Hello, this is Pastor Steven Anderson from Faithful Word Baptist Church in Tempe, Arizona.
Today I want to talk about Esther 8-17.
There's a lot of confusion today about the word Jew.
A lot of people think that being Jewish is an ethnicity and that it has to do with the
fact that you descend from Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob.
If we were to ask Adolf Hitler, he would agree with that because he definitely believed
that being Jewish was a racial thing.
If we were to ask Zionist Christians today, they would tell you that people that are Jews,
they're a certain ethnicity.
It means that they descend from Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob.
That makes them God's chosen people because they descend from that bloodline.
But let's see if the Bible defines being a Jew as being of a certain ethnicity.
Listen to Esther 8-17.
And in every province and in every city whithersoever the king's commandment and his decree came,
the Jews had joy and gladness, a feast and a good day.
And many of the people of the land became Jews for the fear of the Jews fell upon them.
Now according to this scripture, many people at that time became Jews.
Now if being a Jew were an ethnicity, it would be impossible to become one because you can't
change your ethnicity.
For example, if I talked about becoming an American, that would be very possible for
someone of any ethnicity to become an American.
Why?
Because being an American has to do with what nation you're a citizen of.
If I talked about becoming a Christian, that would be very possible as well because neither
of those things have to do with a certain ethnicity.
Well here's the thing, being a Jew is not an ethnicity either.
Being a Jew is a religious belief and in Esther 8-17, we see people becoming Jews, meaning
that they start to believe in the God of the Jews.
Now the people at the time of Esther 8-17 who became Jews, they were worshipping the
true God of the Bible.
Of course today's Jews do not worship the God of the Bible.
These so-called Jews who are outwardly Jews, who are ethnically claiming to be Jewish,
whatever that means, they worship a false god because the Bible says that if they don't
have the son, they don't have the father and since they reject the Lord Jesus Christ and
the religion of Judaism, Jews are worshipping a false god.
So if a person today were to become a Jew, they would be joining up with a false religion
whereas in Esther 8-17, they were worshipping the true God as Jews.
So this scripture should prove to any thinking person that obviously being a Jew is not an
ethnicity, it doesn't have to do with your lineage or what bloodline you are of because
here we have a bunch of people of a completely different bloodline becoming Jews.
How is that possible?
Because being Jewish is not an ethnicity, it's a religion, it's a belief.
At that time, it was a nation.
So to sit there and say that you're a racist if you speak out against Judaism or the Jews
makes absolutely no sense since it's not a race of people.
That'd be like saying, oh, you're against Mormons?
You're a racist.
No, because Mormonism is not a race.
It's a belief system that anybody can join if they want to worship Satan and it's the
same thing with Judaism.
You know, if you want to worship Satan, you can join Judaism and do that.
You can join Mormonism if you want to worship Lucifer.
But the Bible is pretty clear here that being a Jew is a belief system.
Back then it was a righteous belief in Esther 817.
Today being a Jew is associated with a false belief and a false religion.