to gather together to hear the word of God being preached and to sing praises unto your name.
I pray that you would just bless our church family that is struggling with health concerns,
that you would please be with them, strengthen them. Please help those that are not able to
come this evening to search service. I pray that they'd have us do recovery and they could return
back to services quickly. Please just help our extended family and friends that we know have
other health concerns or are praying for their salvation. And I pray that you just help use our
church to be a bright and shining light into the dark world and to help us to reach this Houston
area. In Jesus' name we pray. Amen. That's pretty much all I have as far as announcements
are concerned. So we can go ahead and go to our third song for the evening, 441,
great is thy faithfulness.
Again, that's 441, great is thy faithfulness.
All together. Great is thy faithfulness,
O God, my father, there is no shadow of turning with thee.
Thou changest not thy compassions, they fail not, as thou has been, thou forever will be.
Great is thy faithfulness, great is thy faithfulness, morning by morning, new mercies I see.
All I have needed thy hand hath provided, great is thy faithfulness, Lord, unto me.
Summer and winter and springtime and harvest, sun, moon and stars and their forces above,
join with all nature and manifold witness to thy great faithfulness, mercy and love.
Great is thy faithfulness, great is thy faithfulness, morning by morning,
new mercies I see. All I have needed thy hand hath provided, great is thy faithfulness,
Lord, unto me, pardon for sin and a peace that endure in thy own dear presence to cheer and to
guide, strength for today and bright hope for tomorrow, blessings all mine with 10,000 beside.
Great is thy faithfulness, great is thy faithfulness, morning by morning, new mercies I see.
All I have needed thy hand hath provided, great is thy faithfulness, Lord, unto me.
Amen. While the offering plate's being passed around, if you'll take out your Bibles
to Esther chapter number nine. As we always do, we'll read the entire chapter
before we get to the message. Esther chapter number nine.
If you open your Bible right in the middle, you'll find the book of Psalms. Go before Psalms,
you'll find Job, then you have the book of Esther. Esther chapter nine, the Bible reads,
now in the 12th month, that is the month Adar, on the 13th day of the same,
when the king's commandment and his decree drew near to be put in execution in the day
that the enemies of the Jews hoped to have power over them, though it was turned to the contrary
that the Jews had rule over them that hated them. The Jews gathered themselves together
in their cities throughout all the provinces of the king Ahasuerus to lay hand on such as sought
their hurt and no man could withstand them for the fear of them fell upon all people and all
the rulers of the provinces and the lieutenants and the deputies and officers of the king
helped the Jews because the fear of Mordecai fell upon them for Mordecai was great in the
king's house and his fame went out throughout all the provinces for this man Mordecai waxed
greater and greater thus the Jews smote all their enemies with the stroke of the sword and slaughter
and destruction and did what they would unto those that hated them and in Shushan the palace
the Jews slew and destroyed 500 men and parshandatha and dauphon and asbatha and
poratha and adaliah and eridatha and parmeshta and erisai and eridi and vejazatha the ten sons
of Haman the son of Hamadatha the enemy of the Jews slew they but on the spoil they laid not
their hand on that day the number of those that were slain in Shushan the palace was brought
before the king and the king said unto Esther the queen the Jews have slain and destroyed 500 men in
Shushan the palace and the 10 sons of Haman what have they done in the rest of the king's provinces
now what is thy petition and it shall be granted thee or what is thy request further and it shall
be done then said Esther if it pleased the king let it be granted to the Jews which are in Shushan
to do tomorrow also according unto this day's decree and let Haman's 10 sons be hanged upon
the gallows and the king commanded it so to be done and the decree was given at Shushan and they
hanged Haman's 10 sons but the Jews that were in Shushan gathered themselves together on the 14th
day also of the month Adar and slew 300 men at Shushan but on the prey they laid not their hand
but the other Jews that were in the king's provinces gathered themselves together
and stood for their lives and had rest from their enemies and slew of their foes seventy and five
thousand but they laid not their hands on the prey on the 13th day of the month Adar and on
the 14th day of the same rested day and made it a day of feasting and gladness but the Jews that
were at Shushan assembled on the 13th day thereof and on the 14th day thereof and on the 15th day
of the same they rested and made it a day of feasting and gladness therefore the Jews of the
villages that dwelt in the unwalled towns made the 14th day of the month Adar a day of gladness
and feasting and a good day and of sending portions one to another and Mordecai wrote
these things and sent letters unto all the Jews that were in all the provinces of the king Ahasuerus
both nigh and far to establish this among them that they should keep the 14th day of the month
Adar and the 15th day of the same yearly as the days wherein the Jews rested from their enemies
and the month which was turned unto them from sorrow to joy and from mourning into a good day
that they should make them days of feasting and joy and of sending portions one to another
and gifts to the poor and the Jews undertook to do as they had begun and as Mordecai had written
unto them because Haman the son of Hamadatha the Agagite the enemy of all the Jews had devised
against the Jews to destroy them and had cast per that is the lot to consume them and to destroy
them but when Esther came before the king he commanded by letters that his wicked device
which he devised against the Jews should return upon his own head and that he and his sons should
be hanged on the gallows wherefore they called these days Purim after the name of Pur therefore
for all the words of this letter and of that which they had seen concerning this matter
in which had come unto them the Jews ordained and took upon them and upon their seed and upon
all such as join themselves unto them so as it should not fail that they would keep these two
days according to their writing and according to their appointed time every year and that these
days should be remembered and kept throughout every generation every family every province
and every city and that these days of Purim should not fail from among the Jews nor the memorial of
them perish from their seed then Esther the queen the daughter of Abba Hale and Mordecai the Jew
wrote with all authority to confirm the second letter of Purim and he sent the letters unto all
the Jews to the hundred twenty and seven provinces of the king of Ahasuerus of the kingdom of
Ahasuerus with the words of peace and truth to confirm these days of Purim in their names
appointed according as Mordecai the Jew and Esther the queen had enjoined them and as they
had decreed for themselves and for their seed the matters of the fastings and their cry and the
decree of Esther confirmed these matters of Purim and it was written in the book and the king of
Ahasuerus laid a tribute upon the land and upon the isles of the sea and all the acts of his power
and of his might and the declaration of the greatness of Mordecai wherein to the king advanced
him are they not written in the book of the chronicles of the kings of Medea and Persia
for Mordecai the Jew was next unto the king of Ahasuerus and great among the Jews and accepted
of the multitude of his brethren seeking the wealth of his people and speaking peace to all
his seed bow heads for word of prayer brother Brandon would you pray for us
men we're here in Esther chapter number nine and we're continuing with our story kind of our drama
about the work that Haman had devised against the Jews and essentially how Esther and Mordecai have
devised a counter plan to essentially deal with this particular day of destruction and as chapter
nine is interesting because it brings up a lot of uh war and fighting and you know in the new
testament war and fighting is supposed to be like a spiritual thing in the sense that the bible talks
about how we fight the good fight of faith the bible talks about how we war not against flesh
and blood but against spiritual wickedness and high places and of course there's a lot of warfare
in the bible that's described as being spiritual and and being not a physical fight there's also
talk in the scripture even in the old testament you have angels fighting one another the bible
talks about in the book of Daniel Michael and and other angels contending with the devil or
we see in the book of revelation too in the future that the devil is passed out and so there's kind
of this conflict there's this fighting there's this war that's raging and even though we don't
wage a physical battle there are some upcoming physical battles that are similar to the book of
Esther and so it's kind of interesting when we we look at the book of Esther and we kind of see
the end times and the the apocalyptic type events that are going to follow in the future when we get
to the coming of the lord Jesus Christ but the book of Esther has been a consistent theme of
not only taking us from the current timeline of events to the gospel into the future I believe
that Esther is kind of like a complete book when it comes from its starting point to the end
we we talked about vastly being replaced vastly is Israel being replaced Esther is the picture
of Christians and how we've taken her spot as queen and in essence and Mordecai is is a
picture of the lord Jesus Christ and how he is leading Esther and guiding Esther and is there
is kind of like her rock yet we still have king Ahasuerus which is also there to symbolize God
the father and his role and how both these men are both leaders and they're kind of both influential
and as we've kind of gone through this series we've seen that Haman signifies a lot of evil
and wicked people but specifically the antichrist and and we had a section where Haman was destroyed
hung on his own gallows and upon which he had made and we even had the destruction of
well essentially him we're going to get here in this chapter the destruction of his entire family
but he devised the gallows against the Jews and Mordecai specifically and yet he received his
own punishment and was destroyed the house was given unto Esther and was given unto Mordecai
and because they didn't want their people to be destroyed they had come up with an ulterior plan
of well instead of this writing being reversed which is impossible why don't we just fight why
don't we just show up on the day that we're supposed to be killed and we will fight ourselves
now again from a from kind of a picture of the end times we kind of have Haman as this symbol
of the antichrist type figure and then Mordecai coming into power is kind of a picture of the
Lord Jesus Christ coming into power but I believe that Esther chapter number nine is kind of also
following along with our chronology and kind of our end times picture and so I just wanted to kind
of set up that foundation and then we'll kind of explore that again later but look at verse one now
it says now in the 12th month that is the month Adar on the 13th day of the same when the king's
commandment and his decree drew near to be put in execution in the day that the enemies of the Jews
hoped to have power over them though it was turned to the contrary that the Jews had rule
over them that hated them now you know it's kind of interesting some of the symbolism here and even
just the numbers isn't it is it any coincidence that Haman wanted to destroy the Jews on the
13th day of the last month you know probably symbolic of something satanic for him or
something evil 13 is often a number that's kind of associated with something that's evil or wicked
but notice that the Bible says the day that they had devised against the Jews ends up being turned
contrary and turned upside down and flipped on his head to where the Jews are going to end up
ruling over them and destroying those that hated them and I just thought about this verse and I
just thought about how dramatic the Bible is you know it's like the it's like God could do whatever
he wants and you know the scripture is his for the telling and the the events of the world are
for at his disposal but isn't it interesting that God in the Bible always seems to build up
the most dramatic scenes imaginable where there's a day and there's two armies coming the Jews and
those that the enemies of the Jews and they're coming to a battle royale on a day and winner
takes all basically I mean this is this is kind of the build up this is the anticipation to
you know a really epic scene in a movie if you know you've ever felt like you've seen a movie
where there's this two sides and we're finally getting the battle scene this is kind of what we
have here in the book of Esther chapter number nine where we have the the ultimate climax of the
story where now it's not just Esther fighting for herself this is every single Jew on the face of
the earth fighting against every enemy of the Jews on the face of the earth and and truly according
to the scripture thousands and thousands of people are going to be massacred and destroyed
on this particular day I mean this is not a small event this is a giant event across the entire
globe where many thousands of people are going to be killed verse two it says this the Jews gather
themselves together in their cities throughout all the provinces of the king of hasris to lay
hand on such as sought their hurt and no man could withstand them for the fear of them fell upon
all people and all the rulers of the provinces and the lieutenants and deputies and the officers
of the king helped the Jews because the fear of Mordecai fell upon them for Mordecai was great in
the king's house and his fame went out throughout all the provinces for this man Mordecai waxed
greater and greater thus the Jews smote all their enemies with the stroke of the sword and slaughter
and destruction and did what they would under those that hated them now that's just a really
interesting phrasing but it's just that they would do whatever they want it was just basically like
the the battle was just theirs for the taking I mean essentially this they were so much more
skilled or overpowering of the enemy God gave them the strength whatever way you want to articulate
this but essentially what the bible is saying that when the battle came to fruition the Jews just
won just a hundred and nothing you know it was just basically it's the complete slaughter the
other side had no chance just complete and utter destruction now that to me is significant of when
we kind of look at some of these future end times prophecies of what's going to happen as well
but we see that you know when you go against God's people at the end of the day they will win you
know you might have some setbacks you might lose a few battles here and there but you're
going to win the war and when you have God on your side essentially according to the scripture
you're going to do what you want unto those that hate you it's kind of to me it's like got to be
one of the best days ever like I can't even imagine if there was a day like at the end of
December it's like all right we've made a decree all the enemies of Pastor Shelley and then and
you know pure words and steadfast are all going to be gathered together and Pastor Shelley and
we get to fight you know and you just get to have a heyday and just slaughter and just everything
goes your way I mean that would just be epic you know that would be that I would really enjoy that
so I can kind of see you know and really it's kind of one of those things where it's it's really
intense sir I mean can you imagine the intensity of going to a day where you're going on a
battlefield and the only way to walk away from the battlefield is to destroy the enemy I mean
there's not there's not another option here you're either kill or be killed you know I can't imagine
all the emotion all the different anxiety the stress even perhaps the build up the hope the
pressure I mean all the things that are going on and just drama but you know the thing is God is a
God of drama in the sense that really find something in the Bible that's just not full of
drama and I even looked up the definition of drama because the drama can have a lot of different
definitions but one definition of drama is exciting event or a series of events sometimes
you might think of the word drama as being a negative word like we think about a you know
sometimes we'll talk about a lady and like she's full of drama like that's not what we're talking
about okay obviously that's just saying someone that's just got a lot of issues and likes to air
them out but really when it comes to a film or something the the genre of a drama is simply
just saying that it's it's exciting you know if you said oh it's it wasn't very dramatic
what you're kind of thinking was boring it was lame you know it wasn't very exciting whereas it
was like man it was really dramatic what you're saying is that it was it was exciting it was
eventful it was it was unique you know there was something to be said about it it captured your
attention there's anticipation to this and really that is the God of the Bible the God of the Bible
is exciting there's a lot of anticipation there's there's something to be said about it is something
to look forward to and and while you may even be anxious about it at the same time it's something
you want to see something you want to experience some people love to see the drama of everything
you know whether it's sports whether it's fighting whether it's war you know no matter what it is
people love drama what you know whenever there's a there's a lot of speculation that certain
sporting events are rigged and some things like football or basketball or baseball things like
that and the reason why they speculate that it's rigged is because when two teams that nobody
really cares are going to play in the world series or in the super bowl or in some big event
nobody shows up nobody pays attention and they don't make as much money off of it
so what the events that get the most money and the most audience and the most attention is when
you have just two really strong teams or two diametrically opposed teams that you don't really
know who's going to win for sure and that's what usually generates the most money talk excitement
views ads all of the stuff so a lot of times what people will speculate is that the wrasse
and the commissioner and all these different people will try to essentially help certain
teams make it to that particular stage because they want that event to be as dramatic as possible
why because people are interested in the drama if you had the best team playing the worst team for
the super bowl nobody was going to pay attention because it's like oh it's already over and in
fact a lot of games even uh what sporting event type venues if it's a blowout people will leave
at halftime people will leave way before even the end of the game because they're not really
interested in watching a slaughter anymore they they kind of like the fourth quarter drama they
like it to be all the way down to the bitter end they want to see you know the action and see
what's going to happen this happens in fighting people in a fight they want to see all the drama
they don't want to just see someone that's going to destroy another person in fact if you think
about just fighting in general they have so many different weight classes i mean they have just
all these different various weight classes that are so very specific and it's funny because you
look on tv and these guys look big but then you you meet fighters in real life and they're tiny
you know they're like 150 pounds or they're like 160 pounds and you're like really you know it's
but you know they but they have these weight classes because the fighters have to be
very similar in weight class otherwise might give the other person a big advantage and then
people won't really want to watch because it's not as exciting to just see some guy just beat
up on another guy real easy they want it to be really intense they want all that anticipation
and excitement everything like that and so you know it's really not any different with the bible
that god is often setting up events to make them as dramatic as possible i mean what could be more
dramatic than having a singular day set aside where all the enemies are coming together in
an epic battle royale destroy or be destroyed you know or daniel the lions being thrown into
a lion's den full of lions or being thrown in the fiery furnace or the entire world being flooded
with a great flood and those only on the ark will survive i mean david and goliath we have a young
shepherd boy who's killed a blind and a bear not afraid of one of the tallest men to ever live
who's undefeated you know these epic dramatic scenes that are constantly captured in the
scripture you know god likes some drama and what that signifies to me is even though we don't
have scripture being written about our lives right now you know it's not like you know scripture for
the new testament kind of is capped off with the apostles we don't necessarily have scripture
about 300 ad we don't have scripture about 500 ad we don't have scripture about a thousand ad we
don't have scripture about 1500 ad you know we don't have scripture telling us about the king
james bible being translated you know we don't have scripture telling us about america being
formed as a country we don't have scripture about preachers of the past you know we don't
have scripture about j frank norris or jack hyles or curtis hudson and we don't read about
the leaders of the faith from a scriptural perspective but this is what i know is the
same drama that unfolded in the old testament god anticipated happening in the new testament
because that's the whole reason he tells us in the bible that these things are written for our
admonition he said hey the whole testament was written not for us to just glorify the past
but to realize what the future would be like to realize what the new testament would be like full
of what drama and you know if you actually know anything about history christianity is nothing
short than some of the greatest dramas ever told uh you you even look at this book that you hold
in your hand that you take for granted i mean so many men and so many women have been brutally
murdered and killed just so you can have this book in your hands you know you think that our times
are tough but at the time of the 1500s the catholic church was persecuting christians so hard
that a certain group of christians taught their children psalms 23 they just taught them how to
memorize it and the parents were burned at the stake for teaching their children psalm 23
you know it's funny to me i have to reward people with ice cream to teach their children
a bible memory chapter and yet parents of the past were willing to be burned alive
in order to teach their children the scripture to teach them the word of god you know men like
william tindale strangled at the stake and then burned for what wanting the bible to be in english
for you to not have to read latin i mean the whole reason you don't have to read
or go to a church where you don't even speak the language and they just
it's like what is that going to do any good for you you know the fact that we can actually speak
english and read the bible in english is given to you and look the bible is full of drama because
life is full of drama and so if you're going to find christianity in this world today you
know what it's not going to be lame it's not going to be where there's no drama there's going
to be a lot of drama associated with real christianity you know there's going to be
a lot of drama even in your life because jesus christ told us that hey think not that i'm come
to give peace on earth but a sword yea rather he brings division he's not bringing people together
he's dividing people he's dividing families he's dividing all manner of situation sheep from the
goats so you know if i'm going to find real christianity in the new testament in 2022 america
or wherever i find myself on this planet you know i guarantee drama is going to be there
because if this book is there if this birds being preached if people are actually living a christian
life drama all kinds of drama all kinds of issues enemies you know it would be weird to read this
book and have zero enemies it wouldn't even make sense you'd be thinking like think about how many
psalms that you read of david and it's just talking about how many enemies he has he has
more enemies than hairs on his head you know and he's talking about the destruction of his enemies
and we're reading about the destruction of enemies and then it's like just think if you live in this
world you have no enemies no one does no one everybody loves your church it's joel osteen you
know i'm for everybody i don't have any enemies you know we're just so blessed and so prosperous
i'm telling you what it's like that's fake that's not real and that's not even exciting anyways
everyone loves you that's not even true but generally speaking pretty much nobody cares
about joel osteen because anybody that's serious about christianity realizes fake
and all the people that are actually against christianity also know these fakes so they don't
really care they're like let him just do whatever he wants you know go do his own thing i mean if
you're going to find real christianity you better find some drama also here's the thing when drama
comes to our church don't let that just discourage you from wanting to go to church don't think like
oh well i don't want to go to church with all this drama you know think about this i don't
want to go to the church where on some someday i have to bring my sword and literally fight for my
life well you could just not be a jew then right i mean you could just not be a christian that's
kind of that's an option but you know what i'd rather just go ahead and get a sword and have to
fight to the death and be a christian than to do nothing to be i mean nobody all the people that
did nothing aren't even mentioned this chapter right it's the jews and their enemies all the 99
or all the 90 some percent of people that are not jews are enemies nobody cares about them
nobody remembers their name it doesn't even matter that they existed now of course the only people
that truly matter that existed were the jews because those that were not jews the enemies
they don't matter either look at verse number six and in shushan the palace the jews slew and
destroyed 500 men who are they no one cares and perjoditha and dauphin and aspattha and
poretha and adelia and eridatha and parmestha and erisa and erida and vajisatha now who's named any
of those names who knows people with those names i've never even heard these people you know it
says the 10 sons of hayman the son of hamadatha the enemy of the jews slew they but on the spoil
lately not their hand now this is what i thought about and this is why i believe this is in
you know you read these passages and have you ever have you ever thought this why are these
names mentioned in the bible who's thought that okay just me all right no i'm just kidding
who's thinking at all no i'm just kidding i i've thought about this a lot because it's weird how
many names are just in the bible but go if you went to proverbs chapter number 10 for a moment
go to proverbs chapter number 10 i'm gonna explain to you why this these names are mentioned in the
scripture you know why these names are mentioned in the scripture and you've never heard them
because god wanted to put names in the scripture that you've never heard of
you say well why would why would god give me a whole bunch of names that i've never heard of
i've never i don't even know how to pronounce them those are so weird
and and nobody's named after them and anything like that it's it's it's to show the example of
those that are wicked those that are evil everything about them will fade and rot
into existence and it's meaningless notice oh man i was this great person but it ends up
nobody likes you and nobody even likes your name everything about you is just turned to trash
and look what it says in proverbs chapter 10 verse 7 the memory of the just is blessed
but the name of the wicked shall rot think about that how many people are named isaac abraham
john andrew peter i mean how many people have names like that you know just go down the list
of the bible i mean you just you started with joshua samuel daniel ezekiel i mean james you
just gotta just name at the name at the name and look the name of what these people is blessed in
fact people that aren't even christian like these names i mean muslims look at these people with awe
and reverence i mean how many muslims have you met named moses or named abraham or named and again
they're not they don't even believe in abraham they don't believe in moses okay they don't believe
the prophets really but they still give them respect it kind of makes me think of the catholic
church the catholic church has all these saints yet they wouldn't even want one of those saints
to preach for five seconds in their church because if those saints got up and started preaching what
they used to preach the catholic church would run away screaming it's funny like john chris's stone
you know if you ever read any of this guy's preaching which is crazy how much we have
recorded of what this guy actually preached but it's like this guy sounds more hardcore than a new
iv preacher and it's like this is where the catholic church venerates you know you you look
at some of these guys of antiquity and it's like they were preaching so hardcore about jews about
tomos about all these type of topics that are so controversial nowadays and it's funny but they
love john i mean they love john chris's dome they love the saints they love thomas they love i mean
think about other churches their churches are named after saints saint thomas and saint peter
and mary and all these different things how many people are named mary i mean i know john's a common
name and i mean my name is jonathan's is kind of a form of that but like if you go to mexico
it is like 50 of the women named mary i mean obviously maria but i'm just saying it is it is
crazy i mean you you won't even believe it you go and then you'd be like if you're kind of like
thinking like it's a joke it's like what's your name is maria and she's like maria i'm like what
but you know how many people i've met named parmesan i don't even know how you say it because
it doesn't even matter because nobody cares you know what nobody cares about the wicked
and eventually their name will just rot to a point where no one knows who they are i mean right now
there's some wicked people that we can all think of we could we could remember their names
joe biden george soros all these type of people but you know what in a hundred years
200 years biden will be like i don't know what you're talking about and nobody will be named
biden you know nobody will be named these weird names and these these silly names because why the
memory of these people the name of these people just rot and they'll get to a point where you
can't even remember who they are because no one cares about them this is why it's important to
serve god and to fall after god because those who follow after god are going to not only have
eternal life physically but they're just even the memory of the person will permeate all of eternity
whereas those who are unsaved are going to rot and just be worthless and no one's going to remember
or care ever again it's just gone their life was just a vapor and of course it also goes to show
you you show me the bible the bible names of wicked people that are celebrated even in the
world today you know you have you have certain like musicians that are just full of satan that
will sometimes take some of these satanic names upon themselves but just generally speaking you
know you don't run into just lots of judices you don't run into lots of you know these guys names
you know i've never met a hayman you know i i actually have met people named cane this is weird
but you know typically you're not even running into a lot of canes you're not running into a lot
of these wicked people's names because even just the whole society even just our whole world
just realizes that's a bad that's a bad omen you know people are probably going to name their kids
anytime soon why because the name of the wicked is going to rot you know and whenever someone
really wicked you know people are probably going to name their kids jeffrey dahmer
they're probably you know there's certain names that have just got such a bad stigma with them now
that people just don't want to even name their child you know who's going to name their child
ikabod you know you're not going to name your child these things so we see even if it's like oh
the bible is just written by man well then why does everybody just go by what the bible says
on everything why is it that everybody names their kids after all the positive people in the
bible and doesn't name their kids after all the wicked evil people in the bible i mean if it's
just a bunch of fairy tales then why why do you do exactly what it says then why do you follow all
the models and the principles and all the behavior of it then why isn't the book of proverbs it
describing all the best qualities of people and even all of society agrees with all those
principles why because the bible is truth and you can't escape the reality that when you spit
in the face of god when you mock god when you go against god you're the one that's going to be
destroyed at the end of the day you're the one that's going to be mocked and ridiculed and nobody
will care and throughout history we don't really honor and memor you know put in memory wicked
people by and large there's some exceptions but i believe that those exceptions are going to have
their day and you have things like martin luther king who is still venerated in our society but you
know we haven't really come full circle on that one just quite yet but there we come you know if
history goes out far enough that memory will rot and martin luther king will not be remembered as
this great you know wonderful civil rights leader but ravel you know the truth about that guy will
probably be uncovered and people realize what kind of a wicked hypocrite he was and what a what a
giant phony that guy was and once he's burning in hell and standing in the judgment seat of christ
for sure we're going to realize what kind of a wicked phony that guy was okay go if you would to
or back to esther nine if you're not there and let's keep reading it says in verse number 11
on that day the number of those that were slain in shushia in the palace was brought before the king
and the king said in esther the queen the jews is slain destroyed 500 men in shushia in the palace
and the ten sons of hayman what have they done in the rest of the king's provinces now what is
thy petition and it shall be granted thee or what does thy request further and it shall be done then
said esther if it please the king let it be granted to the jews which are in shushan to do tomorrow
also according unto this day's decree and let hayman's ten sons be hanged upon the gallows
so she wants the ten sons to be hung up which is kind of a symbol of a curse because the bible
talks about being hung up is you know as cursed as he is put on tree and so you kind of show that
the curse that comes on those that are of the devil and and of the sons of the devil and she
also though once gets an opportunity for another petition she says in verse 14 or it says in verse
14 the king commanded it to be so to be done and the decree was given at shushan and they hanged
hayman's ten sons so she wanted uh for there to be an extra day of slaughter and that's kind of
interesting because you know there's a lot of places in the bible that talk about the destruction
of enemies and recent last night i was preaching on second samuel 22 and it talked about how they
destroyed but then he says it doesn't stop until they were consumed so it's like they got started
destroying their enemies but they didn't quite get the job done and instead of just quitting and
doing kind of half days work they're like no we need one more day to finish this job and you know
what i appreciate that you know it's an ugly job but you know nobody wants half of the trash taken
out of the house nobody wants you to clean half of the house nobody wants a half paycheck you know
everybody wants that full job to be done nobody wants half the car to be cleaned you want to get
everything done and what i appreciate is even though it's an ugly job even though it might even
be scary it's pretty risky she's like you know what we need to do this until we've consumed them
we've got it all you know what if the doctor said hey i was i did surgery on you today
and i was in there getting the cancer i got about half out and then i just quit you'd be like
why didn't you just finish you know you don't want someone to get all the way in there
and have that opportunity to get all the cancer out or whatever it is and then just not finish
the job you'd want them to say like i got a hundred percent we got it all we finish it all
just like in america if we said hey we put half of the rapist to death it's like why did we stop
you know like let's let's go ahead and get all 100 of them you know in america it's like we got
a lot of wicked people in here if we ever got the opportunity to destroy the wicked people in our
society we don't want to get 50 of them or 75 we want to get a hundred percent of them you know asa
had to finish daddy's job and remove the rest of the sodomyces remain in the land it's like hey
good job starting as a kaia well let's go ahead and finish the job right we don't want to just
stop and just get some of these people let's get all of them let's destroy them let's consume them
let's not stop until we're done and it's like hey we gave the gospel to half of houston well let's
get the other half you know it's like hey i got i got the dad saved we'll get the mom saved
why i got the brother saved we'll get the sister saved well we went to this mexico town then go
to the next mexico town you know it's not just we did something it's don't stop until it's done
you know it's a good philosophy and everything is that when you start a project finish it
when you get something going you don't want to just leave it hanging or say well at least i did
something you know you got to finish it i don't want to have the marathon and then quit you got
to finish the rest of the marathon for it to even really count and if you're going to destroy the
enemies you don't want to just let them linger because they might multiply again and grow you
don't want the cockroaches to come back you don't want the hornets to come back you want to get just
all of it out all the cancer all the bugs all the trash all the evil of your society you want
to rid a hundred percent of it you know a little leaven leaven at the whole lump and when you have
an opportunity when the floodgates are open it's like we need another day to finish this
and i like that esther is willing to do this so king said let's do it verse 15 for the jews that
were in shushan gathered themselves together on the 14th they also of the main adar and slew
300 men at shushan but on the prey they laid not on their hand so the first day they got 500 they
got the biggest victory but then there's still like there was still a big number i mean 300
enemies who wants to live around 300 enemies it's like let's get those guys too right so we
got the first 500 now we got the rest of it we got the other 300 in our area we slew them the bible
keeps on saying that they didn't put their their hand on the prey they didn't lay their hands on
the prey kind of evidencing the fact that they're not doing this out of a greedy selfish motive
they simply just want to destroy their enemies so they can have peace now it's not like they're just
looking at the greed aspect of this whereas i believe hayman and these other men the enemies
they're looking for the greed they're like oh i get to kill them to get their money but they
don't you know they're not interested in the money they just simply want to be at peace they want to
be pleasing unto the lord they don't want to be harassed they don't want all this evil to happen
to them anymore so they just want to destroy essentially the wicked against them verse 16
but the other jews that were in the king's provinces gathered themselves together and
stood for their lives and at rest from their enemies and slew of their foes seventy and five
thousand but they laid not their hands on the prey on the 13th day of the month adar and on
the 14th day of the same rested day and made it a day of feasting and gladness so on the 13th and
14th day 75 000 enemies were destroyed that's a lot of wicked people that's a lot of probably
they're probably all reprobates and i mean you have to realize you say like oh there's a lot
of reprobates today that was a lot of people then you know 75 000 people that came to destroy the
jews and that's a lot of hatred but i love this phrase in verse 16 it says and stood for their
lives you know sometimes you have to take a stand for your life otherwise if you just lay down or
sit down and do nothing they will destroy your life you know if we don't fight for church we
won't have a church if we don't fight for men to be men we won't have any men anymore if we don't
fight for women to be women we won't have any women anymore if we don't fight for families
that have children we won't have any children anymore you know if we don't fight for christianity
if we don't fight for the king james bible we won't have a king james bible we won't have
christianity we won't have a church you know if you don't fight for the first amendment you won't
have a First Amendment.
Some people get really mad at us for saying certain things.
But it's like, OK, well, if you don't say anything,
what's the point of even having a First Amendment?
What is the point in you believing
in the First Amendment if no one's
allowed to ever exercise it?
You know, the whole point of the First Amendment
is to be able to say unpopular things.
It wasn't designed to just say, I
agree with the official narrative of the government
on everything.
What would be the point of having the First Amendment
if all you do is just agree with whatever the king decrees
every single time?
The whole point of the First Amendment
is that you can question, you can be skeptical,
you can even speak against anyone and everyone
for any reason.
That was the purpose of the First Amendment.
Why?
Because they knew that what evil, wicked people do
is they try to shut down people telling the truth about them.
And they always label it as misinformation or lies
or slander.
They always project what they do on their enemies.
They say, oh, this guy's a malefactor.
And that's what they said about Jesus.
Everything that Jesus did, I mean, Jesus is healing people
of sickness.
He's taking people that are crippled and making them walk,
and then they're calling Jesus a malefactor.
Why?
Because he got up and said that the Pharisees were hypocrites.
Because he said that they were destroying widow's houses.
He was exposing them.
It was like an exclusive interview.
Jesus is going to tell you everything
that the Pharisees is doing.
This just in, Pharisees are hypocrites.
This just in, Jesus said, hey, the Jews
are controlling everything.
I mean, it sounds like Jesus could just write
all the headlines of today.
I mean, this just in, the religious leaders all fake.
This just in, the Jews aren't God's chosen people.
This just in, the Jews are the synagogue of Satan.
Hey, this just in, not the Jews kill Jesus.
It's not really any shock.
Hey, this just in, the Jews are willing to pay money and bribes
to destroy Christianity.
Oh, man, I wonder if that happens today,
where Jews are willing to shell out money in order
to shut down Christianity, shut down the gospel,
shut down churches, shut down people preaching.
You know, it's no new thing under the sun.
All the same events.
And we have to sometimes stand for our lives.
We have to stand up and fight for our lives,
because if you don't, no one's going to fight for you.
They're all fighting against you.
And this church is not one that's just going to lay down
and just let the whole world go to hell in a handbasket.
We're going to stand for our lives.
We're going to stand for Christianity.
And you know what?
More important than just standing for my life
is standing for my children's life
and standing for my wife's life.
I don't want to just live in a society
and go out of the woods like Lot and for my daughters to say,
who are we going to marry?
Just think about it.
I could go live in the woods by myself,
and I could read the Bible every single day.
I could teach my children the Bible every single day.
And we could just serve God happily ever after out
in the woods by ourselves.
But here's the problem.
Who are my kids going to marry?
Me educating and preaching the gospel
and having other churches also helps my children
to have friends and have someone to potentially marry some day.
Because I look out of the world, and I'm like, no.
And look, there's exceptions.
But generally speaking, I mean, you look out in this world,
and you're just like, it gets worse and worse.
And you're just thinking, I've told
other people like this that don't necessarily
go to our church, but they kind of became a hermit crab,
as I would describe them.
They just kind of hide from the world.
And I say, who are your kids going to marry?
I don't know.
And I'm like, yeah.
That's why God wants us to still be social.
God wants us to have church.
And God wants us to have community
that is the local church.
And God wants us to reach other people
and not even just have that fellowship with other churches.
One of the great benefits of being a New Testament church
is that other like-minded New Testament churches should all
work together and be of one accord and help one another
and have that brotherly love and that spirit.
It's so great that today we have a group of churches that
are willing to fellowship and have conferences and preach
for each other.
And young people can meet one another.
And people are getting married.
And children are being born.
And it's great to me when I look at Pure Words Baptist Church
and I think about people that exist because of this church
existing, it's like there's certain babies that I look at.
And I'm like, you might not have even existed
if our church never happened.
Because your parents probably wouldn't have met.
Or they may not have hooked up.
And then they wouldn't have had you.
And so it's like, you're like looking at literal fruit.
There's couples that go to some of my other churches.
There's one in the Dallas-Ford area.
And they came up to me and they said,
hey, we got pregnant because of your preaching.
And I was just like, that's weird.
And they said, well, we were on birth control.
And then we heard a bunch of preaching about that.
We decided to get off of it.
And now we're pregnant.
And that was a long time ago.
So now they actually have the child.
So I can actually look at a human living, breathing person
that's a result of the King James Bible being preached.
Myself included and other families,
they may have decided to have more children because
of the preaching of God's word than they already had.
And so you have to realize that there's
a huge impact to preaching for the Bible,
preaching the word of God.
And I'm not just standing for my life.
I'm standing for that unborn baby's life.
And by us being so vocal and us being so dogmatic
and us just getting up and thundering forth
and being bombastic about the Bible,
maybe that encourages other Christians to speak up.
And then look, in America, I mean,
Roe v. Wade was literally overturned.
And in the state of Texas and in other states,
you can't even get an abortion like you
could not that long ago.
Someone needed to stand up for those lives.
Someone needed to stand up for those children.
And I've even seen a lot of testimonies.
Some of these pro-lifers, they get up and they say,
you know what, my parents wanted to have an abortion
or whatever, and they got talked out of it.
And I'm a result of not being aborted, and I'm so glad.
Or a failed abortion or all kinds of weird scenarios
where people get up and they say,
I'm so glad that my parents didn't,
they gave me at least an adoption or whatever,
and then I'm alive.
You know, it's funny to me, all these people
that are so pro-abortion,
why don't they start with themselves?
It's because they're a giant hypocrite.
Of course they love their life.
Why don't they love the life of other people?
Oh, but you're ruining mom's lives.
No, she ruined her life by being a whore.
Being a whore is the problem for her life,
not having a child.
The child was the blessing.
You know, people look at children as a curse.
Children are a blessing, okay?
And obviously a bastard child is not ideal.
It's not the best blessing that you could have.
You know what, the child itself is not a curse.
The curse was the STD that you got.
The curse was being with a guy
that didn't really care about you
and left you high and dry
when he found out that you're pregnant.
You know, the curse is the fact
that you got a child out of wedlock.
But the child itself is not the curse.
And people wanna end that child's life thinking,
well, that's gonna stop me from having a job
or having a career or having fun or doing all these things.
But they're not gonna have fun anyways.
You know, all these people committing abortion,
they don't look like they're having fun.
They're always miserable.
It's funny to me that in the 1990s compared to right now,
laws have changed so dramatically
that you would think that the liberals would be so happy
because they've gotten so much of what they wanted, right?
I mean, you have gay marriage,
which it's not really gay marriage.
It's really just disgusting, filthy marriage.
It's not marriage.
It's just really just filth and perversion
called marriage or whatever.
But I mean, to be a sodomite is 100 times easier
than it was in the 90s.
It's so much better.
But they complain and cry as if it was worse
now than it was back then.
Why, because they're not happy people.
You know, all these evil satanic leftists
and all these people that hate the Lord,
they're never gonna be happy, it doesn't matter what.
And in fact, in their mind,
they would only be happy if all Christians died.
But even when we died,
then they'd be sad because they'd miss us.
They would have no purpose in their life
and they'd probably just kill themselves.
You know, there's all these people
that watch my preaching that hate me.
And I think that they personally love
listening to my preaching.
I think it's like the highlight of their day.
Like they probably are just like so excited
to listen to the preaching.
And if they didn't have like us to listen to
or the word of God being preached,
they'd probably be so bored,
they'd probably just kill themselves.
It's like we're literally keeping these atheists
and phagnostics and everything like that alive.
Now they talk about how we're increasing suicide,
but we're probably causing them not to.
Because all these countries, like Scandinavian countries,
where it's totally accepted and there's no preachers like me,
they're killing themselves way more than here.
Because they have something to do,
they actually have a real fight in their mind.
Even though they're gonna lose
and they're just losers in general,
just the fact that they have something to do
keeps them busy and distracted
from just killing themselves
for how much they hate themselves
and how disgusting and filthy they are.
But in these Scandinavian countries
where they have no fight
and they've already won and conquered,
they just are committing mass suicide
because it's like there's nothing to do.
And they just hate everything,
so they just might as well just kill themselves,
abort themselves or whatever they want to do.
And it's a misnomer that people like me
are causing all these sodomites and stuff
to be upset and mad.
I make them happy.
I give them purpose.
I give them community.
They all link up and they're buddies
and they get to chat and they get to share my sermon clips.
And I get to listen to all the best parts of my sermon
that I forgot.
Because they'll share it and I'll go listen
and I'll be like, wow, that was a good point.
I'm surprised I sound so coherent.
You know, it's funny because when they do highlights
of Biden, it's just laughable.
It's like a gaffe and he doesn't even know what he's saying
and he's like, two words, made in America.
Like, what?
You know, then they put a clip of Duncan preaching
and it's just like awesome.
He's like telling women to burn their pants
and how wicked feminism is and I'm just like, preach.
I wish there was a longer clip.
Put up longer clips, you know?
And it's just so funny to me.
It's like we give these people some kind of a purpose,
some kind of a life, but at the end of the day,
you know, we still have to stand for our lives.
We have to stand up and we have to fight
and you know, our fight is gonna eventually come
where all of these people are gonna be destroyed.
Now, go forward to Revelation 19.
I wanna kinda get into a little bit of symbolism
before I kinda just finish this chapter quickly.
It's kind of like this main one theme of fighting
but there is a physical battle that's coming.
Now, we don't have to necessarily,
we won't really be part of it in the sense
that we won't actually have to do the physical battling
but there is gonna be a physical battle
and it's gonna be a slaughter.
Just like this one was a slaughter
where the Jews got to do whatever they want,
this battle's gonna be a slaughter.
It's the Battle of Armageddon.
Now, the Battle of Armageddon is one
in which all of the Antichrists and his frenemies
are essentially gonna go against the Lord.
I don't know how they think they're gonna win this battle
but they're somehow gonna think they're gonna fight
the Lord and the Lord is gonna come out of heaven.
We're gonna be riding with them into this physical battle
and the Lord is gonna destroy them
with a sword that proceeds out of his mouth.
Now, look what it says in Revelation 19, verse number 14.
And the armies which were in heaven followed him
upon white horses clothed in fine linen, white and clean.
That's us.
We're in the battle physically.
You're gonna be a literal soldier in a real battle.
And out of his mouth goeth a sharp sword
that with it he should smite the nations
and he shall rule them with a rod of iron
and he treadeth the winepress of the fierceness
and wrath of a mighty God and he hath on his vesture
and on his thigh a name written,
King of kings and Lord of lords.
And I saw an angel standing in the sun
and he cried with a loud voice saying to all the fowls
that fly in the midst of heaven,
come and gather yourselves together
into the supper of the great God.
They may eat the flesh of kings and the flesh of captains
and the flesh of mighty men and the flesh of horses
and of them that sit on them and the flesh of all men,
both free and bond, both small and great.
And I saw the beasts and the kings of the earth
and their armies gathered together to make war against him
that sat on the horse and against his army.
And the beast was taken and with them the false prophet
that wrought miracles before him
with which he deceived them that had received
the mark of the beast and then that worship his image.
These both were cast alive into a lake of fire
burning with brimstone and the remnant were slain
with the sword of him that sat upon the horse
which sword proceeded out of his mouth
and all the fowls were filled with the flesh.
So kind of at the very end of Daniel's 70th week,
that seven year period of time,
we've gone through all seven seals.
And really if you kind of understand how the seals work,
the first four are kind of like these apocalyptic seals
talking about world war, famine and death.
And then the fifth seal is this great tribulation seal
kind of probably signifying when the Antichrist
declares himself God and you have
that great tribulation period.
Short space when Christians are being massacred
on a wide scale.
But then the sixth seal is Christ coming.
Then there's silence for half an hour
and then we get the seventh seal.
Now the seventh seal is different than all the others
because it's the seven of sevens.
So it's like the seventh seal
and then another seven packed into it.
Seven vile trumpets and seven trumpets
and seven vile judgments that are poured out.
And at the end of the conclusion of this
is essentially Christ coming from heaven
on a white horse with us.
Now some people mistake this as the rapture.
But here's the problem with that theory,
which is real easy,
is we're all with him on horses in heaven.
How did we get there if we're still on earth
and haven't been raptured yet?
So that's not the rapture.
The rapture was seal six.
Seal six is when you have half of
or some portion of Christianity in heaven
coming with Christ
and then you have a large portion from the earth coming
and we're all just meeting together in the air.
And then we're with Christ in heaven
for approximately 42 months,
whatever that, less, however much time
the great tribulation is.
So we're there in heaven
and then as we're getting prepared for this battle,
we're getting all our armor on,
we're picking out our horse.
I want like a giant white stallion.
Just get on there.
We're gonna get our horses
and we're gonna get on there
and then Christ is gonna lead the charge
and then he just,
we don't even have to do anything, it's just over.
It's just like he comes down
and just the sword proceeds out of his mouth
and he just literally destroys all of these armies.
But it's a physical destruction.
There is gonna be a giant army of man
that's just gonna be killed.
And then all of the birds of the earth
are gonna come and they're all gonna eat
all of these dead people.
And then I believe if you study Ezekiel,
we're gonna be burying bodies for like seven months
or something like that, some people will.
So we'll have to bury their bodies for about seven months
but then the Bible says that we're gonna turn
all of our weapons into just like tools
because there's no more war again for a thousand years.
Look at Revelation chapter 20
and we're gonna kind of skip ahead a little bit
but it says in verse number three,
and cast him in the bottomless pit
and shut him up, set a seal upon him,
so it's talking about the devil,
that he should deceive the nations no more
till a thousand years should be fulfilled
and after that he must be loosed a little season.
So not only is Christ ruling, think about this,
not only is the Lord Jesus Christ literally on earth
physically ruling, the devil's not even allowed
to be on the earth anymore.
So the devil's not going around whispering in people's ear
or wrecking havoc, I mean there's no false prophet,
there's no beast, all the reprobates have been killed,
every evil wicked person is punished immediately.
It's really hard for there to be any kind of rebellion,
it's really hard for there to be any kind of evil
because all the evil's been snuffed out immediately
and then any new evil will be shut down so quick
it won't have time to spread.
So you're gonna have a thousand year time of peace
with Christ literally ruling and us ruling with him
over this earth, okay?
Now we'll be glorified at this point
but I don't, in the descriptions of the word
it seems like not everybody will be yet.
So there'll still be that remnant of people
that survived all this wrath somehow
and we're ruling and reigning on the earth
with Christ over them.
And it's gonna be the Gentiles.
It says in verse number four,
and I saw thrones and they sat upon them
and judgment was given unto them
and I saw the souls of them that were beheaded
for the witness of Jesus and for the word of God
and which had not worshiped the beast, neither his image,
neither had received his mark upon their foreheads
or in their hands and they lived and reigned with Christ
for a thousand years.
The rest of the dead lived not again
until the thousand years were finished.
This is the first resurrection.
So we have, in essence, a description of those
who are ruling and reigning with Christ
in a resurrected state.
So not only is Christ resurrected
but we will be resurrected too.
And again, those who were raptured I guess
they get qualified in this resurrection class or whatever.
But essentially there's this first resurrection.
We're ruling and reigning with Christ
and especially those who withstood all of that drama
of the antichrist and the mark of the beast
and everything like that.
They're ruling and reigning with Christ.
Verse number six, blessed and holy is he that hath part
in the first resurrection.
On such the second death hath no power.
They shall be priests of God and of Christ
and shall reign with him a thousand years.
So if you are saved, you cannot ever go to hell.
Notice the second death hath no power.
And again, the first death doesn't either,
technically speaking, if you understand
the first death as being hell.
Because the first death is hell.
The second death is also the lake of fire.
But at this point, people aren't really going to hell.
They're going to go to the lake of fire
after the next judgment cycle.
Because of course people that are dying,
I don't know exactly how all this works,
but notice that some people
are already thrown in the lake of fire.
You have the beast and the false prophet
thrown in the lake of fire, which is the second death.
And those of us that have been resurrected,
there's no way for us to go to hell or the lake of fire
because we're saved and internally redeemed
and it has no power over us.
There's no option of us to ever experience
the second death.
It says in verse number eight also,
that we're priests, but I like this,
and shall reign with him.
Notice, it doesn't say we'll live with him.
It doesn't say we'll watch him reign.
It says that we'll reign with him.
So notice, it's like, oh, why serve God?
Because it's going to determine how you reign.
It's going to determine how you rule in the future.
I don't want to just be the doorkeeper in heaven
and on the new heaven and new earth.
I want to reign with Christ.
But you know what?
Reigning with Christ comes with a price.
It's not free.
He doesn't just hand it out.
It's for those that are willing to sacrifice now
and serve him now, and then you get to serve him
in a greater capacity in the future.
And when the thousand years are expired,
Satan shall be loosed out of his prison
and shall go out to deceive the nations
which are in the four quarters of the earth,
Gog and Magog, to gather them together to battle.
The number of whom is as the sand of the sea.
So what's interesting is how Christ
comes to literally rule for a thousand years.
But for whatever reason, that doesn't mean
that everyone gets saved still.
You know, some people think that like,
oh, why doesn't Jesus just come down from heaven
and then tell me to believe in him?
Well, you know what?
Even if he did that, many people
would still not believe in him.
Most people would still not.
Because if you believe Moses, you'd believe me,
for he wrote of me, is what he told the Jews.
He didn't say like, oh, well now that you've seen me,
you have a way better chance of getting saved.
He kind of is insinuating that whether you get saved
or not has really no impact than if you see Christ or not.
Seeing Christ isn't gonna be the determining factor
because we're saved by faith,
we're not saved by sight anyways.
We're saved by putting trust in the Lord Jesus Christ.
And so there's still gonna be a large percentage
of the population that is not gonna wanna believe in Jesus.
And I think the reason why God did this
is he really wants to drive home the impact of free will.
Free will is really existent in the millennial reign
because if you don't choose to believe in Jesus
when he's ruling and reigning on the earth in physical form
and there's no more hidden, like nothing's hidden,
the knowledge of the Lord is everywhere,
there's no opportunity to miss it,
there's no confusion about it,
and then you still don't believe in Jesus,
what does that really illustrate?
It illustrates you had free will
because the only way to resist that
is that you had the willingness and choice to do so, okay?
And so what he's trying to do
is he's trying to show Calvinists,
it's not Calvinism, bro.
Through hath resisted his will.
That's a misunderstanding of that verse, buddy, okay?
What the Bible teaches from cover to cover
is that we have free will
and that no matter what you give mankind,
the vast majority will not believe in Jesus.
For all of sin, all sin no matter what because of free will,
but then even beyond the free will of just choosing to sin,
most people will not even choose to believe in Jesus.
And you say why, I don't know why.
I guess just inherently free will is a very selfish thing.
And only a remnant chooses to humble themselves
and willing to believe on the Lord Jesus Christ,
trust him for salvation.
But God is only going to live for all of eternity
with those who humbled themselves
and believed on the Lord Jesus Christ.
So after this thousand year experiment
of having Jesus Christ ruling and reigning,
you still have a large swath of people
that won't believe in him,
but you gotta do something with them.
It's the last cleaning the barrage.
Think about it in our story of Esther.
Hey, on the first day we got 500,
but there was still 300 left.
And you know what?
He's gonna consume them too.
So just like we had the two days,
we had the 13th and the 14th,
we have the battle of Armageddon,
but then we have Gog and Magog.
So we have that second day of coming in
and destroying that remnant and cleaning everything up.
And then finally we have the peace.
Finally we have just everyone saved
and everyone's redeemed.
And so you kind of have that picture foreshadowed
in the book of Esther where you get that two days.
You know, it always confuses me like,
why do you have another day?
But then it made perfect sense when I thought of it.
I was like, well you have Armageddon
and then you have the battle of Gog and Magog
so you have those two days.
Also you have other symbols in the fact that Christ was dead
and you kind of have him rising on what?
The third day and they have the two days of battle
and then the third day they had a feast
and they rejoiced and they kind of celebrated
on the third day.
Go back to our story.
It said in verse number 20,
and Mordecai wrote these things and sent letters
into all the Jews that were in all the provinces
of the King of Hazres, both Nigh and Far,
to establish this among them,
that they should keep the 14th day of the month
and the 15th day of the same yearly,
as the days wherein the Jews rested from their enemies
and the month which was turned unto them
from sorrow to joy and from mourning into a good day.
That they should make them days of feasting and joy
and of sending portions one to another
and gifts to the poor and the Jews undertook to do
as they had begun and as Mordecai had written unto them.
Because Haman the son of Amaditha, the Agagite,
the enemy of all the Jews, had devised against the Jews
to destroy them and a kasper, that is the lot,
to consume them and to destroy them.
But when Esther came before the king,
he commanded by letters that this wicked device
which he devised against the Jews
should return upon his own head
and he and his son should be hanged on the gallows.
Wherefore they call these days Purim after the name of Pur.
Therefore, for all the words of this letter
and of that which they have seen concerning this matter
and which had come unto them, the Jews ordained
and took upon them and upon their seed
and upon all such as joined themselves unto them.
So as it should not fail that they would keep
these two days according to their writing
and according to their appointed time every year
and that these days should be remembered and kept
throughout every generation, every family,
every province and every city
and that these days of Purim should not fail
from among the Jews nor the memorial of them
perish from their seed.
Then Esther the queen, the daughter of Abba Hale
and Mordecai the Jew wrote with all authority
to confirm this second letter of Purim
and he sent the letters unto all the Jews
to the 120 and seven provinces of the kingdom of Ahasuerus
with words of peace and truth to confirm these days
of Purim and their times appointed
according as Mordecai the Jew and Esther the queen
had enjoined them and as they decreed for themselves
and for their seed, the matters of the fastings
and their cry and the decree of Esther
confirmed these matters of Purim
and it was written in the book.
So it talks about how they had the 13th day,
they had the 14th day and then the 15th day,
the third day as it were, they made it a day
of rejoicing and gladness and they basically rejoiced
and I think there's a little bit of symbolism there
because you got the three days kind of makes you think
of the gospel, right?
And of course they killed Jesus on Thursday
but you kind of have Friday and Saturday
and then you have the third day, he's risen
and you kind of have that rejoicing, that celebration
and they're saying hey, we gotta remember these days.
We gotta put it as a memorial.
We gotta send it out.
The whole world needs to hear about it
and it's gonna be the same way when Christ is ruling
and reigning that the word of God's gonna go out
through the whole world.
We have the gospel where the whole world goes out
to every single person and it's important
that we have memorials to remember certain events.
We celebrate certain events even at this church.
We'll celebrate Easter.
We'll celebrate Christmas, just the birth of Christ.
We'll celebrate different events to,
we'll celebrate the Lord's Supper,
to remember certain things about Christ
and what he's done for us and it's good
to have certain memorials, it's good to have certain days
where you think about the things of the Lord
and it reminds you of why you're here.
God's really big on memorials because often
when he would perform some kind of an action,
he would give them a sign.
Think about Noah's Ark.
What was the sign that he was never gonna do that again?
The rainbow and of course, that's why the Sodomites
love to use that as their symbol
but they're gonna burn in hell for all eternity
so it's not gonna save them in there.
It's funny, they're like, I'm never gonna get drowned.
Well, you're gonna burn.
And okay, you're going to a lake of fire.
You're gonna drown in fire, buddy.
You might not drown in water.
That would've been better than drowning in fire
for all of eternity and your little rainbow flag
is not gonna be what you thought it was.
It's not gonna be your savior.
The children of Israel, they go across the Red Sea.
They're supposed to lay up stones as kind of an altar,
as kind of a memorial, kind of signify things.
God gave them the tables of stones,
kind of a memorial of the law being passed down
and given to them.
So we have lots of different memorials
kind of found in scripture and while we don't necessarily
have physical memorials that we celebrate
in the New Testament, we can still at least take
the symbolism of having a special holiday
or a special Memorial Day to think about
things of the Lord.
I think just Sunday.
Why do we even have church on Sunday?
It's the day that Jesus Christ rose again.
It's the first day of the week.
That's what we have in scripture,
recorded as disciples coming together
but specifically that's when Jesus rose again
and so we're setting day, one day every week
to say hey, let's celebrate Jesus today.
Let's think about God.
Let's think about what he did for us
to remind ourselves of why we even are here.
Like what are we even doing here?
You know, we're here because of Jesus.
We're here because of the gospel.
We're here because eventually we're going to rule
and reign with Christ in all of eternity
and why would I want to give all my effort
and energy to the vanity, to the vanity of this world?
You know, we need to set time apart
to worship and honor the Lord Jesus Christ
and what he's done for us and so as we read,
as we kind of finish the book of Esther,
you have to realize that you're gonna be
on the winning side but how you live your life
is gonna determine where you are in the ranks
of that winning side and that's why
it's important to keep serving him.
Let's close in prayer.
Thank you Heavenly Father for giving us the victory.
Thank you for allowing us to come alongside your son
to be heirs, to rule and reign with your son,
the Lord Jesus Christ, to have victory over our enemies
and realize that we don't even have to lift a finger
but rather we just simply put our trust in you and your son
and that you will destroy them for us.
You will avenge us of our enemies.
I pray that we wouldn't envy our enemies,
we wouldn't envy the temporary fleetingness
of the vanity of this world,
the stuff that doesn't even matter
but rather we would find joy and peace
and the things of God that we would set apart days
like Sunday or special holidays to remind ourselves
of the Lord Jesus Christ and what's coming in the future
and that if we find ourselves in a dramatic situation
instead of running away or being scared
that we would just look at as an exciting opportunity
for you to show yourself strong on our behalf.
I pray that you would just help us to keep serving you
and be better Christians.
In Jesus' name we pray, amen.
Turn to our last song for the evening, 82.
Song 82 in the hymnal.
It's gonna be 82, When He Cometh.
All together.
When he cometh, when he cometh
to make up his jewels,
all his jewels, precious jewels,
his love and his own.
Like the stars of the morning,
his bright crown adorning,
they shall shine in their beauty,
bright gems for his crown.
He will gather, he will gather
the gems for his kingdom.
All the pure ones, all the bright ones,
his love and his own.
Like the stars of the morning,
his bright crown adorning,
they shall shine in their beauty,
bright gems for his crown.
Little children, little children,
who love their redeemer
are the jewels, precious jewels,
his love and his own.
Like the stars of the morning,
his bright crown adorning,
they shall shine in their beauty,
bright gems for his crown.
Amen, thank y'all for coming.
God bless, you are dismissed.