The Alternative

Dr. Tony Evans: God may put you in a bad situation so that he gives you a supernatural deliverance.

Guest (Male): Dr. Tony Evans says the Lord is always ready to lead as long as you're willing to follow.

Dr. Tony Evans: But if your antenna is not up, if human wisdom guides your decision-making, you won't pick up the signals and you will miss the movement.

Guest (Male): This is The Alternative broadcast featuring the timeless biblical teachings from the archives of Dr. Tony Evans.

Life has a way of turning upside down when we least expect it. But how do we know whether those reversals are a part of God's plan or the result of our own missteps? Today, Dr. Evans shows how either way, God is able to take a situation headed for disaster and turn it completely around. Let's join him as he explains.

Dr. Tony Evans: Luck is a doctrine because a lot of people live by it. Chance, fate, happenstance. We've got some people, maybe there are some here, who ride in a car with a rabbit's foot hanging from their rearview mirror. Now how lucky was that rabbit that couldn't even keep his foot? We are looking at the book of Esther, the only book in the Bible that never mentions God by name. And yet his fingerprints are all over it as we've already seen.

Esther has discovered that she's been placed in her position for a spiritual reason, not merely for personal benefit. Mordecai, her cousin, said you've been called to the kingdom for such a time as this. That God's whole plan in making you pretty, God's whole plan in you being chosen out of all the possible females in the kingdom, God's whole plan was that you would be here at this time for this moment for His kingdom purpose.

And she, after thinking about it for a moment, said okay, I'm going to go to the king and tell him about Haman's plan to destroy all the Jews, and if I perish, I perish. She now prepares dinner for the king and invites Haman, the architect of genocide, because she's ready to tell the king and spill the beans on him at the dinner banquet. The king says to her, as we saw last time, Esther, chapter five, verse six, what did you have to tell me?

Esther says my petition and my request is, and she stops. She doesn't get it out. She can't say it. She backs off. She says my request is for you to have dinner again with me tomorrow. Something happened that caused her to pause in her request for deliverance. God not only wants you to do the right thing, He wants you to do the right thing at the right time. Timing matters to God.

He does things with precision, not only related to events, but related to time. And the Holy Spirit's job is to let you know not only what to do but when to do it. But if your antenna is not up, if you walk in secular, think in secular, if human wisdom guides your decision-making, you won't pick up the signals and you will miss the movement, because that is the Holy Spirit's job. But he does it in weird ways.

Well, Haman goes home at the end of chapter six after leading Mordecai through the street. And he's depressed. This is a Prozac moment. He's depressed because he's leading the future king and he was supposed to be the future king. And so he goes home and he just cries out, mourning with his head covered, verse 12.

His wife says to him in verse 13, boy, you're in trouble now. You're leading Mordecai through here and he's the Jew. It doesn't look good for you. Verse 14, while they were still talking with him, the king's eunuchs arrived and hastily brought Haman to the banquet which Esther had prepared. Now this is the second banquet.

Esther had prepared a second banquet because God blocked her from doing the first banquet. While his wife was telling him it doesn't look good and he's mourning, the eunuch comes in and says come on, you've got to hurry up, it's time for the banquet. Why is that important that that happened while? Because that didn't give him time to come up with a plan. It didn't give him time to run and flee. It didn't give him time to escape.

God had that thing clicking so that one thing happens right after another so that there could be no interjection to change the program of God. He tells the eunuch to go get him now because God's got a plan to keep and a program to execute. So he goes to the dinner. So the king says, okay Esther, you've been saying for the last 24 hours you've got to tell me something. What is it?

So she tells him, oh king, this is chapter seven now. Oh king, at the end of verse three, if it pleases the king, let my life be given to me at my petition and my people as my request. Save my life, king. Save the life of my people. For we have been sold, I and my people, to be destroyed, killed, and annihilated. If they were going to sell me as slaves, I would have lived with that. But no, they want to kill me.

So the king asks the queen, who is it? They want to kill my wife and kill my wife's people. Who are you talking about? And not only who is it, but where is he? Guess who's coming to dinner? Who is it? Where is he? Who would presume to do thus? Who are you talking about? Here it is, verse six, chapter seven. Esther said a foe and an enemy is this wicked Haman. Then Haman became terrified before the king and queen. That'll shake you up.

She says this man who I invited to dinner wants to kill me, your wife, kill my people. Rewind. If she would have told him the first time, when he wasn't mad at Mordecai, when he had built the gallows for Mordecai, when Mordecai had not been elevated to be the second in command in the future, the king would have had a totally different mood about the situation.

Because now Mordecai's relationship to the king has changed. Mordecai's relationship to Esther and the king has changed. Everything has been reconvened and redone to fulfill the timing purposes of God. And He's not finished yet. Oh, the king is hot, verse seven. He's ticked off. In anger, he went into the palace garden. He goes into the palace garden. He can't even talk now he's so hot that Haman planned to do this.

Verse eight says Haman was falling on the couch where Esther was. He's falling on the couch, verse seven says, begging for his life. So the king is hot. The king walks out. The king doesn't even know what to say now he's so mad that Haman planned to do this. Esther is laying on the couch, reclining on the couch. Ain't too proud to beg, remember that? He's pleading for his life.

He goes over Esther and falls on her and says please Esther, please don't let him kill me, don't let him kill me. It says now when the king returned from the garden into the place where they were drinking wine, Haman was falling on the couch where Esther was. Then the king said, now he's already hot, then the king said, will you even assault the queen with me in the house? Oh, you've got to be kidding me.

Wait a minute. You already told me you want to kill my wife. Now you are all up on her. No, oh no, no you didn't. You're going to assault my wife with me in the house? Now that's not what he was doing. He was begging for his life, the scripture says. God is so particular he will create impressions. God is so nuanced that he will make something look like it's not really that in order to accomplish his purpose because the king comes in just in time.

Oh, but he's not finished yet. Because after the king comes in and sees what he's doing, then verse nine, then is a time word. You've got while, you've got now, you've got then. Then Harbona, one of the eunuchs who was before the king, said, behold, indeed, the gallows standing at Haman's house, 50 cubits high, which Haman made for Mordecai who spoke good on behalf of the king. And the king said, hang him on it.

All right. So guess what? God delayed Esther from telling the king to give Haman time to get mad so that he would build a gallows for Mordecai in order that he might dig his own grave. God will let unbelievers express their anger against believers and use that very thing to destroy the unbeliever from destroying the believer, and it's all got to do with time. It's all got to do with God nuancing time.

So they hanged him on the gallows that was prepared for Mordecai, and the king's anger subsided.

Guest (Male): Dr. Evans will tell us more about that when he continues his message in just a moment. Don't go away.

Dr. Tony Evans: When impossible circumstances suddenly fall together and you find yourself in just the right place at just the right time, people call that good luck. But not Dr. Tony Evans. You live on luck if you want to. I choose providence. Providence is God hooking things up.

But what about when it's the other way around? Is it still providence when others say that your dreams will never come true, you'll never make anything of yourself, or you'll never be happy, fulfilled, worthwhile? God in His providence can take the nutmeg of your situation, the butter of your circumstance, He can take the flour of your failure and the sugar of your successes, put them in His sovereign blender, mix them up, and still come out with a cake that works.

Guest (Male): Discover how to stay confident and committed to the Lord's one-of-a-kind recipe for your life. Pathways from Providence to Purpose from Dr. Tony Evans. You can find out more about the biblical insights offered in this book at tonyevans.org.

And if you make a contribution to the Alternative Ministries either today or tomorrow, we'll send Pathways to you as our thank-you gift, along with all six lessons in Dr. Evans' current series on the book of Esther. We are offering them both for a limited time as our way of saying thanks for your investment that makes this listener-supported program possible.

So don't miss out. Visit us at tonyevans.org today to take advantage of this special offer. Again, that's tonyevans.org or call us anytime of the day or night at 1-800-800-3222 and one of our resource team members will help you. I'll repeat that offer and contact information for you after the second part of today's message. Here's Dr. Evans.

Dr. Tony Evans: God is a God of reversals. He can reverse things on a dime that appear to be irreversible. Let me show you some of the reversals in chapter eight. On that day, verse one, King Ahasuerus gave the house of Haman, the enemy of the Jews, to Queen Esther. Okay, that's an economic reversal. All that Haman owned now belonged to Esther.

You know the scripture says the inheritance of the wicked is laid up for the righteous? When God gets ready to move and to make a statement in the economic order of things, he can flip that thing for you, to you, through you, by you on a dime. All that Haman owned, now Esther it's yours. We just switched because he was a rich man. He put up all that money to kill the Jews.

Verse two, the king took off his signet ring which he had taken away from Haman and gave it to Mordecai. We'll call that political reversal. You see, the signet ring was the ring of authority. It was the ring in chapter three, verse ten: then the king took his signet ring from his hand and gave it to Haman. The signet ring was the ring of authority where you could represent the king officially. He said give that ring to Mordecai. Wait a minute. Mordecai was a dead man walking. Now he's second in command with the king's ring.

That means he carried clout. That means he carried juice. That means he carried some authority with him. So God can change things on a dime. You think your boss has the final say. You think the powers that be have the final say. You think those unscrupulous coworkers who are plotted against you have the final say. They don't have a thing unless God gives it to them. And the God who gives it can take it away. And if you don't believe me, ask Nebuchadnezzar.

Nebuchadnezzar stood there over Babylon. He said, look at this great Babylon that I have built. I am the man. I am the boss. I'm the one. I'm the main man here. It all revolves around me. God said, oh you think? Well let me show you how much power you have. For seven years, God reduced the powerful man to be an animal out in the field. When he came to his senses at the end of seven years, he cut his hair, cut his fingernails, and said let it be known throughout Babylon there's only one God and that is the God of Meshach, Shadrach, and Abednego. That's the only God out there.

The point is simply that I keep telling you all you only have one source. If you ever get that in your head, that nobody, I don't care who they are, has the final say so over a Christian living by the spirit in the will of God. Nobody. Which means you never live a threatened life. So there was a political shift.

She said if it please the king, if I found favor in your sight, verse seven, if it seems proper, let it be written to revoke the letters devised by Haman. Haman had a letter: kill all the Jews. She said king, do something about this letter, revoke it. The problem is, the laws of the Medes and Persians were irrevocable. So what's the king to do? How can I endure the calamity? Haman's dead, but we still got the problem, which will befall my people? How can I endure seeing the destruction of my people? Why? Because God's kingdom program is always bigger than you.

He says, well I have given the authority to Mordecai. So here's what I want you to do. Verse eight, I want you to write to the Jews as you see fit in the king's name and seal it with the king's signet. So I want you to write. So the king's scribe were called and they began to write. What do they write? Because we've got an unchangeable law.

Verse 11, in them the king granted the Jews who were in each and every city the right to assemble and to defend their lives. To destroy, to kill, to annihilate to an entire army of any people or province which might attack them, including children and women, and to plunder their spoil.

Okay, now follow this. Haman's law: every Jew got to be killed. The law can't be changed. So the king tells Esther, y'all come up with something. Put my seal on it. They come up with a law. The law says, signed by the king, while I can't change the law that you've got to be killed, I can make another law. I'm going to write an executive order. And on this executive order, all Jews have the right to defend themselves against anybody who would try to kill them.

And if they try to kill you, you not only can defend yourself, you can kill their wives and children. Now if I'm one of the Persians operating on law number one where the Jews could not defend themselves, and now I hear there is another law that doesn't cancel that I can kill them, but gives them permission to kill me back, now I'm rethinking law number one because I've got to deal with law number two.

See, God has an override button that can take what Satan has planned against you, people he's raised up against you, circumstances that look not in your favor. When the enemy comes in like a flood, the scripture says he will raise up a standard against them. He will push an override button. So there was a legal reversal.

Oh, but it's not all. There was an emotional reversal. When the second law was passed and the carriers send the message out that the Jews could take care of themselves, it says in verse 16, for the Jews there was light and gladness and joy and honor.

Oh, the Bible says sorrow may endure for the night, but joy cometh in the morning. You may be crying today, but don't think that's how it's going to be when you wake up tomorrow. Not when God has jumped into the situation. God can wipe tears away. He can turn pain into pleasure. He can turn sadness into joy when we are operating with His reversal principles, operating with His timing, operating submitting to His will and listening to His voice. Oh, but it's not over yet, because there's one other thing.

The last verse of chapter eight says at the end of the verse, and many among the peoples of the land became Jews. God may put you in a bad situation so that He gives you a supernatural deliverance so that other people want to attach to the God who delivered you because they want some of this. They want to see God do for them what He's done for you. There was a spiritual reversal when people saw what God can do. God is a God of reversal.

Martin Luther King saw a reversal. He was in the Birmingham jail, but you go to Washington DC, you'll see a monument. Nelson Mandela had a reversal. He was put in jail, but then he became head of South Africa because God is a God of reversal. Oh, but there's one reversal bigger than all of that.

Because Satan thought he had Jesus on the cross. When he hung him high and stretched him wide, it looked like Satan had won. But early Sunday morning, just a little while before day, God raised Jesus up and he said all power is in my hands. God is a God of reversal. So you hang on to Him even though Satan is throwing dirt at you.

Guest (Male): Dr. Tony Evans with some powerful insight for us today on divine reversals. Now if you're ready to experience the biggest reversal of all, to have Jesus break down the barrier that separates you from God and to allow Him to make you a whole new person from the inside out, that can happen for you today. Just visit tonyevans.org and click the link at the top of the page that simply says Jesus. There, Tony will tell you all about what it means to be a Christian and walk you through everything you need to know to start your brand-new life.

And while you're on the website, don't forget to request your copy of the teaching collection Tony's been presenting these last few days on the life of Esther. It includes a great deal of additional material as well as a complete bonus message we won't have time to bring you on the air. And it's yours as our thank-you gift right now when you make a contribution to support the ministry, provided we hear from you before this exclusive offer expires tomorrow.

And don't forget, along with the audio collection, you'll also get a copy of Tony's popular book Pathways. So visit us right away at tonyevans.org to make the arrangement. Again, that's tonyevans.org or you can call our 24-hour resource center at 1-800-800-3222 and let one of our team members help you. Again, the number 1-800-800-3222.

God has a purpose for each of us, and no matter how many detours we take, He still knows the way to get us where we're meant to be. Tomorrow, Dr. Evans explains how to make the most of the journey and how to recognize the destination God has designed just for you. Be sure to tune in.