Turn with me in your Bibles to the book of Esther, where in Esther chapter 9, if you don't have a Bible with you There's some in front of you in the page number. I believe it's printed on your bulletin I forgot to notice what the page number is. I believe it's page 494 So we'll be right there in page 494, but we're closing up our study of the book of Esther this morning On February 24th, 1994, Baruch Goldstein who had immigrated to Israel only 12 years before went into a mosque in Israel, opened fire, killing 29 people before he was subdued, wounding 150 more The mob subdued him with a fire extinguisher, got him on the ground, and then they beat him to death We hear reports of violence in the Middle East every day, and it sounds rather commonplace and And rather tragic and certainly this was a tragic event, but this was not like Other acts of violence or maybe it was like other acts of violence, but this one has some significance to us because What makes this story special and relevant to us is that the this massacre on February 24th, 1994 was a date that year of the Jewish celebration of Purim Purim is a the feast the Jewish festival that commemorates the events in the book of Esther and just before Arming himself and entering that mosque Baruch Goldstein I had been to the Purim festival at a synagogue. He had heard the story read again About how God had rescued the Israelites the Jews from their enemies and on that day he rescued them by having them kill 75,000 of their enemies in those two days and so using that as inspiration for his own little holy war Broke Goldstein slaughtered 29 worshipers in a Muslim mosque The history of human civilization is scarred with the killings of people in the name of religion We have things such as the Crusades More modern events such as the the conflicts in Kosovo the tensions in Northern Ireland and of course 911 and it seems that for all religions talk about love and peace Compassion the religion is the source of a lot of conflict and a lot of hardship and a lot of violence in the world And I think that's why that many Christians are embarrassed by these parts of the Bible Where seems that what doesn't seem that God is clearly endorsing war God calls people to kill people and we find these sections of the Bible when we look at them and we're embarrassed by them and Nine Christians are are offended by these passages and and oftentimes we don't know what to do with them What do you do with the God who seems to be God of violence and the God of war and you say well? That's the old testament. Let me go to the New Testament You'll find no comfort in the New Testament in that regard because you turn he find the book of revelation where God himself Is the warrior and God himself is bringing about justice and God himself is is bringing judgment on the earth and you say How can we reconcile this with the God of peace and the God of love and a God of compassion? Well this morning we're going to look at the story in Esther that inspired Baruch Goldstein's massacre and It's we're not looking at it necessarily a pleasant topic and back here's one of the blessings curses are working your way through a book of the Bible I would never pick this topic to talk about today. I would never pick this topic to talk about probably any day But as you go through and you come to this passage and you say well We have to deal with this honestly. What is God saying here in Esther chapter 9 and 10 to us as modern Christians today? So with that in mind turn with me to Esther chapter 9 verses 1 through 16 This is God's holy and inspired word On the 13th day of the 12th month the month of Adar the edit commanded by the king must be carried out on this day The enemies of the Jews had hoped overpower them But now the tables were turned and the Jews got the upper hand over those who hated them The Jews assembled in their cities and all the provinces of King Zerxes to attack those seeking their destruction No one could stand against them because the people of all the other nationalities were afraid of them All the nobles and the provinces all the nobles and the provinces the say traps the governors the kings and Ministers helped the Jews because fear of Mordecai had seized them Mordecai was prominent in the palace His reputation spread throughout the provinces and he became more and more powerful The Jews struck down all their enemies with the sword Killing and destroying them and they did what they pleased to those who hated them and the citadel of Susa The Jews killed and destroyed 500 men. They also killed Parshandatha, Dalfon, Espatha, Paratha, Adalia, Eradatha, Parmastha, Arasiai, Eradai and Besatha, the ten sons of Haman, the son of Hamadatha, the enemy of the Jews But they did not lay their hands on the plunder. The number of those slain in the city of Susa was reported to the king that same day The king said to Queen Esther the Jews have killed and destroyed 500 men and the ten sons of Haman and the citadel of Susa What are they done in the rest of the king's provinces now? What is your petition? It will be given you. What is your request? It will also be granted If it pleases the king as they're answered give the Jews and Susa permission to carry out this day's edict tomorrow Also let Haman's ten sons be hanged on the gallows So the king commanded that this be done. It edict was issued in Susa and they hanged the ten sons of Haman The Jews and Susa came together on the 14th day of the month of Adar and they put the death in Susa 300 men, but they did not lay their hands on the plunder Meanwhile the remainder of the Jews who were in the king's provinces also assembled to protect themselves and get relieved from their enemies They killed 75,000 of them, but they did not lay their hands on the plunder This is God's holy and inspired word Well the first point that we're going to see in this passage is that God is the divine warrior God is the divine warrior Again, a little bit of background where you're at the end of the story But what has happened is this man named Haman because he was offended by a Jew named Mordecai has written an edict with the king's own Signet ring allowing for anyone to kill any Jew for any reason it is it is open season on the Jewish people And so this law has gone into effect, but Haman has now been He's been hanged he's been he's been found to be a traitor to the king and in his place Mordecai the very man he wanted to kill has been elevated to second in the kingdom Mordecai then needs to undo the law that Haman has written, but you cannot repeal a law of the Persians once it's been written So Mordecai writes a counter decree and the counter decree allows for the Jews to kill those who would kill them And so now the once powerless Jews the Jews who were about to be exterminated were given free reign to kill their enemies and and kill They did in a city of Susa alone they killed 500 men and even with this great slaughter the king says comes to us There says man, I can't believe how many people the Jews killed. This is amazing. What do you want now? She says, well, I want more That's not enough. I want more people to be killed and so she asked the king for permission to kill a second day And not only that she says I know the 10 sons of Haman are dead. I don't want them to be hang Here they are already dead and she asked for them to be hanged and again They didn't hang them with ropes they hanged them on spikes and so that was the way they did this So it seems to be a rather vengeful act and then between the two days the total number of people killed by the Jews were 75,000 people 75,000 people let me give you an idea of how many people 75,000 people is how many how many deaths When the bomb was dropped on Hiroshima and that day 80,000 people died now far more died after the effect But in that one day 80,000 died when they dropped the bomb on Nagasaki When the bomb was dropped on Nagasaki the total number of deaths even years later after the effects of the the radiation was 74,000 people more people died under Esther's reign than died in the death of Nagasaki an Amazing amount of people were killed Well as we consider the story most scholars both Jewish and Christian scholars have wondered If Esther's actions here were morally right, I mean if the the object was simply to defend the Jews against their enemies I mean one day of killing should have been enough or so it seemed and if the goal was self-defense Then then why did they need to kill more and certainly the idea of hanging Haman's 10 sons and we have them here listed by name On the on the gallows lifting him up for everyone to see after they were already dead Certainly seems to be vengeful and it is possible that Esther and Mordecai are abusing their power in some way here That's that's very possible if we have time we may talk about that But there's something more going on here. There's something more Throughout the story of Esther the writer of the story Never sermonizes he gives us very little editorial comments even though Mordecai and Esther both engage in some morally murky behavior We have them doing some things that that you look at say you know That's not right, but the writer simply reports the facts now here under the as the These people are being slaughtered the the writer does not give us editorial comments, but he repeats certain things three times Now before we look at that, I want us to look at Mordecai's law When Mordecai wrote the law he simply wrote took Haman's law and switched it around Haman's law allowed for anyone to kill a Jew for any reason and then to plunder their property So Mordecai and defense of the Jew wrote this law He said the Jews are allowed to assemble protect themselves destroy kill annihilate any armed force of any Nationality or province that might attack them and their women and children and To plunder the property of their enemies So the the Jewish people had the legal right to kill all their enemies and all their enemies women and children That should be how that should read and take the property of their enemies and so what we find though in Carrying out the law. Here's what we find next slide shows us this three times throughout the passage He says in verse 10, but they did not lay their hands on the plunder verse 15 But they did not lay their hands on the plunder verse 16, but they did not lay their hands on the plunder Whenever a writer repeats something so often he's usually trying to get your attention with it He's making a point and he wants to make this point very clearly that the Jews when they they killed their enemies Did not take any of the plunder now what's the significance of that that a legal right to the plunder It was certainly culturally acceptable when you went to war to take the plunder of your enemies Why didn't they take the plunder well to understand that we have to understand a little bit of history we went through this last week for a bit But let me let me Real quick review of this go back a little bit remember when the Israelites came out of Egypt We have the the story of the Exodus you remember the story of the Exodus have you seen the movie the Ten Commandments or the younger Generation the Prince of Egypt okay either one see that's the story of the Exodus well after they finally got free after they escape from Pharaoh they are just a group of slave people wandering around in the wilderness they have have no warriors among them A group of people known as the Amalakites attack them unprovoked they come up from behind they start picking off the Stragulars and they're going to try and wipe out the Israelites before they can get anywhere and so God delivers them through this Amazing victory great story of how God rescues the Israelites but at that time God promised he said because the Amalakites did this I'm going to wipe them out from the face of the earth 400 years later the Israelites are now settled in the land they have their first king on the throne His name is King Saul and and God comes to King Saul and tells Saul this through the prophet Samuel He says this is what the Lord Almighty says I will punish the Amalakites for what they did to Israel when they Waved laid them as they came up from Egypt now go attack the Amalakites and totally destroy everything that belongs to them do not spare them put to death men and women children and infants cattle and sheep camels and donkeys So here God gives a very clear command to King Saul and he is the go and he's to wipe out the Amalakites completely and to not take any of the plunder very clearly he's supposed to destroy the plunder what a Saul do he goes He wipes out the Amalakites He keeps the plunder and he spares the king and the king's name is agag and as we saw last week Heyman throughout the book of Esther is called Heyman the agaguype he is a descendant possibly physically Possibly metaphorically either way he's a descendant of the Amalakites and so the Jews now are at war Against Heyman and his people and so they're recognizing that this is part of what of God's holy war Against the Amalakites and so they're following the same rules of that holy war Which is your to wipe them out but not take the plunder and so the Jews in Esther obeyed where King Saul had disobeyed Recognizing that they are in a holy war against the Amalakites now Pause here just for a moment The term holy war is a term that terrifies us today and rightly so We we have seen the atrocities that have been committed in the name of jihad or holy war And we see how that has been used as a means just for violence and And so certainly you know we consider this we have to consider what what does God mean by that in fact the whole term holy war Seems like an oxymoron to us doesn't it? I mean how can anything as ugly and grotesque as violent as violence as war be called holy Well holy war is holy when God is the warrior There is only one person who is righteous enough Worthy enough to bring judgment on the earth and we don't have time to explain how this goes into the New Testament But in the Old Testament God did is he used the kings of Israel and their armies to exercise holy war to be his instruments of justice on the earth because God is worthy to bring about judgment because God is worthy to bring about judgment now that in the New Testament We see that changing completely and I tried to go into it last service and it took too long so that will be on my blog So we won't get into that so the one that the issues here then is As we look at this whole idea of of holy war and God being a warrior and God bringing about judgment I think what we see here is the most is this some of the most disturbing part of the Bible Here's the parts of the Bible that we find offensive and these are sections where God commands his people to go to war and not just go to war But to slaughter every living thing and the question is how could a God of love a God of peace and a God of mercy Command this type of war and the reason is God is a warrior is because God is a judge and God is bringing judgment Our problem with God being a warrior and bringing about death and destruction is that we have a problem with God as being judge And that's our second point first. We see God's a divine warrior where there's divine warrior actions are simply an outflowing of God as the righteous judge Another certain attributes of God that we like more than others, you know, you think about what is God like and you begin to describe what God is like and there's certain things We'd like to say God is like like God is love God is compassionate God is merciful God is kind God is slow to anger all those things Those are the the feel good attributes of characteristics of God and that's certainly true all of that is true But that's not the whole picture who God is God also is holy. He also is just Yeah, he brings about justice and and because there's justice He's a God who brings about judgment The book of Psalms or That the Psalms are sort of like the hymn book for the Christian church. It's um You know, in fact, I often encourage people if they're depressed or discouraged read the Psalms because you'll be encouraged You'll see what God is like Well, Psalm 7 in the great hymn book of the church has this beautiful song with a scary verse and here's Psalm 7 verse 11 God is a righteous judge A God who expresses his wrath every day Now we don't want to think about the wrath of God We don't want to think about the judgment of God and rightly so if God is a righteous judge Then that means he will bring about justice and you cannot have justice without having punishment You can't you can't in fact it's impossible to have justice without having punishment when when there are crimes committed You can't simply say Let it go if there's going to be justice there has to be punishment for the crime In fact, that's one of the reasons that many people reject the whole idea of God all together Stephen J. Gould was a Harvard paleontologist. He died a few years ago He was very outspoken about his atheism And many of his writings he talks about how we as human beings basically came from nothing There's no design. There's no purpose for our being here We we evolved simply by chance and every one of you and every one of us is simply a product of chance There's there's no divine purpose no great purpose for you being here And he says now that could be discouraging but here's what he goes on to write about that He says we may yearn for a higher answer But nonexist This explanation those superficially troubling if not terrifying is ultimately liberating and exhilarating Here's what he's saying says you may long for an answer for why you're here that that is that is that you have a purpose He says that maybe terrifying to you that you don't but he says ultimately it's exhilarating and liberating why See if there is no creator if there is no God then there's no one to whom you must give an account There is no judge. You are your own judge. You get to decide what is right And you're not accountable to anyone Aldos Huxley you remember that you read him back in English classes brother And Aldos both of them Huxley's they were You know had a philosophy of meaninglessness and existentialism And he says the reason that he and his contemporaries turned a philosophy of meaningless was for liberation form a moral system Because we had a moral system then they couldn't have all the sexual freedom that they wanted And so so they don't they wanted a philosophy that would support their Their freedom to be sexually free and so he goes on to write This is a quote he said I had motives for not wanting the world to have meaning Consequently, I assumed that it had none and was able without any difficulty to find satisfying reasons for this assumption Most ignorance is vegetable ignorance. We don't know because we don't want to know Here's what he's saying is I had a reason I did not want there to be a god. I didn't want there to be meaning in life And so that's my goal and so then I went and I found reasons to support the conclusion already came to And he says the reason that is because I didn't want to know about God and now I'm ignorant about God because I don't want to know about God That's what he said very honest And all he's saying here is the exact same thing the Apostle Paul says in Romans chapter one And Romans chapter one he says that men Know about God, but they suppress the truth and unrighteousness they go into denial because they don't want to know about God Because if there is a god then there is a judge and there's someone to whom we must give an account Now you may be asking What kind of loving God is filled with wrath? What kind of loving God destroys whole peoples and and wipes them out You know, well, I guess the answer to that is How can you have a loving God with wrath that the question really would be how can you have a loving God without wrath You cannot have a loving God a loving person without having anger anger is not the opposite of love in differences You know if all you have is tolerance Then then you don't have love no if Thank for example is someone you'd love And they are doing things that are destructive to themselves They are they're engaging in behavior maybe you see I'm sure some of you had this experience drug addiction alcohol addiction with someone you love and you see them Doing these things and you don't just go Hey, that's okay. You want to kill yourself. That's fine. I'm there for you man. I'm with you all the way You don't do that if you love them. What do you do? You're angry see how can you do this to yourself? How can you do this to me you you rightly get angry Not because you don't love because you do love if you see someone Engage in a relationship that you know it's toxic You know it's gonna be destructive to them. You don't say hey man You know whoever you want to get in a relationship with that is that is that is great I'm so supportive go ahead throw your life away and I'll cheer you all the way That's not love A loving person says no you get angry about that One writer said this he says the more a father loves his son the more he hates in him the drunkard the liar and the trader You know when you see something you love being destroyed you get angry And God is a righteous God God is a loving God and his anger goes with this love Becky Pippert in her book said called hope has its reason says God's wrath is not a cranky explosion But a settled opposition to the cancer of sin which is eating the insides out of the human race He loves with his whole being So God God just doesn't have a temper tantrum and wipe out people He he is bringing about judgment because he sees how sin is destroying his people and he will not stand for it He will not stand for it because he loves the world that he made for God so loved the world And that's why he brings about his judgment Uh Karen jobes and her commentary on Esther writes this he says you know We seem to want God to destroy sin and evil but to leave people alone However sin and evil do not exist apart from beings who sin and beings who do evil You can't have God destroying sin and evil without destroying sin and evil doers And so what we see then In these acts of holy war and these acts of judgment we see in the Bible Sodom and Gomorrah when he destroys them other acts of judgment the book of Revelation These aren't are what these are are are foretaste of the ultimate judgment that is to come That ultimately what we see here in these acts of judgment and holy war is a foretaste of God saying one day I'm bringing judgment on all the earth There is a day of judgment again. This one is topics we don't talk about much But it's real and it's true and so as a reminder to us of this the Bible calls this day of judgment It calls it oftentimes refers to it as the day of the Lord and that phrase appears in the Bible 24 times And in every case the day of the Lord refers to We're really both judgment and salvation and the two go together where God destroys his enemy This saves his people 24 times. We see this being referred to the day of the Lord And the prophet Malachi calls it the great and dreadful day of the Lord So the Bible warns us that God is the righteous judge. You know bring justice to the earth And they'll come a day that create an terrible day of the Lord when justice will be served and every sin will be punished And you know some like Haman and his inner and his his cohorts could justice early But sooner later everyone faces the day of the Lord And writing about this the apostle Peter tells us this You know it says he thinks about he's talking about the day of the Lord the day of Christ returning coming back when Jesus finally returns And he says they're saying why hasn't it happened yet and many people wonder that why hasn't God come back Jesus come back yet Here's what he says He says the Lord is not slow in keeping his promise as some understand slowness He is patient with you not wanting anyone to perish but everyone to come to repentance But the day of the Lord will come like a thief The heavens will disappear with the roar the elements will be destroyed by fire and the earth and everything in it will be laid bare So Peter says there is the day of the Lord coming the day of judgment coming when God Reconciles and rescues his people but judges the whole earth and he says why hasn't that day come yet Why hasn't Christ returned yet? And he says because God is patient because God is long suffering. He's wanting people to to repent Now the word repent Is a word That is used in churches and probably nowhere else, but it was a military term and the days of Jesus in the apostle Paul And what it means is if you're lined with one kingdom to change your mind and go a different direction In other words, he's saying to repent saying He said what God is saying is that you are living your own direction going your own way You're living for your own self and he says he's being patient with us so that we can repent And our line ourselves with the kingdom of God The apostle Paul uses slightly different language but puts it this way in 2nd Corinthians 5 He says we are therefore Christ ambassadors as though God we're making his appeal through us We implore you on Christ's behalf be reconciled to God God made him who had no sin to be sinned for us So that in him we might become the righteousness of God Here's what Paul is saying he says we are Christ ambassadors and what is the ambassador saying saying be reconciled to God Now, what is an ambassador to do? Think of an ambassador We think of an ambassador as someone goes in and tries to have the talk to make peace So that so that the war won't break out And in a sense, that's what this ambassador does, but it's a little bit differently You know growing up those grew up in the 60s and 70s. You know, we think of like Shirley Temple going as an ambassador And and as someone who goes and tries to make everything nice and you negotiate a peace settlement That's not what Paul is saying here What he's saying is that the army of the Lord is at the gate the kingdom of God is coming God senses ambassador in advance and says the kingdom is coming And he says and you have one choice be reconciled to God or else Or else what or else the army invades the kingdom of God is going to come There's no negotiation there no terms he says the kingdom of God is coming You can either stay aligned with this kingdom in this world or you can line yourself with the kingdom that is coming Those are the only choices He said well Jesus didn't talk that way. He most certainly did Jesus the way Jesus put it this way He says repent for the kingdom of heaven is at hand Repent for the kingdom of God is near He went around preaching that what does that mean? He says there's a kingdom coming This world is passing and you're to repent you're to drop what you're doing drop your legions to this world And align yourself and change your legions to the kingdom that is coming and so that's what God calls us to do He says there's a kingdom that is coming and we're to align ourselves with that Well, how do we do that? Well here we see then in the day of the Lord is where the mercy of God and the justice of God collide 2000 years ago on the cross Jesus the son of God on the cross endured the day of the Lord in his own person On the cross he endured God's wrath poured out on sin And there Jesus suffered the wrath of God towards sin the punishment of God God the warrior The divine warrior turned on his own son and punished him for for the sins of the world That's why Jesus when he's on the cross. He's not simply there dying as a victim He's dying as a sacrifice He's dying as the one to take on the wrath of God He cries out my God my God why have you forsaken me because he's enduring God's anger towards sin And what God promises then is that anyone who comes to Jesus Christ in faith Then then they are free from the judgment of the day of the Lord They have nothing to fear in the day of the Lord because Christ has taken the penalty In himself and so what we see here then is what Christ calls us to do He says either you can face the day of the Lord on your own or you can face it under my protection I've already received the punishment of God and because I've received it if you're in me then you don't have to fear it anymore A number of years ago there's a man who is hunting and duck hunting in South Georgia And as he is there duck hunting also noticed some smoke over the horizon didn't think much of it But then soon the winds shifted and the smoke was coming his way and began to hear the crackling of things that were burning and of the fire And he realized they did not have time to get out of the way It was a brush fire and it was spreading rapidly and they could not escape And so the man reached into his pocket took out his matches and he burned a patch of ground And he burned it completely all around him setting fire to it Then he and his partners and his buddies that were with him got down on the ground They put coats over their heads the handkerchiefs over their mouth and they stayed there as the fire swept over And the fire swept over them but none of them were burned And the reason none of them were burned it because where they were had been burned already If you're in Jesus Christ you're in a place you're in that burned out piece of ground God's judgment will pass over you because he has already judged his son on our behalf That's why we say we can come before the Lord without fear because Jesus has taken the judgment for us That's why if you're in Jesus Christ even though you know your sinner Even though you know if you got what you deserve your sins should be punished Even though we have that sense of guilt It can be taken away because Christ has taken the punishment for us That's why Paul says there's therefore now no condemnation for those in Christ Jesus That's why he says we can boldly come before the throne of grace because we don't have to fear God's anger anymore Christian here's the good news if you're in Christ God is not angry at you He's not angry at all In fact God delights in you as this child and he loves you and he looks at you with a full record of Christ credited to you and he looks at you With with delight because Jesus has paid the penalty in full See that's our only hope the day of the Lord Are you going to meet it on your own or you can meet it in Christ And that's why we come to the Lord's table today Now you come to the Lord's table and you're reminded that Jesus really did suffer He really did die it wasn't just an example He really did endure the punishment of God but when we pertake of that bread We're saying that we are sharing in his body what body is that It's the body that endured God's punishment against sin and because we participate in the body that's already been judged God will not judge us and we pertake of the cup We're saying we're sharing in the blood of Christ We're saying the blood that's already been shed as a as a payment for our sin We don't need to shed our blood anymore And so we're free and so we come to the Lord's table today to remember Yes, God is a righteous judge but God has shown us mercy in Jesus Christ. Let's pray Father, we do thank you for the mercy and hope That you've given us in Christ Jesus Father if we are honest Before you even now and sometimes that's very difficult for us to do For honest, we all know that we have sinned. We all know that we've done things that ought to be punished And we all know that that we are not capable of standing before you on that day on our own If if you were to show up right now, we would fall Uh before you as dead people because we cannot stand in your presence But we thank you that in Christ when we we not only can stand we can dance into light Because Jesus has paid the penalty in full He is he's suffered and is suffering counts for all who hope in him Lord we thank you That your wrath and your anger is no longer turned towards us that it's been fully satisfied in Christ We thank you that we don't have to fear the judgment And if you're here today and you have always wondered whether or not God could love you or accept you Maybe you've lived in fear. Maybe you've kept God at a distance because you're afraid that that he's angry at you I invite you now come near to him come before him and say Lord I know I've been living for my own kingdom and now I understand I have to repent I have to let go of my own agenda And after receive you as my king but I thank you I can do that because Jesus has done everything necessary to make me at peace with you I thank you that Jesus died on the cross for my sins And I thank you for forgiving me because of what he has done And so I receive Jesus as my savior as my lord He's going to be my king And I thank you that even though I know I'll mess up and following him That his death Is his payment in full for all my sins past present and future It's on Lord help me to know the delight of your love How many not to be insecure to worry about whether I've done enough for him good enough How many to forget those things and realize that Jesus has done enough And I'm secure and accepted by you We'll confirm those truths to me. We pray this in Christ name amen