1. "God's providence means that everything, when placed in his good and sovereign hand, everything is woven together for good. It means that pain is like the surgeon's scalpel rather than the criminal's knife. It means adversity is measured out drop by drop for your good."

2. "God never speaks. In fact, he's never even mentioned. Esther is the only book of the Bible where God is never mentioned. But that is the genius of the book of Esther, and that is its great relevance to us."

3. "At the end of chapter two, it's like all the IKEA pieces are spilled out on the table in front of you, and you don't have the directions. So in your life, all the pieces are there, but you have no idea what God's going to do with them."

4. "It all comes down to your job description. If your job in life is to be a solver of life's problems, then you won't think much of God's providence. Or if you do think of his providence, you'll become a fatalist. But you're not a solver, you're a steward."

5. "Do you want to live with courage? Oh, be careful. Much of what our world calls courage is really bravado and self conceit that will benefit no one. You will become courageous as you come to know your God and as you come to know your place in relation to him."

6. "So often we hoard our providential blessings, treating them as our property. And the more we're blinded by pride, the easier it is to mistake what God has entrusted to us as our own. Providence has a purpose. There is nothing God has entrusted to you without purpose."

7. "Trusting God's providence is not seeing the good and then declaring God is present. It is about not seeing the good, yet knowing he is present and by faith declaring he is good."

8. "Perhaps God is hidden in the Book of Esther in part because we're seeing everything through his eyes."

9. "In the deserts of Peru are the Nazca lines, massive pictures of animals and various designs drawn in the sand, but not discovered until the 1940s because you can't see what they are unless you're in an airplane. What a wonderful image to sum up the Book of Esther."

10. "All the world's a stage, and we but players on it. So true. God's been directing the play. The play is about Him. And one day we will see it for all of its glorious wonder. Tomorrow we see; today we trust."

Observation Questions

1. According to Esther 3:12-13, what specific instructions were written in Haman's decree regarding the Jews, and when was this destruction to take place?

2. In Esther 4:13-14, what two contrasting outcomes does Mordecai present to Esther, and what question does he pose about her position as queen?

3. What does Esther request of Mordecai and the Jews in Esther 4:16 before she goes to the king, and what statement does she make about the risk she is taking?

4. In Esther 6:1-3, what happens to the king on the night between Esther's two banquets, and what does he discover when the chronicles are read to him?

5. According to Esther 6:6-10, what does Haman assume when the king asks how to honor "the man whom the king delights to honor," and what ironic command does the king then give him?

6. In Esther 9:1, how does the text describe the reversal that occurred on the day Haman's decree was to be carried out?

Interpretation Questions

1. The sermon notes that God is never mentioned in the book of Esther, yet his "fingerprints" are everywhere. How do the "impossible coincidences" throughout the book—such as Esther becoming queen before Haman's plot, Mordecai overhearing the assassination attempt, and the king's sleepless night—reveal God's hidden but active providence?

2. Mordecai tells Esther that if she remains silent, "relief and deliverance will rise for the Jews from another place" (Esther 4:14). What does this statement reveal about Mordecai's understanding of God's promises and sovereignty, and why does this confidence not lead him to passivity?

3. The sermon highlights that Esther prepared to approach the king with three days of fasting rather than beauty treatments. What does this shift in her approach reveal about the change in her faith and priorities between chapters 2 and 4?

4. How does the humiliation of Haman—being forced to honor Mordecai and then being hanged on his own gallows—illustrate the danger of treating God's providential blessings as personal property rather than entrusted gifts?

5. The sermon argues that trusting God's providence is not the same as expecting earthly prosperity or optimistic outcomes. How does the overall structure of Esther—with its terrifying descent before the exhilarating reversal—teach us to trust God's deeper purposes even when we cannot see them?

Application Questions

1. Esther moved from compromised silence to courageous action when she recognized her position as a stewardship from God. What position, relationship, or resource has God entrusted to you that you may be tempted to use for self-protection rather than for His purposes? What would courageous stewardship look like in that area this week?

2. The sermon warns against hoarding providential blessings as personal property, using Haman as a cautionary example. Is there a blessing in your life—such as financial security, a talent, a relationship, or a position of influence—that you are holding with a closed fist rather than open hands? What practical step could you take to hold it more loosely and use it for others?

3. Mordecai's confidence in God's promise to deliver His people gave him courage even in crisis. When you face uncertainty or fear, what specific promise of God in Scripture can you rehearse to yourself to strengthen your trust and move you toward faithful action rather than anxious passivity?

4. The sermon emphasizes that trusting God's providence is a "corporate project" and that God often provides a way through trials via the prayers, faith, and encouragement of others. How can you more intentionally invite fellow believers into your struggles this week, and how can you offer that same support to someone else?

5. Esther's declaration "If I perish, I perish" reflects a faith that trusts God's goodness without demanding a favorable outcome. Is there a situation in your life where you have been unwilling to obey God because you cannot guarantee the results? What would it look like to take a step of obedience this week, entrusting the outcome to Him?

Additional Bible Reading

1. Genesis 50:15-21 — Joseph's declaration that what others meant for evil, God meant for good, provides a foundational example of God's providence turning suffering into salvation for His people.

2. Romans 8:28-39 — This passage, quoted in the sermon, unpacks the promise that God works all things for good for those who love Him and assures believers that nothing can separate them from His love.

3. Exodus 17:8-16 — This account of Israel's battle with the Amalekites (ancestors of Haman the Agagite) and God's promise to blot out their memory provides background for understanding Mordecai's confidence in divine deliverance.

4. Daniel 6:1-28 — Daniel's faithfulness under a death decree in a foreign empire parallels Esther's situation and illustrates God's pattern of raising up exiles to protect His people and display His power.

5. Ephesians 2:1-10 — Referenced at the sermon's conclusion, this passage explains that apart from Christ we deserve judgment, but by grace God makes us alive, securing the promise that His providence works for our eternal good.

Sermon Main Topics

I. The Providential God of Esther and Our Struggle to Trust Him

II. From Compromised to Courageous: Providence as a Call to Courage, Not Passivity

III. From Haughty to Humiliated: Providence and Stewarding God’s Blessings

IV. From Powerless to Powerful: Providence Beyond Optimistic Prosperity

V. God’s Deeper Providential Purposes in Esther

VI. Trusting the God of Providence through Christ Today

Detailed Sermon Outline

It was B.B. Warfield who noted that a firm faith in the universal providence of God is the solution to all earthly problems. That's a bold statement. I think it's a true statement. Providence is the Christian belief, to quote Romans 8:28, that for those who love God, All things work together for good for those who are called according to His purpose.

It is the intersection of three great truths of the Christian faith: God's sovereignty over all things, God's goodness in all that He does, and God's imminence to us, such that He can make all things work together for good for us. A firm faith in God's providence is the solution to all earthly problems.

For example, take the problems of bitterness, anger, and anxiety. Trust in God's providence is the key that unlocks the trap of bitterness because only through such trust can we entrust to God the hardship we're encountering. Knowing it has a purpose. Trust in God's providence is the key that unlocks hatred as we entrust injustice to God, knowing that he will address it. The same for anxiety as we trust the future to God, knowing his care is powerful no matter what the future holds.

God's providence is how we move through grief, knowing that hardship has purpose. God's providence is how we respond to the weakness of a friend or a spouse with tenderness rather than disdain. God's providence is how we respond to setbacks with hope and grace. Even if you're not a believer in Jesus Christ, I hope you can see how believing in his providence, if you could, would have a profound impact on your contentment in life.

God's providence means that everything, when placed in his good and sovereign hand, everything is woven together for good. It means that pain is like the surgeon's scalpel rather than the criminal's knife. It means adversity is measured out drop by drop, for your good. It means blessing also has purpose. Trusting in God's providence rarely means we understand God's good purposes, at least not this side of heaven.

It certainly doesn't mean that we get to define good on our own terms. It doesn't deny evil or God's hatred of evil, yet it does trust that he turns evil to good. And so inside providence, a trust in God's providence, is a contentment and joy and peace that the rumblings of this world can never shake.

But that's not quite where we live, is it? As Christians, we do struggle with bitterness, with hatred, with anxiety, with disdain. We don't have contentment and joy that circumstances could never ruffle because we don't trust God's providence as we should. For many, the Christian doctrine of providence is actually a very difficult one to swallow. It can be hard to believe that even the banal details of life have divine purpose or that any good could come from great evil.

Or because it smacks of fatalism and seems dangerous, or for some, we struggle to trust God's providence because we've confused God's providence with a baptized optimism. And when it doesn't turn out, we feel burned. I wonder what keeps you from trusting more in the providence of God? Would instruct us about God's providence. And to help us trust God's providence, we come this morning, one last time, to the book of Esther, which begins on page 410 of the Bibles in the chairs and pews around you.

We've actually been working through Esther these last four weeks, piece by piece, but this morning we're going to look at the whole book together. And for those seeking to trust God's providence, Esther is a surprisingly potent remedy for the faith-deprived.

Now, some of you haven't been here for these last four sermons in Esther. I will endeavor to keep you up to speed, but we will be skipping over some details because most people here have been here the last few weeks and they have heard them. So if you don't catch all those details, you might find this afternoon to be a great time to read through the book of Esther. And maybe having listened to this sermon, that book will come alive in ways it hasn't before.

God's providence often shows itself most clearly in moments of crisis, and Esther is no different. So we're going to start this morning with the crisis of Esther. Then we're going to back up to see how things got there, and then I'll explain how we'll explore this book together this morning. Esther's at the end of Old Testament history. God's people had gone into exile in Babylon because of their sin.

Seventy years later, Persia has conquered Babylon, and the Persian King Cyrus decreed the Jews could return from exile to Jerusalem. 50 years since then have passed. Xerxes is now on the Persian throne, or as most of you will see in your Bibles, King Ahasuerus, the Hebrew form of the same name. By now, many Jews have returned to Jerusalem, but most have actually stayed in Persia. And it's to those Jews the book of Esther is most immediately written.

So let's start in chapter 3, verse 12, where we see the great crisis that they faced.

Then the king's scribes were summoned on the thirteenth day of the first month, and an edict according to all that Haman commanded was written to the king, satraps, and to the governors over all the provinces and to the officials of all the peoples, to every province in its own script, and every people in its own language. It was written in the name of King Ahasuerus, and sealed with the king's signet ring. Letters were sent by couriers to all the king's provinces with instruction to destroy, to kill, and to annihilate all Jews, young and old, women and children, in one day, the 13th day of the 12th month, which is the month of Adar, and to plunder their goods. That's the crisis. A death sentence.

For every Jew in Persia, the largest empire on earth stretching from Ethiopia to Jerusalem and from Jerusalem to India, every Jew, young and old, women and children, on one day, the 13th day of the 12th month, How on earth did things get here? And what does this crisis have to do with the providence of God? Let's go back to the beginning of Esther, chapter 1, verse 1, and let's see how we got here.

Now, in the days of Ahasuerus, the Ahasuerus who reigned from India to Ethiopia over 127 provinces, in those days when King Ahasuerus sat on his royal throne in Susa the citadel, in the third year of his reign he gave a feast for all his officials and men of the army of Persia and Median and and servants. The army of Persia and Media and the nobles and governors of the provinces were before him, while he showed the riches of his royal glory and the splendor and pomp of his greatness for many days, 180 days. And when these days were completed, the king gave for all the people present in Susa the citadel, both great and small, a feast lasting for seven days in the court of the garden of the king's palace. Chapter 1 is dripping with the grandeur of the Persian Empire, 127 provinces, nearly half the world's population, and what does King Ahasuerus do with such power? He shows it off with a six-month long party, and as wine is flowing freely, verse 11, he commands his queen, Vashti, be brought into the spectacle so that he can show off her beauty to the revelers?

And she says, no. Proverbs 31:4 comes to mind, It is not for kings to drink wine or for rulers to take strong drink. A proverb this king clearly did not live by. Vashti may well have had excellent reasons for refusing the king's drunken demand, but we never find out because she's quickly deposed by the enraged king and his fearful advisors. And in chapter 2, a new queen is sought through a kind of dystopian beauty pageant.

And by the end of chapter 2, that crown belongs to Esther, orphan niece to Mordecai, we read in verse 5. And the whole text here just emphasizes Esther's lack of agency. She's taken to be Mordecai's daughter, taken into the palace, verse 8, taken to the king, verse 16, all for one night with the king who will pick one woman and throw the rest away, verse 14. I don't think we're guilty of reading modern sensibilities back into this text to feel revulsion by the author.

Well, at the end of chapter 2, Ordechi's, sorry, Esther's uncle Mordecai, who's been sitting at the king's gate to keep tabs on Esther, overhears a plot against the king's life. He tells Esther, who tells the king, and the king's life is saved. So we enter chapter 3 expecting Mordecai to be rewarded, but instead, chapter 3:1, after these things, King Ahasuerus promoted Haman the Agagite, the son of Hammedatha, and advanced him, and set his throne above all the officials who were with him. And all the king's servants who were at the king's gate bowed down and paid homage to Haman, for the king had so commanded concerning him. But Mordecai did not bow down or pay homage.

And that is what sets in motion the great crisis of this book. Haman is enraged that Mordecai will not bow down to him, but verse six, he disdained to lay hands on Mordecai alone. So as they had made known to him the people of Mordecai, Haman sought to destroy all the Jews, the people of Mordecai, throughout the whole kingdom of Ahashuerus.

So that's the setup that leads us to the crisis of the book. Just a few things to note before we go any further. But first, this empire is impressive. As you read through Esther, you can't miss the language of splendor and power. King Ahashuerus was one of the most powerful men in the history of men.

Though he is lampooned in the text, in fact, the author's choice to use the Hebrew form of his name, Ahasuerus, is notable because in Hebrew, King Ahasuerus sounds an awful lot like King headache. Second, this empire is dangerous. And especially, it was a dangerous place to be a Jew. So our text points out twice in chapter 2, verses 10 and 20, that Esther kept her Jewish identity a secret. She is, after all, the one character in this account who has two names, Hadassah and Esther.

And a key question in these opening chapters is, which will she be, Jewish or Persian? And as I mentioned earlier, Esther was written to Jews scattered across the Persian Empire, Jews who had chosen, though they could have, to not return to Jerusalem. And because this empire was both enticing and threatening, they were in danger of quietly assimilating with the world around and ceasing to be God's people, which I think is a concern for us as well. This world is a dangerous place for disciples of Jesus. It's dangerous because sometimes it threatens, but it's also dangerous because it entices.

And don't think for a moment we are beyond being threatened and enticed all at the same time. After all, the siren call of this world is to assimilate with the world and Satan cares very little whether he gets you there with a carrot or a stick. Our call, like the call of these people, is to remain faithful to our God.

But speaking of God, a third feature we should note about these opening chapters of Esther is that he is surprisingly absent. Even as one of the greatest crises his people will ever encounter comes to fruition, God never speaks. In fact, he's never even mentioned. Esther is the only book of the Bible where God is never mentioned.

But that is the genius of the book of Esther and that is its great relevance to us. In the book of Esther, we see God's promises fulfilled not through miraculous intervention as so often happens in Scripture, but through God's hidden providence, just like in our lives. And so, Esther is teaching us in times when the hand of God seems hidden, how to trust his providence and understand his love without a pillar of cloud or a living prophet.

But we should also note that in these opening chapters of Esther, God is not merely hidden, he is active. Because by the end of chapter 2, before Haman even steps onto the scene, two things are in place that will prove decisive in saving God's people from Haman's threat. By seeming impossible chance, Esther is in the arms of the king, and the king is in the debt of Mordecai. Who gave her that favor in the eyes of the king? Chapter 2:17. Who allowed Mordecai to overhear that plot?

Verse 22. So before the peril of God's people even begins, God has already moved the pieces into place to save his people. So yes, he is hidden, but he is active. He is very active, just like in our lives. And as we get into this book, that is a key truth we must understand if we are to trust God's providence.

At the end of chapter two, it's like all the Ikea pieces are spilled out on the table in front of you and you don't have the directions. So in your life, all the pieces are there, but you have no idea what God's gonna do with them. So that's the setup to Esther, a world that is both dangerous and enticing, which pressures God's people to become like the world. Instead, they're to serve God. But he's hidden.

So how can we trust the providence of a hidden God? Well, as we continue reading beyond these three initial chapters, we find that the story of Esther is a story of reversals. The first becoming last and the last first. For the rest of this sermon, we are going to examine first three of these reversals. And for each a lesson, about trusting God's providence, and then three purposes underneath those reversals that illustrate God's providence.

Three reversals and three purposes underneath it all. That'll be the structure for the rest of the time we have this morning in Esther. So let's start with our first story of reversal, from compromised to courageous, from compromised to courageous, which is the reversal that we see within Esther and Mordecai as they respond to the crisis of Haman's decree. Let me continue reading with Esther chapter 4.

When Mordecai learned all that had been done, Mordecai tore his clothes and put on sackcloth and ashes and went out into the midst of the city and he cried out to the loud and bitter cry. He went up to the entrance of the king's gate for no one was allowed to enter the king's gate clothed in sackcloth and in every province Wherever the king's command his decree reached, there was great mourning among the Jews with fasting and weeping and lamenting, and many of them lay in sackcloth and ashes. When Esther's young women and her eunuchs came and told her the queen was deeply distressed, she sent garments to clothe Mordecai so that he might take off his sackcloth, but he would not accept them. Esther's confused. So she sends a messenger to Mordecai who informs her of Haman's decree and commands her to go to the king to beg for his mercy for her people.

But verse 11, Esther reminds Mordecai what everyone seems to know, that to go to the king unbidden is death, except, she says, the one to whom the king holds out the golden scepter so that he may live. But as Esther continues, the king has not asked for her in weeks. Verse 12, and they told Mordecai what Esther had said. Then Mordecai told them to reply to Esther. Do not think to yourself that in the king's palace you will escape any more than all the other Jews, for if you keep silent at this time, relief and deliverance will rise for the Jews from some other place, but you and your father's house will perish.

And who knows whether you have not come to the kingdom for such a time as this? Then Esther told them to reply to Mordecai, Go, gather all the Jews to be found in Susa, and hold a fast on my behalf, and do not eat or drink for three days, night or day, I and my young women will also fast as you do, then I will go to the king, though it is against the law. And if I perish, I perish. Mordecai then went away and did everything as Esther had ordered him.

Well, after these three days of fasting, chapter five, verse one, Esther goes unbidden to the king. She finds favor in his eyes. He holds out to her the golden scepter. But rather than begging for mercy, as Mordecai had told her to do, she asked the king and Haman to a banquet. You see, Esther's in a difficult place.

The decree ordering the death of her people is in the king's name. Only the king can do anything about that. And yet, how do you point that out without fingering him as the one responsible, trying to get a man to see the error of his ways without offending his ego?

So at the banquet, Esther again declines to tell him what she really wants but merely invites him to a second banquet, which must leave the king beside himself with curiosity. Esther, it turns out, is exceedingly clever.

But we should note that this is a very different Esther than what we've seen so far. In chapter 2, she of Mordecai chose to hide her Jewish identity.

It's difficult to separate out what was her and what was Mordecai. The two acted together. But the fact is that her decision to hide her Jewish identity would have meant breaking God's law by eating food from the king's court that was against God's law and by marrying a man who was not one of God's people. Ancient commentators were terribly bothered at how Esther could be heroic and yet show such disregard for God's law. And Mordecai is also compromised.

Not only is he the one who leads in these decisions, he himself is actually named after a Persian god, Marduk. And he's descended from Kish, the father of Israel's King Saul, a king known mainly for his disobedience to God. And not just from Kish, from Shimei. A man named Shimei, we read, was a descendant of Saul who harassed King David as he fled Jerusalem.

All that to say, Mordecai isn't introduced in this book as some kind of a Jewish Superman, more like Black Widow with a terribly suspect resume. And when Esther hears that Mordecai is mourning in sackcloth and ashes, chapter 4, verse 4, what's her initial response? To send him new clothes, as if his deepest problem was a wardrobe malfunction. Rising no further from the surface level concerns than the rest of this Persian court. And she's hardly courageous when she first hears Mordecai's demand that she go to the king.

Everyone knows you can't do that, she says. Sorry, wish I could help.

And yet by verse 16, she agrees to go to the king, knowing it could well be the last thing she does. If I perish, I perish. What tremendous courage! Mordecai now obeys her, verse 17. Even the king obeys her, chapter 5, verse 5.

What's more, how is it that she prepares to go to the king?

Not with 12 months of beauty treatments, as she did in chapter 2, but with three days of fasting. So this is not as to the beauty queen who walks unbidden into the king's court. It is Esther in her royal robes, but Esther dehydrated, gaunt, no doubt with sleepless, bloodshot eyes.

She apparently determined that three days of fasting before God was a better way to secure the king's favor than what until then has always been her most obvious advantage. So Esther's not simply showing courage, she is showing faith-filled courage. This is an amazing reversal. So what's changed? What's changed is God's promise.

Remember by Mordecai in chapter 4, verse 14, if you remain silent at this time, not we're lost, but relief and deliverance will rise from the Jews from another place. Referring perhaps to God's promise in Exodus 17 to wipe out the Amalekites, the Agagites, the people of HamAn because of their hatred for his people. Or even deeper, maybe he's referring to the promises God gave Abraham to sovereignly bless his descendants and curse those who hated them. What's changed is the introduction of God's providence.

For each of these three reversals in Esther, we'll see a lesson about trusting God's providence. So this is our first lesson. God's providence should not lead to our passivity. As in, well, God's going to do what God's going to do, so it doesn't matter what I do. That's not at all how Esther responds to God's promise to rescue his people.

She sees God's providence as a call instead to courage.

It all comes down to your job description. If your job in life is to be a solver of life's problems, then you won't think much of God's providence or if you do think of his providence, you'll become a fatalist. But you're not a solver, you're a steward. Your job is to take the talents and wealth and time and relationships that God has entrusted to you and use them for his purposes. Not because God is in any way dependent on you to solve the problems of the world, but because you are his servant.

In doing his work. That's how we, like Esther, can move from compromised to courageous. So teenagers here, do you want to live with courage? Oh, be careful. Much of what our world calls courage is really bravado and self-conceit that will benefit no one.

You will become courageous as you come to know your God, and as you come to know your place in relation to him, your responsibility is not to solve, it is to steward.

My friends, what Esther demonstrates is biblical courage. If I perish, I perish. Not some prosperity gospel version of faith where I think that if I believe hard enough, I can get what I want, but neither a faithless resignation either.

Esther knew the risks. She knew God would somehow save. She knew that she might be the means He used to do that, but more than anything, she knew that she was a steward of the position God had given to her.

But what does that stewardship look like? That brings us to a second reversal, and it has to do with Haman. This is from Hadi, to humiliated, from haughty to humiliated. Let's pick up the action again in verse 9 of chapter 5, as Haman leaves Esther's first banquet.

And Haman went out that day joyful and glad of heart, but when Haman saw Mordecai in the king's gate that he neither rose nor trembled before him, he was filled with wrath against Mordecai. Hamun goes home, boasting to his friends and his wife Zeresh of his great riches and power, lamenting Mordecai's slight against him. Verse 14, Then his wife Zeresh and all his friends said to him, Let a gallows fifty cubits high be made, and in the morning tell the king to have Mordecai hanged upon it; then go joyfully with the king to the feast. This idea pleased Haman, and he had the gallows made. On that night, the king could not sleep, and he gave orders to bring the book of memorable deeds, the chronicles, and they were read before the king.

And it was found written how Mordecai had told about Bigthana and Teresh, two of the king's eunuchs who guarded the threshold, and who sought to lay hands on King Ahasuerus. Well, the king realizes Mordecai has gone unrewarded, and it just so happens that Haman is standing there, ready to ask the king to hang Mordecai. Verse 6, so Haman came in, and the king said to him, 'What should be done to the man whom the king delights to honor?' and Haman said to himself, 'Whom would the king delight to honor more than me?' and Haman said to the king, 'For the man whom the king delights to honor, let royal robes be brought which the king has worn, and the horse that the king has ridden, and on whose head a royal crown is set. And let the robes and the horse be handed over to one of the king's most noble officials. Let them dress the man whom the king delights to honor, and let them lead him on the horse through the square of the city, proclaiming before him, 'Thus shall it be done to the man whom the king delights to honor.' Then the king said to Haman, 'Hurry, take the robes and the horse, as you have said, and do so to Mordecai the Jew, who sits at the king's gate, leave out nothing that you have mentioned.

Well, Haman does as he's told and then hurries home mortified. His wife predicts that since Mordecai is a Jew, Haman's done for. Haman is taken to Esther's second banquet where she finally tells the king what Haman's decree really means. The king is enraged, and one of his servants points out that the gallows Haman had built for Mordecai is standing at his house. So, chapter 7:10, They hanged Haman on the gallows that he had prepared for Mordecai.

Then the wrath of the king abated. End of Haman. Haman was blessed with much, which he was keenly aware of. But he credited none of that to anything more than his own greatness, as his hastily called boasting party of chapter 5:11 makes clear.

In our first reversal, we saw that trusting God's providence is no reason for our passivity. Well, Haman is a warning not to mistake the blessings of God's providence for our property. Don't mistake the blessings of God's providence for your property.

Because that's something we do all the time as a very quick review of the blessed on your social media feed of choice will quickly demonstrate.

So often we hoard our providential blessings, don't we? Treating them as our property. And the more we're blinded by pride as Haman was, the easier it is to mistake what God has entrusted to us as our own. My friends, providence has a purpose. There is nothing God has entrusted to you without purpose.

I wonder which of your blessings you are most likely to hoard?

I so appreciated the comments Elizabeth gave us last Sunday night. She observed and has experienced what is hard about being spent for others as a church and she encouraged us to be good stewards of the blessings we've received because providential blessing always has a purpose. Part of learning to trust God's providence is to let him decide by virtue of your circumstances what's best with the things he entrusts to you.

Like my friend Ray Clark, who's been a good friend to this church and who turns 44 years old today, Ray had a successful career pitching for the New York Yankees, but just a few years into that career, he was injured and forced into retirement, and just four years later, they developed a surgery that would have saved Ray's career. But it was too late for Ray. And when I first learned all that, I was struck by how tragic that timing was. What a shame, I told Ray. But he quickly corrected me.

He says, no, it wasn't a shame. What God does is always good. If God thought it best for me to step away from baseball, then it was best.

God has in the years since done wonderful things through Ray's life so much so that I can almost begin to see why he providentially put an end to that baseball career, but Ray did not know any of that at the time. So like him, we also must carry what God has entrusted to us with open hands. Because it is not our property, and we trust what he does with it. So how do we grow those open and humble hands? By getting to know the God of providence.

We know him through his word. We know him by trusting him with our life and seeing what he does with it. If we know him, all pride is banished.

But what does it really mean to trust God's providence with all of what he's entrusted to you? That's a place where we sometimes get tripped up, which takes us to a third reversal of the reversal of the Jewish people in the book of Esther from powerless to powerful, from powerless to powerful. Let's pick up the story again in chapter 8 verse 4.

Then Esther spoke again to the king. She fell at his feet and wept and pleaded with him to avert the evil plan of Haman, the Agagite, and the plot he had devised against the Jews.

Two months have passed since Haman's execution, and the king has done nothing about this murderous decree. So once again Esther has to risk her life to speak to the king. Once again, he shows her favor, and he doesn't evict himself, but he does allow Esther and Mordecai to write a second decree, which counters the first in verses 9 to 14, copied almost word for word from Haman's initial decree, but this one allows the Jews to defend themselves. So chapter 9, verse 1, when the day of Haman's decree arrived, nine months later, on the very day when the enemies of the Jews hoped to gain the mastery over them, the reverse occurred. The Jews gained mastery over those who hated them.

The Jews gathered in their cities throughout all the provinces of King Ahasuerus to lay hands on those who sought their harm, and no one could stand against them, for fear of them had fallen on all peoples.

The Jews defend themselves, killing 75,000 of those who hated them across the empire. And they celebrate with a feast which Mordecai then turns, verses 20 to 22 of chapter 9, into an annual commemoration of these events, named ironically, Purim, after the Pur, the lots Haman cast to determine the day of destruction. This is the Feast of Chance, an ironically suitable name for a feast celebrating the providence of a hidden God.

Now, because of this great reversal of God's people's fortunes in this book, Some have misunderstood Esther as a promise that for God's people, everything will always work out fine. But when we do that, we confuse the promise of God's providence with a promise of prosperity, which is the third lesson about trusting providence. In reversal number one, we saw that we should not confuse trust in God's providence with our passivity. Reversal number two, don't confuse the blessings of God's providence as our property. And here, Don't confuse the promises of God's providence with promises of prosperity, with an optimistic, don't you worry, it'll all turn out.

Wouldn't it all turn out be a lot easier to say if God had never let his people get into the scrape in the first place? Why all the suspense? Why all the drama? Yes, the roller coaster ride in Exodus 8 through 10 was exhilarating, but it was equally terrifying in Esther's 1 through 7. What good does that do?

Trusting God's promise of providence is not the same as an optimistic, it'll all turn out. At least not on our timetable, not according to our agendas, not from our vantage point. Trusting God's providence is trusting his deeper purposes behind what he does, purposes that we may never see.

A word that unites most of the book of Esther and exemplifies this amazing reversal for God's people is the word fall. When Haman casts the pur in chapter three, verse seven, he literally let the lot fall. When the king tells Haman to order Mordecai, he literally tells him to let none of his proposal fall. Chapter 6. Zeresh observes that Haman has begun to fall before Mordecai.

And her prediction proves to be truer than she realized because it is when Haman is falling on Esther's couch that the king sees a pretext for his execution. Fear of the Jews falls on the Persians. Chapter 8 verse 17 as this fear of Mordecai three verses later. Just that one word fall shows how everything in this book is a part of God's agenda. Both the terrifying ride down and the exhilarating ride back up, God's providence is not limited to just the upswing.

And trusting God's providence for us also means trusting all that he does, not just the upswing. Sometimes we think of providence as some kind of heavenly force for good that we can somehow tap into to do the things that we want to do. But God's agenda is not our agenda. He has a higher agenda, higher purposes. He has a better agenda, better purposes.

So when you are in a hard place in life, and you are struggling to trust God's promises. I would discourage you from trying to squint into the future to figure out the good that God is up to. Scripture never promises we will understand what God is doing, at least not in this life. Instead, it promises His presence.

So look for reminders of God's presence. The coincidences that are hard to believe are just coincidences. The times when God comforts you in prayer. The Bible verse that speaks directly to your heart. Look for God's fingerprints.

Look for His presence. It's the difference between following a recipe I just grabbed randomly off the internet and one my wife told me will be delicious. Why does it call for so much baking powder? Is it really going to work? The faithfulness of the One I trust is what makes all the difference.

In the same way, trusting God's providence is not seeing the good and then declaring God is present. It is about not seeing the good yet knowing He is present and by faith declaring He is good.

And trusting that all that God does is good is a corporate project. The Christian life, I think, can sometimes feel like one of those old magic eye drawings.

Where if you squint just the right way, things pop into three dimensions, but with normal eyes, it's just squiggly lines. And sometimes, no matter how you contort your vision or hold the thing, you just can't see anything but the squiggly lines. So with the Christian life. Which is why we need the faith of each other to know his presence and to believe that all he does is good. 1 Corinthians 10:13 promises that even we were in a stomach churning descent, God will provide a way out of every temptation that fear and uncertainty might bring along.

But have you ever considered that that way out might be through someone else? Maybe that way out is the prayer of another, or the admonishment of another, or the faith of another. Let us never assume that 1 Corinthians 10:13 is an individual promise.

Which leads us to the good God really was up to in the book of Esther. We've seen these three stories of reversal and a lesson from each about trusting God's providence. Now it's time to consider the deeper purposes, three purposes, underneath it all. You see, we read the book of Esther from a very privileged position. Haman didn't know that the king's new queen is Jewish.

But we do. The king doesn't know the significance of Mordecai of all people saving his life, but we do. Esther didn't know what had happened between her first and second banquets, but we do. That's part of what makes the book of Esther such a delectable read. Perhaps God is hidden in the book of Esther in part because we're seeing everything through his eyes.

So let's take advantage of that divine perspective to consider God's purposes underneath these great reversals. The book of Esther is a bit like those Russian nesting dolls where you take one apart and there's another one inside. There's one purpose on the surface of Esther, yet there's another inside, fainter but grander, and still a third inside of that. And in these three purposes, we see marvelous plans unfold for what God was doing in Esther. Now, knowing what God was doing in Esther won't tell you what he's doing in your life, but as you see the intricacy, the beauty, the magnificence of what he was doing here, it can help you believe that he is doing something with all those mismatched Ikea pieces that make up your life.

So having looked at three reversals, let's consider three purposes underneath it all. First, God was protecting his people from annihilation. Protecting his people from annihilation. That's, I think, the most obvious of these purposes. Though once again, we have to read between the lines and see that God is the one doing this work.

We see God working to protect his people in the favor that Esther mysteriously receives at court and from the king and from the fear that mysteriously falls on the Jews would be enemies. We see God at work in the really impossible coincidences that fill this book. That woman installed as queen, that man overhearing the plot, that night for the king to not sleep, that man to be standing in the court and on and on with divine fingerprints all over the book of Esther.

This is a God who's hidden but who is working to protect his people from annihilation. But there's another way we see God at work in the book of Esther, and that's in the structure of the book. If you look at page 18 of your bulletin, you'll see how symmetric Esther is with so many events in the first half of the book pairing with events in the second half. Esther is a chiasm. The symmetry is not perfect, but it is remarkable.

And when we see symmetry like this in ancient literature, the focal point is what's at the center. And what's at the center of Esther is fascinating. It is not what you would think. The great moment of chapter seven when Haman's plot is finally exposing God's people are saved, which would make Esther the hero and savior of God's people.

That may be the climax of the plot line, but that is not the climax of the book. Now, if you look at your bulletin, you'll see at the very center of the book is Esther chapter 6, when Esther and Mordecai were presumably asleep when the king could not sleep, when the king discovers Mordecai as his savior just as Haman comes to ask that Mordecai be executed, all of which was entirely unknown to Esther when she chose not to show her hand at that first banquet.

But waited until a second, all of which was crucial for the great reversal of fortune for God's people. My friend, I don't know God's purposes for the blessings you enjoy any more than for the burdens you carry, but his fingerprints are everywhere. And even when you are asleep, that God is at work.

Many have loved the book of Esther because there's a woman in power, which is Esther in many ways, but true power in the book of Esther is found in a hidden God who acts even while Esther is asleep. God is the one who protects his people from annihilation. That's his first purpose, but there's more. Remember who the book of Esther was written to. Jews who were comfortable enough to stay in Persia, yet not motivated enough to return to Jerusalem, Jews in danger of disappearing into the world.

So this is second purpose here as well. God is preserving his people from assimilation, preserving his people from assimilation. Take a look again at that central chapter, chapter 6. It's interesting that most of this core chapter is actually entirely unnecessary if God's only goal were to save his people from annihilation. The king did have to discover that his savior was Mordecai, but the complete and utter humiliation of Haman, that's not necessary to move the plot forward.

So why is that at the very center of the book of Esther. Because God's not merely working to protect his people from annihilation, but to preserve them from assimilation. To whatever extent his people were tempted to throw their lot in with Persian power, the humiliation of its greatest prince in chapter six is a huge boost in the right direction. Put your trust in Haman? Why would you ever do that?

Trust what Haman trusted? Why would you ever do that? Do you see how gloriously Haman's plot has backfired? He wanted to get rid of the Jews forever. But by the end of chapter 8, the Jews are feared and honored.

Even Persians are calling themselves Jews, chapter 8 verse 17. And the whole point of the Feast of Purim, chapter 9 verse 28, is that these days will be, quote, kept and remembered throughout every generation. In every clan, province, and city into these days of Purim should never fall into disuse among the Jews, nor should commemoration of these days cease among their descendants.

The events of Esther take place in roughly the 470s BC. The very last Old Testament prophet, Malachi, wrote about that time or maybe a decade later. And after that, there would be no word from the Lord for 400 years. Until the time of Jesus. So just as God is about to fall silent, just when the danger of his people assimilating seems to wax to its fullest, God locks in their Jewish identity and teaches them what it looks like to trust the providence of a hidden God.

But there's more. God was not merely protecting from annihilation. He was not merely preserving from assimilation. He was also preparing for salvation, preparing for salvation. We see that, I think, most clearly in how Esther and Mordecai established patterns that would get us ready for Jesus, Esther who was willing to give her life for her people, who is the king's beloved, stands as mediator for her people, Mordecai who uses his position of power not for his own sake, but for the welfare of God's people, speaking peace to God's people.

The very last words of this book. Do you see the shadows of Jesus here? God's beloved Son who gave his life for us and stands as our mediator, speaking the peace of God to us? In fact, Mordecai is a particularly interesting shadow of Jesus because of how he fits into a larger biblical pattern. In the Old Testament, God's people live in a foreign empire three different times: under Egypt, Genesis and Exodus; under Babylon and Ezekiel, Daniel and elsewhere; under Persia, as in Esther and Esther; and each time God raised up one of his own exiles in a foreign land to protect his people in exile.

Joseph in Egypt, Daniel in Babylon, Mordecai in Persia. Each, the Bible tells us, was made next only to the king in authority.

So what happens when God's people fall under the dominion of Rome 400 years later? Does it make a bit more sense why the people of that day were looking for a political protector? And so we have Jesus, the true and better Mordecai, not mere protector but savior, not saving from Caesar but from Satan, not in service to a king but as the King of Kings.

We also see God preparing his people for salvation, all those stories of reversal that we looked at earlier showing how illusory the power structures of this world really are. Showing us how weakness can be strength and strength turn out to be weakness. If the Pharisees of Jesus' day had paid closer attention to the book of Esther, perhaps they would not have so quickly dismissed a Messiah who was God incarnate hanging on a Roman cross.

And beyond that, Esther is really the only book in the Old Testament aimed at the Jewish diaspora who had chosen not to return to Jerusalem where people like Haggai that guy in Ezra had rebuilt God's temple, they may have wondered if they were still God's people or had that decision to opt out of the return to Jerusalem, in fact, opted them out of God.

Well, isn't it interesting that in Esther, God has now used those people, the ones who remained in Persia, to save his people, including the ones in Jerusalem. Isn't it interesting how God has now installed one of those people to seek the welfare of his people as second in rank to the king? Isn't it interesting that God's given those people rest? Chapter 9, the very word he used to describe the promised land, even though they're not in the promised land. Isn't it interesting how the protector he has installed, Mordecai, is described in such glowing, exalted benevolent terms, it seems that God's blessing remains on those who chose not to return to Jerusalem.

But why? If you know your Old Testament, that blessing is confusing. You see, Old Testament Judaism was a geographic religion centered on a particular land with particular promises about that land and a particular place of worship, the temple in Jerusalem.

So why would God bless those Jews who didn't come back?

I can only speculate, but it seems God was doing something. He was lifting up the model of worship. His people had developed an exile, shifting the locus of their faith from temple to synagogue, from sacrifices to Torah, from festivals to Sabbath day. Synagogue that would later become the model for church, Torah that would become the first installment of the Bible, Sabbath day that would shape what we know as Lord's Day. Things were not going to go back to the way they were before exile, and Mordecai and his like were evidence of that.

God was preparing his people for something new, for Jesus and the church, protecting from annihilation, preserving from assimilation, preparing for salvation. That is what God in his providence was up to in the book of Esther. And Jesus perfectly fulfills what Esther points to. Jesus was the true and better Esther, the true and better Mordecai who saved his people from their sins. His name literally means the Lord saves.

And in saving us from our sins, he saved us to be the new people of God. So that we might be in the world but not of the world. And though we live in a world condemned to death, to annihilation, Jesus has given us eternal life.

So how much of all of those grand purposes could Esther see as she so resolutely said those words, if I perish, I perish? I assume almost none of it. But God in his providential care was doing amazing things. Perhaps one of John Piper's most quoted tweets is this one: God is always doing 10,000 things in your life and you may be aware of three of them. What a wonderful way to sum up the book of Esther.

In the deserts of Peru are the Nazca lines, massive pictures of animals and various designs drawn in the sand not long after the time of Esther. But not discovered until the 1940s because you can't see what they are unless you're in an airplane. What a wonderful image to sum up the book of Esther. So what do we do with all these purposes? Well, you can't know what God is doing with your life any more than Esther did.

But where in Scripture does God do anything that does not in the end prove itself to be marvelous?

God's hand may be hidden in your life, but God's promise is that he is working what is marvelous.

Though consider that all of this, all of his providence, is good for us only because Jesus died for us. God is in control of all things. God is perfectly good. God in Christ is with us. Those truths form the doctrine of providence.

But as rebels against our good and holy God, we do not deserve good. We deserve judgment. Because we've sinned against Him, we deserve for providence to send us to hell.

But, God, being rich in mercy, because of the great love with which he loved us, even when we were dead in our trespasses, made us alive together with Christ, by grace you have been saved, Ephesians 2:4. So my friends, put your trust in Jesus Christ. Repent of your sins. Bank everything on his promise that for those who trust him there is forgiveness, my friend, do not leave this building today until you have reason to believe that God's providence is for you.

So in these stories of reversal, in the purposes behind these stories, we understand throughout Esther, though God is hidden, He is active and he is active for our good. He is active for our good in ways that are far grander than anything that people at the time could have seen. So I wonder if you are in Christ, what your life will look like from that great view from heaven. How many times will we hear, oh, oh, that's what God was doing as we see his perfect wisdom laid out for all that he's done in our lives. I wonder what this church's life will look like from the perspective of heaven as we finally get to see all that God has done.

All the world's a stage, Shakespeare wrote, and we put players on it. So true. God's been directing the play. The play is about him, and one day we will see it for all of its glorious wonder. Tomorrow we see, today we trust, we trust in the providence of God.

Let's pray.

O our great God and Father, we do praise you as the God of divine providence, the God who works every detail of the universe's existence to one grand aim, the good to show off his glory. We praise you as that God, and we pray that you would help us to trust that we would trust you are at work, that your works are good, and that we would in happiness and contentment give ourselves to you. We pray this in Jesus' name, Amen.