The sermon you are about to hear was recorded at Grace Baptist Church, Cape Coral, Florida. For additional sermons and more information, visit our website at truegraceofgod.org. Well, I worked very hard to make the middle school basketball team. It was a struggle for me. I remember going to tryouts day in and day out, and then I was very encouraged when I found out that I had made the team. But I wasn't a star by any means. About the only thing that I guarded was the water cooler on the bench. But there was a key game in which I had my first time to step on the court. And the coach put me in. And it was one of those moments in basketball where you need to be very observant, because someone was shooting free throws. And the thing that you need to pay most attention to, if you're the one that's about to rebound a free throw, is who is shooting the ball. Is it the guy on your team, or is it the guy on the other team, because if it's the guy on the other team, you should not rebound it and put it back in the basket, which is exactly what I did, and thus scored for the other team. Imagine the look on my players' teammates' faces. They looked at me in bewilderment, saying, whose side are you on? Well, in the world today, there is great confusion over that question when it comes to God. When it comes to God, whose side are you on? Are you on His side? Or are you not on His side? Now, some people would claim that there's only one side, that everyone is on the side of God. There might be a kernel of truth in that, in the sense that God has created everyone. God has created man in His own image. And in that sense, indeed, we are all creatures of God. The Bible has an insider-outsider theme that runs all the way through it. Right off the bat in the garden, we see that there are going to be two seeds. There is going to be the seed of the serpent who tempted Adam and Eve, and there's going to be the seed of the woman. And there's going to be enmity or hatred between these two seeds. When Abraham comes along in the Bible, we see that there are those who are with Abraham and thus with God, and that there are those who are not with Abraham. When Moses comes along in the Bible, we see that there are those who are with Moses and the Israelites, and then there are those who are not with Moses and the Israelites. When David comes along, there are those who are under David's kingship, and then there are those who are not under David's kingship. And when Jesus comes along, we see that there are those who are with Jesus, and that there are those who are not with Jesus. So the question before us is, whose side are you on? And how does God relate to these two types of people in the world? Those who are His people and those who are not His people. That's the question this sermon answers. How does God relate to these two types of people? It's my hope that all who are not on Christ's team this morning would join it by the end of this sermon. That has been my prayer this week. Oh God, help us to see how you relate to us as God's people and help anyone who might hear this sermon. who is not one of your people to become one of your people, to trusting your son, Jesus Christ. Turn with me in your Bible to Esther chapter seven and verse one. If you're using the Bible that's provided in the seats, you're going to find that on page 414 of that Bible. Our story picks up with God's old Testament people, the Jews living as subjects of the Persian empire. It's important to see that God himself had exiled them there for their disobedience. God had been so good to the Jews. He'd brought them out of slavery in Egypt. He had given them the 10 commandments. He had set King David over them, but the Jews were disobedient to God and therefore God came in and exiled them, scattered them, destroyed the temple in Jerusalem so that God's people are now far from home and they're under the authority of the Persian empire, a foreign nation. One of these Persian officials named Haman planned to kill all the Jews. This Haman was a longtime enemy of God and his people. But a Jew named Esther became the queen of Persia. And the kicker is that the king of Persia had no idea that Esther was a Jew. He didn't know that this work that Haman had done to destroy all the Jews meant that his very own wife would be destroyed. So, as chapter seven begins, Esther is about to spring it on the king, that his right-hand man, Haman, is trying to kill her. and all of her people. Follow along with me in your Bible as I read Esther chapter 7 and chapter 8. So the king and Haman went in to feast with Queen Esther. And on the second day, as they were drinking wine after the feast, the king again said to Esther, what is your wish, Queen Esther? It shall be granted you. And what is your request? Even to the half of my kingdom, it shall be fulfilled. Then Queen Esther answered, If I have found favor in your sight, O king, and if it please the king, let my life be granted me for my wish and my people for my request. For we have been sold, I and my people, to be destroyed, to be killed, and to be annihilated. If we had been sold merely as slaves, men and women, I would have been silent, for our affliction is not to be compared with the loss to the king. Then King Ahasuerus said to Queen Esther, who is he and where is he who has dared to do this? And Esther said, a foe and enemy, this wicked Haman. Then Haman was terrified before the king and the queen. And the king arose in his wrath from the wine drinking and went into the palace garden. But Haman stayed to beg for his life from Queen Esther, for he saw that harm was determined against him by the king. 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. Then Harbonah, one of the eunuchs in attendance on the king said, moreover, the gallows that Haman has prepared for Mordecai, whose word saved the king, is standing at Haman's house 50 cubits high. And the king said, hang him on that. So they hanged Haman on the gallows that he had prepared for Mordecai. Then the wrath of the king abated. On that day, King Ahasuerus gave to Queen Esther the house of Haman, the enemy of the Jews. And Mordecai came before the king for Esther had told what he was to her. And the king took off his signet ring, which he had taken from Haman and gave it to Mordecai. And Esther set Mordecai over the house of Haman. Then Esther spoke again to the king. She fell at his feet and wept and pleaded with him to avert the evil plan of Haman the Agagite and the plot that he had devised against the Jews. When the king held out the golden scepter to Esther, Esther rose and stood before the king and he said, And she said, if it pleased the king, and if I have found favor in the sight of the king, and if the thing seems right before the king, and I am pleasing in his eyes, let an order be written to revoke the letters devised by Haman the Agagite, the son of Hamadathah, which he wrote to destroy the Jews who are in all the provinces of the king. For how can I bear to see the calamity that is coming to my people? Or how can I bear to see the destruction of my kindred? Then King Ahasuerus said to Queen Esther and to Mordecai the Jew, Behold, I have given Esther the house of Haman, and they have hanged him on the gallows because he intended to lay hands on the Jews. But you may write as you please with regard to the Jews in the name of the king and seal it with the king's ring. For an edict written in the name of the king and sealed with the king's ring cannot be revoked. The king's scribes were summoned at that time in the third month, which is the month of Sivan, on the 23rd day. And an edict was written according to all that Mordecai commanded concerning the Jews, to the satraps and the governors and the officials of the provinces from India to Ethiopia, 127 provinces, to each province in its own script and to each people in its own language, and also to the Jews in their script and their language. And he wrote in the name of King Ahasuerus and sealed it with the king's signet ring. Then he sent the letters by mounted couriers riding on swift horses that were used in the king's service, bred from the royal stud, saying that the king allowed the Jews who were in every city to gather and defend their lives, to destroy, to kill, and to annihilate any armed force of any people or province that might attack them, children and women included. and to plunder their goods on one day throughout all the provinces of King Ahasuerus on the 13th day of the 12th month, which is the month of Adar. A copy of what was written was to be issued as a decree in every province, being publicly displayed to all peoples, and the Jews were to be ready on that day to take vengeance on their enemies. 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. Then Mordecai went out from the presence of the king in royal robes of blue and white, with a great golden crown and a robe of fine linen and purple, and the city of Susa shouted and rejoiced. 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 of the peoples of the country declared themselves Jews for fear of the Jews had fallen on them. God destroys his enemies and delivers his people. That's what this passage of scripture teaches us. That is how God relates to man. Each and every person falls into one of these two categories. You are either in the kingdom of darkness or you are in the kingdom of light. You are either spiritually dead or you are spiritually alive. You are either blind or you see you are deaf or you hear you are one of God's people or you are one of his enemies. that we might be reassured of how God relates to us as his people, and that if there is anyone here who is not a part of his people, we're going to consider this text three parts of it. First, we will consider that God destroys his enemies. Second, that God delivers his people. And finally, that he does all of this for Christ's sake. An inescapable truth of the passage before us is that God destroys his enemies. Many people have come to think that that is a distasteful truth, an unbelievable truth, an unjust truth. Some would try to say that this God of the Old Testament is somehow different than the God of the New Testament. But God does not change. He is the same yesterday, today, and forever. He has made clear in his word that he will judge his enemies. In the passage before us, we see a shadow of the coming judgment. We should not cry that God's judgment is unfair because God destroys his enemies justly. You can't help but see the justice of this story. This Haman character was a corrupt man. As we see him go to the very gallows that he had prepared for Mordecai, Mordecai, an innocent man, Mordecai, who had actually sought the good of the king. And we see Haman going to those gallows inside. We say, you know what? That serves him right. He was the one that was going out trying to kill everybody. He wasn't satisfied only killing Mordecai. He wanted to kill every last Jew just because Mordecai was a Jew. And we saw last week that this Haman character is so corrupt that he goes home and he begins to boast of all of his accomplishments to his wife and friends. And he has the audacity to tell his wife how many sons he has. This was a guy who was all about himself and he meets his end in a just way. God has placed this sense of justice in each and every one of us. And this story draws it out of us. It was right for Haman to be punished because he had done wrong. But the Bible doesn't only say that Haman was a sinner. The Bible says that every last one of us, just like Haman, are sinners. That we have turned our back on God. That we have taken up the arms of rebellion against Him. This is the problem with our sin. It's sin against a holy God. Oh, listen, young people and listen, children, when we do wrong, when we do wrong, we're not just doing wrong against someone else. We're not just doing wrong against mom and dad. We're doing wrong against God. This is our great problem. We've taken a shot at the holy, most high God. He is pure and he's righteous in every way. And when we offend his law, we offend him. Therefore, it is perfectly right for God. to send us to hell apart from him, away from his presence. It's just of him. It's certainly right then that God destroys his enemies and his wrath. Do you see the wrath of Ahasuerus here in the passage? He arises from this feast, finding out that Haman is seeking to lay his hands on his wife. He goes away trying to compose himself and thinking about what he's going to do only to come back into the place where they were feasting. And while Haman is trying to beg for his life, he's falling upon the couch where Esther is and the king is enraged. Will he lay his hands on my wife in my very own house, he says. And so God Almighty has wrath. Because we have sought to lay our hands on what is most precious to him, we have sought to do harm to his glory. The Bible says that God is angry with the wicked every day. It's not a day that goes by that God is not wrathful toward the wicked. The Bible says that he abhors the bloodthirsty and deceitful man and the judgment, the destruction that all will face who are apart from Christ is a judgment of God's anger. Being that God is so angry, it makes sense that God destroys his enemies suddenly. You notice how quickly it unraveled for Haman. In one moment he was sitting at the feast enjoying fat and rich foods, enjoying sweet wine with the king and Esther. And in a moment the tables turned on him. Esther said, I've been sold. Who has done this? A foe and an enemy that wicked Haman. And in one moment, an instant, everything turned around for Haman. He who thought he was going to get everything that he desired, found out that he got nothing that he desired. And so friends, the judgment of God will come swiftly. Jesus says that he's going to come when we least expect it. The world will be going on as usual. It will just be another day of the week. People will be doing what people have always done. And in a moment, everything will be changed. How foolish it is to think that you can put off repentance until tomorrow. We are not promised tomorrow. Haman didn't get a tomorrow. We're not promised to make it to the end of this sermon alive. The Bible says that death comes and then comes judgment and an instant his destruction will come. The edict to the edict itself. You notice it went out swiftly. It went out hurriedly. It went out by horses that were bred from the Royal stud to ensure that this judgment, this execution on all those who would raise their hand against God's people, This judgment would be executed swiftly. And there is no escaping this judgment of God. For God destroys every last one of his enemies. The kingdom of Persia was vast, 127 provinces from India to Ethiopia. You would think in a land that large that you could hide from this destruction that was going to come. But do you notice? that Mordecai ensured that it was written in every language of every people and that every governor and every state rep and every official knew exactly what was going on because anyone who was an enemy of the Jews was going to die. Men, women, children who raised their hands against God's people were going to die. There was no escape. Mordecai himself was an official of King Ahasuerus. He had reached the highest place that you could reach. And you would think if you're going to be safe anywhere, you can be safe if you're the right hand man to the king. But even Haman was not protected. So God's word to you today, men, women and children, is that no one is going to escape the judgment of God. On the last day. Every single person who has ever lived in all places will be gathered together at that great judgment throne to look at the God man, Jesus Christ, and to be judged according to their works. Christian, God destroys his enemies. And if you were on his team and on his side, that means he destroys your enemies. There's sweet truth for you here. You have enemies. The devil is your enemy. He stands against you. And the message for you this morning is that God has triumphed over the devil. Christ has triumphed over the devil at the cross. Jesus Christ came into this world and he is bound up the devil. And though the devil may tempt you and taunt you, Christ put him to public shame at the cross. And there's a day coming when the Lord Jesus Christ will return and he will cast him into a lake of fire, never to tempt you, never to taunt you, never to depress you, never to steal away all of your comfort in Christ. That day's coming for you, Christian, because God destroys his enemies. You have an enemy called sin. God destroys sin. Christ destroy sin. Christ has struck down sin as the king of your heart. When you were born again by the spirit before you were born again, before you became one of God's people, sin reigned on your heart. You were under the dominion of sin. All that you could ever do is sin. But as you heard God's word and as the spirit came to take a residence in your life, guess what happened? Sin got struck down from that throne. And even now, the sin that remains in your flesh, no longer your king, Christ is your king, but the sin that remains in your flesh, you know what God is doing right now for you. He's destroying your sin. He's vanquishing your sin. Even now through his word and spirit, he is putting sin to death in you and encouraging you to join him in that battle. It will destroy all of your enemies. You have an enemy, it's called death. It's the last enemy. and God will destroy death utterly and completely. There will be no more weeping. There will be no more sorrow. There will be no more grieving because death itself will be done away with completely as we are raised up on that last day to enjoy fellowship together and fellowship with Christ forevermore. Unbelieving friend, the message to you is God destroys his enemies. So repent of your sin and trust Christ. You don't want to be one of God's enemies. This is a warning. It's such a kind warning. It's going out and you need to say, you know what? I'm not going to say that's unfair of God because we've all sinned against God. And I'm not going to pretend as if I have more time to consider this, because it's going to come so sudden, I don't even have another minute guaranteed to me in this life. Turn away from your sin to Christ. Flee to Christ. Join yourself to God's people. The same way some of these Persians joined themselves to the Jews. Turn away from your sin to God. be encouraged to join God's people, seeing, secondly, that God delivers his people. That is how God relates to those he has made his own. And there's no sweeter news than this. It's pictured here in these two chapters before us. Notice first that God saves his people from destruction. The Jews had a terrible decree. If you haven't been with us, you need to know in the chapter previously, the same decree that went out that said the Jews could destroy their enemies. That decree was actually made against them. Their enemies were able to kill, to destroy, and to annihilate them. And you see, God delivers them from that judgment. In a similar but also distinct way, God's people have been delivered from ultimate destruction. The Jews, what they faced here in Persia was a physical destruction at the hands of their earthly enemies. But Christian, what you and I faced outside of Christ before we came to Christ was not a physical destruction from the hands of a physical enemy, but was spiritual destruction from the hands of a spiritual enemy from the hands of God himself. The one that we have set ourselves against this God was set against us in this God was going to execute an eternal destruction upon us. Listen to what Charles Spurgeon once said about this. He said you must believe or be damned, sayeth the Bible. and mark that threat of God is as unchangeable as God himself. And when a thousand years of hell's torments shall have passed away, you shall look on high and see written in burning letters of fire, he that believeth not shall be damned. But Lord, I am damned. Nevertheless, it says shall be still. And when a million ages have rolled away and you are exhausted by your pains and agonies, you shall turn up your eye and still read, shall be damned, unchanged, unaltered. And when you shall have thought that eternity must have spun out its last thread, that every particle of that which we call eternally must have run out, you shall still see it written upon there, shall be damned. Oh, terrific thought, how dare I utter it, but I must. Ye must be warned, sirs, lest ye also come into this place of torment. The judgment of God, the destruction of God is eternal. It is never ending. Brothers and sisters in Christ, you've been delivered from that destruction. You'll never know that destruction. You will never know the eternal wrath of God. You will never be separated from him. Friend, how could you wait any longer to confess Christ? How could you wait any longer to turn to Christ? Call upon him and you can be spared this destruction. You do not have to do better to join God's people because notice here, God delivers his people graciously. The Jews were in Persia because they had sinned against God. God sent them there as an exile because they were disobedient to Him. They didn't deserve to be saved. They deserved exactly what they had coming to them. Esther and Mordecai, we've already seen that they're not perfect examples for us. They were full of sin, full of mistakes. And so we look at this text and we say, yes, God's people, but God's people didn't deserve to be saved. Look at what they had done. And so God saves his people, not because of their good works, but because of his grace. There's not a single one of us that have deserved to be delivered. Ephesians 2 says it is by grace you have been saved through faith. And this is not your own doing. This is the gift of God. It's his mercy and his kindness that has made us one of his people. The deliverance only gets sweeter when we see that God delivers his people unto honor. He didn't just spare them destruction, but he raised them up. Did you see that in the two chapters? What did Mordecai get when Haman went down? Mordecai got his signet ring. The king's signet ring that was Haman's came to Mordecai. Esther got Haman's house and then put Mordecai over the house. And the text says that the Jews were raised up to honor as they plundered their enemies. Likewise, God delivers his people unto honor. The Bible says that he has raised us up and seated us with Christ in the heavenly places. 1 Peter 2.9 says of Christians, But you are a chosen race, a royal priesthood, a holy nation. He has made us like shining stars in the midst of a crooked and twisted generation. Christian, God has raised you up to a place of honor. You're seated with Christ. You're going to rule and to reign with Christ. as one who is worthy of honor because you're in Christ. What a remarkable salvation He's worked for us. Not only honor, but gladness. God delivers His people into gladness. The Jews, chapter 8, verse 16 says, had light, gladness, and joy. There was so much joy among the Jews that they had a feast and a holiday. Can you imagine as they received this decree, as it went out and you could see those horses ride up to your village in some distant part of the Persian empire and you got the second decree that said, you're not going to die at the hands of your enemies, but rather you will live. You will live as your enemies. Can you imagine the rejoicing that went on in those villages? They'd been delivered. And if they could rejoice in a physical deliverance, if they could rejoice in a temporal deliverance, how much more New Covenant Christian can you rejoice in your eternal deliverance, your spiritual deliverance and physical deliverance on the last day when your body's raised up out of the ground and your soul's reunited to your body and you live forever with the Lord Jesus Christ. We sit down to feast with him for all of eternity. Oh, brothers and sisters, we should repent that we are not more joyful. We're not thinking rightly. If we're cast down in despair only, we're not thinking rightly. God has promised that he's not going to withhold anything good from us. He's going to turn everything that happens for us into a blessing for us. God delivers his people and he delivers them unto joy. Psalm 16 says in the presence of the Lord, there's fullness of joy and at his right hand are pleasures for evermore. That's ours. That's God's deliverance. God delivers all of his people. Not a single one of them are left out. You might say, well, you don't know my struggle. You don't know how far off in the Persian empire I am. I'm one of those distant villages. I'm afraid that God will not get me. Oh brothers and sisters, he will get you. This message went out to everyone and his salvation is going out to all those who are in Christ. Christian, be assured of this today. God will deliver you. Unbelieving friend, Be sure to this today. You don't have to face that destruction. There is remarkable deliverance. It is a sure deliverance. This deliverance is sealed with the King's signet ring. It comes with all the authority of the Most High God. Call upon the name of the Lord and you will be saved. God says this. And God is not like man that he should lie. Trust in the Lord. And you'll know this joy, gladness and honor in Christ. But why is it that God justly destroys his enemies and graciously delivers his people? This text tells us something about the coming Lord Jesus Christ. We see this. God destroys his enemies and delivers his people for the sake of Christ. This is very important as you look to an Old Testament text. God relates to human beings according to the God-man, Jesus Christ. At the time of Esther, Jesus Christ was not to come into the world for nearly another 500 years. But Christ has said that the whole Bible is about him. He's on every page. And so we see him here in this story. Notice this, in destroying Haman and delivering the Jews, God was clearing the way for the coming Savior. He was clearing the way for the coming savior. If you go back to the very beginning of the Bible, you hear God say to the devil who had tempted us, he said to the devil, I'm going to put enmity between your seed and the seed of the woman. You're going to Bruce's heel. He's going to crush your head. And so we have a promise that one is going to come from the woman from Eve. One's going to come and he's going to crush the head of the serpent. Who is that one going to be? That's the Lord Jesus Christ. But as the story goes on in the Bible, we see God dealing with Abraham and he says, through you, blessing shall come to the nations. And so we see promise that that seed is going to come through a particular people. That is the Jews of the old Testament. He's going to come through Abraham. He's going to come through the Jews. Well, what is Haman doing now in Persia? If not setting himself against that eternal salvation plan of God, what would happen if he killed every last Jew? Well, the coming seed would not come because God had promised that the seed was going to come through the Jews. And Haman is trying to kill every last single Jew on the planet. so that the promised savior would never come. This is what the enemy was doing. He was attacking God's plan of salvation. This is why God said to Abraham all the way back at the beginning of the Bible, anyone who curses you or who dishonors you, I will curse because he's protecting his old Testament people, the Jews, because he's protecting the coming Messiah. Do you see how sure the salvation of God is Christian? God is not going to allow some pagan official in Persia named Haman stand against his saving purposes. He is going to see that Christ comes into the world. He is going to see that all those who are called by his name are redeemed in the blood of Jesus Christ. And now we stand on this side of history and we look back and we say, Christ has come. Christ has come. And God doesn't let any enemy stand in the way of his salvation of you. So no weapon formed against you shall remain. No attack of the enemy, no matter how vicious, no matter how intense, is going to remain. Do you see what God does to those who stand in the way of his salvation of you? He sees Haman on the gallows. He ensures that salvation is going to come. Did you observe also that King Ahasuerus made his decisions because he was pleased with Esther? Again and again, as Esther speaks to the king, she says, if I have found favor in your sight, if I am pleasing in your eyes, please spare my people, grant to me my people, if I am pleasing in your eyes. This was an important thing for King Ahasuerus and the whole situation because King Ahasuerus just loved himself. And he loved Esther. But there was no other reason that a service was going to do anything good for these people. But Esther was pleasing to him. Esther was right in his eyes, and it was in behalf of Esther that he saved Esther's people in the same way the holy and just God is only pleased with the Lord Jesus Christ. God is only pleased with His Son. There are not a single one of us who have pleased God, who have done what He has told us to do. He has given us His commandments, His law. He has told us, do not murder. He has told us, do not commit adultery. He has told us, worship Me and only Me, God says. And all down the line, we have broken his law and cast it to the side. But one has come, and his name is Jesus of Nazareth. He was born of the Virgin Mary. This Jesus Christ kept every last part of God's law. He pleased God. We hear God at the baptism of Christ say what? This is my son with whom I am well pleased. We hear him again at the Mount of Transfiguration in the Gospels. God says, this is my son with whom I am well pleased. And so the message for us is the only way to please God is to come to the sun, is to be in the sun. We cannot work our way to Him. We cannot do enough good deeds. We cannot come to church enough. You cannot read the Bible enough. You cannot pray enough. You must come to the Son. You must be united to the Son. You must join yourself to Esther's people, to Esther's God. And the way you do that is you call on the name of the risen Christ. You trust Christ for your salvation. believe upon him and what will happen is God will be pleased with you because he's pleased with his son because you are in the sun. This being the case that God grants eternal life to Christ's people for Christ's sake, we must turn from sin and death to Christ and life. We must turn from sin and death to Christ in life. Do you notice how many plot turns there are in this book? The gallows that were prepared for Mordecai turned to become Haman's gallows. The decree of destruction prepared for the Jews turns to become the enemy's decree of destruction. The anger Haman had for Mordecai, this vicious, prideful anger, turns to become the anger of the king toward Haman. Haman wanted a Jew to bow down to him. And Haman meets his demise, bowing down to a Jew, Esther. Haman's ring turns out to go to Mordecai. Haman's house turns out to go to Esther. The feast Haman enjoyed at the outset of the passage turns out to become a feast of the Jews at the end of the passage. This first decree that went out that the Jews were to be destroyed resulted in despair among the Jews. But the second decree that went out turned out to result in the joy of the Jews. There are these mighty swings, these turns of plot that go on in the book. And the signal to us is that we must turn to the Lord Jesus Christ. If you would be spared those gallows, then you must turn to the Lord Jesus Christ. If you would be spared having your signet ring stripped away, having your house stripped away, then you must turn to the Lord Jesus Christ. If you would be spared this decree of destruction that went out, you must turn to the Lord Jesus Christ. He's the only one who can save. Oh, Christ is all friend. He's the one to whom you must turn. You must look to Christ. This Jesus Christ has lived. He has died. He is risen again. He is alive today. He is able to save to the uttermost all those who call upon his name. Friend. Why would you not come to Christ? If these things are true, it's the most important thing in your life to know if these are true. Is this just some book or is this the word of the living God? Can he take your life away right now? Can he strip you of everything that you enjoy in this world right now? Can God do that? Is he just to do that? Can he do that swiftly? The answer is yes. This is what God has revealed. Could it be that you can wake up day after day after day in eternity and only know the wrath of God, only know the judgment of God, not know any other pleasure in this world? Are these things true? If they're true, then how could you not come to Christ right now, where you are? How can you not call upon the name of the resurrected King of Kings, Jesus of Nazareth, who shed His blood for His people? Trust Him, depend upon Him. Throw out everything in your mind that is not in accordance with God's word, that somehow you can be saved, or somehow you have time, or somehow it will be okay for you. It won't be okay for you apart from Christ. Don't believe your own thoughts like prideful Haman did. You will meet the gallows. Believe what God has revealed. Believe what he says about judgment and deliverance. Call upon the name of the Lord and you'll be saved. Oh, how desperately we want you to call upon the name of the Lord. Oh, sweet people of God. Be encouraged with this news. God will put down every last one of your enemies and raise you up to salvation and joy and honor. You too continue to trust in Christ. God is very pleased with him. And in him, God is pleased with you. So rejoice. Take joy. Sit down at a feast today and be glad. Let's pray. Father, you are a holy God. You are righteous and you are merciful. We see your righteousness and your mercy in Christ. Oh, how we pray that All who are here today would trust in the Lord Jesus Christ. Save God. Spare people eternal judgment. Grant to people eternal life because of your mercy and your grace. Help us as your people to rejoice in what you have done for us. And to remember that you will destroy every last one of our enemies. You are our help. We set our eyes upon you. We pray this in Jesus name. Amen.