Please join with me in the time of prayer here as we enter into the time of the preaching. Heavenly Father, we are grateful, Lord, that You have so intervened in our lives, Lord, to set us apart for Your praise and Your worship. Lord, it's those that You have redeemed, and we are grateful for another occasion that we might gather here as your people to celebrate and to contemplate the mercy and the grace that you have bestowed upon us in Christ. Even today, as we walk through the book of Esther, as we begin working our way through this book, we pray that You would give us fresh views, Lord, of all that You have accomplished on our behalf in Christ. I pray for grace for me as I seek to preach the Word, and so much, Lord, that I may do so in a way that is honoring to You and edifying to Your people. Lift all these things up in Christ's name. Amen. So, strictly speaking, the United States, the form of government that we have here, is not actually a true democracy. It's considered a republic, or what we might call a representative democracy. In other words, we vote to elect men and women who will go and represent a certain constituency of people in the meeting of the government, in those who form the government and make decisions for the land. For example, each state has two elected senators that will represent that state in the U.S. Senate. We also have a number of House of Representatives allotted to each state according to the number, the population and distributing that. We in Kansas are allotted four. And these are individuals that have been selected out through a particular process of election, and they go and they represent the interests of the people whom they're serving. So in this way, our senators and our representatives here in Kansas are really selected representation for the people of Kansas. And today, as we go through the first two chapters here of Esther, we're going to see a similitude here of sorts, a selected representation, though the process of selection and the type of representation is considerably different than the example that I just shared with you. So as we begin, those of you that were here last week, we started with an introduction. I spent the whole of the message last week just sort of trying to get us a good backdrop for understanding and appreciating the book of Esther. And I just briefly review a few things from that introduction. Wrong direction here. So the historical context is, as you recall, this happens during the period of time as they are being returning from exile, as the people of Israel have been sent into exile and are being returned out of exile. There's various waves in which that happens. And this happens somewhere between the first and second waves of return. Somewhere after the temple had already been restored, but, and completed, but prior to when Nehemiah goes back to work on the walls in Jerusalem, you kind of see there on that little graph on the bottom portion there, if we're looking at the historical books of Ezra and Nehemiah, Esther happens somewhere there between chapter six and seven, actually, is when this takes place. And the backdrop to that is we're in the midst of the Persian Empire. And as you'll see here, as we get into the story, we're going to be introduced to King Ahasuerus, also known as Xerxes I. The geographical context we talked about, so this is occurring in the city of Susa, which was the capital of the Persian Empire. And at that time, the Persian Empire covered a vast stretch of land from India over to the northern part of Africa there, over towards Europe, what's there on the screen. And you can see Susa there towards the middle, located not too far from Babylon. And it was located at the base of the Zargos Mountains, as we talked about last year, or last week, rather. And that would be present day Iran, just for further geographical context. And as we began the introduction last week, I said we want to kind of step back and see what this book is about. I tried to boil it down into this statement. The Book of Esther is the story about the providential preservation of a chosen people by the hand of an unseen God again. One of the unique features of the book of Esther is that the name God is never mentioned anywhere in this book and it's the only book in which the name of God is not found. But it fits very well when we understand the context here and what's being played out in terms of the providence of God in intervening for his people. Though his name is never seen on the pages, it's very clear in so many remarkable details that God is sovereignly orchestrating a way to spare his people from destruction and to triumph over their enemies through an agent of his choosing who's willing to die for the sake of their salvation. Redemptive theme, as we talked about last week, all throughout the Old Testament, and we see this building up to Christ, all these different episodes working towards the grand theme of scripture, which is God's glory displayed in the redemption of his people through Jesus Christ. That's what the Bible is about. And we see these episodes playing out that are leading towards that great deliverance in Christ. And so oftentimes, even the episodes themselves have a reflection of the whole of that story. So not only is Esther just another step along that path, it's also a picture to us, and we see Christ in it this way. And as I shared last week, I've broken it up into four episodes. And we're gonna be doing episode one here today. And each one of these episodes gives us another picture of God's providential preservation, particularly here then for this first episode. What we have is God's providential preservation accomplished through selected representation. God's providential preservation is accomplished through selected representation. So this morning, what I'll do is sort of walk through these first two chapters. Bear with me, it's a large portion of text. I know there's some individuals here that didn't get too much sleep last night. Stay with me. There's more coffee in the back if you need it. We'll try to work through the first two chapters here. And then what I want to do is pull out some, what I'm calling tangential lessons. some lessons that we can learn just in the closer picture of some of the events that are happening. And then we want to step back a little bit and look at the issue of providence and preservation. In other words, the themes that really are overarching throughout this book of Esther. So, if you have a Bible, you can join me here in Esther chapter 1. Now it took place in the days of Ahasuerus, the Ahasuerus who reigned from India to Ethiopia, over 127 provinces. In those days, as King Ahasuerus sat on his royal throne, which was at the citadel in Susa, in the third year of his reign, he gave a banquet for all his princes and attendants, the army officers of Persia and Media, the nobles, and the princes of his provinces being in his presence. And He displayed the riches of His royal glory and the splendor of His great majesty for many days, 180 days." So, I'm going to stop here and pause as we go through. So we see this initial feast is going to last for five months. Now, many people feel that And it wasn't as though he brought all of those nobles and princes in for that whole five months, but it's likely that what he did is he brought them in maybe province at a time, a week at a time, different provinces, different nobles. So it's very possible that there were just people kind of circulating through according to however he had arranged this great feast, as we can sort of try to examine what's happening here. So moving on, verse five, when these days were completed, the king gave a banquet lasting seven days for all the people who were present at the citadel in Susa from the greatest to the least in the court of the garden of the king's palace. So after having entertained all of these nobles from distant provinces, he sort of brings to a close this great celebration, this great feast, with the people living there locally in the capital city. They're the ones who are going to be the sort of the honored guests here in this last and final week of feasting. There were hangings of fine white and violet linen held by cords of fine purple linen on silver rings and marble columns and couches of gold and silver on a mosaic pavement of porphyry, marble, mother of pearl, and precious stones. Drinks were served in golden vessels of various kinds." Now, we can only imagine, if you recall back in the days at the end of Babylon, when it was, taken over by the Persians. They were using the vessels, actually many of which had come from Jerusalem when they took the Jews out of captivity. And Belshazzar was using all of these golden vessels. So very likely these probably included some of those as well. And the royal wine was plentiful according to the king's bounty. The drinking was done according to the law. There was no compulsion, for the king had given orders to each official of his household that he should do according to the desire of each person. In other words, the people weren't compelled to drink a certain amount. That was something they would do sometimes, say, well, this is a feast, you must drink this much. of wine, and that would be too much for some. And so they actually showed some temperament here in saying, you choose. You're not compelled. Here's the wine. You can have it if you'd like it. Queen Vashti also gave a banquet for the women in the palace, which belonged to King Hasuerus. On the seventh day, when the heart of the king was merry with wine, he commanded mihumen, biztha, horbona, bigtha, abagtha, zithar, and karkas the seven eunuchs who served in the presence of King Oerris to bring Queen Vashti before the king with her royal crown in order to display her beauty to the people and the princes, for she was beautiful. But Queen Vashti refused to come at the king's command delivered by the eunuchs. Then the king became very angry and his wrath burned within him. Then the king said to the wise men who understood the times, for it was the custom of the king, so to speak, before all who knew law and justice and were close to him, Karshina, Sheethar, Admetha, Tarshish, Maris, Marcina, and Mimoukan, the seven princes of Persian media, who had access to the king's presence and sat in the first place in the kingdom. According to the law, what is to be done with Queen Vashti, because she did not obey the command of King Oasuarus delivered by the eunuchs. In the presence of the king and the princes, Mimuken said, Queen Vashti is wronged not only the king, but also all the princes and all the peoples who are in all the provinces of King Ahasuerus. For the queen's conduct will become known to all the women, causing them to look with contempt on their husbands by saying, King Ahasuerus commanded Queen Vashti to be brought into his presence, but she did not come. This day, the ladies of Persia and Medea will also have heard of the queen's conduct, will speak in the same way to all the king's princes, and there will be plenty of contempt and anger. If it pleases the king, let a royal edict be issued by him, and let it be written in the laws of Persia and Medea that it cannot be repeated, that Vashti may no longer come into the presence of King Huasuerus, and let the king give her royal position to another who is more worthy than she. When the king's edict, which he will make is heard throughout all his kingdom, great as it is, then all women will give honor to their husbands, great and small. This word pleased the king and the princes, and the king did as Mimoukan proposed. So he sent letters to all the king's provinces, to each province according to the script, and to every people according to the language, that every man should be the master in his own house, and the one who speaks in the language of his own people. In other words, oftentimes there would be people, a husband and wife who were of two varying descents, and maybe had two different native tongues. And he's saying, make sure that it's the husband's native tongue that will be the prevailing language used in that home as a way of demonstrating honor to the husband. So after these things, when the anger of King Oasweros had subsided, he remembered Vashti and what she had done and what had been decreed against her. Then the king's attendants who served him said, let beautiful young virgins be sought for the king. Let the king appoint overseers in all the provinces of his kingdom that they may gather every beautiful young virgin to the citadel of Susa, to the harem, into the custody of Hegai, the king's eunuch, who is in charge of the women, and let their cosmetics be given them. Then let the young lady who pleases the king be queen in place of Vashti. And the matter pleased the king, and he did accordingly. Now there was at the citadel in Susa a Jew whose name was Mordecai, the son of Jer, the son of Shimei, the son of Kish, a Benjamite, who had been taken into exile from Jerusalem with the captives who had been exiled with Jeconiah, king of Judah, whom Nebuchadnezzar, the king of Babylon, had exiled. He was bringing up Hadassah, that is, Esther, his uncle's daughter, for she had no father or mother. Now the young lady was beautiful in form and face, and when her father and mother had died, Mordecai took her as his own daughter. So it came about, when the command and decree of the king were heard, and many young ladies were gathered to the citadel of Susa in the custody of Haggai, that Esther was taken to the king's palace into the custody of Haggai, who was in charge of the women. Now the young lady pleased him and found favor with him. Stop right there. You need to pay attention to this phrase, found favor. And we're gonna see that happen a couple more times here in this passage. So he quickly provided her with cosmetics and food, gave her seven choice maids from the king's palace and transferred her and her maids to the best place in the harem. Esther did not make known her people or her kindred, for Mordecai had instructed her that she should not make them known. Every day Mordecai walked back and forth in front of the court of the harem to learn how Esther was and how she feared. Now when the turn of each young lady came to go into King Ahasuerus after the end of her twelve months under the regulations for the women, for the days of their beautification were completed as follows. Six months with oil of myrrh and six months with spices and the cosmetics for women. The young lady would go into the king in this way. Anything that she desired was given her to take with her from the harem to the king's palace. In the evening she would go in, and in the morning she would return to the second harem to the custody of Shashgaz, the king's eunuch who was in charge of the concubines. She would not again go into the king unless the king delighted in her and she was summoned by name. Now in the turn of Esther, the daughter of Abahail, the uncle of Mordecai, who had taken her as his daughter, came to go into the king. She did not request anything except what Haggai, the king's eunuch, who was in charge of the women, advised. And Esther found favor, here's the second time, in the eyes of all who saw her. So Esther was taken to King Ahasuerus to his royal palace in the tenth month, which is the month Tebeth, in the seventh year of his reign. So just a note here, Vashti was set aside during the third year of his reign. So we've now seen four years go past since that time. The king loved Esther more than all the women, and she found favor and kindness with him more than all the virgins, so that he set the royal crown on her head and made her queen instead of Ashti. Then the king gave a great banquet, Esther's banquet, for all the princes and his servants. He also made a holiday for the provinces and gave gifts according to the king's bounty. When the virgins were gathered together the second time, then Mordecai was sitting at the king's gate. Esther had not yet made known her kidred, or her people, even as Mordecai had commanded her. For Esther did what Mordecai told her, as she had done when under his care. In those days, while Mordecai was sitting at the king's gate, Bigthan and Teresh, two of the king's officials, from those who guarded the door, became angry and sought to lay hands on King Hasuerus. But the plot became known to Mordecai, and he told Queen Esther, and Esther informed the king in Mordecai's name. Now, when the plot was investigated and found to be so, they were both hanged on a gallows, and it was written in the Book of the Chronicles in the king's presence. So it's interesting because this good act of Mordecai is gonna come up later again in the story as something that God's going to use. This was no accidental thing. Again, it's even that particular situation was an act of providence. And interestingly as well, 18 years later, according to other historical records, Ahasuerus was murdered by Artabanus, the commander of the royal bodyguard. who was the most powerful official in the Persian court at that time. So while being spared from this plot of assassination on this occasion, ultimately that would be his fate. He would be assassinated and give way then to Artaxerxes would be the following Persian king after him. So in these first two chapters here, we really see a setting of the stage, how things are gonna be worked out here. And again, as I mentioned, I wanna begin with maybe just a couple, pulling out some lessons. There's a lot of things happening here in this story, maybe some things worth mentioning as we come through this, things that caught my attention. First tangential lesson that we see here is the vanity of wealth and pleasure. As we see King Vasqueres, who is at the zenith of the kingdom, and who is over all of these things with vast amounts of wealth. And yet, this little episode with Vashti just sets him off and makes him absolutely miserable. It says in Proverbs 17, one, better is a dry morsel and quietness with it than a house full of feasting with strife. And again, in the book of Ecclesiastes, the author says, I said to myself, come now, I will test you with pleasure. So enjoy yourself and behold it too is futility. I said of laughter, it is madness and a pleasure. What does it accomplish? It's sort of like if you've ever seen a picture or even seen it yourself out in the desert, this mirage, what's known as a mirage, something that appears to be a great body of water. And you go after that and you get up close to it and find out there's nothing there. It just vanishes, it's not real. And this idea of pursuing pleasure and wealth and position seems to hold before our human nature great promise and great reward, but in the end it doesn't deliver what it promises. I've often mused at the fact Have you ever passed someone driving a Mercedes-Benz that was smiling? Just an interesting comment. I'm sure there are people who smile that drive Mercedes-Benz. But usually when you pass someone driving a Mercedes, they're not smiling. Why is that? I have a particular memory etched in my mind, different memories I'll share here. One relating to a time when I was in Haiti on a missions trip. We, as a group, employed these guides who put us on these things they called horses, only they were so small and scrawny, I don't think that was the right name for them. I don't know what you could call them, but these beasts of burden. And they would lead the beast up the hill and we followed them up to this, to see this great fortress that's located there. And I convinced my, because I had a little bit of, experience riding horses, I convinced my guide that I was capable of taking care of my own beast. And so he let me just have reins. And it was one of the neatest experiences of my life is coming back down. I was separated out from the rest of the group coming down this little jungle road. And what struck me as we would come by each of these little huts and people that were living along the road who had absolutely nothing. I mean, they're just living in these little huts. how happy so many of them looked. And it really struck me. They've got nothing by any standard of anyone in this world. These people were absolutely impoverished, but they were joyful for whatever reason. And they seemed to be getting along just fine, at least at a superficial level. And it just sort of made me muse on the fact the deceit that Satan puts before us about various things that we think are going to make us happy. I also have a picture of those of you that know Nat and Marcia Bascom and they were back on furlough one time and my grandfather had this old, oh I don't know what kind of station wagon it was, but it was really old. Rust everywhere. It was terrible, because the dust on the road just went right into the vehicle, because there was no, like, back in the trunk, there was rust holes and whatnot. And I still remember one, just kind of those pictures. You capture your attention, and it gets etched in your brain, where they'd gone up as a family to go watch the sunset, and had just come back down the road. And they're piling out of this old junky station wagon, and they're laughing, and they're enjoying each other, and they're having such a wonderful time, and it just really, it caught my attention that way, just the, you know, so many times we think what's, the things that we think are going to make us happy are really not the things which can make us happy. In fact, in that Proverbs, I think it speaks to the fact that good relationships outweigh good times, good stuff, good positions, whatever. to be in, ultimately, to be in communion with God, to be in a right relationship with God, and to be abiding in loving and peaceful relationships with those around you is so much better than all that this world has to offer. And that's, you know, even our sinful nature is tied to these things, the lust of the eyes, the lust of the flesh, the pride of life, those are, that's what the world goes after. But we ought to run after those things which hold out a better reward. And really, ultimately, that's what our redemption is about. It's a restoration of right relationship. And with God, and through God, and through Christ, and we can be in right relationship with one another as well. And that's the way heaven's gonna be, right? And I think many of the wonderful things that we desire as well. I think we can see this, though, portrayed in the life of Hasuerus and this episode that unfolds here in this story. The second lesson, too, I wanted to consider. is this picture of the headship of the husband that comes out in this whole story. The whole concept of Vashti getting displaced and Esther coming into place revolves around this issue of a headship of a husband, and it's a good principle that's being upheld here with really bad examples. And so, the good principle is this, that God has ordained that a man ought to be the head of his home, and the wife ought to respect and honor him. That's according to God's good order, and it's a picture, ultimately, we see that pictured in Christ in the church. It has ties even to the gospel. We read in Ephesians, wives be subject to your own husbands as to the Lord. For the husband is the head of the wife, as Christ also is the head of the church. He himself being the savior in the body. But as the church is subject to Christ, so also the wives ought to be to their husbands in everything. Yet this honorable role as head of the home comes with an honorable duty. to love the wife sacrificially. It says, husbands, love your wives just as Christ also loved the church and gave himself up for her. Or we can also go to another passage, wives, be subject to your husbands as it is fitting in the Lord. Husbands, love your wives and do not be embittered against them. So there's responsibilities on both sides of this. And we see here in this text and even in this story that there seems to be at least some sort of acknowledgement of this creation order truth, what we can call a creation order truth, even in the midst of a pagan empire. But really bad examples of that being played out. Ahasuerus is not acting in a loving way to call Vashti out just to display her as though she's some sort of trophy of his. That's not the kind of love that a husband ought to have for his wife. She's like an object that he's gonna flaunt. And then he abruptly discards her in the midst of his tizzy. It's this terrible, terrible example. And on the other hand, we have Vashti who defiantly refuses his request, and just sort of an arrogant refusal. And that ends up costing her pretty dearly. So again, just would say we see here this good principle, the headship of the husband, a creation order truth, but we see it displayed in reference to some really poor examples. I wanna get in then to the meat here. What does this whole passage, we wanna look at and consider, what does it have to do with the issue of providence and preservation? And by the way, providence is really an outworking of sovereignty. Justin, as he was beginning the time last week, said, you know, this Esther is gonna be about the sovereignty of God. He's absolutely right. It is about the sovereignty of God. And that sovereignty is being worked out through providence. It's one way in which God is working out His sovereignty in the affairs of this world across time for the care and the preservation of His people. So what can we learn about providence and preservation here? First of all, God's providence is mysterious. God's providence is mysterious. We see God using, in this case, even the folly and the sin of man, in serving his own purpose. And this is really a very mysterious thing. How is it that God, on the one hand, gives man a will to make choices, and yet his will always supersedes? And commenting on this aspect, as it relates to the book of Esther, William Morehead remarks, Who shapes and guides the events of the world? Statesmen? Politicians? Armies? Only in a very subordinate way. Every wheel and screw, every shaft, pivot, and belt in the complicated machinery of human affairs is under the hand of Him who is unseen and nameless, and yet who controls and conducts all things according to His sovereign will. Nevertheless, he seems to stand apart from them and at a distance. It is appropriate, therefore, that in a book devoted to the elucidation of God's mysterious providence, his name should be omitted." Again, referring here to the fact that in Esther, we don't even see God being named or mentioned, but we know that he is over all of these things that are happening. His providence is really mysterious because of this fact. His ways are so far above ours. And that's an important truth for us to get a hold of. We need to understand that God is in control. We also have to understand that we can't understand everything that He's doing. It says in Isaiah 55 verses 8 through 9, For my thoughts are not your thoughts, nor are your ways my ways, declares the Lord. For as the heavens are higher than the earth, so are my ways higher than your ways, and my thoughts than your thoughts. Thought one commentator put it well, he said, Providence is secret, mysterious, and even unintelligible until its ends are revealed. Until its ends are revealed. William Cooper wrote an entire song about this issue entitled, God Moves in a Mysterious Way. I'll just read you the first and last verses. And this is something that the song will probably refer back to because so much of the content is applicable and ties in very much to what we see happening here in Esther. God moves in mysterious ways, wonders to perform. He plants his footsteps in the sea and rides upon the storm. And then that's how he begins his last verse. Blind unbelief is sure to err and scan his work in vain. God is his own interpreter and he will make it plain. So here's what I want you to take home. This is what we want to glean here in terms of application. We need to be careful in attempting to read God's providence beyond what He has already revealed according to His Word. Because unless we can discern well His end, we cannot understand His way. And I mentioned that last week. There's been times in my life where I see a dark cloud coming that looks like it's full of rain, and I'm just sure it's what God has sent because I've prayed for rain. And that cloud comes and passes on by. There's going to be things that happen in our lives where we know God's in control and you can almost say, I see, I see the clouds moving. I see things happening. I know you're doing something. But we may not have the privilege and the ability, we don't, to fully comprehend what it is that He's working out. And so it's never wrong to say and ask ourselves this question. And those of you that maybe went through the Blackabee series, Knowing God, he brings this up. It's always good to look around and say, what is it that God is doing? I want to be a part of what God is doing. What is he doing? And I wanna make my will bend to his. I wanna see what he's doing and go with him in this thing. But we have to be very careful in trying to figure it all out because oftentimes the path that he takes is not the path that we would have taken to get to the end point. And we know the end point. We're gonna, I don't wanna talk about this too much today because this issue's gonna come up again later. We have clues. We know where it's all headed. He has given us the end point. So we do know where things will finally arrive. But how the path will land there, we don't have all of those details. So we have to be very careful in trying to read God's providence. The second thing we see here is God's preservation through human agency. And perhaps this is one of the greatest mysteries of God's providence, that He not only uses nature in working out His providence, but human agency in the unfolding of His great plan of redemption. And we see this time and time again in Scripture, how God chooses certain individuals and marks them out And the reason I want you to pay attention to this idea of found favor, you often see that term associated with these people. They find favor with God, with rulers. with other people, with the Lord's, the angel of the Lord, and it manifests itself in various ways, but all of this is the doing of God to bring this status of favor upon them in such a way that he prepares them to become an instrument in the preservation of his people. It's tied together with his selection. He chooses out, he marks out certain people, and he sort of crowns them with this favorable status. And he does so so that they can go and intervene for his people. And the amazing thing about this, as we consider, How he does this is that it's in the context of God's people having failed. And this is merciful, it's gracious, it's all of that. Because the reason he has to bring someone in to deliver the people is because they've failed and they need deliverance. And that's even the context here, right? These people are in captivity because the Jews had rebelled against God, he had warned them. Don't do that, don't do that, don't do that. They kept doing it. They got sent into exile. They're under the discipline of God. And yet, as we see time and time again, God chooses somebody out and marks them out to get them out of the mess, right? So just some examples. Noah, we're told, found favor in the eyes of God. Joseph. found favor in the eyes of Potiphar, in the eyes of the jailer, and then later in the eyes of Pharaoh. Moses found favor in the eyes of the Egyptians and in the presence of God. Gideon found favor in the side of the angel of the Lord. Samuel found favor, we're told, with the Lord and with men. David found favor in God's sight. And a little later down the path from this story, Nehemiah finds favor from King Artaxerxes in order to return and help the Jews rebuild the walls of Jerusalem. But interestingly here in the book of Esther, six times, I think there's either nine or 10 references if you look up the word favor here in the book, six of these times, particularly relating to Esther gaining favor with someone. Three of these here in the passage that we're looking at this morning. She finds favor with Haggai, with other members of the royal court, and then the king himself. God is marking Esther out to be a selected representative that will deliver his people from destruction. That's what's happening. In fact, as we were going through Genesis 45, chapter 45 verse seven, Who was reading that this morning on Blanken? Whoever read that? Who read that? Floyd. As Floyd was reading that, verse seven caught my attention. Just listen to this verse. Now this is in reference to Joseph describing what God had done through his brother's sinful acts in order to deliver them. And this is what he says. He says, and God sent me before you to preserve you for a remnant on the earth, and to keep you alive by a great deliverance." We could have put that right in Esther's mouth, couldn't we? And all of this, all of this is pointing us to Christ. Christ is our select representation. In other words, God's providential preservation is accomplished through selected representation of which Christ is the ultimate expression. Jesus is truly the decisive instrument of God's favor. Now, we know from other passages that his election, the election of Christ, or God choosing Christ, happened before the foundation of the world. But we see it in the pages of Scripture, in his conception, and the favor gets transferred to Mary, because she's the one in whom he's being conceived. But listen to the passage here out of Luke. And coming in, the angel said to her, greetings, favored one. The Lord is with you. But she was very perplexed at the statement and kept pondering what kind of salutation this was. The angel said to her, do not be afraid, Mary, for you have found favor with God. And behold, you will conceive in your womb and bear a son and you shall name him Jesus. He will be great and will be called the Son of the Most High. And the Lord will give him the throne of his father David and he will reign over the house of Jacob forever and his kingdom will have no end. Then, as we see the testimony of Jesus growing from a child into a man, it says this, And Jesus kept increasing in wisdom and in stature, and in favor with God and man. At his baptism, the declaration made from the heavens, and behold, a voice out of the heavens said, This is my beloved Son, in whom I am well pleased. The favor of God. upon him at the onset of his ministry. He comes into Nazareth where he'd been brought up. And as it was his custom, he enters the synagogue in the Sabbath and stood up to read. And the book of the prophet Isaiah was handed to him. And he opened the book and found the place where it was written, the spirit of the Lord is upon me because he anointed me to preach the gospel to the poor. He has sent me to proclaim release to the captives and recovery of sight to the blind, to set free those who are oppressed, to proclaim the favorable year of the Lord. He closed the book, gave it back to the attendant, and sat down, and the eyes of all in the synagogue were fixed on him. And he began to say to them, today this scripture has been fulfilled in your hearing. And at his transfiguration, while he was still speaking, a bright cloud overshadowed them, and behold, a voice out of the cloud said, this is my beloved son, with whom I am well pleased. Listen to him. God appointed Christ to be our advocate, the one that would represent His people for the purpose of their salvation. You've heard the phrase, having friends in high places. In Christ, we have a friend, the best of friends, in the highest of places. John says, we have an advocate with the Father, Jesus Christ, the righteous. Or as we read in 1 Peter 1.20, for he was foreknown before the foundation of the world, but has appeared in these last times for the sake of you, who through him are believers in God, who raised him up, I'm sorry, who raised him from the dead and gave him glory so that your faith and hope are in God. Or in 1 Timothy 2, verses 5-6, For there is one God and one mediator, also between God and men, the man Jesus Christ, who gave himself as a ransom for all, the testimony given at the proper time. Christ, in other words, is the ultimate manifestation. of God's providential preservation as the selected representative of His people, raised up for the salvation of His people at the proper time. As we go back and we think about all of these other instances that I gave you of people upon whom God's favor rested that were selected representatives for the people of God, consider that the reason that happened is because there was some great peril hanging over the people. and he's gonna use that person as a deliverance. So the next episode, we're going to see how this selected representation is for a perilous intervention. That will be next week. So I wanna close here this morning with the kids' questions. Last week, I asked you these questions. I said, what is the book of Esther about? And we said, Esther is a story about God's providence and preserving his people. What is providence? Providence is God directing all things for his own purpose. And then this week, we're gonna add to this, these questions. How does God preserve his people? Through selected representation, which ultimately is found in Jesus. Let's close in a word of prayer. Heavenly Father, we just thank you for the advocate that you have selected for us. Lord, all other selected representatives really falling short. None of them able to accomplish for your people what we needed. And yet you chose Christ, the perfect man, the God-man, who is perfectly able to satisfy all of our needs and bring about the deliverance, the ultimate deliverance that we needed. And Lord, we just wanna praise You for that and praise You for the mercy that You have shown that wasn't deserved, the grace that You have bestowed upon us in bringing Him to us. Pray that again, Lord, just that this story would serve then as a reminder of those truths to us as we walk through it. We pray these things in His name. Amen. So I just want to give an occasion then to open it up for any of the men in the church that might have a question, a comment, a correction, addition, or something else the Lord has placed in your heart for the edification of the body. It was a perversion of his relationship. He wanted to display his wife for the pleasure of men, and she refused, and good for her. And then he goes out to the kingdom and says, look what's happened here. You guys are heads of your wives, and your wives should behave that way. That is wrong. So we need to be sure to convey that, that this is a perversion of the headship. You're absolutely right, Floyd. Thank you for clarifying that. It definitely is a perversion. Very bad examples of a good principle. So yeah, we want to distinguish out very clearly those two. the burden that continues to today in the descendants of those people. Right. Yeah, you're right. Right. Absolutely true. And so we can see errors. You can either dump the principle, the good principle, and just turn it upside down and say, no, that's not how you should be, the egalitarian movement. because we see bad examples of that being played out, but we don't want to do that either. We want to uphold the principle that's good when it's done the way it should be. How do we know how it should be done? We look at Christ in the church. Any other thoughts? Yeah, you had given the example of a person driving a car down a road and he shakes his head and something's on his head. I guess one of the things I was meditating on But I guess one of the things I want everyone to consider is when they look at us driving a 19 something or other, jalopy, Chevy Ford, doesn't matter, what do they see in us? I think that's the other part of that equation when we're looking on someone, but what do they see coming from us? That's a great point. Godliness with contentment is great gain. Paul learned to be content with much and with little, and we ought to be too. You should be able to drive a Mercedes with a smile on your face. So, right, it's, I think, and I'm glad you said something, it's not those things that are wrong, it's the pursuit of those things and the vanity of those sorts of things in our ultimate, finding our ultimate satisfaction and joy. Relationships, you know, The whole of the scriptures really boils down to relationship, our relationship to God, ultimately. So we just have to make sure that we're searching for the right things. All right, I'll go ahead and turn it over to Matt.