What If You Knew?

Esther 6:1 That night the king could not sleep. So one was commanded to bring the book of the records of the chronicles; and they were read before the king. 2 And it was found written that Mordecai had told of Bigthana and Teresh, two of the king's eunuchs, the doorkeepers who had sought to lay hands on King Ahasuerus. 3 Then the king said, "What honor or dignity has been bestowed on Mordecai for this?" And the king's servants who attended him said, "Nothing has been done for him."

4 So the king said, "Who is in the court?" Now Haman had just entered the outer court of the king's palace to suggest that the king hang Mordecai on the gallows that he had prepared for him. 5 The king's servants said to him, "Haman is there, standing in the court." And the king said, "Let him come in." 6 So Haman came in, and the king asked him, "What shall be done for the man whom the king delights to honor?" Now Haman thought in his heart, "Whom would the king delight to honor more than me?"

Knowing God is behind the scenes should be very comforting to the believer. The hard part is knowing…and how knowing is so often tested by waiting. Waiting is the hardest part about knowing. Waiting tests knowing to the extreme. It is in waiting that knowing becomes doubting, and doubting leads to doing, and doing without knowing leads to failure.

Suppose you were, as was Mordecai in the Book of Esther, waiting to be killed in a holocaust-like operation sponsored by an evil man named Haman. (The text teaches us the Jews were all to be killed by written decree of the king, in 12 months.) A year of waiting to ensue…and what is to be done?

Does this sound like any time to wait on the Lord? Well, there IS time – but so much is at stake. And, since the king has already written an edict which by law cannot be over-turned, what can God really do anyway? Surely, this must be a time to flee the scene for self-preservation. But how can all the Jews be organized to move? It all seems so perplexing…(see Esther 3:15.)

When you are in a perplexed place – as all the Jews were, not just Mordecai – it is a place of waiting. No matter what, a time when you find yourself confounded is a time when waiting is appropriate. We are only to move out and take action in a time when we are as certain of God’s direction as we can be. And waiting is what we are to do when we are as uncertain as we can be about what to do.

We become certain of what to do when we see what God has done while we were waiting and watching. To trust that God is working while you are waiting is the part the Bible shows us over and over again, and it is the part that is imperative to remember. What if you knew God was working while you were waiting? Wouldn’t that settle your heart? What if Mordecai hadn’t waited?

- Pastor Bill