Mon.’s Devo - For Such a Time as This

Read: Esther 4:1-7:10; 1 Corinthians 12:1-26; Psalm 36:1-12; Proverbs 21:21-22 When Mordecai heard the evil decree to kill the Jews and take their land, he tore his clothes, dressed in burlap and ashes and went out crying with a loud wail. This was repeated by the Jews throughout the provinces as the news traveled. *** Esther heard that Mordecai was in mourning and sent word to find out why. He explained the decree and told her that she had to appeal to the king for her people. She was afraid to approach him because it might cost her her life. Mordecai told her it would cost her her life if she didn’t and maybe this was why God had made her the queen. She agreed to go to the king if all the Jews would fast for three days. *** On the third day, Esther went to the king and he held up his scepter to her. When he asked her her request, she asked for him and Haman to come to a banquet she would prepare. He agreed. *** Haman and the king went to the banquet but when the king asked Esther what her request was she asked them to come the next night to a banquet and then she would give him her request. They gladly agreed. *** Haman went home happy and boasted to his wife and friends about all his wealth, position and favor with the king. Then he told them about Mordecai who refused to bow to him. They suggested he erect a pole 75 feet tall in his backyard and asks the king permission to empale Mordecai on it the next day. *** Than night the king couldn’t sleep and he called for the books of his kingdom to be read to him. When he reached the part where Mordecai reported the assassins, he asked what had been done to reward him. Nothing had been done. *** Then next morning the king asked Haman what he would do for the man the king would want to honor. Haman thought it had to be him, so he told him what he would want done to him to show the world how the king honored him. *** The king liked his idea and told him to go and do it for Mordecai. So Haman had to put Mordecai on the king’s horse with the king’s robe on and yell, “this is what the king does for someone he wishes to honor!” Mordecai went home humiliated. *** He told his wife and friends about what had happened and they changed their tune. They told him since Mordecai was of Jewish origin, he would never succeed in his plans against him. It would be fatal to try. (Now they tell him.) *** Haman didn’t have time to think about it because the king’s eunuchs arrived to escort him to Esther’s banquet. *** When the men had had their wine, the king asked Esther what her request was. This was when Esther exposed Haman for plotting to kill her and her people. The king was enraged and went immediately to get someone to take Haman to his death. Haman fell on Esther to beg for his life. When the king came back in he accused Haman of assaulting his wife. *** The kings eunuch told the king that Haman had erected the pole in his yard to impale Mordecai on. The king told him to use it for Haman. So Haman was impaled in his own yard on the pole he had erected for Mordecai. *** In Corinthians, Paul was asked about spiritual gifts. Paul explained that the Spirit of God would never curse Jesus. There were different kinds of spiritual gifts but they all came from the Spirit of the Lord. They did different services but they all served the Lord. They worked in different ways but God was the one who worked them. *** Everyone is given a spiritual gift. Some have the gift to give wise advice, another has the gift to give a message of knowledge. Another has the gift of great faith and to another God gives the gift to heal. He gives one person the power to perform miracles and to another the ability to prophesy. He gives to one the ability to discern whether a spirit is from God or not. Another person is given the ability to speak in unknown languages while another can interpret the unknown languages. God’s Holy Spirit decides who gets what spirit and gives it to them. *** God set up the Church to run like our bodies do. Each member of the Body of Christ has its purpose just like each member of our physical body does. We all need each other. Every part is extremely important whether they are seen or not. Each part is necessary in the whole success of the body. God made it this way so we would work together in love and unity. *** If one part is suffering, the whole body suffers and if one part is honored, the whole body is honored. *** Lord, may we have eyes to see the way the Kingdom is supposed to work. May we stop competing against one another and work together in love. May we learn our spiritual gifts and how to use them to give help the rest of the body.