God's Providence in Esther: Hope Amidst Hiddenness

Well, in the book of Esther, we we find ourselves in a story where, as I said, God's name is never mentioned, but his presence is everywhere. And like Luke, learning to trust the force, Esther and Mori in our story are living in a world that seems politically chaotic, uh, morally compromised and spiritually silent. Yet behind the scenes, God is working with precision. He's aligning people and events and timing for his good and great purpose. And just like Luke couldn't see the force, but chose to act in trust, we are called to trust the unseen hand of God, his providence, his wisdom, and his plan. Even when we can't trace his working. [00:02:27]

But what plan do the servants come up with? Well, let's read it in verse 2 through 4. It says this. Then the king's servants who attended him said, "Let beautiful young virgins be sought for the king, and let the king appoint officers in all the provinces of his kingdom that they may gather all the beautiful young virgins to Shushan the citadel into the women's quarters under the custody of Hegi, the king's unic, custodian of the women. And let beauty preparations be given them. Then let the young woman who pleased the king be queen instead of Vashi. And this thing pleased the king. And he did so. [00:09:15]

This plan that they come up with is nothing short of objectifying, adulterous, and sinful. This is not some cutesy beauty pageant. This is, as Mike Cosper puts it in his book, The Stories We Tell. This is the ancient Persian precursor to the Bachelor. That's what this is. These women are going to dress in objectifying ways and sleep with the king. And whoever makes the greatest impression in bed will lead the king to make her his new wife, the new queen. And in the midst of these sinful actions by sinful people, though his name is not mentioned once, we will see God still carrying out his good purposes. [00:10:08]

So as we follow along in the story, let's first of all take this to heart that even when it feels like God is not working or watching, trust that he is working. Even when it feels like God is not watching, trust that God is working. So the story goes on to tell us and introduce us to one of these young virgin women that was brought before the king. In verses 5-7, it says this, "In Shushan, the citadel, there was a certain Jew whose name was Morai, the son of Jaier, the son of Shimi, the son of Kish, a Benjamite. Kish had been carried away from Jerusalem with the captives who had been captured with Jeconiah, king of Judah, whom Nebuchadnezzar, the king of Babylon, had carried away. [00:10:48]

And Morortei had brought up Hadassa, that is Esther, his uncle's daughter, for she had neither father nor mother. The young woman was lovely and beautiful. When her father and mother died, Mordei took her as his own daughter. So it explains to us that Mori and Esther are descended from royalty. It tells us that they come from the line of actually Saul would have been a Benjamite and from that line would have come Kish. And you see that they come from royalty but they also are descended from slaves. They come from people who were taken captive in the exile to Babylon. [00:11:33]

And Morortei and his wife, it tells us, adopt Esther, this orphan, and raised her as their own girl. Hada, it tells us, was her Hebrew name, and her Persian name was Esther. Esther, it means star. And it would have been named after one of the gods that the Persians would worship called Ishtar. And it tells us this about Esther. It tells us she was lovely and beautiful. And this is the only thing it tells us about her physical appearance that she was lovely and beautiful. If you were to look at what those words mean, it's basically saying this. She's beautiful in form and face. [00:13:28]

So, it was when the king's command and decree were heard and when many young women were gathered at Shushan the citadel under the custody of Hegi that Esther also was taken to the king's palace into the care of Hegi, the custodian of the women. Now, the young woman pleased him and she obtained his favor. So he readily gave beauty preparations to her besides her allowance. Then seven choice maid servants were provided for her from the king's palace. And he moved her and her maidervants to the best place in the house of the women. So this is describing what is uh known as a royal herum. [00:14:12]

And you hear all that and you go what kind of wicked society was this? A very wicked one. A very wicked society in fact. So uh but we're told that Esther gets put under he custodian of the women. Something that they would do with certain men, certain slaves in these kingdoms is that they they would do this because they knew that if you castrate a stallion, then it would calm the horse. And so they took that mindset and they go, "Well, then let's make all of our slaves uh calm as well." And they would castrate them in order to calm them as well. And those are what's called Unix as you read it here, who were in charge of the women. [00:15:34]

And so these women remain for the king alone and he alone could have these women. So this unic He really likes Esther. He notices Esther and thinks that's the one like that's our queen. That's the one who's going to uh need to be queen over all of us. She needs to win out of this whole quote unquote competition that's taking place. She's the one who needs to become queen. It's like when you're watching a real reality show and you see pe people like in the first two minutes like you're watching American Idol or something. You're like that person needs to win that I love them. I like who they're what they're about. I like their voice. [00:16:22]

It tells us now that that phrase literally means this. It means to lift up grace in his eyes. uh other people in scripture where it says that grace or favor was poured upon them. As you read through the scriptures, you find men like Joseph in the land of Egypt, the favor of the Lord was on him and he was lifting up grace in the eyes of Piper and of Pharaoh. You read the book of Daniel and you find out Daniel, it says the same thing about him. The grace of God was lifted in the eyes of the elders, of the leaders. It tells us this of Ruth. If you read the story of Ruth that she was uh found favor in the eyes of Boaz. [00:17:03]

Now in the New Testament, the word that's favor here in the Old Testament, in the New Testament is the word grace. And what we find out in scripture is grace is not earned. This favor is not earned. It is given. So you you might read that and go, "Wait, so God just pours out favor on some people and not on others?" Bible tells us, yeah, that that's how it works. Those who by faith trust in Jesus's work for their salvation are given the grace of God in their lives. And other times, as we look to the fruitfulness of other people's lives, and God seems to be blessing them more than others. [00:17:54]

But God can do whatever he wants. And God knows the whole timeline of how all this is supposed to take place. So he's doing things on purpose. Well, sometimes he blesses us in ways that we don't deserve. You haven't earned it, but for some reason, he's good to you. That's grace. God has poured out his grace in your life that you didn't deserve. Now, there is a way for us to pursue the grace of God, the empowering grace of God. We pray for it. The New Testament tells us we can pray and ask the Lord to bring favor uh upon us in the sight of others. And when we pray that oftenimes God will put people in the right place at the right time with the right opportunities. [00:18:34]

And God's grace, it tells us in this story, is given to Esther. It's given to Esther and she finds favor in the eyes of Hegi. While everyone else would get beauty preparations, Hegi would give her extra beauty preparations more than she was necess necessarily supposed to. And he gave her the best maid servants he could. And he housed her and her servants in the best part of the house where the women of the king's herm lived. So, she's getting a lot of special treatment in uh this situation that she's found herself in because the grace of God seems to be upon her and giving her favor in the eyes of those who are coming across her. [00:19:19]

So it tells us like this little parenthetical statement Morai said don't tell anyone that you are a Jew. Now Jews they when they're told don't tell people you're a Jew, they don't have to ask why. Okay? They don't have to ask why because Jews for much of world history have been a persecuted people. And it makes sense because for a world that hates God, it makes sense that they would hate God's people. Just a side note, I hope you love who God loves. I I hope that you uh are a supporter of those who God has asked us to support and stand with who God stands with. [00:19:56]

And then it goes on and says this. Each young woman's turn, okay, now it's telling us a little bit about how this process is going to take place. Each young woman's turn came to go into the king auarius after she had completed 12 months preparation according to the regulations for the women. For thus were the days of their preparation aortioned, 6 months with oil of myrrh and six months with perfumes and preparations for beautifying women. thus prepared each young woman went to the king and she was given uh whatever she desired to take with her from the women's quarters to the king's palace. In the evening she went and in the morning she returned to the second house of the women to the custody of Shazgaz. [00:21:03]

And it tells us this. They would not see the king again unless he remembered their name and called by them. Now, think about that. I mean, we we think about in the story of Solomon and his so many wives and concubines. There's no way he remembered all their names and no doubt even past that all of the anniversaries he had with the wives that he married, right? We make jokes about that, but but seriously, think about how hard of a situation this would have been for these women. they they're taken before in in in their uh time of innocence. They have not known a man. And when that finally comes to fruition in their life, it's in a single night. [00:24:18]

But when she had access to get whatever she wanted, she wasn't greedy. She she didn't take all that she could because she knew this might be the only night I get everything that I want because then I might be taken away forever. She says, she takes only what Heggi has advised. She she thinks, you know, you've known the king. What would he like? And she's teachable and and and wise at least in what she does. And so she takes only what Hegi advises. Then look at verse 16 through 18. So Esther was taken to King Ahazeris into his royal palace in the 10th month, which is the month of Tabth, in the seventh year of his reign. [00:26:23]

The king loved Esther more than all the other women, and she obtained grace and favor in his sight more than all the virgins. So he set the royal crown upon her head and made her queen instead of Vashi. Then the king made a great feast, the feast of Esther for all his officials and servants. And he proclaimed a holiday in the provinces and gave gifts according to the generosity of the king. Now, the implication is clear from the story. Esther apparently made a really good impression in bed with Xerxes, but but I personally believe there was more than just the sexual aspects of why he chose her. The Lord gave her grace and favor in the eyes of all who met her, it tells us, and gave her grace and favor in the eyes of the king. [00:27:11]

God uses the sinful desires and sinful actions of sinful people to accomplish his good purposes. Did you catch that? God uses the sinful desires and the sinful actions of sinful people to accomplish his good purposes. This is hard for us to comprehend. When we go through loss, when someone uses us or abuses us or our government put law puts laws into effects that are antithetical to God and his ways. So many of these things leave us wondering where is God? How how is any of this good? Is he even watching what I'm watching? Is he even seeing what's going on? And I just want to encourage you this morning that even when it seems God is not watching, we can trust that he is working. [00:28:57]

And let me be very clear this morning. God is not the active agent in the evil perpetuated against you, but he is sovereign over it. And just because God allows something does not mean that he endorses that behavior. Not once in this story are we told that God is okay with this plan to get a new queen or that God is okay with the objectification and abuse of these women or that he's okay with Mortifi Moriah and his wife allowing Esther to be taken away for this purpose or that God is okay with Esther engaging in sexual activity with the king. But we do know from the story and from the whole of scripture that God still accomplishes his good purposes through the compromising choices of all of these flawed people. [00:30:00]

But God can and will still use it to accomplish his good purposes. And I'm not saying that to trivialize the situation or to try to lessen the hurt that someone has caused you or to diminish what they did. But I'm speaking from what the word of God tells us about the heart of God. He will work it out for good. Now, here's the hard part. This is a hard pill to swallow though about this. We may never understand or see that good in this life here on earth. We may not. We may never see or understand the good that God is working out of people's evil actions here on this earth. We may only understand it when we're with him in eternity. [00:31:25]

And our motivation shouldn't be to get recognition anyway. Jesus in the sermon on the mount uh taught that if you're doing righteous deeds just to be seen of men, that's your reward. Congratulations. You were seen of men. Woo! You got it. That was your reward if that's what you wanted. But if your motivation is to be seen by your heavenly father who sees you even when no one else does, then your father who sees in secret will reward you openly. And here's what I love about this little like footnote in Esther chapter number two. It gives us one seemingly minor detail, but it's actually one of those mcguffins or props that we talked about ear last week that it's a prop that seems insignificant, but it's setting you up for something later in the story. [00:35:29]

God used it to accomplish salvation for mankind. So see amidst all the debauchery in the story we find that Esther is a foreshadow of God and it's a foreshadow of our own lives as Christians. Think of how we are like Esther in this chapter specifically. You were the nobody wandering around in the world, a slave but with roots to nobility. You're you're created in the image of God. And one day at one moment, the King of Kings just picked you and and began to pour out on you the wealth of love and joy and peace and patience and gentleness and all of these things. And now you sit in a place beside the King of Kings. [00:38:54]

So look at go how God worked in the story of Esther. Look at how God has worked in the whole story of the Bible in Jesus to remember that he is the same yesterday, today, and forever. He is working in your story even when it seems like he's not. Even when it seems that what you're going through is the worst of the worst, the evil desires and evil actions of evil people have hurt you and used you. But the truth is this. What you have gone through will not be wasted. You can trust that God is working it for good and your good deeds will not go unrewarded. Trust that God sees and takes note. [00:39:57]