The Book of Esther | Episode. 1
Title: The Book of Esther – A Call to Action
Speaker: Harry Conn
Presented At: Men For Missions
Date: October 31, 1957
Summary
This sermon explores the Book of Esther, revealing how, though God’s name is not mentioned in the text, His divine plan, program, and purpose are clearly evident. The story of Esther, Mordecai, and Haman is paralleled with the larger mission of the Church: spreading the Gospel to a world under the decree of sin and death.
Key themes include:
God’s Sovereignty: Even when He seems absent, He is working behind the scenes.
Divine Appointments: Just as Esther was placed in her position "for such a time as this," we, too, have a purpose in God’s kingdom.
The Call to Action: Esther risked her life to save her people. Likewise, believers must be willing to sacrifice for the mission of spreading the Gospel.
Undelivered Pardon: The Gospel is a message of salvation, but it must be taken to every tribe, tongue, and nation.
True Christian life involves dying to self—just as Esther risked death, and as David Livingstone gave his life for missionary work. Only through surrender can we bear fruit for God’s kingdom.
What "divine appointment" might God be calling you to in your life right now?
How can you apply Esther’s courage and faith in your own walk with God?
Are there any areas where you need to "die to self" in order to fully serve God’s purpose for your life?
Episode Transcript
Now, fellas, we're going to talk about the Book of Esther.
Every book in here, God has it in here for a purpose.
But you know, the theologians, Homer, to this day, cannot understand why the Book of Esther is even included in the sacred canon of scriptures, because the word God isn't in here, and they don't seem to be able to find Christ in here either.
But I think you folks will agree with me, before we finish here, the real purpose that God has in here.
Now, many people look upon God as a kind of a tired old man.
He's not going to invite Homer.
And every once in a while, he reaches down, he saves the sinner, and he has no plan, or program, or purpose.
See, Eddie?
Now, in this book here is a plan, program, and purpose for the whole church, all through the ages.
Now, this starts out here, this Book of Esther.
It says, now, it came to pass in the days of A, and they had the eras, which rained from India and Ethiopia over a hundred and seven and twenty provinces.
There's quite a king, Homer.
He's raining over a kingdom.
It's over a hundred and twenty-seven different provinces.
And we go on down here, and we read that these provinces, Eddie, stretched out from India to Ethiopia.
Now, that's fifteen hundred miles.
He's over the whole thing.
Now, this old boy began to feel his oats here, see?
So he called in all his nobles, what we would call our ambassadors from each one of those.
And he's having a big banquet with them.
And he makes the same mistake that many big men do, that he drinks too much wine.
Now, drinking too much wine, his reason went out the window.
So, what does he do?
But he calls for his wife, Lacey, to come over there to entertain these men.
Well, in this particular case, the wife has more sense than the husband.
So, she refuses to go over there, and he made a spectacle of in front of all these men.
So, here's the king.
He's embarrassed before all these men.
So, the nobles prevail upon him and say, look here, King Ahazeroth, you gonna let her get away with this?
This will go all over the kingdom like wildfire.
And then our wives won't obey us either.
You better discipline her.
So, they prevail upon him and he passes a decree that Vangsty will never come into his presence again.
Never.
Never.
So, here he is.
He's a king.
But they king without a wife.
Now, at this time, the Israelites have been carried away in the captivity over here.
They're slaves.
But it so happens that one of the fellows that sets up the gates, Eddie, is a fellow named Mordecai, a Jew.
And Mordecai bowed down to no man.
And the prime minister we call him today was a fellow named Haman.
He was the fellow next to Mordecai.
I mean to have a ear.
So, but he gets mad because Haman will not bow down to him.
But Haman only bows down to God.
That's all.
Now, you know, most of us, we try to get power with man, then we're going to have power with God.
That's backwards.
When you get power with God, then you'll have power with man.
That's the rotation.
That's God's order.
You'll notice that Mordecai fulfilled it perfectly.
Now, long about this time, there's a slight insurrection started and Mordecai hears about it.
So he tells the proper authorities, and they go and they arrest these two men that are going to kill the king, and they hang these two men from trees.
Now, that's not the chronicles mentioned in the Bible, but it's a matter of record of that kingdom.
That here is Mordecai, the Jew, who has saved the life of the king.
But the king wasn't told.
All right, now, Mordecai, we find in the second chapter, had adopted a little orphan girl.
And this little orphan girl was the daughter, and he brought up Hadassah, that is Esther, his uncle's daughter, for she had neither father nor mother.
Now, get this, Eddie, she is an orphan, Esther.
Now, God has never changed his ways of operating.
He has always used the weak things of the world to confound the mighty.
But man is forever, Brother Olson, trying to make us into the mighty to confound the weak, and that's backwards.
He uses the weak to confound the mighty.
So we see here God beginning to reach out, and he lays his hand on a little orphan girl, in her natural name is Hadassah, that is Esther, his uncle's daughter, for she had neither father nor mother, and the maid was fair and beautiful, whom Mordecai, when her father and mother were dead, took for his own daughter.
Now you can imagine that Mordecai really brought her up and nurtured her in the admonition of the Lord.
All right, now, along at this time here, we find that this fellow Haman had such a terrific dislike for the Jews on account of, I believe, Dan, the way Mordecai would not bow down to him.
Here he is, he's a big stop, and there's that Jew down there at the gate with the wise men.
He will not bow down.
Now, let's look at that, about the gates.
In the Old Testament, the wise men sat at the gates.
That's where they held courts.
Now, when Jesus said, upon this rock I found my church, and the gates of hell shall not prevail against us.
This is what he meant, all the wise guys of hell.
All these great heavy thinkers, all these so-called skeptics, all these fellows that know all about, we'll say, the origin of species and a few others like that.
See, evolution.
The wise guys, see, the gates of hell shall not prevail.
Otherwise, those are the prophets that would, they're the wise guys of hell.
That's what he meant.
Now, but here's Mordecai, a man that checks in the gates, so which means he's very, very wise, but he's a godly man.
All right, now, this fellow Haman has so much favor with this king that he prevails upon him the past of decree that upon a certain day of the 12th month, the 13th day of the 12th month, they will kill every Jew in that whole kingdom of every 127 prophets from India to Ethiopia.
Otherwise, he passes the decree, Eddie.
He puts the king, the king puts his stamp upon it to kill every Jew over a 1500 mile area.
Now listen, Eddie, the devil was really in this place because the devil knew that from the seed of Abraham was going to come the Messiah, didn't he?
If he could wipe out, if he could destroy the Jewish nation, brother, he had endless days of great care, isn't that correct?
So he's working through Haman.
And Haman gets the king to pass his decree and to sign it.
And this is the law that meets in the persons that their laws cannot be rescinded or repealed.
A law that meets in persons, brother, you've got to watch that.
And this is the kingdom of the law that meets in the persons.
All right, then, the decree of death goes out to all these provinces.
As it says in this next chapter here, that Mordecai perceived, I love that, that Mordecai perceived how we need men today, Eddie, that will perceive God's over all plan and program and purpose, and see through all this theological trance that's gone out.
How the Church of God, of Christ, is asleep and has no mention or evasion, has no program, not going anywhere, Eddie, has no burden, see?
We need men that will perceive today, like this man, Mordecai, perceived in that day, and he saw through the whole thing right then.
And he said, well, if it doesn't go down, we'll all be wiped out.
Now, at this time, they have a beauty contest, and they bring in all the beautiful virgins to pick out a wife for the king.
Well, who do you think gets to be the queen, but after the Jewel, who's been raised and nurtured in the admonition of the Lord by this great man of God, Mordecai?
Now, here he is, he's the queen, but he has the heiress, doesn't know she's a Jew.
And he puts his signet, his stamp, upon this law to kill all the Jews.
He's really putting a death sentence on his own wife, isn't he?
All right, now here's Mordecai.
Mordecai perceives the whole thing.
So Mordecai goes and he puts sackcloth and ice on, and he gets down and he weakens and begins to pray.
When men begin to pray, God begins to move.
Remember this, fellas, God only moved and answered a prayer, because then he gets to go.
All right, then we find that then he sent a messenger over to Esther.
And he tells Esther about this whole festival.
And he says to Esther, he says, Esther, deliverance is going to come from somewhere, because he knew that the Messiah was prophesied to come.
He had to come.
Deliverance was going to come from somewhere.
Eddie, somebody is going to evangelize this world.
Somebody is going to reach the last kindred tribe in termination because it's in the word of God.
If we're too theological stupid to see it, that doesn't mean it isn't going to happen, Eddie.
It's just going to happen a lot later than what it should.
And many billions of sinners are going to hell.
It should never have been born in the first place, because of our procrastination.
But so he writes to her.
He says, now our enlargement shall come.
And if you don't act upon it, God is going to raise up somebody that will.
And God gives every Christian a chance to get into the army of the Lord to get the world evangelized.
And he says, oh Esther, who knows but what thou art come into the kingdom for such a time as this?
Who knows, Esther, but what thou art come into the kingdom for such a time as this?
I say this to you fellas here tonight.
Who knows but what thou art come into the kingdom for such a time as this?
God's got a purpose in our lives.
As much as he has an overall plan and purpose, there's a place for it, Sam.
So here is, he wants her to go prevail upon the king, and Esther says to him, and sends a message back, and she says, look, I can't go call on the king because the law is if anyone goes in to see the king without being invited, they're killed.
That's the law of the means and the person.
That's the law.
I didn't make the law.
Just follow it.
She could have said it.
But she didn't say it.
She says, now listen, you get the Jews fasting and praying for three days, and I'll get my maidens and myself, and we will fast and pray for three days and three nights.
Oh, Eddie, if we could get the professing church today to fast and to pray for three days and three nights, man, we get this world evangelized in the next ten years.
Do it then, all right?
So, here she is now, we find in the Bible that she has fasted and prayed for three days and three nights.
Now we also find then that now she is ready to go into the king.
Now, tell us, get this, here's the spiritual principle, except the corn of wheat fall into the ground and die in a bite of the lawn.
But if it die, it bring it forth much sooner.
You and I will never be great soul winners, we'll never be real reproducers until we really die.
So our own ambition, our own desire, our own wants and pampering to the place, except the corn of wheat, Homer, fall in the ground and die in a bite of the lawn.
But if it die, it bring it forth much fruit.
Paul said, death in me worketh life in you.
He said, I am crucified with Christ.
See there, the corn of wheat fall in the ground and die.
Now, some of you folks may have heard me say this before, but it's like this.
You reproduce, Eddie, to the amount you die.
Like this.
You can take a seed potato and you can plant it in the ground.
You can come along, then in the fall, you go to dig.
You can get your hand on that seed potato and find to the extent it died, you'll know how many potatoes are there, how it is.
If that potato didn't die, it'll just be there.
It'll just be there a potato, that seed potato.
If it only died partially, Eddie, you'll find a bunch of little marbles around in it.
But if it really died, Brother Olson, you'll find that hill full of great big potatoes and just full of them.
See, it reproduces itself to the amount it died.
Now, the same thing is true with the grain of wheat.
You can go out and sow wheat, Eddie, but if the grain of wheat doesn't fall in the ground and die, it can't spring up and bear fruit.
Now, neither can a Christian.
That's why Jesus said, If any man come after me, let him deny himself, take up his cross.
What was the cross for?
To die upon.
That's right.
That's what a cross is for.
That's what a cross meant to him.
And he that comes after me and bears not his cross, cannot be my disciple.
See, what is a disciple?
Herein is my father glorified that he bear much fruit.
So shall you be my disciple.
A disciple is a fruit bearer.
A disciple is one that reproduces himself, see.
Now here is this dear girl.
She fasted and she prayed three days and three nights.
And now, Eddie, she's got Holy Ghost Bulliness.
And furthermore, Eddie, she's not afraid to die.
And she comes up now, she's going right into the king.
Why, brother, she can die for this.
But she's willing to die to save her people.
So she comes up here to the court and so on.
Well, here she is now, Eddie, she's prayed up.
The nation is prayed up of this one.
Even though they're next time.
It doesn't matter where you're at, brothers, long as you're in the will of God and prayed up.
So she goes up there and she stands and boy, the king looks out there.
Hey, Esther, come here.
I could just see.
Why, God made him feel that way about it.
God made him.
Esther, come here.
Why, Esther, I love you so.
You can have anything in this whole kingdom you want, up to one half of the whole kingdom.
Brother, here's that devil again, right?
Here's that devil again, tempting God's people with the things of this world, the cares of this world and the deceitfulness of riches and the lust of other things, entering in, choke the word and become a kind of fruit.
Thank God for her godly bringing up.
And now she's prayed up, now she's acting.
And let's see what effect it has upon her.
It has not.
Why, he says, Esther, what do you want?
She says, Oh, King, I'm to the worst of effect, I'm not interested in one half of this thing.
Oh, King, all I want is for you to come to my banquet tomorrow night and bring Haman with you.
That's all I want.
Eddie, isn't that a lot different than we Christians today?
Why, we just said, why, we'll take half of the kingdom and give it to Macy's.
What do I say?
It's no good, let it die.
You can go out and get five billion unpaid four dollars and it won't mean a thing for the world of civilization.
I'm convinced of one thing.
Much of the money we do raise for mission debt is a bigger harm than it is a health.
Because most of it is for equipment and for money to keep that missionary from dying.
We send them out to die, we're to go out to die and we do everything we can to keep them dying.
It doesn't make much sense.
All right now.
He says, OK Esther, you can have it.
I'll come and we'll be there.
So, in the meantime, he goes home and he goes to bed, but he cannot go to sleep.
The Blessed Holy Spirit of God is speaking.
And so we find then that he will get up and he walks around and he goes over.
Hey, look here, look here, I was going to be killed then.
We had an insurrection.
They never even told me.
And look, that fellow Mordecai, that fellow had uncovered the whole thing.
I wonder what we ever did for him.
He keeps on reading.
Well, I can't find any record here of anything.
Well, here's one of those hated Jews, and he saved my life.
Only God, Dan, could have got him up and walked him around and made him read that book.
He says, now I've got to do something for this fellow now.
Well, here is this fellow, Haman, who has already gone and built a scaffold 70 cubits high, the Bible says, to hang Mordecai on, on this day, the 13th day of the 12th month.
He's really got all set for it.
But he says, wait a minute, I've got to do something for this fellow.
I was gratitude.
So he calls Haman the next day.
He says, Haman, now what would you do for a man that has done so much for you, and that he's close to your heart, and he's this and he's that.
Oh, Haman is about to bust his vest.
He thinks the king is talking about him.
I've got to do something now, Haman, for this person.
That means so much, and he's so smart, and he's so brave, and he's everything.
And Haman just thinks he's talking about him.
Well, he says, I'd put fine clothing on him, and I'd have a great big parade.
I'd just let everybody know what you mean, what this fellow means to the kingdom, and I'd really show the people.
By the way, oh, Kenny, who is this?
Well, it's Mordecai.
Brother, he almost died of mortification right on the spot.
Right on the spot.
That is, the Bible records he went home and told his wife and family, and his wife had that perception that a few women ever have.
She says, well, Haman, you're done.
You're done.
You're kaput right now.
And he was.
He was later hung on his own scaffold.
But he's got to go to this banquet this night with the king.
So here they come to Esther's banquet, he and the king.
And the king goes into that routine again.
Now Esther, I love you so much.
You're going to have one half of my king.
Over 127 provinces, you're going to have one half of all of this.
Now Esther, what is it you want?
She says, oh, King, I want just one thing.
I want the life of my people.
Oh, Eddie, here was all that Christian character coming out in that girl is doing in Christ.
And that noble woman, I think she's the most noble woman in the whole Old Testament.
Because it all comes out.
A lot of people say, now, if I could be used like God before Christ, well, I'd act like Billy Graham, too.
Oh, no, they wouldn't.
They'd act just the way they're acting now, Eddie.
They'd act just the way they're acting now.
Like, for instance, you may say, Richard Ball, if I got in a real crisis for God, like Daniel did or David did, well, I'd act just the same way they did.
No, no, no, you wouldn't.
You'd act just the way you're acting now.
The only thing that can never come out of us during a crisis is what's been in there all the time.
And that's the real meaning, the real moral to the parable, the five wise versions and the five foolish versions was preparation.
Preparation, see.
Christian character is not built up overnight.
If you're talking about position, that's something different, but I mean that which you're going to stand at the judgment seat of Christ and answer for.
Now, she said, here it comes down to this dear girl.
He says, Oh, Esther, what do you want?
Oh, no, she's beginning to haul up the old flag, see.
Now, she's going to show her colors, see.
No more secret discipleship.
She says, Oh, King, I want the life of my people.
He says, What do you mean, my people?
Well, what's the difference between you and me?
Well, I'm a Jew.
You're a Jew?
Yes.
Well, what do you mean about the life of your people?
Well, he was just like our legend later today, they signed so many laws that they forget what laws they got.
He'd forgotten that there was a law to kill all the Jews on the 13th day of the 12th month.
So she reminds him of this law.
Well, he says, who will ever call such a law like that to ever be written?
She says, there is the man and she points to Haman and Haman's done.
Now, he turns to him and he, you see, God had put these thoughts into his mind.
Boy, he had one thought, getting rid of him.
And Haman could tell by the look that he was giving, he better look for greener pastures.
So he gets up and he runs out of this banquet room.
So when the banquet is over, he goes over to beg mercy of Esther because he knows she has favor with the king.
And he's so beg and he gets down on her bed.
And in comes the king and the king, according to the scriptures, thinks that he's dying to rape her, he's dying to force Esther.
Now his number is really up.
So he has him hung on his own scaffold.
Now he says, now what is it you want?
She says, look, my people are under a decree of death.
Wait a minute, Eddie, tonight, the whole world is under a decree of death.
The soul that's in it, they shall die.
And all have sinned and come short of the glory of God.
All, not half.
So everybody out there tonight, Eddie, is under a decree of death.
Now, what she wants is a pardon for those people, Eddie.
These people scattered over 127 provinces.
She wants a pardon for them.
And anyway, we want the evangelization of the world so bad, we'll give our life for it, then we'll get the world evangelized.
Because man does what he sincerely desires to do, and we're going to stand in front of God for our sincerity to him.
That's what's really going to be the thing that will come.
We talk about worship him in sincerity and truth.
Well, brother, it's going to be well.
I'll see you later.
That will be the result.
So, now here he is.
And he says, okay, I want this pardon for my people.
So he says, call that guy Mordecai.
Call that guy Mordecai.
We need somebody to write this pardon.
So he calls Mordecai in, and Mordecai begins to write this pardon.
And you know this pardon that is written in the Bible.
You know, friends, you know, something?
That's the longest verse in the whole Bible.
Did you know that?
Yeah.
That's it.
In Esther, the eighth chapter, the ninth verse.
Now here is the pardon.
He's gonna write the pardon.
Then were the king's scribes called at that time in the third month, that is the month of Savan, on the three-and-twentieth day, they're up.
And it was really written, according to all that Mordecai commanded under the Jews, and to the lieutenants, and the deputies, and rulers of the provinces, which are from Ethiopia, from India and Ethiopia, and hundred and twenty and seven provinces, under every province, according to the writing, they're up, and under every people, after their language.
You get that, Eddie?
After their language.
Now, listen, Jesus, when he came to him, and said, What shall be the signs that are coming?
He said, The gospel must first be published among all nations, right?
Published.
But Matthew 24, 14, And this gospel of the kingdom shall be preached in all the world, for a witness under all nations, right, Eddie?
Under all nations.
And when he said, You shall go forth and speak with me, I believe it's not necessarily our Tentacastal friends, idea of tongue, but we're going to be preaching the gospel to those people in their own native tongue.
See?
In their own native tongue, like this right here, see?
As he says here, And to every province, according to the writing they write, and to every people, after their language, see?
Homer, not in a foreign one.
And to the Jews, according to their writing, and according to their language.
Now, there's a long verse.
There is the pardon.
But Eddie, when it comes right down to it, look, Eddie, this whole Bible is a pardon to the human race.
That's the type of the whole Bible.
Here's a pardon to Eddie.
We got an undelivered pardon in our hands.
Now, these people knew what the job was for this time, because we read in the next verse, and he wrote, And the king, he has the iris named, and sealed it with the king's ring, and sent letters by post on horseback, riders on mules, camels, young girls on dairies, helicopters, outboard motor boats, jeeps, horses, all this equipment we've got today, and we're not getting the job done.
Now, let me tell you something, fellas.
One thing that God spoke to me about in preaching on the list of the missionaries in Japan was this.
That they used what they had available.
Little is much if God is in it.
And little is enough if God is in it.
You take all these revivals that Finney had, he never had big advance programs, he never had high class radio programs, he never had all of this advertising and high powered, high geared promotion that we have today, brothers.
What he did was he got this man on fire for Jesus, he went home, told his family, told all the families around him, some of them got saved, they went on, and that's God's way of revival, brother.
And just like what they used here, now Eddie, they didn't go into a prayer meeting and begin to pray for equipment.
They didn't do that.
They just used what they had.
And like I said to the missionaries in Japan, I said to them, which would make the greatest effect upon you if you were a heathen, if a man walked five miles over to you to preach to you, or if he come riding over in a jeep five miles?
Now, what do you want to do, preach to a lot of people or be effective?
See?
What do you want to be?
You want to be effective or you just want to preach to a lot of people?
I want to be effective.
How about you?
All right.
Now, we find here that they begin to go out there, every kindred, tribe and tongue and nation and peoples.
We would say, Eddie, see, this is the type of what we're supposed to be doing, Eddie, and they've got the pardon in their hand.
Now, you'll notice that there's a time limit on this pardon because this is the 3 and 20th day of the third month.
Now, they're to be killed, Eddie, on the 13th day of the 12th month.
There's a time limit on.
But Eddie, there's a time limit on this.
We got to get it out because 120,000 will die today.
There's never heard about it.
There's a time limit on it.
Notice?
All right.
Now, we find that they use this equipment, mules.
Look at that.
Can you imagine going 1500 miles on a mule?
Of course, we know some of them didn't have to go all that way, Eddie.
But certainly with some guys had to take a long ride on a mule or a drone derry or a camel.
That's a two-hump deal, I think.
That drone derry in there, something like that.
I'm staying straight and I don't want to.
Now, let's go.
See, the Bible says, thou hath redeemed this by thy blood out of every kindred, tri-totation people.
This whole story here, Eddie, is the type of the world laying in the arms of the wicked ones tonight under a decree of death, because all have sinned, come short of the glory of God.
All we like sheep have gone astray.
We've turned every one to his own way.
The Lord has laid on him, on Jesus, the iniquities of us all.
We got a pardon for Eddie, but it's undelivered.
They're under the decree of death out there.
Furthermore, Jesus wants to come back, but the bride isn't complete.
The bride isn't even half complete tonight.
And we find here that they had to, then they had to get out to every one of these.
Now, Eddie, they didn't stand around showing it to people in this province and then come around again a week later and show it to them again.
They didn't come around again and show it to them again.
All they were responsible for was to take the message to them.
And then get it across to the Jews, to the place where they could get up and defend themselves.
Now, that's all they were responsible for, which is the thing that go preach and make this happen.
All right, then we find here in the next chapter, that great fear, yes, great fear came upon all of these people.
Great fear, because, now, here's the Jews, see?
And that's in the 17th verse of the 8th chapter.
And in every province, in every city, where there's ever the king's commandment and his decree came, the Jews had joy and gladness of peace and a good day, and many of the people of the land became Jews for the fear the Jews fell upon.
Brother, when we really get down to business, Dan, with God, when we're prayed up, when we've got the right message, when we do what the fear of God come upon, you what, Eddie, the bridegroom comes.
These people knew what the job was.
It just wasn't to go out and win souls out of 19 of these provinces.
This was to go out and to reach every cross.
And in their own language.
Now, I'm not saying here, Eddie, that we've got to go out and we've got to translate the Bible into every language in the world.
I don't mean any such thing as all that.
I think certain we've got to give them some of the word of God.
But Eddie, I can't get over the fact that the time, this period of time upon this world, when Christianity was the most powerful and spread the quickest was during the time they didn't have the word of God in their language.
It wasn't even in a printed form.
Now, I admit that strikes against what?
Certainly, they had an Old Testament, but it was a series of scrolls and rolls and things, and it was hardly any fellow ever had all of the 39 books of the Old Testament.
And he wouldn't go carrying them around.
Paul did write for Timothy to bring his other coat.
That's good, his other coat.
And a few scrolls and rolls.
That's all.
Eddie, you and I both know that a man can know four verses of Scripture and the Spirit of God quickens him through and he gets saved, isn't that right?
All he's doing is giving him a pardon.
But many of us, we go into a place and we got to give him the whole Bible.
And then we got to step down, another guy comes up and he's got to give him another translation to show you how terrible it gets then and bogged down.
In the English language, we have over 200 versions of the Bible, Eddie.
When there are 3000 languages tonight with nothing, not even a John 3.16 in their language.
Now, you mean to tell me, Brother Homer, that the Spirit of God led 199 of those men to translate that Bible into the English for us when we already had these other translations, huh?
Oh, no.
Oh, no.
Man doesn't realize the guiding to the Holy Spirit of God.
Any man says that's true.
I'm not saying there wouldn't have been four or five, because some of them have been very, very poor translations, and there isn't a perfect one yet today.
But God is not responsible for translation.
He was responsible for the inspiration.
Now, so there is the overall plan and program and purpose of Christ for the Church, to take the Gospel out, Eddie, to every kin, tribe, and tongue, and nation, and people so that they might at least have a chance, the justice of God be vindicated, they have a chance to be saved.
Now, look, they are not saved because they never heard the Gospel.
Whether a man has heard the Gospel or not, that's got nothing to do with him being lost.
They are lost because they are sinners.
A lot of people have said, oh, you don't think God would convict and condemn a man to hell because he's never heard the Gospel?
Of course he wasn't.
He condemned him, Daniel, because he's a sinner, and he's alienated from the common law of the God.
That's why.
And he hasn't been reconciled to him, and he could only be reconciled to the freaky of the Word, and the Holy Spirit, God bless in the Word, convict me, bring me to Christ for salvation.
That's why, Richard, we must take the Gospel to every kindred, tribe and tongue and nation and people.
We owe the Gospel to them.
We owe it to them.
Yes.
We're debtors.
I am debtor, he said.
I am under obligation for all.
And you know, there's great liberty in the Gospel, fellas, but there is a corresponding responsibility in the Gospel.
Jesus has all power, all authority is given unto me.
Go ye therefore.
He said, I'm giving it to you.
All right, fellas, when you got authority, you got responsibility too.
You got responsibility.
And we're all going to stand to judgment at the feet of Christ to give account to the deeds done in the flesh.
And who knows, fellas, but what thou art come into the kingdom for such a time as this.
Every one of us here tonight, we stand or sit in exactly the same relationship to God and the heathen that Esther sat in relation to the king and the Jew.
And except the corn and wheat fall into the ground and die, it abides us all.
But if it die, it brings us forth much food.
How much more time will that take?
Well, I want to tell you a story about the fellow that died.
There was a fellow named Samuel Mock, the first missionary at Ascot.
He came back and was a preacher in the East.
There was a young fellow in there, and it was a tremendous preacher hearing him preach.
He won 503 souls in one night to Christ in England.
This young man sat in there listening.
So he was no misfit evangelist, Eddie.
This young man sat in there was a man, and the power of God was on him in a mighty way.
And he sat there in the background, he heard Samuel Mock pour out his soul and his heart, and his spirit for the lost man down in Africa that had never heard the gospel, and he pled to those people to fall into the ground and die, that's what he pled with him, boy, to come forward, to come down and get into the army of the Lord and take the cross of Christ, and the flag of Christ and find where it had never been found.
This young man back there, he stood up and he said, I'll go, I'll go, I'll go.
But he had a brother, and his brother got up to hold him and he said, look, you don't want to go bury yourself down there in Africa?
Don't do that, be like me, be a successful man in business, and have the world come and beat a path to your door like they're beating to mine.
Don't go bury yourself down there, nobody will ever hear of you, nobody will know you, you'll just be a nobody, I'm nothing.
And he said, they're lost down there, and Jesus has said, go into all the world and preach the gospel.
I must be obedient to my master, my captain.
And this young man left and he went down there, and he fell into the ground and died.
And tell us, he has pages and pages written about him in these encyclopedias over here.
His name is David Livingston.
But there's not a man in Chicago can tell me David Livingston's brother's name.
You know why, Eddie?
Because he didn't fall into the ground and die.
And except a corn or wheat fall into the ground and die, it abideth alone.
But if it die, it brings forth much fruit.
And he that sayeth he abideth in him or himself also so to walk, even as he walked, right?
And brother, he went to this elephant and never heard.
He never heard.
He said to the next city, I must go.
To the next city.
So you see, fellas, here is the whole plan and program and purpose of the church, right here in the Book of Esther.
There it is.
There they were.
They were under the creed of death.
The world tonight is under the creed of death.
All right.
Jesus Christ came and he provided a pardon.
All right.
Now, you and I must take that pardon to the rest of the world.
And fellas, we got an undelivered message tonight.
Undelivered pardon.
It can't be saved without the word of God.
Being born again, not a corruptible seed, but an incorruptible, by the word of God, delivers and abides.
So, David Livingston fell into the ground and died.
But if it's gone, it may force much more.
You know, you know why most of our churches are so dead?
You want me to tell you what?
Why there's no life in it?
Let me tell you.
They're so cold.
And brothers, they're cold.
And we know whether there's no vision of people perished, isn't that right?
You know something?
If there's more spiritual death in these churches, then there's some life.
You get it?
If we're willing to pray more, if we're willing to spend our time going house to house, if we're willing to give all our money to the Lord Jesus, if we're willing to really get going for Jesus, we've got to die to sell.
All right?
If we have more death in our churches, we have more life.
Someone says, if this is a dead church, there's no life.
That's because there's no spiritual death in it.
Same thing is true in our own lives.
You know, God uses us to the amount of our devotion to Christ.
Otherwise, what we have vertical is reproduced for God.
No more, no more.
Like you've heard it said, little prayer, little power.
Much prayer, much power.
Little devotion to Christ, little effect upon the world for him.
Much devotion to Christ must be imbued with it.
And then, fellas, when we die, fall in the ground and die our own ambitions and desires, then Christ of Calvary can be seen to our lives, and it's not we that see it all, it's him.
That's why no place of glory in this presidency.
Any man loves you, Eddie, for the Christ-likeness in your life, for the goodness in your life, it's not you that see it anymore, right, Eddie?
It's him.
He will never have anything to glory about.
But, Richard, they can't see Christ in you until you get out of the way.
Like DO.
Moody said, the one that gives me the most trouble in his life has been DO.
Moody.
You follow?
There's many a place out there tonight, waiting for a surveyor of the gospel to come.
If they'll pardon me.
How long, how long must they wait?
We pray, Carl.
And then after Carl prays, you know.
Oh, precious Lord and Heavenly Father, as we wait here before thy throne, we realize that thou has loved us and died for us and sent Jesus to suffer and takes the penalty and the wrath upon himself that belonged to us.
And oh Lord, we thank you for this freedom.
We thank thee for deliverance, Lord.
We thank thee that thou has said that, that we confess our sins, our faithful and just to forgive us our sins and cleanse us from all unrighteousness.
But oh Lord, tonight we see a world that's perishing and oh Lord, we think of Moses back there.
Lord, when he realized that there were those friends of his that seemed that they were just bent on sitting and going their way to hell.
And then he said, Lord, if you aren't going to save them, if you won't forgive them, then blot my name out of the Book of Life.
Lord, give us that kind of law for these heathen we pray.
And then we think of Paul when he said, Oh, I would that I were a clerk for my brethren sakes, after the flesh.
Oh, Lord, we pray thou will give us a burden for the perishing laws that we are willing to die for.
Oh, Lord, to get the gospel to them, to bring life, oh Lord, to those that are dying day after day without a knowledge of Jesus.
Ferdin our hearts, we pray.
Ferd up the dross and help us that we are willing to die for Jesus' sake.