Sovereign...and good?

Unit 18, Session 1, Day 2, Esther 1-3

I was witness to a conversation last week in which I was not a participant. The main part of the conversation was about rap music but, apparently there is a son in which the rapper explains he doesn’t believe in God because God has never been there for him. One of the participants affirmed that this was why he doesn’t believe.

As I was re-reading the first three chapters of Esther, I wondered if it felt this way to those people. Queen Vashti was certainly no believer in Jehovah, but I’m sure she would not have seen His providence, though it was plain in her circumstances. Mordecai certainly couldn’t have had any idea what God might have had in mind when he suggested Esther submit to the king’s harem.



That decision set in place a situation where Mordecai was in place to discover a plot against the king and send warning through Esther. King Ahasuerus certainly would not have acknowledged God’s providence, even as his life was spared. And how did God provide for Mordecai? Haman got mad at all of Israel’s children in Susa because Mordecai would not bow down to him and arranged to have them all killed. Did it look like God was providing for them? In the moment, it would have looked as though God was napping or paying attention somewhere else. At the end of chapter 3, Mordecai has not been recognized for the service he provided the king in reporting an assassination plot, and Mordecai wants to wipe out the Israelites…in the moment. Yet God is sovereign, even when it looks dark.

So, consider today’s study question: “How can you focus on the goodness of God and cultivate present

faithfulness in light of His sovereignty?”

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