Thanksgiving

This is the evening worship service of the 4th Presbyterian Church, Bethesna, Maryland in November 25th, 1990. Dr. Norris' sermon this evening is entitled Thanksgiving. The text is Esther 917-103. In turn, as we conclude our expositions in the book of Esther for tonight, while looking at the 9th chapter and reading from the 17th verse through to the end of the 10th chapter, which is only three verses long. We have our December program, as we prepare for Advent and Christmas time, and beginning in January in the first week. In the mornings we will begin a new series of expositions from the book of Acts, from the 1st chapter through to the 5th chapter, which will take us until June. And after that, we will see how much further we will go in the book of Acts. In the evenings between January and June, we will examine together the 17th chapter of John's Gospel, the great high priestly prayer of our Lord Jesus Christ. And so, as you are preparing yourselves to come to worship, those are the two passages, the two portions of God's Word, that will occupy our thoughts over the next months, as God would lay His word upon our heart. Esther, the 9th chapter, reading from the 18th verse, the Jews in Susa, however, had assembled on the 13th and 14th, and then on the 15th they arrested and made it a day of feasting and joy. That is why rule all Jews, those living in villages, observe the 14th of the month of Eidah, as a day of joy and feasting, a day for giving presents to each other. Would a K.I. recorded these events, and he sent letters to all the Jews through the provinces of King Exorcise, near and far, to heaven celebrate annually the 14th and 15th days of the month of Eidah, as the time when the Jews got relief from their enemies, and as the month when their sorrow was turned into joy and their mourning into a day of celebration, and he wrote them to observe the days as days of feasting and joy, and giving presents of food to one another and gifts to the poor. And so the Jews agreed to continue the celebration they had begun, doing what Mordecai had written to them. For him and son of Hamedath are the agites, the enemy of all the Jews, had plotted against the Jews to destroy them and had cut off the poor, that is the lot for their ruin and destruction. But when the plot came to the King's attention, he issued written orders that the evil scheme he had devised against the Jews, he should come back onto his own head, and that he and his sons should be hanged on the gallows, therefore these days were called purim from the word purr, because of everything written in this letter, and because of what they had seen and what had happened to them, the Jews took it upon themselves to establish the custom that they and their descendants, and all who joined them, should without fail observe these two days every year, and the way prescribed and at the time appointed, and these days should be remembered observed in every family and in every generation, in every province and in every city. The days of purim should never cease to be celebrated by the Jews, nor should the memory of them die up at among their descendants. And so Queen Esther, daughter of Abigail, along with Mordekai the Jew, wrote with full authority to confirm this second letter concerning Purim, and Mordekai sent letters to all the Jews in the 127 provinces of the Kingdom of Zexes. Words of goodwill and assurance to establish those days of Purim at their designated times as Mordekai the Jew and Queen Esther had decreed for them, and as they had established for themselves and their descendants, in regard to their times of fasting and lamentation, Esther's decree confirmed these regulations about Purim, and it was written down in the records. King Xerxes imposed tribute throughout the empire to its distant shores, and all his acts of power and might, together with a full account of the greatness of Mordekai to which the King had raised him. Are they not written in the book of the annals of the kings of media and Persia? Mordekai the Jew was second in rank to King Xerxes, preeminent among the Jews and held in higher esteem by his many fellow Jews, because he worked for the good of his people, and he spoke up for the welfare of all of the Jews. Amen, and may the Lord bless. This is holy word to us tonight. These verses begin by recognizing an event in the life of the village and in the life of the city. The people of the villages of the empire celebrated on the 14th day of Ejar, the fact that God had delivered them from their enemy. That is, among the day in which it had been appointed, that they should all be killed by those who hated them. They had been defended themselves against their enemies, and now they set that day apart and celebrated. All that is, except for the people of the city of Sushan, or Suza, the capital, and they celebrated on the 15th day, and it had taken two days in the city to root out and deal with all those who were enemies of the Jews. And whilst in the villages it had taken but one day to deal with their enemies, in the city it had taken two days, and so the celebration was for two days. And what had happened was that in that time, they had rooted out everyone who had set their face against God and his people and having rooted them out, they celebrated a victory. The victory that was spiritual, the victory of God over him and his enemies. Everyone wanted to mark that day, the day of jubilation as a day of feasting and joy. And in these verses we see three truths that become evident to us and guiding and directional to us as we too would with thanksgiving seek the peace of God, for here he brought his peace. A peace that was so vain with these people, a peace that was established over all of Persia. A peace that has been costly. If it had cost the lives of his enemies, it had cost the lives of those who had set themselves against God and his purpose and his way, it was a peace that had been bought in blood, but a peace that was declared by God. Well, the first thing that we see is that the people celebrated a spiritual battle, the victory of God in the conflict between good and evil. In the 22nd verse, we see that there is a recognition of course for celebration. It was a day that changed from morning into a day of celebration. Their sorrow was turned into joy and their mourning into a day of celebration. Here was a time in which the people of God celebrated the victory that he had accomplished. And it was a victory that in some ways was a purely temporal one for the enemy, the human and his soldiers were defeated and destroyed and the human was hanged from his old gallows. But much more, there is a spiritual victory because there is a recognition that the human was involved in seeking to defeat God and his people. And the conflict was more often simply a political conflict. It was a conflict between God and his enemies. And we see that in that Mordecai and Esther sent out and then confirmed the fact that the celebration was for the day of Turem. Now, that odd word for means lot. And we've seen in the third chapter and the 17th verse, the human had cast lots to see when was the right day on which he should cast his plans to destroy the Jews. And in casting lots, it involved a ceremony of going and seeking the mind of the gods. That is the day that was propitious to the gods of Persia when they would accomplish for him the overthrow of his enemies and where God, the God of the Jews, Jehovah. And so Turem was a day that was taken by Esther and Mordecai and it was created as a day in which it was dedicated to God that people should remember that in the conflict between him and Mordecai and Esther, there was also the conflict between God and the devil, the conflict between good and evil. And the remembrance is not simply a great thing as individuals that stalk the pages of history, but it is a remembrance that in every day and every generation there is a call to spiritual warfare. But the battle that we are engaged in is a spiritual battle. Whatever it might appear in terms of the way in which we might fight some of the enemies that we might observe, it is ultimately a battle between the powers of the air and God himself. Esther and Mordecai by naming the day of remembrance as Turem, remember the victory of God over the gods. The victory not simply of Mordecai over him and but of the God of Israel, the God of Isaac and Jacob, the God who is over his enemies and those who would serve the lesser gods and they exist today. And not simply the gods of materialism and the gods of any particular ideology there in our sophistication we have grown. But the truth is that in this generation there is a spiritual conflict, there is a warfare. And in this particular time it is my own belief that there is a spiritual warfare that is real and urgent and powerful. We have never known in 1500 years of Christian history within the West a time when it was legitimate for the Church of Satan to exist but we know it today in this country. We have never known when it was legitimate for coverings to practice witchcraft. We have never known the power of the evil one legitimized in law but we know it today. When Esther and Mordecai set Turem it was to remember the victory of God over the gods. It was that his people should celebrate that in the spiritual conflict in which they found themselves there was the victor and it was the Lord of Lords and King of Kings. And if there is anything that we are most urgently aware of today it is that our warfare, the reality of our warfare in this generation is a spiritual one. And that we were with spiritual forces set for the destruction of God's people and for the ending of his kingdom and for the bringing into note of his purpose. But we celebrate now the activity of the evil one, so much as the victor of God. For in the gift of Jesus Christ is only begotten son God has conquered every enemy. And yet we fail to appropriate for ourselves the grace of Calvary when we forget for real. When we forget that our warfare is a spiritual warfare. When we become a sophisticated people that no longer believe in demons and no longer sees spiritual evil and no longer think in terms that are regarded as simply mystical. And when our gospel has so deemed apologized so removed the supernatural that everybody of articulate reasoning is able to say well it is true. There is nothing miraculous. Then we are of people deceived and our own warfare is diminished when we no longer see every one of us here. That our battle is with eternal evil. It is with the devil, it is with the principalities and the powers. And we will see that ever more conscious three as it touches individuals and families and churches. The power of evil begins to settle life out of God's people and we are God unaware so often. Poor the form of luck casting was turned into poor real, the celebration of the victory of God. It is interesting as a sideline to note that what Esther did has been criticized in every generation from hers to this day. She took a pagan festival and gave to it a rich and godly heritage and meaning. I was amazed not many months ago when I was speaking at a seminary in the site to find that there are people there who have all the use of Christmas trees and indeed still remember not having any celebrations that are like that. And indeed deny any of the celebrations of harvest is simply those things that hark back to pre-Christian and pagan fertility cults. Well it doesn't matter if what originated in that way has been taken by God's people and used and celebrate his victory as long as what we do is to celebrate him. People mark that Christmas and harvest are only pagan festivals are, but we have taken that which belong to the devil. And we have offered it as a sacrifice as poor him was offered for poor the victory of God. Us is the call therefore to celebrate his victory, to glory in his triumph and to point not at ourselves, no yet to see it as an opportunity for one great party alone. But to point in the mystery of God's providence to his sovereignty it was the founder of the Salvation Army, Colonel and later General Booth who said why should the devil have all the best music. And so he went to the musicals and he heard the best music that was being played in the musicals and he set him used to them and the Godly was shocked. But he said we will take what the devil had and we will offer it to God in his glory. And he went to public houses and houses a little repute and his band collected in boxes money that would be used for the kingdom's glory and the Godly was shocked. And General Booth said I will take the devil's money and I will use it to God's glory for him is the celebration of God's victory. And we are called both to celebrate that that is the glory and its power and trust in the one who is given the victory and also to stand on to remember that in the same conflict. Therefore and costly that the conflict with evil is always yet nonetheless God's people celebrate his triumph. Well there is a second thing that these verses draw to our attention and it is this. That in the 31st verse we see that Purim the observance of this festival or remembrance of the salvation of the people of God was thing that was brought to the remembrance of every generation. Listen to the verse to establish the days of Purim at their designated times and they established for themselves and for their descendants in regard to their times of fastening and lamentation. Second thing we learn is the importance of knowing the history of God's blessing. It is summed up in the New Testament by the great apostle Paul in that simple single word remembrance. I thank God for every remembrance of you. How many times does he say that as he introduces himself to those churches of the New Testament and he glories in the remembrance that he has of the activities of God in their midst? And we have become the people who glory only in the moment. We take this up of our history and we take no time to remember God's hand of blessing in generation upon generation. And we cast out that which is his guidance over the centuries and we forget the rock from which we are human. Where people of the instant and our memory is one generation and in doing that we have forgotten exactly and precisely what this passage would teach us. It was established for every generation to remember the goodness and the faithfulness of the way of God. We remember ten years and twenty years. We forget the history, the place that we are human from, that which we have been given life to. We have become people immediate, immediate and unmemories. Now it is important for us to see that, but God's goodness extends in faithfulness from generation to generation. And if we do not recount his blessing, I will never know where it is we will look for his hand of guidance and his movement in our life. You remember Jacob as he wandered in the wilderness and he had found nowhere to kick any of the respite that he could find in the burning sun. And there was no water to be found in the wilderness and a verses scripture where Jacob I did again at the wells of Abraham, my father. You know, it is not a verse that you learn in Sunday school every month. But you know, in that of us is some of the great tradition of our Christian perspective, it is this. Jacob, when he longed for water, when he did not know the way ahead, when he could not find any strength for the moment, he dug again where Abraham had dug those many years before him and there he discovered the water, the oasis that had provided for God's people in the pilgrimage land. Remembrance is a remembrance of the blessing, the provision of faithfulness, God's giving to his people, or when we have forgotten that, when we look with John this guy upon the history of God's triumph and pressing, we forget and we become incapable of seeing how God is the God who knows the end from the beginning and works all things perfectly. In his plan, I was touched again by that as I spoke on thanksgiving morning of the lunch that Al-Nasim and Mike Dennis and I enjoyed with the present pastor of the Church of 13th and Fairmont, where this body was moved from those 30 odd years ago in 1956. And the pastor was prepared to sit and bread with us and is prepared to pray and to present to his diagonal board an opportunity for this body and that congregation to link arms in partnership and fellowship and relationship. Why? Because he remembered as vividly as though it were yesterday, Dr. Myers and one of his elders selling him the Church that they could not afford and financing the sale for them when they could not find a way to purchase it. And because he remembered the faithfulness of God's servant, he met with us who knows what the future will hold. There is nothing certain that the pastor gave to us part of the direction for the future and the hope and the possibility for the ministry there. And we remember the blessing, the hand of God, his faithfulness in which nothing is ever wasted. We remember that God purposes beginning and end and moves his people to that purpose which is his, the blessing, the upholding of his kingdom. There is a third thing that we learn in these verses and it is the capacity to say thank you. Thank you for the blessing of God that draws out of us obedience. In the 10th chapter and in the second and the third verses, we see Mordecai the despised Jew by God's grace set as the most honored man in the kingdom. And as he has set there, serve the glory of God radiates from him. His obedience became the key to the blessing that God had brought upon that people. And obedience that had brought deliverance and the magnitude of God's capacity to save his people, his faithfulness in every generation was recalled and gloryed in. And God's people said thank you. The New Testament recounts for us that of those many who were healed only one returned of the Lord and said thank you. And that was not new either then or now. We find the myriad reasons for forgetting and failing to say thank you to God. We find the multitude of different ways in which we no longer remember what gratitude he is grace obedience is the key to God's blessing and obedience begins with gratitude that says thank you to him. As we come to the end of this passage in God's word, a call is to celebrate. A call is to offer to him the obedience that is due to the God that we remember. Tonight as we stand on the Sunday before Advent, as we stand before that season in which we would remember specifically the birth and the coming of our Savior. We celebrate that not simply with our songs but the obedience of hearts and mind and spirit and action to the king of kings to remember his faithfulness is to be utterly and absolutely obedient. It is the only gratitude that heaven returns the obedience of his people. Let's pray. Our Father, as we would remember our Savior, we would be obedient to him who is first and foremost in our hearts, Jesus the Lord. We would celebrate the night, your goodness and grace and mercy at work within us, bless us and lead us, we proceed to your present glory. Amen.