“Hadassah”Where Is God? - The Book of EstherLanse Evangelical Free ChurchOctober 26, 2025 :: Esther 2:1-23  
“Where Is God?” That’s the title of our new series on this unique book of the Bible called, “Esther.”
“Where is God?” That’s a question that we have all asked from time to time, and we have all felt in our bones.
“Where is God?” Especially, where is God when bad things are happening to us?
We saw already, last week, that the Book of Esther answers that question in a subtle way. It doesn’t just come out and hit you with the “right answers.” It allows you to feel the question and to feel your way to the answer by following this rollicking good story.

“Where is God?” 
Especially when He is not mentioned. We pointed out last Sunday that unlike the Book of Daniel that had all of those amazing names for God that Shaggy referenced in his song. Unlike the Book of Daniel with all of those amazing names for God, in the Book of Esther, God is never named.
God is never mentioned! Not even once. We read chapter 1 last week, all about the fateful banquet that King Xerxes (also known as Ahasuerus) threw to impress his kingdom and the trouble he got everybody in when he required his queen to appear and make a show of herself before a crowd of drunken men. When Vashti refused, Xerxes dug in and made it all worse. He allowed himself to be talked into publishing his spat with the queen and make it an unrepealable law that Vashti could never enter his presence again and her place as queen be given to someone else.
And in all of that story, God was never mentioned. 
Where was God in Esther chapter 1? Was God present and active in the foolish court of the pagan king of Persia? Or was He absent, inactive, missing, gone? I think the story is hinting already that God, though perhaps hidden, is very present and very active, and we just need to keep our eyes open and our ears tuned to catch what He is up to. What do you think?
It’s also possible that He’s there, but we aren’t going to know or understand what He is up to. We wouldn’t understand if we did know.
In Esther chapter 2, Xerxes is still on the throne, but he feels alone. Let’s look at verse 1.
“Later when the anger of King Xerxes had subsided, he remembered Vashti and what she had done and what he had decreed about her.”
He’s feeling it, isn’t he? He’s finally sobered up and cooled down. And he’s thinking about Vashti. I wonder if he regrets at all what he did. I wonder if he was brooding.
Xerxes never seems to ever think he did anything wrong. Notice it says that he remembered what she had done. As if Vashti was the real problem here. Not what he had demanded that she do. But he also remembers what he had decreed. By law, he was never supposed to see Vashti again. And that law had been translated and broadcast into every language in his kingdom from India to Ethiopia. 
I wonder if he was depressed?
And Xerxes has even more on his mind during this time period. Do you remember last week that we said that Xerxes wasn’t happy with the size of his giant kingdom. He really really wanted to conquer...what other kingdom?
Greece! His dad had tried it and failed. He was going to try it once again.
How did that go?
Do you remember the vision of Daniel chapter 8? That’s the one that Daniel had in Susa (where this story takes place), and it was about a Ram and a Goat. And the ram had two horns (one longer than the other one), and it was the Medes and the Persians. Do you remember what the goat was? Ran so fast it didn’t touch the ground. The goat was the Greeks. And they ran at each other. And which animal won? The goat won. Ultimately, years later, with Alexander the Great.
So Xerxes could not conquer the Greeks. Even when he had superior numbers! Some of you may remember from your high school history classes the battle of Thermopylae. Or the 300 Spartans that held back the oncoming onslaught of the giant army. Well, that was Xerxes army, and it was right about this time.
So Xerxes may have been feeling like a loser. He had lost to Greece, and he had lost his queen. He had lost to his queen. With her refusal, she had made him look weak, a joke. Even though he was perhaps the most powerful man on the planet at that moment, Xerxes was down.
So his staff tried to come up with a solution to cheer him up.
“You know what you need, O king? You need a wife. You need a queen. You need a replacement queen. An upgraded queen. And to get there, you need a lot of sex.”
You can almost see his head bob up in verse 2.
“Then the king's personal attendants proposed, ‘Let a search be made for beautiful young virgins for the king. Let the king appoint commissioners in every province of his realm to bring all these beautiful girls into the harem at the citadel of Susa. Let them be placed under the care of Hegai, the king's eunuch, who is in charge of the women; and let beauty treatments be given to them. Then let the girl who pleases the king be queen instead of Vashti’” (vv.2-4a).
This is another terrible idea.
Instead of fixing his problem with his old wife, or instead of choosing a new queen from those who might be qualified by their wisdom and experience in overseeing other important responsibilities, the king’s personal attendants proposed...a giant beauty and sex contest. A star search. 
A reality show where beautiful young ladies of marriageable age are brought from all over his vast kingdom for the king to try out one at a time.
Survivor: Queen Edition. Persian Wife Search. “Tune in at 9, 8 central.”
This is a terrible idea.
His advisors make it sound so legitimate with “appointing commissioners,” and placing these women under the care of Hegai, and providing them with beauty treatments. How nice for them to get a day in the spa!
But this is not nice. This is brutal, when you think about it. Because I don’t think that these women were, for the most part at least, volunteering. They were being subscripted. Just like the army. Just like the eunuchs. The commissioners were snatching up the beauties from all over the kingdom. “You, you, you. Come with me.” [I got this "you, you, you" wording from Christopher Ash.]
It was more like a kind of kidnaping. More like coercion. More like royal human trafficking than just a version of “The Miss Persia Contest.”
And the only thing they were looking for was superficial youthful beauty. They had to be young, of marriageable status, and beautiful. 
Apparently, King Ahasuerus and his friends did not know what Lemuel’s mother had taught him, “Charm is deceptive, and beauty is fleeting; but a woman who fears the LORD is to be praised” (Proverbs 31:30).
Guys, you don’t want a queen whose only qualification is that she is great arm candy or lots of fun in bed.
But that’s the plan! Gather up the beautiful young girls and have them put under the care of Hegai, a man that Xerxes has most likely had castrated so that they will be safe with him. [Interestingly, even though Vashti and Esther are not named in Herodotus’ history, this Hegai may be!]
And place them in a harem. “A house for the women of the king.”
Every time a harem is mentioned in Scripture, it’s presented as a bad idea. Bad for women. And bad for nations. And bad for the king who thinks he should have one. [This includes King Solomon who was a Hebrew!]
So what does Xerxes do? Verse 4.
“This advice appealed to the king, and he followed it.”
Of course, he did.
Where is God?  Xerxes doesn’t know and doesn’t care. He just knows what he wants. And he’s the king, so he’s going to get what he wants! He’s all cheered up. He’s rubbing his hands together. [By the way, this tracks with what we learn about Xerxes during this time period. He was famous for his affairs and adulteries and chasing after his pleasures.]
“Great idea, guys! This will be expensive. What big a undertaking! But I am totally worth it. Start bringing them in. Let’s see what we’ve got.”
Now in verse 5, the focus of the story changes. The storyteller introduces two more key characters in this drama, including the one from which the book gets its name. Look at verse 5.
“Now there was in the citadel of Susa a Jew of the tribe of Benjamin, named Mordecai son of Jair, the son of Shimei, the son of Kish, who had been carried into exile from Jerusalem by Nebuchadnezzar king of Babylon, among those taken captive with Jehoiachin king of Judah” (vv.5-6). Stop there for a second.
There was a Jew named Mordecai, and this is his story.
Where does he live? He lives in Susa. That’s this Persian city where Xerxes has his winter fortress. In fact, he lives in the fortress. He’s somehow attached to the citadel. Perhaps he’s a low-ranking official in Xerxes’ government. 
Why does he live there? If he’s a Jew, why doesn’t he live in Israel? Well, it’s complicated. His family was carried off into exile in 597 BC. We read about Nebuchadnezzar’s uprooting and hoisting away the second-to-last king of Judah named Jehoiachin (also called Jeconiah) in 2 Kings 24 and Jeremiah 24, and 27, and 29. Apparently, Mordecai’s family went with King Jehoiachin into exile, and Mordecai has found his way not just to Babylon but to Persia.
By the way, it almost certainly must mean that his great-grandfather Kish was carried into exile because it’s been like 114 years since that happened, and I don’t think Mordecai was that old!
But Mordecai is in Susa because of the broken covenant. And because of some other decisions by his family. For over 50 years, they have been allowed to immigrate back to Israel. Xerxes’s grandfather Cyrus said so. But only about 50,000 Jews went back to Israel at that point. Most of the rest of them decided that they would try to make a go of it in the land where they had been replanted.
Was that good and wise?
It’s hard to say. It was definitely hard. It was hard to maintain their Jewish identity when they were embedded in Persia.
Mordecai’s name for example is almost certainly Persian in origin. It was probably a variant of Marduk one of the gods of Mesopotamia. It’s possible that Mordecai had a Hebrew name, too, but the Bible doesn’t tell us that. To us, he’s just Mordecai, son of Shimei, the son of Kish.
By the way, keep that last name in your head. It may become somewhat important as the story unfolds.
But we need to move on from considering Mordecai to gazing upon his young charge. And her name was “Hadassah.” Look at verse 7.
“Mordecai had a cousin named Hadassah, whom he had brought up because she had neither father nor mother. This girl, who was also known as Esther, was lovely in form and features, and Mordecai had taken her as his own daughter when her father and mother died.”
Her name was Hadassah which means “myrtle,” which is a fragrant star-shaped flower. It’s a beautiful name. I’m sure her parents loved bestowing it upon her when she was born. But they had both died. The storyteller tells us that twice in this one verse. We need to understand that Hadassah was an orphan.
Where was God when her parents were taken from her?
At least, Hadassah had her cousin. Mordecai had taken responsibility for Hadassah and was bringing her up. 
And Hadassah also had another name. This is the only place in the Bible where we read her name as “Hadassah.” She had another name that was much more famous. Her other name was Esther. Esther is probably her Persian name. It’s probably related to the name of the Mesopotamian goddess Ishtar. And it is related to the word “Star.” Esther is, in many ways, the star of this story.
I have so many questions when I read this book.
I wonder if she loved both of her names? I wonder if she had a hard time with the Esther name. Just like I wonder about Daniel (who was also called Belteshazzar) or Hananiah, Mishael, and Azariah a.k.a. Shadrach, Meshach, and Abednego.
Those guys didn’t think these names were worth fighting over or dying over. It was a just a name, after all. But I wonder how they felt about it.
I really wonder how Hadassah felt about what happened to her next. Because just as soon as the storyteller let us know that Esther was “lovely in form and features,” every person listening to the story so far said, “Uh oh! I can see where this is going!”
Esther is a pretty young thing, and Xerxes is looking for some pretty young things. Let’s read verse 8.
“When the king's order and edict had been proclaimed, many girls were brought to the citadel of Susa and put under the care of Hegai. Esther also was taken to the king's palace and entrusted to Hegai, who had charge of the harem.”
So many questions.
I wonder how she felt about it. It doesn’t say that she resisted. Apparently, on some level, she was willing. She maybe didn’t feel she had much choice. She didn’t have much choice. She was at the king’s mercy.
When that decree went out, I wonder how all of the parents in the kingdom felt about it. Some may have wanted their daughter to get into the program. A shot at being the queen! An honor to be picked just for the harem itself, and as we’ll see, a relatively safe and secure future in an uncertain and scary world. There are worse things than being in a harem as much as I would not want it for any woman I know. 
Other parents probably rushed to marry off their daughters to someone they knew and trusted before the king’s commissioners could take them away from them.     
Did you feel that word “taken” in verse 8?
I felt that word like I had never felt it before as I studied Esther this week.
“Esther also was taken...”
[And there was no Liam Neeson with a particular set of skills to go rescue her.]
How did she feel? There go her hopes and dreams. She would never marry a nice Jewish boy and move back to Jerusalem. She would never live in her home with her guardian cousin again.
Her parents had been taken from her, and now she was being taken from everything she knew.
Where was God when Hadassah was taken to the king’s palace?
By the way, the Bible does not tell us all of this because God was okay with it! This part of the story is not presenting the king’s audition program as the biblical way to get a wife or a queen. Far from it! God does not condone this treatment of women.
The Bible is telling us this part of the story to bear witness that this is what happened...and to hint that God can use even this evil for His glory and our good.
Mordecai lets her go. He probably doesn’t think he has much choice either.
And then something interesting happens...
Esther rises to the top. Look at verse 9.
“The girl pleased him [that’s Hegai] and won his favor. Immediately he provided her with her beauty treatments and special food. He assigned to her seven maids selected from the king's palace and moved her and her maids into the best place in the harem.”
Now, just like that word “taken” was important in verse 8, so is the word “favor” in verse 9.  Hegai just loved Esther! She was perfect in his eyes. Hegai was a talent spotter, and he could see something special in this one. She was a real beauty! She won his favor. And the word translated “favor” in verse 9, is the Hebrew “hesed.” Which we normally think of as something that God has for us. Steadfast love. Lovingkindess. Loyal love. 
It’s in our new memory verse, Psalm 117. “Praise the LORD, all you nations; extol him, all you peoples. For great is his [hesed] toward us, and the faithfulness of the LORD endures forever. Praise the LORD.”
Hmmm. I wonder if there’s something special going on here? Not a miracle, and yet...
Hegai gives her nothing but the best. Special beauty treatments, special ointments, massages, exfoliation, and special food. And unlike Daniel and his friends, Esther says, “Okay, I’ll eat your food.” It probably wasn’t kosher. In the best part of the harem, she got seven [count them seven! Just like the 7 eunuchs and 7 advisors last week, Esther gets 7] maids to be on her beauty staff to get her ready to meet the king!
Now, is this a good thing that she’s doing all this? It’s hard to say. Unless she is going to pull a Daniel and the lions den or a Shadrach, Meshach, and Abednego and face the furnace, she doesn’t have much choice. So she makes the best of it.
I don’t judge her. And I don’t think the Bible presents her as necessarily doing something wrong here.
She made a hard choice in a hard place.
If she was doing something wrong, it’s probably the next thing, in verse 10.
“Esther had not revealed her nationality and family background, because Mordecai had forbidden her to do so.”
Nobody knew she was a Jew. Nobody knew that she was Hadassah. They just knew she was Esther, the Star. She was quiet about it. She didn’t deny it. But it was a secret.
She kept it secret because Mordecai told her to. We don’t know why he did that, but we can guess. It’s called “antisemitism,” and it’s been around a long long time.
We’ll find out in the next chapter that Mordecai had good reason to fear hatred of the Jews in Susa.
But it’s not completely clear if keeping this was the right thing to do or not. It’s always tempting to keep quiet about our connection to our God. It’s often easier to be a “secret believer.” It’s easier if you are living in two worlds, to keep quiet about the one when you’re in the other. Making little compromises and losing your true identity in the process.
Or perhaps, in that moment, it was wise and strategic to stay silent. I can’t say. I don’t think the Bible is clearly saying one or the other in this part of the story either. But there is probably coming a time in this story when Esther will need to reveal that she is also Hadassah, and it might take some courage to get there.
Mordecai is keeping a close eye on her. Verse 11.
“Every day he walked back and forth near the courtyard of the harem to find out how Esther was and what was happening to her.”
He has not given up on her, even though she was taken. He’s right there checking on her every single day. 
I think, men, that we could learn something from that! Checking on the well-being (literally the shalom) of the key women in our lives every single day.
Mordecai was probably worried about her. What was going to happen to Hadassah?
Verses 12 through 14 explain the process that all of the girls in this program went through. Look at verse 12.
“Before a girl's turn came to go in to King Xerxes, she had to complete twelve months of beauty treatments prescribed for the women, six months with oil of myrrh and six with perfumes and cosmetics. [A whole year!] And this is how she would go to the king: Anything she wanted was given her to take with her from the harem to the king's palace. [Perfumes, clothes, jewelry, aphrodisiacs, special food. Anything that she thinks would really please him.] In the evening she would go there...and in the morning return to another part of the harem to the care of Shaashgaz, the king's eunuch who was in charge of the concubines. She would not return to the king unless he was pleased with her and summoned her by name” (vv.12-14).
I love how careful the storyteller is with the details.
We don’t have to have it all spelled out for us.
She prepares for a year. She gets herself all dolled up. She goes in the evening. She stays the night. She goes from the part of the harem for virgins to the part of the harem for concubines. She is no longer in the realm of Hegai but of Shaashgaz.
Her life has changed.
She has “auditioned.”Her status has changed.She has been inducted into a new reality.
She is not quite a wife. She’s still a prisoner, really, and always will be. But she could be called back for some more if the king calls her by name. And not many were called back.
That’s what happened to all of them. What about Hadassah? What happened to her in particular? In verse 15, her time has come.
“When the turn came for Esther ([to be clear, that’s Hadassah] the girl Mordecai had adopted, the daughter of his uncle Abihail) to go to the king, she asked for nothing other than what Hegai, the king's eunuch who was in charge of the harem, suggested. And Esther won the favor of everyone who saw her. [Favor!] She was taken to King Xerxes in the royal residence in the tenth month, the month of Tebeth, in the seventh year of his reign.”
That was probably 479BC. Church, that was four years since Vashti had been banished! Has Xerxes been trying out new girls for four years?!!
Verse 16 says again that Esther was taken. Her parents were taken from her.She was taken from her guardian.She was taken from the harem to the king.
And verse 17 says that there she found favor with him. Look at verse 17.
“Now the king was attracted to Esther more than to any of the other women, and she won his favor and approval more than any of the other virgins. So he set a royal crown on her head and made her queen instead of Vashti” (v.17).
Ahasuerus took a big high royal turban and set it on her head.
“And the king gave a great banquet, Esther's banquet, for all his nobles and officials. He proclaimed a holiday throughout the provinces and distributed gifts with royal liberality” (v.18).
Esther won! Esther won the contest. She won hands down. She was the best in the king’s eyes! The king even threw her a banquet!
We said last week to keep an eye on the banquets in this story. “Mishteh.” Every time a banquet happens, the story changes. This girl went from a nobody orphan exile at the bottom of society to be rocketed to the tippy top! Hadassah is now Queen Esther! She was married. Not just a concubine but a wife. And not just a wife but a queen. Never had she ever expected anything like this. What an honor! What possibilities may stretch ahead of her!
Is this a good thing? Well, there’s certainly good things about it. I don’t think a good Jewish girl was supposed to go bed with an uncircumcised pagan they weren’t even married to. And they weren’t supposed to marry outside of the twelve tribes either [see Ezra 9-10 for more about this!].
But it’s not like she had much choice, and now a Jew (though a secret one) is now the Queen of Persia. In a place of honor and power. And everybody in the kingdom is celebrating. The king has gotten generous like he did at the last banquet with the wine. He’s giving out gifts with “royal liberality.”  Probably canceling taxes so that everybody celebrates a Esther’s Banquet. Three cheers for our new Star Queen!
There’s one more part to this story, and then we’ll try to do a little application; though I think it’ll just be a hint of application this week.
In verse 19, we read another story about Mordecai and something he heard. Look at verse 19.
“When the virgins were assembled a second time, Mordecai was sitting at the king's gate. 
It's not quite clear why they were assembled. My guess is that the contest is actually over now that Esther has won, so they are getting grouped together to be sent home. Which would be a relief to many of them and a disappointment to some. Or it could mean that the king enjoyed the first round of this contest so much, he was starting a second one. It’s not clear.
But Mordecai is still doing his job at the king's gate. That's not just sitting around at a doorway! The king’s gate is where the official business of the kingdom was often conducted. V.20
“But Esther had kept secret her family background and nationality just as Mordecai had told her to do, for she continued to follow Mordecai's instructions as she had done when he was bringing her up. [The storyteller tells us this again. It will probably be important as the story goes on.] During the time Mordecai was sitting at the king's gate, Bigthana and Teresh, two of the king's officers who guarded the doorway, became angry and conspired to assassinate King Xerxes. But Mordecai found out about the plot and told Queen Esther, who in turn reported it to the king, giving credit to Mordecai.  And when the report was investigated and found to be true, the two officials were hanged on a gallows. All this was recorded in the book of the annals in the presence of the king.”
Do you get the picture? Mordecai gets wind of this plot to kill the king. Maybe he even overheard “Biggie and Terrie” conspiring together. 
Mordecai is immediately concerned for Esther! If the king gets killed, what does that mean for the queen?
Apparently they still talk regularly, maybe every day. Mordecai tells the queen. The queen tells the king. The secret service conduct an investigation into the threat, and later that day Bigthana and Teresh are hanging from gallows, or, to be more specific, impaled on poles in the front yard as a cautionary tale for whoever might even think about trying to kill the king. 
Isn’t it interesting that Mordecai just so happened to be there to catch wind of this plot?
And isn’t it interesting to see how handsomely Mordecai was rewarded. Wait. He wasn’t rewarded, was he? No. Everything gotten written down in the log. “Recorded in the book of the annals in the presence of the king.” "Mordecai. Bigthana. Terish. Gallows. Got it."
But, contrary to Persian practice, Mordecai gets overlooked for recognition. Somebody else rises in the kingdom whom we’re going to meet in the next chapter. But Mordecai gets nothing and is forgotten.
Hmmm. I wonder if that might become important later in the story?
So, let’s think together about application from this chapter of the Bible. What lessons could we learn because we’ve studied Esther chapter 2?
How to find a wife?How to pick a queen?How to snag a husband?How to run a harem?
I don’t think so. I think we get the best applications for this chapter by asking once again our key question for this series.
Where is God?
Where is God in Esther chapter 2? He’s never mentioned. He’s never named. So if we see Him, it’s just a glimpse. It’s just an echo. Just a whisper. He’s hidden in the Book of Esther, after all. If we see him, it'll be just a glimpse in the corner of our eye.
I thought of three things we might say. Three things that are hinted at in this chapter and are definitely true in the rest of the book and the rest of the Bible. Number one. 
Where is God in Esther chapter 2?
#1. HE IS THERE WITH OUR SUFFERINGS.
He is present in our pain. He is on hand in our trauma.
God wasn’t absent when Hadassah’s parents died.God wasn’t absent when she was orphaned.God wasn’t absent when Esther got taken, violated, imprisoned. He wasn’t away on vacation that day.
He was there. He was right there.
How do we know that? 
Well, this story tells us what happened. It bore witness to the history of her life. And of Mordecai’s life. And their entire exiled family’s life. The storyteller tells their story.  And we know Who the ultimate Storyteller is! And just because it happened, doesn’t mean that it’s good. Life is hard. The Bible says that clearly. And it’s hard for believers, too. We are not exempted from death or sexual assault, or systemic injustice.  Just because we have a Mighty Fortress does not mean that we will escape pain and harm and trauma in this life. We will not escape pain and harm and trauma in this life. But that doesn’t mean we are alone.
At the fall retreat, we memorized Proverbs 15:3, “The eyes of the LORD are everywhere, keeping watch on the wicked and the good.”
Just like Mordecai checking daily on Hadassah, the LORD is watching over His children.
Present in our pain. He knows! The LORD knows what you have gone through. That thing that person did to you? God was there. And He cares. 
He knows your story. And He dares to tell it. And He’s doing something with it.
We might not ever know this side of eternity what in the world God was doing with all of that suffering that He allowed into our life. But we know that He was there for all of it. And He has the ability to turn it all for our good.
We know that. The Bible says so. The Bible says, “And we know that in all things God works for the good of those who love him, who have been called according to his purpose” (Romans 8:28).
And that, in the process, He will never leave us nor forsake us. 
Where was God? He was right there with our sufferings.
Second hint. Where is God in Esther chapter 2?
#2. HE IS THERE WITH OUR SUCCESSES.
He’s not just there with “taken.” He’s there with “favor.” It’s both.
Where do you think all this favor for Esther was coming from? It doesn’t say! But it sure makes you wonder. Where did all of this “hesed” come from all of sudden? How did Hadassah go from the bottom to the top in one year?
Hmmm. I wonder. God is not just sovereign over the hard things but the happy things, too.
Proverbs 21:1 says, “The king's heart is in the hand of the LORD; he directs it like a watercourse wherever he pleases.” ]
Xerxes ends up wherever the LORD ultimately wants him to end up. He makes all of his own choices for himself. Terrible as they often are! But Xerxes’ choices don’t stop the LORD’s purposes from being fulfilled. And that includes Esther finding favor with him and with everyone. It’s not because she’s so great (as great as she probably was!) but because the LORD was with her. It doesn’t say it. But... And any more successes that are in this story, especially the big surprising ones, I wonder where they might come from?
And last but not least. Where is God in Esther chapter 2?
#3. HE IS THERE WITH OUR SALVATION.
I know we haven’t seen it yet, only just a hint, but next time, Lord-willing, in chapter 3, we’re going to learn of a grave danger that threatens the people of God and yet does not catch God by surprise.
Even though His name never appears in the story. There just might be Someone who has a plan that He’s been putting into place from before even chapter 1! There just might be Someone who just might have a plan that includes little details that just so happened to happen in chapter 2. Because maybe there is no such thing as coincidence. 
Maybe Someone is sovereign over even the small things that make our lives. The details. The things even we’ve forgotten much less everyone else. Even our bad choices along the way.
The odds were stacked against Hadassah and her people. But I think we might see as this story unfolds, that there is salvation on the way.
That’s what happened at the Cross and the Empty Tomb, isn’t it?  Everything was stacked against us there. All of our enemies were winning. The World, the Flesh, the Devil. Our backs were against the wall, and we had nobody to blame but ourselves. 
But our God had a plan. He had a plan before the story even began. And it was a plan that we would have expected or come up with our own.
God sent His Son to rescue us from our sin by taking our sin onto Himself and giving us His righteousness. So that when Jesus went to the Cross, He died for our sins. And then when came out of the Tomb, He came back to life to give us life forever with Him!
Not because of anything we had done or would do.
Salvation is by grace alone through faith alone in Jesus Christ alone. And we know this because of the Word of God alone. God had a plan and all who repent and put their trust in His Son will enjoy the blessings of that plan forever. To the glory of God alone. 
God is not hidden. He is with us in our salvation.
Psalm 46:11, “The LORD Almighty is with us; the God of Jacob is our fortress.”
***
Messages in this Series:
01. The King Gave a Banquet - Esther 1:1-22