ESTHER

Chapter 1

And drinking was according to this edict: “There is no compulsion.” For the king had given orders to all the staff of his palace to do as each man desired. Esther 1:8 – At first this mindset seems appealing, to freely do as they want. Like that “freedom” a college freshmen has when they leave the parents and can make their own choices on how to live. What we see unfolding in the chapter is some of the results to living in the false freedom. The queen is degraded, their relationship is over, the queen is kicked out from her home, and this is just the beginning. Living in this mindset that you can do whatever you want is not freedom. Be aware that mindset has the result of destroying so many things in your life. Sometimes the most freeing thing for you to do is limit yourself from some things some other, better things can flourish in your life. I love you, but Jesus loves you more – Mac – Daily DEVO 910

On the seventh day, when the heart of the king was merry with wine, he commanded Mehuman, Biztha, Harbona, Bigtha and Abagtha, Zethar and Carkas, the seven eunuchs who served in the presence of King Ahasuerus, ¹¹to bring Queen Vashti before the king with her royal crown, in order to show the peoples and the princes her beauty, for she was lovely to look at. Esther 1:10-11 – After 180 days of showing of his riches, the king throws another feast for a week for the people. At the end of that week of partying, and while being very drunk from the wine, the king made the command we see in our verse. This one drunken decision led to the rest of the story of Esther unfolding. While we are grateful that Esther was able to step up into the position of Queen as a result of this, the king ruined his marriage and Queen Vashti’s life because of his actions. Never underestimate the damage one action that is fueled by sinfulness can create. Families can be destroyed, churches can crumble, and lives can be turned upside down because of one choice made in sin. How often do we see and hear stories of individuals who long to be able to go back and undo what they did because their sinful choices ruined something beautiful. Dwell then today on the possible outcomes your sinful choices could have. If what you are doing in secret was out in the open, what damage would it cause? Sin never takes place without someone being hurt because of it. If you love the people in your life, and if you love Jesus, make whatever changes are needed to end the sinfulness in your story. I love you, but Jesus loves you more – Mac – Daily DEVO 2517

Chapter 2

He was bringing up Hadassah, that is Esther, the daughter of his uncle, for she had neither father nor mother. The young woman had a beautiful figure and was lovely to look at, and when her father and her mother died, Mordecai took her as his own daughter. Esther 2:7 – Our lacking of something doesn’t cancel out our ability to be used by God for His purpose. Esther sadly had both her parents die. What we see though is that while that was a big part of her story it didn’t make it impossible for her to be a part of God’s story. You as well might be missing something. Possibly a loss of someone special, or a health limitation, or it’s a mistake that you made in the past that follows you everywhere. Know if you’re willing to be used by God nothing you see as a limitation is actually a limitation to God. He can use you as you are. The only thing that holds Him back is our unwilling, disobedient heart. If we allow Him to use us, everything in our story, even the things not there, God can use for His glory. I love you, but Jesus loves you more – Mac – Daily DEVO 911

And every day Mordecai walked in front of the court of the harem to learn how Esther was and what was happening to her. Esther 2:11 – The king had made his decree to have the young, beautiful women of the land brought to him to find his new queen, and Esther was one such woman. For a year she undertook a beautification process that each woman was required to take before coming to the king. She was taken from her home, brought most likely against her desires to be presented to a foreign king, and was away for a long time. Yet her cousin Mordecai, the one who raised her after her parents died, came each day to visit and check on Esther in this season she was in. Let’s seek to position ourselves in each other’s life like Mordecai did with Esther. We all more than likely have friends or family that have found themselves in a season they didn’t ask for and is lasting longer than they desired. While we can’t change everything for them, we can be present for them in this season. We can check in to see how they are doing, we can pray with them and over them, we can choose to walk with them through the hard. We all find ourselves in seasons during life that are unwanted and difficult, but what a change it is when someone shows up alongside us in that season to support. Be a Mordecai in the life of those you know are walking through tough seasons. I love you, but Jesus loves you more – Mac – Daily DEVO 2518

Chapter 3

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 thirteenth day of the twelfth month, which is the month of Adar, and to plunder their goods. Esther 3:13 – Jesus warns us in John 10:10 that the thief, our enemy, comes to steal, kill, and destroy. It shouldn’t surprise us then that this passage is so similar to what Jesus said in the gospels. From the very beginning all our enemy wants is to separate us from God. He’ll lie, deceive, feed our lusts and greed, and even make life away from God seem superior to a life with God. All for the sake of stealing, killing, and destroying the unity with God we need. Be wise to how the enemy works. Remember that it’s God who you need active in your life not the enemy. God gives, heals, and creates while the enemy does all the opposite. Keep all this in mind today when you debate if you’re going to pursue God well today. I love you, but Jesus loves you more – Mac – Daily DEVO 912

But 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 Ahasuerus. Esther 3:6 – Sin left unchecked evolves. The beginnings of this situation started with Mordecai refusing to bow down to Haman as Haman passed by. This greatly angered Haman for he enjoyed the power and glory he got from the bowing. While it began with wanting to take out Mordecai alone, we see the desire and hatred grew to the whole of the Jewish nation. Even to people Haman had no knowledge of or issue with personally. His sin evolved. Think now to sins we see today. A one-time going too far with alcohol can lead to a full-blown addiction if not addressed. A simple click on a website can lead to a struggle with porn for years. A seamlessly harmless text can grow into a marriage ruining affair. Sin doesn’t stay small when left alone. It grows, evolves, and as it does, the wake of damage grows and evolves too. Thankfully in Jesus we have victory over all sin and can find help in Him to overcome it all. The question is will we today, with whatever sin may be in our story, turn to Jesus and use His help? For while sin left unchecked evolves, sin that is handed over to Jesus dies. I love you, but Jesus loves you more – Mac – Daily DEVO 2519

Chapter 4

For if you keep silent at this time, relief and deliverance will rise for the Jews from another 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? Esther 4:14 – There is a deeper reason why you are in this season and why you are in this place you find yourself in. Deeper than the superficial and deeper than just the physical. God is working His master plan out and inviting us into it. Our purpose then is to see how we can be leaning into His plan where we are today and in the season we’re in today. It’s more than just getting through another day and taking care of things. God is moving today, move with Him. That’s your bigger purpose for your life today. To get to know God more and help those you can know about His love. So how can you today in the season you’re in and in the place you’re at with the things you have fulfill that purpose? Who knows, maybe you were placed there with this purpose with what you have for such a time as this. I love you, but Jesus loves you more – Mac – Daily DEVO 913

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. ⁵Then Esther called for Hathach, one of the king’s eunuchs, who had been appointed to attend her, and ordered him to go to Mordecai to learn what this was and why it was. Esther 4:4-5 – The king’s decree to destroy all the Jews had gone out to all his lands and Mordecai is mourning this news, just like the Jewish people all over the kingdom were. He had positioned himself at the king’s gate in sackcloth, an outward way for them of showing their inward brokenness. When Esther hears of this, she seeks to have Mordecai put on new clothes so he could approach her and share what was wrong, for we learn that no one in sackcloth could enter the king’s gate. Yet even after he refuses, she persists in seeking out what was issue. We too may have to persist when we see someone hurting to discover what is happening in their story. They may not want to talk, they may not want to approach us, and they may not even want to “feel better” at that moment. Yet what they still need is community and love being shown to them. Be willing to remain with them even if they push back and seek to push you away in their pain. While they may not be demonstrating it nor even realizing it themselves at that moment, they need you. We’re designed to need one another and to have each other in the struggle. Be present for them, help how God leads you, and remember your ultimate role in their struggle is to simply refocus their eyes on their Savior. I love you, but Jesus loves you more – Mac – Daily DEVO 2520

Chapter 5

Then Haman said, “Even Queen Esther let no one but me come with the king to the feast she prepared. And tomorrow also I am invited by her together with the king. Yet all this is worth nothing to me, so long as I see Mordecai the Jew sitting at the king’s gate.” Esther 5:12-13 – When your focus is on your sin rather than God, the fills that God brings won’t satisfy you anymore. Your taste is for things God won’t bring into your story. While these feasts were not God trying to encourage Haman, we can see this point played out. Having alone time with the king and queen would have been a great honor, but for him it was nothing because of his hatred. So when God leads you to leave your sin it’s more than Him just getting you to stop doing bad things. He realizes that when your eyes aren’t on Him you won’t find the restoring He can bring to you. I love you, but Jesus loves you more – Mac – Daily DEVO 914

And when the king saw Queen Esther standing in the court, she won favor in his sight, and he held out to Esther the golden scepter that was in his hand. Then Esther approached and touched the tip of the scepter. Esther 5:2 – Though there was the high possibility this action could result in Esther losing her life, she bravely steps into the king’s throne room without being called for. Her only hope would be that she would find favor in the king’s eyes and he’d allow her to approach his throne. As we can read in our passage, she won such favor and was able to approach the throne of the king. Today, know you too have won favor in the sight of the King. Jesus, the King of Kings, who sits on His throne in Heaven, has welcomed you to come close to His throne to be with Him. This winning of His favor didn’t come because of your beauty or grace like with Esther, but this favor was won solely by Jesus Himself. Jesus found us in our sin, cleansed us from our filth, put royal clothes on us, opened the throne room doors for us, and has welcomed us to approach His throne. Our only question is to ask ourselves, “Will we walk to Jesus today?” Everything has been taken care of by Jesus for us to draw close to Him today, but will we? Take hold of this grand blessing you’ve been given to draw close to the Lord today and find time to pursue the One who loves you beyond what your understanding could comprehend. I love you, but Jesus loves you more – Mac – Daily DEVO 2521

Chapter 6

And Haman told his wife Zeresh and all his friends everything that had happened to him. Then his wise men and his wife Zeresh said to him, “If Mordecai, before whom you have begun to fall, is of the Jewish people, you will not overcome him but will surely fall before him.” Esther 6:13 – Currently I’m preaching on Sundays over Acts 5 and a situation like this unfolds at the end of that chapter (Acts 5:38-39). The Apostles are refusing to stop speaking about Jesus like the Jewish leaders are commanding them to. While worked up, the leaders realize that if God truly is with the Apostles, they won’t be able to stop them for they would be opposing the Lord. Haman, his wife, and his wise men realize this too, that if Mordecai has God with Him, failure is the only option for those who oppose the Lord. We are seeing in the Old and New Testaments examples of non-followers of God acknowledging the power of God and His unstoppable nature. While they don’t follow the Lord or believe in the name of Jesus, they get that He is all-powerful and nothing can stop the Lord when the Lord is at work. I wonder how many followers of Jesus today need to have such faith in God as these non-followers? How is your faith in the Lord when difficult seasons in life arise? Do you truly believe that no evil can stand in the presence of our God? Do you believe that if you’re following the Lord no enemy can stop you and no evil can destroy you? Do you have such faith in the Lord that He will always sustain, protect, provide, and bless those that follow Him, even in the presence of your enemies? Be willing to read ahead in our story of Esther to see just how powerful our God is at being able to protect and provide for those that follow Him. I love you, but Jesus loves you more – Mac – Daily DEVO 2522

Chapter 7

And Esther said, “A foe and enemy! This wicked Haman!” Then Haman was terrified before the king and the queen. Esther 7:6 – Up until this moment Haman thought he was going the right direction. Yet when our sin suddenly gets brought into the spotlight we see it for what it really is and we see all the deception that was hiding in the darkness all along. Haman here learned his path of following his sin was the wrong one to take. Have you learned that lesson yet? What if today a spotlight shone on your sin, what deception that you’ve been listening to would be uncovered? Let God’s Word today be that spotlight in your life. The sin in our lives is leading us to a place God never created us to go. Let God’s Word shine a light into your life and anything that’s been hiding in the darkness that shouldn’t be there, get rid of. I love you, but Jesus loves you more – Mac- Daily DEVO 916

And the king returned from the palace garden to the place where they were drinking wine, as Haman was falling on the couch where Esther was. And the king said, “Will he even assault the queen in my presence, in my own house?” As the word left the mouth of the king, they covered Haman’s face. Esther 7:8 – Haman, the “foe and enemy” of the Jews as Queen Esther called him, had created and was executing flawlessly a plan to annihilate the whole of the Jewish people. Things were moving perfectly for him and it looked as if God’s people were going to be ended. What we see though in this chapter is Haman enjoying wine and food with the king yet only moments later his sin was exposed. The next thing he sees is darkness because they covered his face to hang him. We see here what power an earthly king has over those that wrong him. How much more power though does our Heavenly King Jesus have over His enemy! Sometimes it can look and feel as if Satan is executing his plans flawlessly and is enjoying the feast of his work. Remember though the power of our King. He isn’t going to cover Satan’s head, he’s going to crush it underneath His feet. Choose then to remain faithful to King Jesus, trusting in His power, even when the enemy sure seems to be taking the victory. I love you, but Jesus loves you more – Mac – Daily DEVO 2523

Chapter 8

The Jews had light and gladness and joy and honor. And in every province and in every city, wherever the king’s command and his edict reached, there was gladness and joy among the Jews, a feast and a holiday. And many from the peoples of the country declared themselves Jews, for fear of the Jews had fallen on them. Esther 8:16-17 – Where the news that the message from the king to not destroy the Jews reached there was joy among the Jews. What about though where it didn’t reach? What about the places where the message didn’t get to yet? There the Jews would have been still under the fear of death, not being able to have the joy God was giving. All because the message hadn’t reached them yet. We too have a message to get out as fast as we can. We have people fearing death when they could be tasting God’s joy. Today you are a messenger getting the good news of Jesus to the people. Who then can you share it with? They need to know life is being given to them by God, you make sure they know that. I love you, but Jesus loves you more – Mac – Daily DEVO 917

So the couriers, mounted on their swift horses that were used in the king’s service, rode out hurriedly, urged by the king’s command. And the decree was issued in Susa the citadel. Esther 8:14 – If you haven’t been following along with our reading, or are unfamiliar with the story of Esther, an original command from the king was sent out all over his kingdom that on a certain day all the Jews ought to be killed. While unable to take back that original command, this new decree allowed the Jews to defend themselves from their certain doom. Imagine the stakes if you were one of these mounted mailmen carrying this message. You would have people who were going to die if you didn’t get to them with the message you were carrying quick enough. An enemy was coming after them, hope was lost, but you have in your hands the message of life for them. Of course you’d ride as fast as you can! How different though is this from our mission to share the gospel? We’re a mailman with a message of life in our hands. There is an enemy coming after people, their hope is gone, and if the message we carry doesn’t get to them it’s certain doom. Put that way, maybe that TV show or game isn’t as important. Maybe the uncomfortableness of talking about sin with them is something we can get over. Maybe them hearing about Jesus is worth the effort and sacrifice. Be willing to saddle up, ride hard, and get the message of life to those around you that need to hear it. I love you, but Jesus loves you more – Mac – Daily DEVO 2524

Chapter 9

And Mordecai recorded these things and sent letters to all the Jews who were in all the provinces of King Ahasuerus, both near and far… Esther 9:20 – Make it a habit to remember what God has done for you and also make it a habit to share that with others. That’s what Mordecai is doing here. He is taking the time to write down the news of the work God was doing amongst His people and then sending the word out to all. So for us, God has sent His Son Jesus to die on the cross and rise again for the forgiveness of all the wrong doing we’ve done that kept us away from God. We now can have life with God because of what Jesus did for us. Make sure you are sharing that news with as many people as possible like Mordecai did with his news of God’s provision. I love you, but Jesus loves you more – Mac – Daily DEVO 918

…obliging them to keep the fourteenth day of the month Adar and also the fifteenth day of the same, year by year,²²as the days on which the Jews got relief from their enemies, and as the month that had been turned for them from sorrow into gladness and from mourning into a holiday; that they should make them days of feasting and gladness, days for sending gifts of food to one another and gifts to the poor. Esther 9:21-22 – The day that the enemies of the Jews were longing for to be able to rid themselves of their problem Jewish neighbors was flipped on them and became their ruin. The Jews instead were allowed by the king to kill any who were haters and enemies of them. This day looked to be one of sorrow and mourning for the Jewish people, but the Lord stepped in and flipped it to be one of gladness and holiday. Isn’t this so much the same with resurrection Sunday? When Jesus died it looked as if our enemy had found mastery over us. Sorrow and mourning would have been our posture if we were there in that time. But God turned that sorrow into gladness and that mourning into holiday by rolling that stone away and raising Jesus from the dead. See our Lord isn’t one to settle for defeat amongst His children. He has shown us He can take the worst of sorrow and turn it into gladness and He has demonstrated His ability to take the deepest of mourning seasons and turn them into a blessing. Who else is like our God! I love you, but Jesus loves you more – Mac – Daily DEVO 2525

Chapter 10

For Mordecai the Jew was second in rank to King Ahasuerus, and he was great among the Jews and popular with the multitude of his brothers, for he sought the welfare of his people and spoke peace to all his people. Esther 10:3 – When God lifts you up and blesses you how do you choose to use all that He just gave you? We see Mordecai using this to bring help and rest to God’s people, something that would honor God as well. Rather than using that blessing for his selfish desires he chose to give glory to God and seek to help others. Challenge yourself against what Mordecai did. As you currently look at what you’ve been given in life are you using it only for you or for others and God? What could you today begin using of the things you’ve been given to make God’s name known more and to bring rest and help to those around you? Life is about more than just satisfying our selfish needs. I love you, but Jesus loves you more – Mac – Daily DEVO 919

For Mordecai the Jew was second in rank to King Ahasuerus, and he was great among the Jews and popular with the multitude of his brothers, for he sought the welfare of his people and spoke peace to all his people. Esther 10:3 – While the book is entitled Esther and is certainly focused on her, Esther’s story would be vastly different without Mordecai. When Esther’s parents died, he took her in as his own daughter, raising her well and pouring God’s word and law into her. He gave guidance and peace to her when the government over her was doing things outside of her control. He checked in on her daily and encouraged her to walk boldly with her God. Now Mordecai is placed second in command of a world power, and how does he use such power? In the same way he did for orphaned Esther, to seek other’s welfare and to speak peace. Know God sees the holy actions done that you may not think anyone notices. He also sees the pure heart and mind within. He sees, He knows, and He hears, and know He also doesn’t leave such faithfulness without blessing. Just be willing to pursue such a holy life even if you don’t get promoted in this world but your blessing comes only in Heaven. For not every holy follower of God was raised to worldly glory like Mordecai, some were even crucified for following our Heavenly Father. So whether blessing comes within this life or the next, know a holy life lived out for the Lord is worth it for who know all that God will do with our faithfulness. I love you, but Jesus loves you more – Mac – Daily DEVO 2526