Bibledoorajar Reminds the Reader that God is Still in Control

Here is a quick review of events that have previously happened in our story:

• Haman wears the king's ring and has established a decree that the Jewish peoples will be destroyed on the thirteenth day of the month of Adar across the king's 127 provinces
• Esther has found favor with the king and he has extended the gold scepter to her
• Mordecai has decreed that she may be in her position as queen because God has strategically placed her there to save her people
• All the people of God have been asked to pray and fast
• Esther has declared that she is willing to die trying to save her people
• The king has realized that Mordecai had not been rewarded for saving the king from a rebellious act
• He asked Haman how such a hero should be rewarded
• Haman, absorbed in himself and his plans, thinks the king is seeking to reward him
• But Haman now knows the hero is not him, it is Mordecai!

     The time has arrived for the King and Haman to attend Esther's second wine banquet.  As Haman and the king drank their wine, the king again said to Esther: "Whatever your request, Queen Esther, you will be granted it; whatever you want, up to half the kingdom, it will be done." I wish I had been there. Haman could not be made merry by the wine because of what he heard Esther tell the king.  I bet when he heard it he needed another drink! But as King Solomon's proverb says, the wine is pretty and red, but has the sting of an adder in the end. Here is what Haman heard Esther say over drinks:

"If I have won your favor, king, and if it pleases the king,

then what I ask to be given me is my own life and

the lives of my people. For we have been sold, I 

and my peple, to be destroyed, killed, exterminated.

If we had only been sold as men and women slaves, 

I would have remained quiet; since then trouble

would not have been worth the damage it would

have caused the king"(to repair-rap).

Esther 7:3-4

     The king is all ears now and demands to know who this ruthless enemy is! Can you imagine the look on Haman's face? Pass the wine please, I think Haman needs a drink!