you're trapped in this tiny circle of sight. But the
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Speaker 2: fog has diffused light, so you can't even tell where
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Speaker 2: the sun is going down. And you begin to swim.
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Speaker 2: You think toward the shore, but you're not sure. And
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Speaker 2: then you turn and you panic and swim in another direction,
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Speaker 2: and you again have lost your orientation. You don't know
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Speaker 2: where land is. You panic, your heartbreaking increases, and you
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Speaker 2: decide maybe to float to conserve strength. And it gets dark,
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Speaker 2: and the only way you're going to be safe is
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Speaker 2: by hearing a voice, faint though it may be, you
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Speaker 2: need a voice, you have someone calling from the shore,
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Speaker 2: and you could then point yourself in that direction and
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Speaker 2: swim rapidly and find safety and comfort and relief. Something
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Speaker 2: like that sense of lostness swept over Job as he
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Speaker 2: sat in the rubble of what was once a beautiful landscape.
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Speaker 2: His ruined ranch was before him, and his children now
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Speaker 2: fresh graves on a wind swept hill. He lost everything,
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Speaker 2: everything he owned, virtually everything he was, and now finally
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Speaker 2: his health. And he sits in ashes, and he cannot
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Speaker 2: hear God's voice. It's like a fog. It's like a
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Speaker 2: tiny little space of sight and not knowing where, say
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Speaker 2: nothing of why. That he writes in his journal, third chapter,
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Speaker 2: words that could easily be criticized by people sitting in
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Speaker 2: a place of comfort, good health, and ease. He opened
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Speaker 2: his mouth and cursed the day of his birth, and said,
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Speaker 2: let the day perish in which I was born, and
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Speaker 2: the night which said a boy is conceived Verse eleven,
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Speaker 2: Why did I not die at birth? Come forth from
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Speaker 2: the womb and expire? Those are words from the lake,
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Speaker 2: Those are words in the fog. Those are words that
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Speaker 2: come from a man who doesn't know why, and God
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Speaker 2: won't speak, and he is alone, and he is worse
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Speaker 2: than dead. He is alive in his misery. Look at
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Speaker 2: the end of that third chapter, verse twenty four. My
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Speaker 2: groaning comes at the sight of my food, and my
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Speaker 2: cries out like water. For what I fear comes upon me,
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Speaker 2: and what I dread befalls me. I am not at ease,
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Speaker 2: nor am I quiet, For I am not at rest,
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Speaker 2: but turmoil comes. Don't criticize job until you've been there.
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Speaker 2: It is the worst kind of existence. Bad enough to
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Speaker 2: have everything gone and to have your body covered with
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Speaker 2: sores from your head to your feet, but to hear
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Speaker 2: no voice from God from that moving account of a
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Speaker 2: man's misery. Let me shift gears to a realm that
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Speaker 2: is not nearly so measurable and realistic. Let's move from
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Speaker 2: this real world to a realm some might call philosophical.
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Speaker 2: And for the next few minutes, I want you to
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Speaker 2: think with me about time. Time. I would like to
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Speaker 2: contrast our time with God's time. You and I are
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Speaker 2: locked in a cage that causes us an enormous amount
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Speaker 2: of struggle and confusion. We are in a tiny space
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Speaker 2: on this lake of life called the present. Because our
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Speaker 2: entire perspective is gauged from this moment where we find ourselves.
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Speaker 2: We speak of the past and the future because our
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Speaker 2: world of time, to begin with, is objectively measured. You
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Speaker 2: want to know the hour or minute of the day
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Speaker 2: you look at your watch. You want to know the
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Speaker 2: day of the week. You look at your calendar, easily marked,
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Speaker 2: carefully measured. You want to know the past year. You
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Speaker 2: look into the diary or the journal you've been keeping,
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Speaker 2: and you have a record of how things were objectively measured.
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Speaker 2: Second time, for us is consciously accountable. Events are seen,
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Speaker 2: they are dated, People are visible, things are tangible. It
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Speaker 2: is an a realm of sight, smell, touch, hearing, feeling.
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Speaker 2: It is a very real realm, this accountable realm. And
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Speaker 2: if we want to get it straight, we can ask
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Speaker 2: several others who are accurate witnesses, and they saw it
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Speaker 2: or they were there, and they can account for it.
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Speaker 2: It is in a world of the tangible and the visible.
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Speaker 2: Third time is rarely ignored or overlooked. Oh, we daydream
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Speaker 2: and we sleep. But aside from those momentary lapses, we
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Speaker 2: may have a little mental lapse in the midst of
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Speaker 2: a busy day where we lose track of time, but
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Speaker 2: not often. Most of us know about every hour of
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Speaker 2: the day pretty close to the exact time, because that
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Speaker 2: is our world, and it is very real, measurable and
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Speaker 2: understandable and conscious. God is not like that at all.
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Speaker 2: His workings are not on the basis of that. As
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Speaker 2: a matter of fact, we are in this realm of
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Speaker 2: life on planet Earth that has its own realm of time,
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Speaker 2: and you leave it instantly when you move beyond it,
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Speaker 2: and He lives beyond it. I thought of this when
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Speaker 2: I read this account. On the night of February twenty three,
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Speaker 2: nineteen eighty seven, an astronomer in Chile observed with his
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Speaker 2: naked eye the explosion of a distant supernova, a blast
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Speaker 2: so powerful that it released as much energy in one
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Speaker 2: second as our Sun will release in ten billion years.
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Speaker 2: Did that event truly occur on February twenty three, nineteen
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Speaker 2: eighty seven, Well, only from the respective of our planet.
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Speaker 2: Further investigation revealed actually the supernova exploded one hundred and
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Speaker 2: seventy thousand years prior to our nineteen eighty seven. But
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Speaker 2: the light generated by that faraway event, traveling almost six
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Speaker 2: trillion miles a year, took one hundred and seventy thousand
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Speaker 2: years to reach our galaxy, and we noticed an explosion.
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Speaker 2: God is in that realm. There is no night where
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Speaker 2: he lives. Maybe you heard the comic story of foolish
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Speaker 2: scientists who made plans to send a rocket to the Sun.
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Speaker 2: Someone said, you're going to burn up. No, they answered,
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Speaker 2: we're going at night. God has no night, God has
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Speaker 2: no day, God has no month, God has no year.
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Speaker 2: God has no past, present, or future. He transcends it
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Speaker 2: on all, and he operates in a realm that is transcendent.
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Speaker 2: We see history like a sequence of still frames moving
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Speaker 2: from one to another, like the passing of a movie.
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Speaker 2: God sees all the movie all at once in a flash,
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Speaker 2: along with billions and trillions of others going on at
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Speaker 2: the very same time. He is beyond it all, which
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Speaker 2: makes our little bit of space on the lake seem
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Speaker 2: terribly much like a cage called time. It's just not
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Speaker 2: easy to sing it. In his time, In his time,
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Speaker 2: God makes all things beautiful in his time. It's a
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Speaker 2: quarter of the twelve. Lord, Lord, please show me every
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Speaker 2: day he has no day that you're teaching me your way.
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Speaker 2: He has a way, and you do just what you
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Speaker 2: say in now. We're talking your time now immediately. We
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Speaker 2: have a problem. Our problem is that we read life wrongly.
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Speaker 2: It must be read in the panorama of God's mind
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Speaker 2: and through God's perspective. But we are finite creatures, so
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Speaker 2: we are left in a fog in disappointment with God.
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Speaker 2: We read these words. No matter how we rationalize, God
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Speaker 2: will sometimes seem unfair from the perspective of a person
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Speaker 2: trapped in time. Only at the end of time, after
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Speaker 2: we have attained God's level of viewing, after every evil
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Speaker 2: has been punished or forgiven, every illness healed, and the
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Speaker 2: entire universe restored. Only then will fairness reign. Then we
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Speaker 2: will understand what role is played by evil and by
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Speaker 2: the fall, and by natural law in an unfair event
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Speaker 2: like the death of a child. Until then we will
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Speaker 2: not know, and can only trust in a God who
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Speaker 2: does know. He continues, we remain ignorant of many details,
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Speaker 2: not because God enjoys keeping us in the dark, but
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Speaker 2: because we have not the faculties to absorb so much
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Speaker 2: light at a single glance. God knows what the world
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Speaker 2: is about and how history will end, But we time
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Speaker 2: bound creatures have only the most primitive manner of understanding.
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Speaker 2: We can let time pass. Not until history has run
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Speaker 2: its course will we understand how all things work together.
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Speaker 2: For good faith then means believing in advance what will
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Speaker 2: only make sense in reverse. And that's hard. That is hard.
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Speaker 2: His heart is moving from the chorus in his time,
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Speaker 2: and his time, God makes all things beautiful in his
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Speaker 2: time on Sunday, to the real world of pain and
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Speaker 2: loss and hardship and earthquakes and floods and death on Tuesday,
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Speaker 2: our Wednesday, our Friday. So what do we do? How
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Speaker 2: do we live in a fog without panic? How do
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Speaker 2: we make it in this little space not knowing where
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Speaker 2: the shore is, and especially during the times when we
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Speaker 2: do not hear a voice. Well, we need help in
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Speaker 2: discovering how God works. The book just before job is
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Speaker 2: the Book of Esther, and it's quite a book. It's
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Speaker 2: the only book in the Bible where God isn't named.
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Speaker 2: But you haven't had to worry about that because I've
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Speaker 2: named him all the way through these messages, and to
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Speaker 2: your attention the ending of the book. You see, they
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Speaker 2: didn't know about it in the third chapter or fourth chapter.
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Speaker 2: I've read the book and you have two, and so
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Speaker 2: we're able to read and reverse and give them peace
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Speaker 2: and comfort and tell Mordecai to wait and rest, and
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Speaker 2: to tell Esther she'll move when it's God's moment because
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Speaker 2: we're able to read it into it because we have
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Speaker 2: the book, and the book is written from the perspective
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Speaker 2: of no planet specifically, but God's transcendent presence generally. So
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Speaker 2: when we come to chapter three and we find that
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Speaker 2: there's a sustained period of silence where the king promotes
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Speaker 2: Hayman you and I want to say, no, don't do it.
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Speaker 2: You'll be sorry. He's a bad guy, he hates the Jews.
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Speaker 2: He's going to work out a murderous plant. Don't promote him,
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Speaker 2: but he promotes him. And there's no voice from the
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Speaker 2: shore verse six of chapter three to destroy all the
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Speaker 2: Jews who are in the whole kingdom of a Haguaras,
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Speaker 2: And the King of all things plants his ring and
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Speaker 2: the clay, and he sends the message by edict across
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Speaker 2: the kingdom of Persia, and the Jews now live in
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Speaker 2: the fear that they will die. But the end of
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Speaker 2: the year, and God's silent. He doesn't say a word,
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Speaker 2: he doesn't speak, He doesn't even stop them. Must have
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Speaker 2: been like living in Paris when the Nazis came. How
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Speaker 2: could they come? How could they take us? We are Frenchmen.
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Speaker 2: But they came and they killed, and God was silent.
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Speaker 2: Mordecai tries to motivate Esther and she's hesitant, and we
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Speaker 2: want to say, esther get at it, the queen, you
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Speaker 2: can make a difference. I know I read where you
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Speaker 2: did a little later. Do it? And she doesn't do it,
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Speaker 2: not right away, and God is silent. She asks that
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Speaker 2: they might fast and pray for her, and they do,
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Speaker 2: and she decides to do something. And in the meantime
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Speaker 2: Haman aggravated that Mordecai builds gallows that are gonna hold
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Speaker 2: the carcass of Mordecai un till he rots, and nobody
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Speaker 2: stops him. Let me tell you something. Had we lived
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Speaker 2: then in that little place of the lake, we had
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Speaker 2: have wondered where is God? Just like Elie Wiesel in
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Speaker 2: his book Night Stands as a child viewing all the
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Speaker 2: sights of death and smelling it from the ovens, and
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Speaker 2: the man behind him says, where is God? Now? Of
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Speaker 2: course you know, such periods of silence are woven all
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Speaker 2: the way through the text. If you don't know this,
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Speaker 2: and if you don't remember this, and if you don't
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Speaker 2: call this to mine, when he stays silent while you
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Speaker 2: were on the lake, you will panic, You will doubt,
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Speaker 2: you will become cynical. Your faith will remain like a
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Speaker 2: little tiny mustard, seed. I've heard great sermons on Joseph.
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Speaker 2: I've listened to great sermons on Moses. I have never
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Speaker 2: heard a sermon on the four hundred years that separated
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Speaker 2: Joseph from Moses. What if you and I had lived then,
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Speaker 2: I'd much rather live in the days of Joseph or
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Speaker 2: prefer to live in the days of Moses, especially when
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Speaker 2: the redemption happens. But what about the silent period where
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Speaker 2: God doesn't move. We move along in history and we
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Speaker 2: come to Hannah. We love Hannah, this woman of God
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Speaker 2: who prayed for a son, and the wonder boy came.
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Speaker 2: His name is Samuel. Great message is on Hannah, great
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Speaker 2: messages on Samuel. I don't think I've ever heard a
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Speaker 2: message on first Samuel three to one says word from
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Speaker 2: the Lord was rare in those days, visions were infrequent.
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Speaker 2: The Good News Bible says there were very few messages
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Speaker 2: from the Lord, and visions from him were quite rare.
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Speaker 2: But I venture to say that's exactly where most of
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Speaker 2: us are spending our lives right this hot moment. God
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Speaker 2: is silent. You're in a waiting period. We think the
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Speaker 2: prophets were the ones who heard God's voice on a
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Speaker 2: regular basis. If you think that you haven't read Hubakuk,
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Speaker 2: who watched unjust events occur one after another, one after another,
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Speaker 2: and they didn't stop. Finally, he said to God, why,
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Speaker 2: And while I'm at it, how long this is a prophet?
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Speaker 2: What was the problem? He was on the lake the
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Speaker 2: fog had rolled in. You can sing in his time
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Speaker 2: where God makes all things beautiful, But right now I'm drowning.
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Speaker 2: Between Malachi and the birth of the Lord Jesus as
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Speaker 2: another four hundred year period, you have probably never heard
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Speaker 2: a sermon about absolute stark silence, not even the writing
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Speaker 2: of a verse of scripture for centuries. If you want
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Speaker 2: to discover how God works not only in Esther's day,
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Speaker 2: but in your day, keep these four things in mind.
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Speaker 2: Number one, there are often sustained periods of silence. Okay often,
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Speaker 2: unless I miss my guest. That's where you find yourself,
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Speaker 2: and I want to give you a tip on how
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Speaker 2: to handle those times of absolute silence. Here it is
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Speaker 2: the periods of God's silence are just as significant as
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Speaker 2: the times in which he speaks. They are far more painful,
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Speaker 2: and they are far more often You need ears of
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Speaker 2: faith to listen for his voice when you're on a lake,
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Speaker 2: and then let me mention. Secondly, there will be a
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Speaker 2: subtle turn of events that will begin to happen. Sensitive ears,
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Speaker 2: sharp antenna will detect those changes. They're subtle. Remember, for example,
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Speaker 2: you're looking at Esther chapter six, the King can't sleep.
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Speaker 2: I want to ask you, when was the last time
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Speaker 2: that made news? The President couldn't sleep last night. I
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Speaker 2: don't think I've read that the king can't sleep, or
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Speaker 2: if I did, it was a little part of the paper.
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Speaker 2: But it's subtle. It's nevertheless a change. I suppose the
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Speaker 2: king slept well all the time. That's why it made
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Speaker 2: news in chapter six that he didn't on this occasion.
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Speaker 2: And out of the blue, Mordecai's name comes out of obscurity.
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Speaker 2: He's reading the record, listening to the notes from the chronicles,
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Speaker 2: and he hears Mordecai's name, and he hears that this
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Speaker 2: man saved his life. By the way, this is between
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Speaker 2: the two banquets, isn't it? Isn't it significant that God,
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Speaker 2: in his timing, wanted to introduce the king to Mordieca,
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Speaker 2: and it took two banquets. I laughed at two banquets.
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Speaker 2: I'm now ashamed that I laughed at two banquets. It
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Speaker 2: was part of his plan. I think, why two banquets,
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Speaker 2: one will do well. I'm not God. He could have
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Speaker 2: called for four or none. He's not into banquets. The
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Speaker 2: point of it all is that in the mystery of
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Speaker 2: these changing of events, subtle things occur that the sensitive
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Speaker 2: heart picks up. And, my friend, that's what wisdom is about.
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Speaker 2: That's Christian maturity. And rather than thrashing about on the
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Speaker 2: lake thinking I will not make it, I will never
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Speaker 2: hear a voice, we begin to watch for turns of events.
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Speaker 2: I mean, right after he gets out of this sleepless night,
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Speaker 2: who's in the courtyard or in the court of the
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Speaker 2: king but Hamon he has splinters in his hands from
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Speaker 2: building the gallows on which to hang, and the king
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Speaker 2: called him, and we laughed at that last time. Remember
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Speaker 2: the king calls him in says who should we honor?
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Speaker 2: Aimon thinks who's better than me? I'm glad you think that,
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Speaker 2: but that's not my plan. I'm going to honor Mordecai.
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Speaker 2: And sure enough, Aiman is the man who takes Mordecai
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Speaker 2: out for a walk on a horse, proclaiming his greatness
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Speaker 2: I'd call that a change of events.
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Speaker 1: What may look like a coincidence is actually sovereignty. That's
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Speaker 1: the quiet confidence that Chucks Wndall wants us to carry
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Speaker 1: away from Esther's story. When God seems silent, he's not absent.
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Speaker 1: He's at working ways we can't see from our limited
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Speaker 1: human perspective. You're listening to Insight for Living. A bit
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Speaker 1: later on, Chuck will share a closing thought that you
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Speaker 1: won't want to miss. First, I want to tell you
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Speaker 1: about a special bundle of resources for the Esther series.
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Speaker 1: It includes the Searching the Scripture's Bible Study workbook, Chuck's
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Speaker 1: full length biography of Esther, and the complete collection of
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Speaker 1: twelve sermons on CD. To access these resources right now,
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Speaker 1: go to insight dot org slash offer. In just a moment,
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Speaker 1: I'll tell you about a brand new booklet that Chuck's
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Speaker 1: written about the power of the Cross. We published it
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Speaker 1: just in time to coincide with a teaching series that
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Speaker 1: begins on June tenth. The Cross not only represents our
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Speaker 1: salvation through Christ, but when we focus on the Cross
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Speaker 1: of Jesus, it becomes our compass every single day. Here's Chuck.
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Speaker 3: You might not remember the name Roy Regals if not.
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Speaker 3: Roy was a football player, and in the nineteen twenty
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Speaker 3: nine Rose Bowl, he picked up a fumble and took off,
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Speaker 3: running fast, confident, strutting toward the goal line, absolutely certain
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Speaker 3: he knew where he was going. Guess what he was
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Speaker 3: headed in the wrong direction. Y sprint headed the wrong way?
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Speaker 3: Oh man, can't you just picture it? His own teammate
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Speaker 3: had to chase him down. And when that teammate finally
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Speaker 3: caught up with him, Roy shouted, I love this, get
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Speaker 3: away from me, this is my touchdown. He was convinced,
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Speaker 3: but Roy was dead wrong. Well, I've spent a lifetime
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Speaker 3: in ministry, and I can tell you that story never
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Speaker 3: gets old because it never stops being true. Sincere people,
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Speaker 3: well meaning people, people who love God and work hard
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Speaker 3: and mean every word of their prayers running the wrong direction?
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Speaker 3: Why because somewhere along the way they lost sight of
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Speaker 3: the cross. The cross reorients everything. When it's in clear focus,
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Speaker 3: you know which goal line is which, you know what
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Speaker 3: matters and what doesn't. You know how to live. That's
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Speaker 3: what insight for living is all about. Every broadcast, every resource,
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Speaker 3: every message we send into the world has one purpose
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Speaker 3: to point people back to the Cross, not to me,
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Speaker 3: not to this program, but to the Cross. And here's
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Speaker 3: something I want you to understand. As we approach June thirtieth,
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Speaker 3: the end of our fiscal year. Every gift that comes
25:23
Speaker 3: in doesn't just keep Insight for living on the air.
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Speaker 3: It sends you into the world as a minister of
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Speaker 3: this message through radio, through the Internet, through social media
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Speaker 3: and printed materials, reaching people on every continent.
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Speaker 2: You cast that seed.
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Speaker 3: We just get to watch God grow it. Please give
25:46
Speaker 3: today generously. The world needs the right direction.
25:51
Speaker 1: Yes, the world needs the right direction. To respond to
25:55
Speaker 1: Chucks Wendall, call us at eight hundred seven seven to
25:58
Speaker 1: eighty eight eighty eight eight, or go to Insight dot
26:02
Speaker 1: org slash donate plus when you respond with a much
26:06
Speaker 1: appreciated gift Today, we'll say thanks by providing a brand
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Speaker 1: new booklet from Chuck. It's called The Cross We Proclaim.
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Speaker 1: In his booklet, Chuck draws from Paul's Letter to the
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Speaker 1: Corinthians to show how easy it is to live with
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Speaker 1: great energy but be heading in the wrong direction, whether
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Speaker 1: chasing achievement, reputation, or religious performance. The Cross alone has
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Speaker 1: the power to reorient your life. We'd love to send
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Speaker 1: you the cross. We proclaim to send a check in
26:35
Speaker 1: the mail. Just address your donation to Insight for Living
26:39
Speaker 1: post Office box five thousand, Frisco, Texas, seven five three four.
26:45
Speaker 1: That's post Office box five thousand, Frisco, Texas, seven five
26:51
Speaker 1: three four. You can also call us at eight hundred
26:55
Speaker 1: seven seven to two eighty eight eighty eight, or go
26:58
Speaker 1: online to insight slash donate. How do we live faithfully
27:11
Speaker 1: when God seems silent? I'm Bill Meyer inviting you to
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Speaker 1: hear Chuckswyndall's answer Thursday on Insight for Living. The preceding message,
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Speaker 1: God's Surprising Sovereignty was copyrighted in nineteen eighty nine, nineteen
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Speaker 1: ninety nineteen ninety seven, two thousand and five, twenty eighteen,
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Speaker 1: and twenty twenty six, and the sound recording was copyrighted
27:35
Speaker 1: in twenty twenty six by Charles R. Swindall Incorporated. All
27:39
Speaker 1: rights are reserved worldwide. Duplication of copyrighted material for commercial
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Speaker 1: use is strictly prohibited