You are not here by accident. Not in this city, not in this season, not around the people you are around. This past Sunday, Pastor Chip Dean stepped away from Ezra and Nehemiah to bring a message from the book of Esther that was personal, urgent, and full of hope.
God Is Working Even When He Is Not Named
The book of Esther is unlike any other book in the Bible. God is never mentioned by name. Prayer is never mentioned. Faith is never mentioned. The word of God is never mentioned. And yet, Pastor Chip said, God’s hand is all over every single page.
That is not an accident. It is a picture of the world we live in. The world wants to forget God. But God never stops working, orchestrating, and moving behind the scenes. He is present in the story even when no one is saying his name.
The book of Esther actually takes place within the book of Ezra, between chapters 6 and 7, during the period when the Israelites were living as captives in Persia. That is the world Esther is born into. That is the world God uses to save his people.
A Crazy, Messed Up World and a God Who Is Still in Control
The story opens with King Ahasuerus, also known as King Xerxes, throwing a six-month party for his officers followed by a seven-day feast for all his people. He is the most powerful man on the planet, ruling over roughly half the earth’s population. In a drunken moment, he calls for his queen, Vashti, to be paraded before his guests. She refuses. He divorces her. The men of the kingdom panic and pass a law requiring all wives to obey their husbands or be thrown in jail.
The point was not comedy. The point was this. Sin does not make sense. The deeper you go into it, the less your life makes sense. You look up one day and wonder how you got here.
The answer for believers is not to retreat into a Christian bubble and avoid the world. It is to live in the world, not of it, for the name of Jesus. We are not playing defense. We are playing offense. The world does not know how to be a husband or a wife or a parent without the word of God. We do. So we go and we live it and we share it.
A Nobody Named Mordecai and an Orphan Named Esther
Enter Mordecai. A captive. A nobody with no rights and no privileges. He had been carried from Judah to Babylon and then deported again to Persia. He is on his second exile. He has nothing.
But Mordecai is a noble man. When his cousin Esther was orphaned, Mordecai took her in and raised her as his own daughter. That single act of adoption set in motion everything that followed.
While serving at the city gate, Mordecai overhears a plot to assassinate the king. He reports it. The king is saved. The act is recorded in the royal chronicles and then forgotten. For now.
Meanwhile, after Queen Vashti is removed, the king holds a kingdom-wide search for a new queen. Esther enters. She wins. She becomes queen of the most powerful kingdom on earth. A Jewish orphan, sitting at the side of the king who rules half the world. That is not coincidence. That is sovereignty.
The Villain, the Plot, and the Moment of Decision
Haman rises to become the king’s second in command. Every person in the kingdom bows when he enters a room. Every person except Mordecai. Mordecai will not bow. His bowing is reserved for God alone.
Haman is enraged. He convinces the king to sign a law authorizing the killing of every Jewish person in the empire. When Mordecai learns of it, he goes into mourning and reaches out to Esther with a message that has echoed through history ever since.
Esther 4:14. 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 could have stayed comfortable. She could have kept her head down. But Mordecai’s words reached her. She called for a three-day fast. She prayed. She made her decision. If I perish, I perish. But I will do the will of God.
God Works Behind the Scenes
The night before Esther approaches the king, God will not let the king sleep. He calls for his servants to read him his royal chronicles. Of all the pages they could have read, they read the entry about Mordecai saving the king’s life. The king realizes Mordecai was never honored for it.
The next morning, Haman arrives at the palace thinking he is about to receive more honor and planning to ask permission to execute Mordecai. Instead the king asks him, what should be done for a man the king truly wants to honor? Haman assumes the king means him and suggests a royal parade through the city. The king tells him to go do exactly that for Mordecai.
Pastor Chip paused on that moment. Even when you do not feel God working, he is working. Even when he seems silent, he is orchestrating. Even in the middle of the night, when no one is watching, he is behind the scenes arranging everything.
Esther Exposed the Enemy’s Plan
At the feast, Esther finally reveals everything. The king. The plot. The man responsible. Haman is exposed, removed, and executed. Mordecai is elevated to second in command. The law is reversed. The Jewish people are saved.
Pastor Chip drew a direct line from Esther to the gospel. Every time you share the gospel of Jesus Christ, you are doing what Esther did. You are exposing the enemy’s plan. Satan just wants to be worshiped. When people live in sin, that is what they are giving him. But the gospel reveals the truth. Satan steals, kills, and destroys. Jesus gives life, blesses, and lifts up.
Every time you speak the name of Jesus, there is supernatural power behind it. The Holy Spirit is not just empowering you to share. He is empowering the person listening to hear. It is not just your words. It is the power of God unto salvation, just as Romans 1:16 reminds us.
Pastor Chip also pointed to the ways Esther foreshadows Jesus. Esther risked her life for her people. Jesus gave his life for his people. Esther approached an earthly king. Jesus is the king who came to earth. Esther said if I perish, I perish. Jesus actually did. Esther interceded for one nation. Jesus intercedes for every nation, tribe, tongue, and language. Esther leveraged her life to keep the Messiah’s line alive. Jesus is the Messiah who came to save the world.
You Were Created for Such a Time as This
Pastor Chip closed with a text message he received from a church member after her father passed away. She shared how her dad had been invited to church by a neighbor during their daily carpool commute from Powder Springs to Norcross. That neighbor never gave up asking. One day her dad finally went. He heard the gospel. He gave his life to Jesus. He was baptized alongside his wife. From that point on, he traveled to visit all twelve of his siblings across multiple states every year to share the gospel with them one by one.
One cousin heard the gospel from him, got saved as a young woman, and passed away in her twenties. She is in heaven today because one man never gave up inviting.
Who has God placed around you? Who is in your carpool? Who lives next door? Who is in your office? You are not there by accident. God is too perfect not to have a purpose for your life. Every single day you can wake up and ask him, God, what is your purpose for me today? Who do you want me to love? Who do you want me to tell about Jesus?
This is your moment. This is your time. You were created for such a time as this.
There’s a Seat for You
Whether you are just beginning to understand why your life matters or you have been following Jesus for decades and need a fresh reminder of why it all counts, you belong here. We are a church that believes God puts people in the right place at the right time for a reason.
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