Behind the Curtain

Posted on September 3, 2021 by Pete

Most often (like maybe always) I think of our hope as a hope which looks up to heaven. But this morning I’m reminded it’s also a hope that should prompt me to remember what’s behind the curtain.

We have this as a sure and steadfast anchor of the soul, a hope that enters into the inner place behind the curtain, where Jesus has gone as a forerunner on our behalf, having become a high priest forever after the order of Melchizedek.

(Hebrews 6:19-20 ESV)

Next chapter we’ll get into the implications of “the order of Melchizedek”, but this morning I’m chewing on the implications of a high priest who has gone behind the curtain.

One not only permitted into the inner place, but One wholly at home in the Holy of Holies. The place where the glory dwells. The place where the presence of God resides. The place where, if forever atonement is going to happen, it’s going to happen there. The place where Jesus has gone as a forerunner on our behalf.

A forerunner. Noodle on that.

The high priests of Aaron’s line were also permitted into the inner place, but only once a year, and that as an exclusive invitation. No one else but Aaron & Co. could enter. They weren’t forerunners, they were a sole-runners. A one of a kind.

But Jesus, our great High Priest, is of a different sort altogether. Able to enter the inner place freely because of a perfect and holy life, making the way for others to enter because of His perfect and holy life. A life offered up for us as the once forever sacrifice for our sin. A life imparted to us through regeneration forever securing our salvation. A salvation which gives us hope. A hope tethered to the mercy seat. Though behind the curtain and unseen today, imagined only through the eyes of faith, a hope which acts as a sure and steadfast anchor of the soul.

To be sure weary saint, look up and cast your mind’s eye on the heavenly city to come. But equally sure, behold the curtain, enter by faith into the inner place where Jesus has gone ahead of you and even now makes ready a place for you. And there know afresh the reality of the anchor which holds fast amidst the storm. Tethering you not as some erratically bobbing buoy battered by the waves, but enveloped in the Savior’s arms, secure in the Spirit’s power, stable in the Father’s steadfast love.

Behind the curtain. An anchor tethered to the inner place. Sure and steadfast.

Be still my soul.

By God’s grace. For God’s glory.

Be Still My Soul (Finlandia)

Be still my soul the Lord is on thy side
Bear patiently the cross of grief or pain
Leave to thy God to order and provide
In ev’ry change He faithful will remain
Be still my soul thy best thy heav’nly Friend
Through thorny ways leads to a joyful end

Be still my soul thy God doth undertake
To guide the future as He has the past
Thy hope thy confidence let nothing shake
All now mysterious shall be bright at last
Be still my soul the waves and winds still know
His voice who ruled them while He dwelt below

Be still my soul the hour is hast’ning on
When we shall be forever with the Lord
When disappointment grief and fear are gone
Sorrow forgot love’s purest joys restored
Be still my soul when change and tears are past
All safe and blessed we shall meet at last

Be still my soul begin the song of praise
On earth believing to thy Lord on high
Acknowledge Him in all thy words and ways
So shall He view thee with a well-pleased eye
Be still my soul the Sun of life divine
Through passing clouds shall but more brightly shine

Jane Laurie Borthwick | Jean Sibelius | Kathrina Amalia von Schlegel
© Public Domain

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True of Me.

Posted on September 2, 2021 by Pete

I’m guessing that for most people, most often, when they pause over Hebrews 6 it’s to have a debate. The question? Who, in these opening verses of this passage, has “fallen away” and cannot be restored again to repentance? Is it a believer the writer’s referring to? If so, then what about eternal security? Is it someone who looked like a believer but never was? If so, just how far can someone who is spiritually dead experience spiritual things without actually being spiritually alive? Theologians, start your engines! Let the debate begin!

But this morning, as I’m noodling on this passage, this I know, I am a believer. I am saved. And the signs of eternal life described in this passages are my vital signs. The taste described I’ve tasted. So, call me selfish, but rather than stew about who, I am going to rejoice in what is true of me.

. . . those who have once been enlightened, who have tasted the heavenly gift, and have shared in the Holy Spirit, and have tasted the goodness of the word of God and the powers of the age to come . . .

(Hebrews 6:4-5 ESV)

Seen the light. Had a taste of the freely given riches of heaven. Have become a companion with the Holy Spirit. Experienced the sheer goodness of God’s word. Have had a sampling of the powers of a glorious age to come. Yup, that’s me! Praise God! Thank You, Lord!

How easy is it to take for granted water when you’re a fish? I’m guessing pretty easy (if a fish can think) given how little I think about breathing air. How dense I am to the wonder of atomic structures that flow into me unseen, do what they do as my body rhythmically keeps what it needs to keep and expels the rest.

Similarly, when’s the last time you looked in the mirror in the morning as you were getting ready and said to yourself, “Self, there’s the face of a divinely enlightened person?” As you brush your teeth and taste that minty freshness thought, “Nothing like the taste of the heavenly gift I’ve experienced and the goodness of the word of God I’ve known.” Looking deep into the eyes of the face staring back at you and whispering, “Wow! You are sharing in the Holy Spirit. Get ready for another day with an encounter of the divine kind as you are again graced with another appetizer-sized bite of the powers of the age to come.”

Okay, maybe it would be weird to have that kind of conversation with yourself as you look into the mirror with a toothbrush in your mouth. But have that conversation as you hover over your bible in the morning? Not so weird. Instead, wonderful . . . as in wonder full . . . as in worship evoking.

What a great salvation. What a jaw-dropping transformation. What a hope-securing expectation. All because — and no controversy about this — I am a child of God.

True of me. True of you?

By His grace. For His glory.

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A Use It or Lose It Thing

Posted on September 1, 2021 by Pete

That they were struggling is evident. That they were complicit is also evident.

To be sure, taking a stand for Jesus within the predominant Jewish community of the first century wasn’t for the faint of heart. While many believed that Jesus was the promised Messiah, many more believed that He wasn’t. The One who split time (think B.C. and A.D.) also split families, synagogues, and entire towns and cities.

So, to find that some were wavering in their new found faith, and were looking again to the old ways as the easier ways, probably isn’t surprising. That faith was feigning was perhaps expected, given that the flesh is weak. But while the author to the Hebrews is sympathetic to his audience as he contends for their faith, he also knows that their shaky foundation is in part due to their lax approach to the Scriptures. Reminding me this morning, that when it comes to standing firm in the faith, you need to be growing in the word. That it’s kind of a use it or lose it thing.

About this we have much to say, and it is hard to explain, since you have become dull of hearing. For though by this time you ought to be teachers, you need someone to teach you again the basic principles of the oracles of God. You need milk, not solid food, for everyone who lives on milk is unskilled in the word of righteousness, since he is a child.

(Hebrews 5:11-13 ESV)

The writer is trying to encourage these beleaguered believers with the excellencies of Christ. Urging them to keep on keepin’ on because Jesus holds the keys to the kingdom. How does he do that? He appeals to the Scriptures. The living and active word of God. The same way Jesus did on the road to Emmaus, he goes to what was written concerning the promised Messiah “in the Law of Moses and the Prophets and the Psalms” trusting the Holy Spirit “to open their minds to understand the Scriptures” (Lk. 24:44-45). But it’s hard to explain. Not so much because it was difficult to harness, but because they had become dull of hearing.

Literally, they had become lazy. And while the Spirit is more than able to illuminate the Scriptures, He needs something to work with. And these believers had, it seems, tapped out after the basic principles. For as long as they had had opportunity to learn the word of God, they should have been teachers. Instead, they were stuck retaking the 101 classes. While they should have been able to eat solid food like a grown up, they were still gumming the pabulum of stories they had learned in Sunday School. They were unskilled in the word. So, the writer to the Hebrews finds it frustrating to elevate their understanding of God given the sluggishness they had mired themselves in concerning the things of God.

The remedy?

But solid food is for the mature, for those who have their powers of discernment trained by constant practice to distinguish good from evil.

(Hebrews 5:14 ESV)

Constant practice. Constant use. A deeply-formed habit. Trained not by some extraordinary means, but through habitual, regular, meaningful engagement with the life-changing word of God. Engaged constantly in personal reading and study of the word. Engaged constantly in sitting under the public preaching of the word. Engaged constantly in talking through with others the word — processing together its application to the realities of the day.

The living word then becomes the functional word as their powers of discernment are divinely developed.

All through constant practice. Using it so as not to be losing it.

I’ve said it here before, there’s no coasting. You can’t store up the manna, it atrophies. You need to be harvesting afresh, regularly and frequently, the bread supplied from heaven. You need be in the word and the word in you. Otherwise, it’s babies-ville. Pabulum palace.

God protect us from becoming dull of hearing.

Father, stir within us a hunger and thirst for Your sanctifying word. Help us to develop a taste for Your word and know that the Lord is good.

By Your grace. For Your glory.

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Our Confession and Our Confidence

Posted on August 31, 2021 by Pete

As I finish up Hebrews 4 this morning, two penetrating commands to obey, one preeminent reason.

Since then we have a great high priest who has passed through the heavens, Jesus, the Son of God, let us hold fast our confession. For we do not have a high priest who is unable to sympathize with our weaknesses, but One who in every respect has been tempted as we are, yet without sin. Let us then with confidence draw near to the throne of grace, that we may receive mercy and find grace to help in time of need.

(Hebrews 4:14-16 ESV)

Hold fast. Draw near. Our confession. With confidence. How come? Burst forth with the tested and tried Sunday School 101 answer: Jesus!

They were wavering. Teetering between going on for Jesus, which was hard, and going back to the old ways which, though easier, would have forfeited the rest they were promised (Heb. 4:9). “Strive to enter the rest” (Heb. 4:11), is the exhortation to these Hebrews, “Harden not your hearts” (Heb. 4:7).

And that’s what it was, a matter of the heart. To what were they going to direct the centrality of their being — hope in their good works or faith in the finished work of the Son of God? How would they set their internal GPS, to seek ease and the favor of man, or to seek first the kingdom of God? Whichever it was, the word of God would splay open “the intentions of their heart,” for “no creature is hidden from [God’s] sight” (Heb. 4:12-13).

But I know my heart. Even at its finest it is so often so fickle. Even though my heart’s desires might be pure at times, it is also so easily distracted. Even with the best of intentions, too often the center of my being is beset with self-affection.

So even if I have ears to hear that I should hold fast to my confession as a Jesus-follower, even if my desire is to draw near with confidence to His mighty throne, if you knew me the way I know me, and the way God knows me, you’d know why I’m tempted to ask, “Who am I to stand so firm? Who am I to confidently draw so near?”

Wrong questions, though. It’s not “Who am I?” It’s “Who is He?”

He is our great High Priest. So let’s hold fast our confession. He has offered the once for all sacrifice for all our sin — past, present, and future — atoning fully for our transgression before a Holy God and able to declare us fully justified in His sight. Thus, let us not lose our grip on the One who has promised never to lose His grip on us. He has passed through the heavens and is, even now, at the Father’s right hand actively interceding for His own. So, let us stand firm on our profession that, “Jesus loves me, this I know!” Holding fast not because of who we are, but because He is our great High Priest.

Drawing near with confidence. Not in my own merit or works, but in His. The Son of God come in the flesh that He might be tempted in every way as we are — yet without sin — thus able to identify to the depths of my humanity and weakness. Victor over temptation, sin, and death. Now reigning on high. His throne a throne of grace. His call to me an invitation to draw near with confidence so that I might receive mercy and find grace in time of need. Not because I deserve it, but solely because I need it. Not that I’ve shown myself good enough, but that His grace is always sufficient enough.

Hold fast your confession. Draw near with confidence.

Not because of who you are, but because of who He is. Our great High Priest.

Full of abounding grace. Worthy of everlasting glory.

Hallelujah! What a Savior!

Amen?

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By Faith, By Effort

Posted on August 30, 2021 by Pete

So then, there remains a Sabbath rest for the people of God.

(Hebrews 4:9 ESV)

You read those words and it has a way of settling the soul.

There’s rest and then there’s Sabbath rest. Rest where you pause from work, and then rest where the work is done. Rest when you cease from labor and then rest when there’s no labor remaining. Just as God created for six days and then rested on the seventh, because the work was finished and because the work was good.

That’s the rest available to the people of God. The Sabbath rest found in the finished work of the risen Christ, the Son of God.

But as I hover over these first 11 verses in Hebrews 4, I’m struck by the fact that, while it’s a rest we enter into by faith, it’s also a rest we enter into by effort.

For we who have believed enter that rest . . .

(Hebrews 4:3a ESV)

Let us therefore strive to enter that rest . . .

(Hebrews 4:11a ESV)

Enter by faith or enter by effort? Which is it? It’s both. It’s not an either/or thing, it’s a both/and thing.

Faith is the key that unlocks the door to Sabbath rest, but due diligence is required to inhabit all that is behind the door.

Far from faith being some effortless state of mind that carries us into depths of rest, it’s more an intentional discipline of mind that pursues that rest. A discipline, even of itself, which we are unable to muster up apart from trusting in His provision for it.

“I believe; help my unbelief!” (Mark 9:24 ESV)

So, it’s gonna take work. Having entered the rest we make every effort to enter the rest. Having believed we seek to behave. Have trusted we’re prepared for toil.

It’s a rest that comes with a yoke (Mt. 11:28-29).

Having been saved we then are to work out our salvation (Php. 2:12).

Therefore, brothers, be all the more diligent to confirm your calling and election, for if you practice these qualities you will never fall. For in this way there will be richly provided for you an entrance into the eternal kingdom of our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ.

(2Peter 1:10-11 ESV)

By faith we have entered. By effort we will enter.

By His grace. For His glory.

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He Holds On to You

Posted on August 27, 2021 by Pete

“Hold on to Jesus.” Ever heard that said before? Ever given that counsel before? “Hang in their man, keep holding on to Jesus!” I think I’ve offered up such advice on more than one occasion.

But something I read in Hebrews 2 this morning, followed by a bit of digging into the original language, makes me wonder if — though holding on to Jesus might be good counsel — telling others that Jesus is holding on to them might be better counsel.

For surely it is not angels that [Jesus] helps, but He helps the offspring of Abraham. Therefore He had to be made like His brothers in every respect, so that He might become a merciful and faithful high priest in the service of God, to make propitiation for the sins of the people. For because He Himself has suffered when tempted, He is able to help those who are being tempted.

(Hebrews 2:16-18 ESV)

God’s Son, the appointed Heir of all things, the One through whom all things were created, the radiance of God’s glory, the exact representation of God’s being, the One who upholds the universe by His power (1:1-3), partook of flesh and blood (2:14), identifying Himself as part of the family of man, experiencing suffering as we experience suffering, in order to become a merciful and faithful high priest, to not only rescue us from death but also to help us through life.

That’s a mouthful. That’s a brainful. Pause, and noodle on it just a bit, and it becomes a heartful. For it is jaw-dropping wonderful. Amen?

In the midst of it all, I ended up chewing on the word help as it ignited my taste buds (as in “taste and see that the Lord is good” – Ps. 34:8).

Help in verse 18 has, in the original, the idea we’d expect it would. To relieve, to rescue, to support, to bring aid. Jesus is able to help. Not only able, but ready and willing. That’s why we encourage others to hold on to Jesus.

But the word translated “help” in verse 16 is a different word. The literal translation is “lay hold of” as in, “He takes hold of the offspring of Abraham.” He seizes them in order to rescue them from peril. So, beyond holding on to Jesus, might we not also encourage one another with the reminder that He’s holding on to us? I’m thinkin’ . . .

In my mind, it shifts seeing Jesus as some passive aid-giver waiting in the wings until we ask for His help to One who is actively engaged, proactively taking hold of us even as He lives in us and through us. That He is ever moving towards us to bring aid, even before we realize we need to be moving towards Him in search of assistance. Advocating for us even before we’re aware we need to cry out for ourselves. Not surprised or disappointed when again our weak flesh compromises our willing spirit, but anticipating it, having experienced it “yet without sin” (4:15), and compassionately, willingly, actively taking hold of us through His all-powerful, ever-present, never-changing, unfailing Spirit.

It’s not angels He lays hold of, but it’s us — Spirit-born children of Abraham by faith and for faith.

Hold on to Jesus? For sure! But know, weary saint, He holds on to you.

O, what a Savior!

All by grace. All for His glory.

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Confide and Abide

Posted on August 26, 2021 by Pete

In Isaiah 6, in the year that King Uzziah died, the prophet saw the Lord sitting upon His throne high and lifted up (Isa. 6:1). But in Isaiah 7, in the days of King Ahaz, he saw the unholy alliance of Syria and Ephraim coming for Judah’s throne. And “the heart of Ahaz and the heart of his people shook as the trees of the forest shake before the wind” (Isa. 7:1-2).

But while judgment through exile would eventually befall unfaithful Judah, this was not the time, nor were these the agents of judgment that God had determined. And so the LORD directs Isaiah to go to Ahaz and tell him, “Don’t sweat it.”

“Say to him, ‘Be careful, be quiet, do not fear, and do not let your heart be faint because of these two smoldering stumps of firebrands'” . . . thus says the Lord GOD: “‘It shall not stand, and it shall not come to pass. For the head of Syria is Damascus, and the head of Damascus is Rezin. And within sixty-five years Ephraim will be shattered from being a people. And the head of Ephraim is Samaria, and the head of Samaria is the son of Remaliah. If you are not firm in faith, you will not be firm at all.'”

(Isaiah 7:4a, 7-9 ESV)

If you are not firm in faith, you will not be firm at all. Okay, tell me that isn’t a verse for a t-shirt. Tell me that’s not timeless counsel regardless of whether you’re looking down the siege-works of enemy armies or confronting another cycle of surge-works from a pandemic. If we don’t stand firm in our faith, we’re not gonna stand at all (CSB). If we don’t believe, we’re not gonna last (NASB). Or as one commentator of long ago put it, “if ye will not confide, ye shall not abide.”

More and more, as uncertainty becomes less uncommon, as things “piling on” just seems to be the order of the day, isn’t what Isaiah declared, and Paul affirmed, increasingly true? We really need to walk by faith and not by sight (2Cor. 5:7).

I gotta believe because so often everything around me is unbelievable. I need to hold fast to faith’s anchor because so much “truth” around me is based on false assumptions. I need to know His word, and believe His word, if I am gong to stand firm in this world.

If you are not firm in faith, you will not be firm at all.

So worth chewing on. So worth recommitting to. So worth believing in.

Only by His grace. Always for His glory.

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What More To Do?

Posted on August 25, 2021 by Pete

He does all things well (Mk. 7:37). If that’s not one of the “official” attributes of God, I’m thinking it should be. Something I read in Isaiah this morning has me thinking it.

In chapter five, Isaiah the prophet becomes Isaiah the singer. The Spirit of God moves the herald of God to sing a song of God. A love song to a divine Vinedresser concerning His vineyard, the house of Israel. The Vinedresser established the vineyard. He cleared it of stones, and He planted it with the best of the best vines. He set a watchtower over it to care for it and, in anticipation of the fruit it was to bear, He built a winepress in the midst of it. But instead of producing a yield worthy of His labors, “for all His pains He got junk grapes” (MSG). Twang!!! The song hits a sour chord.

And then, through the prophet, the Vinedresser takes over the song.

And now, O inhabitants of Jerusalem and men of Judah, judge between Me and My vineyard. What more was there to do for My vineyard, that I have not done in it? When I looked for it to yield grapes, why did it yield wild grapes?

(Isaiah 5:3-4 ESV)

The Vinedresser did everything He could to set up His vineyard for fruitfulness. He provided everything for the bride He had called to faithfulness. But at the core of rotten fruit, at the center of an unfaithful bride, was a bad heart. A heart infected by sin. A heart prone to loving created things more than the Creator. A heart wanting to serve self more than serve the Sovereign. And so, the vineyard, beyond being a warning against rebellion and disobedience, sets us up for the Vinedresser’s 2.0 planting. A vineyard sown in hearts made ready to receive the implanted seed.

Hearts cleansed of sin through the sacrifice of the Vinedresser’s own Son. Hearts justified and freed from the penalty of sin through the shedding of the Son’s own blood. Hearts regenerated and credited with the Son’s own righteousness, a righteousness it was now able to live out through the Son’s enabling Spirit. Hearts made new so that the Vinedresser’s redeemed vineyard would produce fruit. Good fruit. Fruit befitting the kingdom of heaven.

What more was there to do for My vineyard, that I have not done in it?

He does all things well. Having loved His own He loves them to the uttermost — with the full extent of His love, to end of time, for all eternity (Jn. 13:1). He loves them perfectly, enabling them by grace, disciplining them in His goodness, forming them into the very likeness of His Son. What more to do?

No more.

Our God does all things well. O let us worship our God!

Let us rest in His goodness. Let us revel in His thoroughness. Let us abide in the true vine bearing His fruitfulness (Jn. 15:5).

Only by His grace. Only for His glory.

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God Has Spoken

Posted on August 24, 2021 by Pete

God has spoken. That’s a key bet for our faith, isn’t it? If our God were not a communicating God, He would be but a God of our own imagination. If God has not addressed those created in His image, then all that is left is for us to create a God in our own image. While our God has imprinted His existence into creation (Rom. 1:19-20), if He has not imparted to us His nature, His thinking, and His purpose, so that we might know this God, our Maker, then we are left with nothing to discover and everything to manufacture. Thank God it has not been left to us to guess about God. Thank God our God has spoken.

Long ago, at many times and in many ways, God spoke to our fathers by the prophets, but in these last days He has spoken to us by His Son, whom He appointed the heir of all things, through whom also He created the world. He is the radiance of the glory of God and the exact imprint of His nature, and eH upholds the universe by the word of His power.

(Hebrews 1:1-3b ESV)

Our journey of faith really begins with believing that God has spoken.

No need to pay attention to the writings of ancient, so-called prophets concerning a coming Messiah if the Creator is mute, or cares so little of earth’s manufacture that He ignores it. But if our God has spoken through the prophets of what we call the Old Testament, then heads-up, who’s He speaking about? What we call the New Testament provides the answer. God, through the prophets, spoke of a coming Messiah, His Son. His Son having come, God now speaks to us through Him.

To know Jesus, is to know God. To know something of the heart, mind, and motivations of the Christ is to know something of the Creator. For He is the shining forth, the reflection, of God’s glory. The very nature of God etched within His human form, to read the record of Jesus in action is to see Jehovah in action. For God has spoken to us by His Son.

John, one who walked with Jesus, also declared that Jesus is the Word. The Word who was with God, the Word who was God. The Word who was in the beginning with God and through whom, God made all things (Jn. 1:1-3). Oh, Word of God speak!

These opening verses of Hebrews are pretty familiar, but they’re still pretty jaw-dropping. Especially as you consider that this Word from God is not some distance word, but the Word that loved us, died to redeem us, rose from the dead and now lives in and through us.

God has spoken and God continues to speak. Not that He speaks a new word, or a new truth, or a changing truth, but that He speaks His revealed truth personally, profoundly, and supernaturally through the Spirit of God in us who gives us ears to hear what our communicating God has communicated.

God has spoken.

By His grace. For His glory.

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127 Provinces

Posted on August 23, 2021 by Pete

127 Provinces. That’s what I’m chewing on this morning.

The king’s scribes were summoned at that time, in the third month, which is the month of Sivan, on the twenty-third day. And an edict was written, according to all that Mordecai commanded concerning the Jews, to the satraps and the governors and the officials of the provinces from India to Ethiopia, 127 provinces, to each province in its own script and to each people in its own language, and also to the Jews in their script and their language. . . . saying that the king allowed the Jews who were in every city to gather and defend their lives . . .

(Esther 8:9-11a ESV)

The king? King Ahasuerus, king of the Persians and Medes. The edict? A counter-measure of the edict that had gone out before, devised by Haman, an enemy of the Jews, declaring that all Jews were to be destroyed? The outcome of this second edict? “The reverse occurred: the Jews gained mastery over those who hated them” (Es. 9:1b). The scope of the victory? 127 provinces.

While the events recorded in Esther were concerned with those Jews who decided to remain in Babylon rather than go back to Jerusalem to rebuild the temple, the impact of those events was felt in all 127 provinces within the Persian/Mede empire — including Israel, “the province Beyond the River” (a term used frequently in Ezra). Had it not been for the book of Esther, there would have been no book of Nehemiah.

While the world was moving and shaking in Susa, God was protecting in Jerusalem. While men were scheming and edict-ing, the Sovereign God was in control. While the storm was brewing in the Empire’s capital, the anchor held fast in the land of promise. While not even the name of God is mentioned in Esther, that God was in the thick of it all is evident by the fact that the latter portion of Ezra and Nehemiah exist. God worked in and round the palace through a nobody who became queen in order to preserve and protect a people He had chosen for Himself to reign over as King.

127 provinces. A reminder that God works behind the scenes and in far away places. While the gates of hell may seem to be bursting forth all around us, the God who will prevail is at work, even if out of sight, protecting us — faithful to His eternal promises and His unchanging person.

I can only imagine what is was for those exiles who returned to Jerusalem to have heard that first edict read authorizing their destruction. What a kick in the gut. Made no sense given they were certain they were in God’s will having returned to the land to rebuild the temple. But then, to have received the second edict allowing them to defend themselves? What hope! And then to see their enemies defeated? To have experienced the reality of “the reverse occurred”? What joy! What elation! What reason for celebration! Worthy of a perpetual feast of remembrance (Es. 9:20-28).

. . . as the days on which the Jews got relief from their enemies, and as the month that had been turned for them from sorrow into gladness and from mourning into a holiday; that they should make them days of feasting and gladness, days for sending gifts of food to one another and gifts to the poor. . . . Letters were sent to all the Jews, to the 127 provinces of the kingdom of Ahasuerus, in words of peace and truth, that these days of Purim should be observed at their appointed seasons . . .

(Esther 9:22, 30-31a ESV)

Our God reigns. Our God prevails. His promises are sure. The outcome is guaranteed. The victory is ours. Our sorrow will turn to gladness. Our mourning will fade as we feast in remembrance.

By His grace. For His glory.

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