May 27, 2025 • 36 mins
Courage under pressure. Divine purpose. Standing bold when everything is on the line. These aren't just abstract leadership concepts – they're the powerful realities that emerge from the remarkable story of Queen Esther.
After a brief hiatus, we're back in the studio diving into one of the most fascinating leadership narratives in the Old Testament. The Book of Esther provides us with a masterclass in recognizing divine positioning, making consequential decisions, and finding the courage to act when stakes couldn't be higher.
The famous words from Mordecai to Esther – "Perhaps you were born for such a time as this" – echo through history as a challenge to every leader. What if you're exactly where you need to be right now? What if your position, regardless of how you got there, is precisely where you're meant to make a difference that no one else can?
We explore Esther's journey from orphan to queen, and how she risked everything to save her people. Her willingness to put her reputation and life on the line stands as a timeless example for leaders today. As Dr. Posey notes, "We can choose to do whatever we want, but we can't always choose the consequences" – a principle that applies whether you're leading a family, a team, or an organization.
Perhaps most fascinating is how God works throughout this narrative without ever being explicitly mentioned. This reminds us that divine purpose often operates behind the scenes, even when circumstances seem chaotic or when evil appears to be winning.
What's your "such a time as this" moment? Where are you positioned to make a difference that only you can make? Join us for this compelling discussion about finding your divine purpose and having the courage to stand up when it matters most.
Check out biblicalleadershipshow.com for more episodes as we prepare to complete our journey through the Old Testament before moving into the New Testament in upcoming episodes.
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Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Speaker 1 (00:11):
uh-huh now, yeah, uh-huh, yeah.
Come on, come on, all righty.
Welcome to another exciting,exciting.
(00:33):
I don't even know if it'sexciting.
Speaker 2 (00:35):
It's exciting for us, dr B, but, tim, you got to say
welcome.
Speaker 1 (00:39):
Welcome, welcome.
Speaker 2 (00:43):
You guys have just been missing out there.
I know it.
I've been missing being here inthe studio.
Speaker 1 (00:47):
I know we apologize because we've sort of been MIA.
We're not giving up.
We're not doing it.
We had previous engagements.
If you've been listening to thelast few there, you know that
Dr P went back into the workingworld temporarily yes, I did
down in waco texas.
Speaker 2 (01:08):
Yeah, a couple of months but he's since retired
again yes I have I've since gotback in town from traveling so,
uh, we're back in the studiotogether.
That is so exciting.
Speaker 1 (01:21):
I'm very excited oh man, I'm so excited to have us
back.
Speaker 2 (01:24):
I've been missing it.
I like what you've done to theplace.
Speaker 1 (01:27):
Yeah, we're slowly changing it up.
You know that's what I do.
I get you know bored in theevenings and I start doing
things.
Speaker 2 (01:34):
It's crazy it is, but it looks really good.
It's got a bunch of vinyl onthe walls and everything.
That looks really nice, yeah,so I had all these old, old
records and uh, so I I made us awall of records in here.
Speaker 1 (01:50):
So, yeah, literally it looks good, looks really good
yeah, I will tell you that ittook a little bit to get all
those records straight and rowsand all that stuff.
Speaker 2 (01:58):
So that was a task.
Yeah, exactly right, but Ispace them out and get them all
done.
Yeah, that's good.
Speaker 1 (02:06):
I think I finished that around 10, 15 one night.
Speaker 2 (02:09):
Okay.
Speaker 1 (02:10):
Yeah, it was a long night, but anyway it's good to
be back.
Yeah, good to be back.
Biblicalleadershipshowcom.
If you haven't been with usbefore, you know, if you're just
catching up, maybe this hitsand we get a rebirth.
We've had a lot of downloadshere lately and I'm sure
everybody's like whoadownloading the last show to see
where we might have went Right.
What happened?
(02:30):
People are where'd they goRight?
Speaker 2 (02:33):
Well, we tried that one remote and that worked kind
of well, but it was a challengewith the schedule.
It just was.
So now I'm re-retired and backin the you know fort worth area
and so we can be in the studioon a regular basis.
Speaker 1 (02:52):
I'm pretty excited because it's much easier to look
at you across that than alittle computer screen while
you're down in waco andeverything.
It's not that far away but itdoes help a little bit to be
able to see your, your bright,shiny face over there and be in
a studio.
It's always fun.
But yeah glad to be back, Gladyou had a good time.
Glad to you know.
Speaker 2 (03:12):
It was good, there we go.
He asked me to help and I didin a couple of months.
Speaker 1 (03:17):
So I did what I could and enjoyed every minute of it,
and I'm done and I'm back andhe figured out he likes to be
retired and he likes to work.
He can't figure it out, but helikes to be retired.
I'd like to be retired, can'tspend more time with my bride.
Speaker 2 (03:32):
There you go.
Speaker 1 (03:32):
Yeah Well, wonderful.
Well, you know, after we'recatching up here, you know we're
going to actually talk a littlebit about, but we only got a
couple left in the Old Testament.
Speaker 2 (03:42):
We've got this episode and next episode and
we're done with the OldTestament.
Speaker 1 (03:45):
Yeah, if you're just joining us, maybe the first time
we've been doing a series everyweek to go through all the Old
Testament.
We're getting ready to startthe New Testament here in a
couple weeks and we're goingthrough each chapter of the
Bible, basically, and givingleadership lessons, discussing
what happens, sort of anoverview, a high-level overview,
(04:06):
of each chapter.
And so, yeah, go back anddefinitely catch up and start
from the beginning of OldTestament and work up to now and
then catch us up in the NewTestament.
We're going to be doing thatover the course of fewer.
Yeah, the rest of the yearpretty much, depending on how we
lump some of them together hereand there, but other than that,
(04:27):
it's exciting.
And yeah, what are we talkingabout?
Speaker 2 (04:31):
today.
Today we're talking aboutEsther Now.
Esther's not toward the end ofthe Old Testament, it's kind of
in the middle, just before themiddle, um, but um, it is the
timing of it in historical uh,relevance of when it happened in
history.
Uh, as to why we're doing itnow, and Esther it's only, it's
(04:53):
a.
It's a small book compared toothers in the Old Testament.
It's only 10 chapters, but it isa powerful lesson on leadership
and, uh, there are four maincharacters in the book and the
storyline of Queen Esther isjust phenomenal and there's some
(05:14):
very important words that arespecifically in chapter 4, verse
14, that I think are importantfor everybody who's ever
listening, whatever age, andjust some characters, traits
that we see in Queen Esther andMordecai and also in Xerxes and
(05:37):
Haman, and so we can comparethose two groups of people and
see things that we want toemulate and things that we don't
.
So it's a powerful book, agreat story.
If you have not read the storyof Esther, you can sit down and
read it in probably 30, 40minutes or listen to it on the
(06:01):
Bible on your phone or whatever.
It's just a powerful book andit has so many lessons for us.
Today We'll get to a few ofthem here in a minute.
Speaker 1 (06:12):
Awesome.
So where do we want to takethis?
Do you want to sort of describe?
Speaker 2 (06:17):
Well, we have to, our new listeners have to realize.
And we didn't stop doing thepodcast because we ran out of
dad jokes.
We will never run out of dadjokes.
Speaker 1 (06:27):
Oh, the dad jokes, it's like an artesian.
Speaker 2 (06:29):
Well, there is never an end to dad jokes, okay, so
here we go.
We're just going to start out.
Before we talk about the Bible,we've got to talk about dad
jokes.
So here's one how did the owlmanage his bad breath?
How did the owl manage?
Speaker 1 (06:55):
his bad breath?
How did the owl manage his?
Speaker 2 (06:59):
bad breath um, I don't know altoids, oh boy let's
see, let's see.
Speaker 1 (07:02):
Oh my gosh, I thought I was gonna get the groaner no,
no, we got it there and uh,yeah, my kid will like that.
I have to remember that.
One tell him a little bit.
He my, my, my boy's sort of ajokester.
He likes some of those things.
Yeah, there we go, there we goI just hand you the paper.
Speaker 2 (07:16):
Just hand me the paper.
Yeah, um so oh so yeah, we'lljust, we'll just keep doing a
little bit more.
So how do you get anastronaut's baby to sleep?
Speaker 1 (07:31):
An astronaut's baby to sleep.
Well, that's a great questionTrying to think of something fun
.
Speaker 2 (07:43):
You rock it.
I was going through Trying tothink of something fun.
You rock it.
I was going through the spaceshuttle.
I was going through themoonwalk, the moonwalking, the
spacewalking.
Speaker 1 (07:57):
I was going through all the fun stuff in there
trying to figure out where arewe going on this.
But yeah, just if you're notfamiliar, you're like what in
the world are we going on this?
So, but yeah, just if if you'renot familiar, like what in the
world are we doing here?
Uh, you know, we like dad jokesand we decided, if we're going
to do a podcast, we're going tohave fun.
I know it's, it's crazy for auh leadership keynote guy and
(08:18):
and uh motivational speaker anduh, uh, minister, pastor, pastor
for uh 40 years.
Like dad jokes.
But by gosh, that is our stickand we're pretty excited about
it, yeah.
Speaker 2 (08:30):
Okay, here's one last one.
Some of our listeners willprobably appreciate this more
than others.
Maybe none will appreciate it,but here we go.
You know, today, before I camein the studio, I uploaded my
1,000th photo to Instagram andthey upgraded me to
Instakillagram.
Speaker 1 (08:54):
Let's see Hold on.
Speaker 2 (08:57):
That's a bad one, I know.
Oh yeah, that is a groaner.
Speaker 1 (09:11):
Oh boy, oh boy, oh yeah, that is a groaner oh boy,
oh boy.
So anyway, let's, uh, let'stalk about we've already
punished their people.
Speaker 2 (09:14):
Are like oh, let's turn down and see if anything's
changed.
No, nothing has changed.
Looks like we are tired.
Speaker 1 (09:18):
Let's talk about the bible, please no more.
We've suffered enough, oh allright, so let's talk about this.
Where are we going to go?
On this, okay, so let me justgive a brief, and I guess the
setting of it, you know, and thebrief overview of how this all
came apart.
Speaker 2 (09:35):
Okay, so here is King Xerxes.
He was the king of a massivekingdom, basically from Egypt
all the way to almost India.
I mean, it was massive, okay,and he was a big partier, very
wealthy, but he loved parties.
(09:55):
And so we have this person andhe was doing a party.
We read this in chapter onehe's doing this party and he
wants his queen to come out andshow off in front of everybody
else.
Speaker 1 (10:10):
And she said she wasn't having it.
Speaker 2 (10:12):
No.
She said no, I'm not gonna doit.
And so he goes okay, you'refine, you can do whatever you
want.
And here's a.
Let's just stop right there,okay?
Because I think one of the mostimportant lessons we can learn
is here, from the first chapterand I have taught this lesson to
young teenagers a lot and thatis we can choose to do whatever
(10:36):
we want to do, but we can'talways choose the consequences,
okay?
So let me just repeat that wecan choose to do anything we
want to do, but we can't alwayschoose the consequences.
And sometimes we want to choosewhat we want to do, but we also
want to choose the consequences.
That's not reality, okay.
(10:56):
Sometimes the consequences aremonths or years later.
Sometimes we are the only onethat pay the consequences.
Sometimes other people pay theconsequences of our decisions.
Many times, that's true, but wecannot always be in control of
(11:17):
the consequences.
We want to be in control of theconsequences, and so this woman
who was the queen wanted to beto say no, I'm not going to do
what you want, even though I'mthe queen, you're the king.
And so she was, let's just say,unqueened, you're not going to
be queen anymore right.
Speaker 1 (11:38):
He sort of had like a beauty pageant and started
lining up other girls to be thequeen.
Speaker 2 (11:43):
From all around the kingdom.
Speaker 1 (11:44):
Yeah.
Speaker 2 (11:44):
Okay, and this is where it gets a little PG.
You know, in the book you haveto read between the lines.
But so they gathered all these,let's say, virgins from around
the kingdom and they had to gothrough months of beauty
processes to be perfect for theking, and then they would spend
(12:06):
one night with the king, okay,and whoever the king liked the
most after all of that, he wouldchoose to be the queen.
So Esther was rounded up inthat group and she went through
all these beauty treatments,even though she was obviously a
very attractive woman already.
She was an intelligent woman,she was bold, she was Jewish,
(12:27):
which she hid from her, you know, from the people, because of
Mordecai.
Her relative wanted her to dothat.
And so in the process shebecomes queen.
And there was another person.
So the whole story involvesseveral people, but there's four
(12:51):
main people in the story.
So you have Xerxes, who is theking.
You have Haman, who is like asecond-hand man.
Okay, he's not the vicepresident, but he's like the
second-hand man.
Then you have Mordecai, who isa relative of Esther.
Then you have Esther.
So those are the four people,and so Esther becomes queen.
(13:13):
Mordecai did not want to payhomage.
He didn't want to bow down tothe king, he only wanted to bow
down to God.
Well, haman hated Jewish peopleand so he wanted to get revenge
over Mordecai.
And things go back and forthover several chapters and Haman
(13:36):
wanted to destroy all the Jewsin the entire kingdom and Esther
found out about it, toldMordecai and in chapter 4, verse
14, maybe one of the mostimportant verses in the entire
Old Testament and it's quoted somany times outside of the Bible
, so relevant for our livestoday.
(13:59):
And Mordecai's talking toEsther.
Esther's trying to figure outwhat to do and Mordecai says to
her perhaps you need to realizethat you were born for such a
time as this.
What a powerful.
It is powerful, it is a powerfulstatement and it is so true and
(14:21):
it's like, okay, we see God'sprovidence in that, we see God's
wisdom in that.
God placed her in that veryposition because if there wasn't
going to be someone advocatingfor the Jewish people, the
Jewish people would have beendestroyed, at least in the
kingdom.
And so, with that encouragementand let's just stop right there
(14:43):
one of the most importantleadership principles that we
see from Mordecai here isencouraging other people, even
if that means encouraging yourco-workers, encouraging your
boss.
Encourage your employees,encouraging whoever, your
janitor, whatever, good leaders.
Encourage their people andencourage them to do something
(15:07):
that they may not really theyhave the ability to do.
Okay, it's not like you'retrying to get them to do
something illegal or immoral.
You know they have the skill todo it.
You know they have the talentto do it, they have the wisdom
to do it, but they're hesitantto do it for whatever reason.
Okay, mordecai knew all of thatabout Esther, and so he's there
(15:30):
just encouraging her to be bold, stand up for her faith and her
people.
And what an incredibleleadership principle from
Mordecai.
So Esther does that.
She encourages the people tofast for three days and they all
fast.
And then the rules back thenwas you couldn't as the queen,
(15:53):
you couldn't go in to see theking unless the king called you.
So even the fact that she wentto be bold enough to see the
king without her being summonedwas taking her life in her own
hands.
But she said I got to do thisfor my people was taking her
life in her own hands.
But she said I got to do thisfor my people and so let's just
stop right there.
With leaders like Esther,they're bold.
(16:15):
Sometimes you got to put yourreputation on the line.
You got to put not necessarilyyour life on the line, but your
reputation.
You got to put a lot of thingson the line to do what you know
is right.
Speaker 1 (16:26):
Yeah, she had courage under pressure.
I mean, that was one of thebiggest things that she looked
at and I think that the versethat if I perish, I perish, that
she was calling to a cause andshe says I'm going to stand up.
Speaker 2 (16:39):
Yeah, I'm going to stand up.
And so she stood up for whatshe believed in.
And so many times leaders bowdown under pressure because, I
don't know, the market might bebad or their social media thing
is going wrong, and so they kindof downsize or they cower to
the pressure instead of standingup for their values, and their
(17:01):
values change, or they don'tstand up, and then the
consequences of that are justhuge.
Their employees or theircompany or anything like that
and I see that in churches a lotSome people they need to stand
(17:22):
up for the truth of theScripture and sometimes, because
of what's going on in thecountry or the world or whatever
, they're just afraid to do that.
And so those of you who are outthere listening today, I
encourage you to learn somelessons from Mordecai and Esther
Be bold, not be obnoxious.
Don't be autocratic or puttingpeople down.
(17:43):
You know Jesus died for us.
He didn't make me better thanyou, he just made me better than
I was.
Okay and so.
But be bold for your faith.
Stand up.
Be the same person on Sunday asyou are on Monday, tuesday,
wednesday, thursday, friday,saturday.
Be the same person in church asyou are on the softball field.
(18:06):
Be the same person at work asyou are in church.
I field Be the same person atwork as you are in church.
I mean, be the same person, bebold enough to be the same.
And that's what Esther was.
She was quiet, she wasconcerned.
Mordecai came along, encouragedher and she made that bold
statement.
She went in to see the king.
(18:27):
He said what do you want?
And he said well, let's have adinner.
You and Haman and me, we'regoing to have this dinner.
Okay, what do you want?
Let's have a dinner the nextnight.
And so, finally, she exposedHaman.
Now, back then, once the kingmade a ruling, a decree, you
couldn't change it, but he couldmake another decree that
(18:48):
allowed the Jewish people todefend themselves.
And so that's what he did andthat went around through the
entire kingdom.
Now, just think about it.
They didn't have, you know,facebook and Instagram and
social media and all that stuff.
They had to carry this edict onhorseback, you know, for
thousands of miles and allaround the kingdom.
(19:11):
And so it took a while for thatfirst edict to go out, and then
took a while for the other oneto go out, but it got there in
time and the Jewish people wereable to defend themselves, and
Esther was just an incredibleexample of someone being bold
(19:34):
when her life was on the line,and so what a great lesson for
all of us.
Speaker 1 (19:37):
Yeah, and one of those things that you know
courage.
You know, if you have thatcourage, you know a lot of times
you stand up.
I mean, how many times peoplehave had courage where they you
know jobs or somebody started inthe garage.
They had that passion.
They know that this was part ofa bigger picture.
You know whether, whether youlook at it as your bigger
picture and your head, you knowit all ties back to.
(19:59):
Is it a bigger picture where,where your divine destiny is,
where what you're, what you'redriven to be part of the bigger
picture, of God's bigger picture?
you know, and and you, you know,and you look at that and I see
so many leaders, if you get tiedinto that purpose I mean, we've
been talking about thatpre-show you know, different
things are creeping up in bothof us, like different directions
(20:19):
.
I mean it's still similardirections, but there's little
tweaks that we've been noticinghere lately.
So I think that's veryinteresting that we both sort of
have acknowledged some of thosethings as well.
Speaker 2 (20:30):
Yeah, and here's the other thing.
We could look at this book andcompare it to things that are
happening today very easily,because we can look out on
what's happening in the worldand say where is God?
You know, there's so much evil,corruption, there's so much
(20:52):
hatred and violence, and whereis God in all of that?
And my thinking is sometimes,you know, we might think God is
hidden or God doesn't care, butthe story of Esther is so
powerful, that, um, that ittells us that God is still
sovereign and actively workingto protect his people.
(21:14):
Um, and you might be in a inthe very place right now that um
, esther was in, and it mightnot be saving your people, but
it might be saving your company.
You might, you might have anidea that your company's
struggling and you've beenthinking about it and you just
need to go and maybe sit downwith your boss or other
employees and say, hey, whatabout this?
(21:37):
And I would say that you areexactly where God wants you to
be right now, just like Esther.
God put you in that spot rightnow for a purpose, and the
question is have you thoughtabout what that purpose might be
?
And that could be in arelationship, that could be in a
(22:00):
business, that could be with anorganization, a nonprofit, it
could be anything.
But God doesn't do random, okay, he puts you there for a reason
and the question is are wewilling to listen to God and
find out?
Okay, what can I do to honorGod and bless people, no matter
what situation I'm in?
(22:20):
You might be coaching a littleleague team.
Okay, how can you do that?
Maybe you need to stand up forthe rules.
Maybe you need to stand up forpeople the parents that are just
yelling all the time andprotect the kids and so just be
thinking about okay, how doesthis story apply to me right now
?
And I just think to me.
(22:43):
I just lived this story out herein the last couple of months
because I was literally at adinner meeting for my triathlon
club when I got a call fromanother pastor.
It was a Thursday night, it wasthe end of January, darrell
Bock and my phone rang and I'mthinking who's calling me?
And if it's not Diana, I'm notgoing to answer it.
(23:05):
Well, it was a pastor that I'veknown for a long, long time and
I thought, okay, what'shappening?
And I took the phone call, wentout of the room and he asked me
about would I be willing to bean interim pastor at First
Methodist Waco?
And it's like that wasn'tsomething that it had to be.
God.
(23:26):
God put me in that position fora specific reason at a specific
time.
And I went home that night andI told Diana I said you'll never
believe who called me today andwhat they asked.
And she said you got to do it,you got to do it, you got to do
it.
And so that was a Thursdaynight.
(23:47):
That Sunday we were at thatchurch in Waco.
They introduced us.
We started like the next day orthe next two days or something,
and I was there for threemonths.
And so I think we have to justtrust God, that he's sovereign,
that he puts us where he wantsus, and we just have to realize,
okay, what does God want me todo where I am right now?
(24:09):
Okay, what is my role in thisright now?
Always blessing God and helpingpeople.
What does that mean in mysituation?
So I just experienced that itwas a real blessing and I
believe God is willing to youknow, bless you.
But we have to realize thatGod's at work in our life.
(24:30):
He's sovereign, he puts uswhere he wants us for the time
he wants us, and the question ishow are we going to respond to
that?
Speaker 1 (24:38):
Yeah, and a couple other things.
For one, it was good to see youon your sermons.
Speaker 2 (24:44):
I've been missing your sermons.
Speaker 1 (24:46):
I get my own little version of sermon in the studio
but I've been missing that so.
Speaker 2 (24:50):
I had to log on and watch you on TV or on social
media.
Well, I was just wonderingabout the shine on those lights.
I look good you know my kidswould say Dad, more powder?
Speaker 1 (24:59):
No, no, I'm all about it it was shining.
I want to do some.
I need to go talk to the church.
I want to update some stuff.
I was looking.
Speaker 2 (25:07):
I'm like ooh my construction and I'm like we
need to update that.
Speaker 1 (25:11):
We need to do that.
In my head I'm like, oh, we canmake some things down there.
It looked good, but there's Inmy head.
I was like no-transcript.
Speaker 2 (25:46):
So one thing that's unique about that church that I
don't think is in any otherchurch in the entire world, and
I don't know how this happened,but the chancel area, or the
stage as some people call it, ismade out of black granite.
It is, which is the same.
It was leftover extra materialfrom the Vietnam War Memorial in
Washington DC.
Speaker 1 (25:57):
Really, I don't know how they got that.
Speaker 2 (26:00):
I don't know the backstory behind that, but there
was enough that the churchacquired that somehow and they
used it for their chancel andit's absolutely stunning.
Speaker 1 (26:12):
It is.
Speaker 2 (26:13):
You know, when you walk in the building, I mean
they've got stained glasswindows that would just.
You could sit in that room forhours and take in the beauty of
the windows.
Um, but the chancel.
You know the history and ifyou've ever been to um
washington, dc and I encouragepeople to do that to go see the
vietnam memorial and all thenames, and there's so much.
(26:35):
There's so many stories andsadness about that part of our
country's history I see that youneed to call on tom.
Speaker 1 (26:42):
I didn't see that on their website because I was
looking.
I looked through old and tellthem I didn't see that on their
website because I was looking.
I looked through old picturesand these and I didn't see
anything about.
Speaker 2 (26:48):
That's where the granite come from.
It needs to be on their websitethat makes a whole different
thought process when you'relooking at that stage, right
it's amazing to stand in thatspot that had so much history
for America and preach and itwas just a humbling experience
to be asked to do that, even fora short time.
(27:10):
And I would think, esther, youknow, after the king agreed to
send out the second decree, tosay, hey, I understand you want
to save your people, I'm goingto give permission for that to
happen.
I can't imagine thesatisfaction.
She said it was worth it.
(27:31):
I risked my life and it wasworth it because I'm helping
people yeah.
Speaker 1 (27:39):
I sort of caught my thought because we went down a
rabbit hole there.
But you know, that's one of thethings that you know you need
to look at your life in openeyes.
But you also got to look atthat nagging.
Wife and I were talking aboutthat is that little nagging.
You know, if that littlenagging is just out there, then
you need to really pay attentionbecause maybe there's something
you're supposed to be doingthat you aren't doing, that you
(28:00):
need to and maybe you're.
You know, you could be,everything could be great in
life, but there's somethingyou're supposed to be doing,
that little nagging you.
You gotta pay attention.
She was, she was talking abouther grandpa used to tell her all
that and she's, she's reallybig, I'm really big at that as
well.
But her grandpa used to tellher he was a priest and he used
to always say, yeah, if you getthat nagging, you need to stop
(28:22):
and pray about it and listen toit.
Because you don't know where thepaths are going to lead you.
Speaker 2 (28:28):
Yeah.
And so, going back to the storyof Esther, esther was in the
palace, mordecai was outside,and I can only imagine the agony
that both of them felt,especially Mordecai.
He's sitting there, especiallyMordecai.
He's sitting there, you know,he's being looked down upon by
Haman and he's concerned aboutEsther.
(28:48):
And just, you have to read inbetween the lines, when you read
that story, just about theemotional drain that must have
been on him and also on Esther.
You know thinking about thosethree days of fasting and
thinking about I want to do this, but do I have the courage to
do it?
Do I have the boldness to do it?
(29:09):
And here's the other thingEsther was smart enough and wise
enough to ask for help, and Ithink that's a great leadership
principle that we can learn fromher.
She didn't go oh well, I can dothis by myself.
No, I need the people to prayand fast with me because I got
to make this decision.
And so you know for leaders,what a great thing to say hey,
(29:36):
you know my team, we need to bepraying about this or I need
your help.
Let's think about this, okay,let's think about how we're.
I need your help.
Let's think about this, okay,let's think about how we're
going to do this.
I've got an idea, but I don'tknow if it's the right idea.
Let's just brainstorm on thisand think it through.
And I need your help.
And I remember years ago we werein a building committee meeting
(30:00):
for a building and a church andthere was about 15 of us in the
room and we were talking andthe architect was there and we
started talking and we kind ofall agreed, except for one man.
His name was Russell.
I still remember this andRussell said I don't think
that's right, I don't thinkthat's a good decision, and it
made us stop and think.
(30:21):
We started processing it andyou know what?
He was right and we changed thedirection because of what that
one man said and the end of theproduct was so much better
because that one man had theboldness to stand up and say,
hey, I, but also because weasked for input.
And so just take the timeSometimes you don't have time,
(30:43):
but a lot of times you do andjust ask for help and other
people's input and to make awise decision.
Speaker 1 (30:51):
Now and wrapping up, before we get to some more dad
jokes.
Speaker 2 (30:53):
Oh, yes, of course I know.
Speaker 1 (30:55):
Is Esther the chapter that really God was never
mentioned in it?
Speaker 2 (30:59):
Is that the right one ?
Speaker 1 (31:01):
Okay, it was just sort of read it takes on a
timeline of you know throughlike a roller coaster, but it's
never really mentioned as God.
So I thought that was veryinteresting.
Speaker 2 (31:12):
Yeah, very interesting but powerful lessons
about faith and about theircommitment to their faith.
Speaker 1 (31:21):
But you're right, yeah, it was more about
assumptions and you putting thatin the story yourself.
Speaker 2 (31:29):
Right, you're reading it into the story, but it
actually is not there.
Speaker 1 (31:31):
Yeah, I thought that was interesting, you know,
because you know there's a fewthings like that that you, you
know you look at.
So anonymous, offalar, I think.
Right Is that?
Anonymous on Instagram.
Speaker 2 (31:40):
Yeah, something like that.
Speaker 1 (31:41):
Anyway, I'm just making sure.
Anyway, yeah, so we're comingup here at the end of the show.
Dr P Wow, I know right.
So you know what that means.
Dr Posey gets pretty excitedabout the beginning and the end,
because he's got like notes andthings.
He's got spreadsheets on thewall over here.
Speaker 2 (32:00):
I've got like 400 dead notes Literally.
Speaker 1 (32:07):
I've got like 400, maybe 500.
Speaker 2 (32:10):
And we haven't had a podcast for a couple of weeks,
so I could probably use somefrom last year and people might
not go.
If you go back and listen toone of our Christmas or New
Year's Eve specials it was alldad jokes.
We could probably fit one intothis one too.
One of our Christmas or NewYear's Eve special it was all
dad jokes.
Okay, here we go.
We could probably fit one intothis one too.
What is a tree's favorite radiostation?
Speaker 1 (32:30):
Oh, man Barks leaves Close Trunks.
Speaker 2 (32:38):
Anything that plays popular hits, anything that
plays Poplar hits.
Speaker 1 (32:48):
Oh my gosh.
Speaker 2 (32:48):
You know, I've learned the hard way that it's a
very bad idea to tell yoursecrets to a clock.
Speaker 1 (32:58):
You know why.
Speaker 2 (32:58):
Why?
Because time will tell.
Speaker 1 (33:01):
Nice, nice, I didn't even get any response will tell
Nice, nice.
Speaker 2 (33:04):
I didn't even get any response from that.
Speaker 1 (33:06):
Nice.
Well, I was seeing if I couldfind a good dad joke.
I was just running around andtrying to play with all our
equipment here making sure we'reall good, because we hadn't
been in the studio recording fora little bit.
Speaker 2 (33:23):
So I was in there looking at my little thing just
to see if I could get a goodjoke.
Okay, so my wife and I were.
Every time we go to the statefair, we always stop at the
mattress booth just for fun.
Lay on the mattress, and one ofthese days we have to buy a new
mattress.
Okay, so we go into themattress store and we said, hey,
we'd like to look at a bed.
(33:43):
And he said, well, do you wantone like a spring mattress?
And I said, no, I want to useit all year long.
Speaker 1 (33:57):
All right, all right.
So what do you call a night?
Who is afraid to fight?
Speaker 2 (34:03):
So what do you call a knight who is afraid to fight?
I know this one Knight that isafraid to fight.
Speaker 1 (34:08):
I can't remember Surrender.
Speaker 2 (34:10):
Surrender.
Ah, that's it.
Okay, that was.
I can't even read some buttonsanymore.
There we go, yeah.
Speaker 1 (34:19):
I've got all the buttons.
I took your ability to nottouch him away, didn't I?
Yes, you did.
Put him farther away from thetable, right?
Speaker 2 (34:23):
Yeah, I've got all the buttons.
Speaker 1 (34:24):
I took your ability to not touch him away, didn't I?
Speaker 2 (34:25):
Yes, you did Put him farther away from the table,
right, Okay?
Speaker 1 (34:38):
why did the sailboat start smoking?
How about peer pressure?
Oh Okay, yeah, that's bad,let's see.
Give us two more.
Okay, I'm going to tell youeverything I know about
(35:01):
leprechauns.
Speaker 2 (35:01):
All right, it's very little.
I'll give you that one.
Speaker 1 (35:03):
I'll give All right.
It's very little.
Speaker 2 (35:05):
I'll give you that one.
Speaker 1 (35:08):
I'll give you that one.
It's the little things thatmake me happy right.
Speaker 2 (35:19):
You know statistically, statistically
only one in seven dwarfs arehappy Statistically.
Yeah, statistically yeah, allright.
Speaker 1 (35:27):
Well, Dr P, it's been fun, I'm glad to have you back.
Speaker 2 (35:34):
Yeah, very nice to see you, oh yeah, I bet, oh, my
God, oh.
Speaker 1 (35:40):
Good people are like.
Oh my gosh.
Speaker 2 (35:42):
I'm glad this episode is over.
Oh my gosh.
I hope they say, wow, can youuse that at work tomorrow?
Speaker 1 (35:50):
I've got a couple to use when I get home tonight.
Speaker 2 (35:52):
Okay, good, yes, exactly right.
Speaker 1 (35:54):
All right guys.
Well, check us outbiblicalleadershipshowcom.
We're excited to be back withyou.
We're going to, you know,unless Dr P goes and decides to
start working in another churchhere, but you never know.
He can shake his head all hewants, but he's a man of.
God they call and he listensright.
(36:14):
So we'll see how it works.
But other than that, check usout BiblicalLeadershipShowcom
and Dr P and Tim Lansford.
But Dr P, take us out, make ita great day.
Make it a great day.
uh-huh now, yeah, uh-huh, yeah.
Come on, come on, all righty.
Welcome to another exciting,exciting.
(00:33):
I don't even know if it'sexciting.
Speaker 2 (00:35):
It's exciting for us, dr B, but, tim, you got to say
welcome.
Speaker 1 (00:39):
Welcome, welcome.
Speaker 2 (00:43):
You guys have just been missing out there.
I know it.
I've been missing being here inthe studio.
Speaker 1 (00:47):
I know we apologize because we've sort of been MIA.
We're not giving up.
We're not doing it.
We had previous engagements.
If you've been listening to thelast few there, you know that
Dr P went back into the workingworld temporarily yes, I did
down in waco texas.
Speaker 2 (01:08):
Yeah, a couple of months but he's since retired
again yes I have I've since gotback in town from traveling so,
uh, we're back in the studiotogether.
That is so exciting.
Speaker 1 (01:21):
I'm very excited oh man, I'm so excited to have us
back.
Speaker 2 (01:24):
I've been missing it.
I like what you've done to theplace.
Speaker 1 (01:27):
Yeah, we're slowly changing it up.
You know that's what I do.
I get you know bored in theevenings and I start doing
things.
Speaker 2 (01:34):
It's crazy it is, but it looks really good.
It's got a bunch of vinyl onthe walls and everything.
That looks really nice, yeah,so I had all these old, old
records and uh, so I I made us awall of records in here.
Speaker 1 (01:50):
So, yeah, literally it looks good, looks really good
yeah, I will tell you that ittook a little bit to get all
those records straight and rowsand all that stuff.
Speaker 2 (01:58):
So that was a task.
Yeah, exactly right, but Ispace them out and get them all
done.
Yeah, that's good.
Speaker 1 (02:06):
I think I finished that around 10, 15 one night.
Speaker 2 (02:09):
Okay.
Speaker 1 (02:10):
Yeah, it was a long night, but anyway it's good to
be back.
Yeah, good to be back.
Biblicalleadershipshowcom.
If you haven't been with usbefore, you know, if you're just
catching up, maybe this hitsand we get a rebirth.
We've had a lot of downloadshere lately and I'm sure
everybody's like whoadownloading the last show to see
where we might have went Right.
What happened?
(02:30):
People are where'd they goRight?
Speaker 2 (02:33):
Well, we tried that one remote and that worked kind
of well, but it was a challengewith the schedule.
It just was.
So now I'm re-retired and backin the you know fort worth area
and so we can be in the studioon a regular basis.
Speaker 1 (02:52):
I'm pretty excited because it's much easier to look
at you across that than alittle computer screen while
you're down in waco andeverything.
It's not that far away but itdoes help a little bit to be
able to see your, your bright,shiny face over there and be in
a studio.
It's always fun.
But yeah glad to be back, Gladyou had a good time.
Glad to you know.
Speaker 2 (03:12):
It was good, there we go.
He asked me to help and I didin a couple of months.
Speaker 1 (03:17):
So I did what I could and enjoyed every minute of it,
and I'm done and I'm back andhe figured out he likes to be
retired and he likes to work.
He can't figure it out, but helikes to be retired.
I'd like to be retired, can'tspend more time with my bride.
Speaker 2 (03:32):
There you go.
Speaker 1 (03:32):
Yeah Well, wonderful.
Well, you know, after we'recatching up here, you know we're
going to actually talk a littlebit about, but we only got a
couple left in the Old Testament.
Speaker 2 (03:42):
We've got this episode and next episode and
we're done with the OldTestament.
Speaker 1 (03:45):
Yeah, if you're just joining us, maybe the first time
we've been doing a series everyweek to go through all the Old
Testament.
We're getting ready to startthe New Testament here in a
couple weeks and we're goingthrough each chapter of the
Bible, basically, and givingleadership lessons, discussing
what happens, sort of anoverview, a high-level overview,
(04:06):
of each chapter.
And so, yeah, go back anddefinitely catch up and start
from the beginning of OldTestament and work up to now and
then catch us up in the NewTestament.
We're going to be doing thatover the course of fewer.
Yeah, the rest of the yearpretty much, depending on how we
lump some of them together hereand there, but other than that,
(04:27):
it's exciting.
And yeah, what are we talkingabout?
Speaker 2 (04:31):
today.
Today we're talking aboutEsther Now.
Esther's not toward the end ofthe Old Testament, it's kind of
in the middle, just before themiddle, um, but um, it is the
timing of it in historical uh,relevance of when it happened in
history.
Uh, as to why we're doing itnow, and Esther it's only, it's
(04:53):
a.
It's a small book compared toothers in the Old Testament.
It's only 10 chapters, but it isa powerful lesson on leadership
and, uh, there are four maincharacters in the book and the
storyline of Queen Esther isjust phenomenal and there's some
(05:14):
very important words that arespecifically in chapter 4, verse
14, that I think are importantfor everybody who's ever
listening, whatever age, andjust some characters, traits
that we see in Queen Esther andMordecai and also in Xerxes and
(05:37):
Haman, and so we can comparethose two groups of people and
see things that we want toemulate and things that we don't
.
So it's a powerful book, agreat story.
If you have not read the storyof Esther, you can sit down and
read it in probably 30, 40minutes or listen to it on the
(06:01):
Bible on your phone or whatever.
It's just a powerful book andit has so many lessons for us.
Today We'll get to a few ofthem here in a minute.
Speaker 1 (06:12):
Awesome.
So where do we want to takethis?
Do you want to sort of describe?
Speaker 2 (06:17):
Well, we have to, our new listeners have to realize.
And we didn't stop doing thepodcast because we ran out of
dad jokes.
We will never run out of dadjokes.
Speaker 1 (06:27):
Oh, the dad jokes, it's like an artesian.
Speaker 2 (06:29):
Well, there is never an end to dad jokes, okay, so
here we go.
We're just going to start out.
Before we talk about the Bible,we've got to talk about dad
jokes.
So here's one how did the owlmanage his bad breath?
How did the owl manage?
Speaker 1 (06:55):
his bad breath?
How did the owl manage his?
Speaker 2 (06:59):
bad breath um, I don't know altoids, oh boy let's
see, let's see.
Speaker 1 (07:02):
Oh my gosh, I thought I was gonna get the groaner no,
no, we got it there and uh,yeah, my kid will like that.
I have to remember that.
One tell him a little bit.
He my, my, my boy's sort of ajokester.
He likes some of those things.
Yeah, there we go, there we goI just hand you the paper.
Speaker 2 (07:16):
Just hand me the paper.
Yeah, um so oh so yeah, we'lljust, we'll just keep doing a
little bit more.
So how do you get anastronaut's baby to sleep?
Speaker 1 (07:31):
An astronaut's baby to sleep.
Well, that's a great questionTrying to think of something fun
.
Speaker 2 (07:43):
You rock it.
I was going through Trying tothink of something fun.
You rock it.
I was going through the spaceshuttle.
I was going through themoonwalk, the moonwalking, the
spacewalking.
Speaker 1 (07:57):
I was going through all the fun stuff in there
trying to figure out where arewe going on this.
But yeah, just if you're notfamiliar, you're like what in
the world are we going on this?
So, but yeah, just if if you'renot familiar, like what in the
world are we doing here?
Uh, you know, we like dad jokesand we decided, if we're going
to do a podcast, we're going tohave fun.
I know it's, it's crazy for auh leadership keynote guy and
(08:18):
and uh motivational speaker anduh, uh, minister, pastor, pastor
for uh 40 years.
Like dad jokes.
But by gosh, that is our stickand we're pretty excited about
it, yeah.
Speaker 2 (08:30):
Okay, here's one last one.
Some of our listeners willprobably appreciate this more
than others.
Maybe none will appreciate it,but here we go.
You know, today, before I camein the studio, I uploaded my
1,000th photo to Instagram andthey upgraded me to
Instakillagram.
Speaker 1 (08:54):
Let's see Hold on.
Speaker 2 (08:57):
That's a bad one, I know.
Oh yeah, that is a groaner.
Speaker 1 (09:11):
Oh boy, oh boy, oh yeah, that is a groaner oh boy,
oh boy.
So anyway, let's, uh, let'stalk about we've already
punished their people.
Speaker 2 (09:14):
Are like oh, let's turn down and see if anything's
changed.
No, nothing has changed.
Looks like we are tired.
Speaker 1 (09:18):
Let's talk about the bible, please no more.
We've suffered enough, oh allright, so let's talk about this.
Where are we going to go?
On this, okay, so let me justgive a brief, and I guess the
setting of it, you know, and thebrief overview of how this all
came apart.
Speaker 2 (09:35):
Okay, so here is King Xerxes.
He was the king of a massivekingdom, basically from Egypt
all the way to almost India.
I mean, it was massive, okay,and he was a big partier, very
wealthy, but he loved parties.
(09:55):
And so we have this person andhe was doing a party.
We read this in chapter onehe's doing this party and he
wants his queen to come out andshow off in front of everybody
else.
Speaker 1 (10:10):
And she said she wasn't having it.
Speaker 2 (10:12):
No.
She said no, I'm not gonna doit.
And so he goes okay, you'refine, you can do whatever you
want.
And here's a.
Let's just stop right there,okay?
Because I think one of the mostimportant lessons we can learn
is here, from the first chapterand I have taught this lesson to
young teenagers a lot and thatis we can choose to do whatever
(10:36):
we want to do, but we can'talways choose the consequences,
okay?
So let me just repeat that wecan choose to do anything we
want to do, but we can't alwayschoose the consequences.
And sometimes we want to choosewhat we want to do, but we also
want to choose the consequences.
That's not reality, okay.
(10:56):
Sometimes the consequences aremonths or years later.
Sometimes we are the only onethat pay the consequences.
Sometimes other people pay theconsequences of our decisions.
Many times, that's true, but wecannot always be in control of
(11:17):
the consequences.
We want to be in control of theconsequences, and so this woman
who was the queen wanted to beto say no, I'm not going to do
what you want, even though I'mthe queen, you're the king.
And so she was, let's just say,unqueened, you're not going to
be queen anymore right.
Speaker 1 (11:38):
He sort of had like a beauty pageant and started
lining up other girls to be thequeen.
Speaker 2 (11:43):
From all around the kingdom.
Speaker 1 (11:44):
Yeah.
Speaker 2 (11:44):
Okay, and this is where it gets a little PG.
You know, in the book you haveto read between the lines.
But so they gathered all these,let's say, virgins from around
the kingdom and they had to gothrough months of beauty
processes to be perfect for theking, and then they would spend
(12:06):
one night with the king, okay,and whoever the king liked the
most after all of that, he wouldchoose to be the queen.
So Esther was rounded up inthat group and she went through
all these beauty treatments,even though she was obviously a
very attractive woman already.
She was an intelligent woman,she was bold, she was Jewish,
(12:27):
which she hid from her, you know, from the people, because of
Mordecai.
Her relative wanted her to dothat.
And so in the process shebecomes queen.
And there was another person.
So the whole story involvesseveral people, but there's four
(12:51):
main people in the story.
So you have Xerxes, who is theking.
You have Haman, who is like asecond-hand man.
Okay, he's not the vicepresident, but he's like the
second-hand man.
Then you have Mordecai, who isa relative of Esther.
Then you have Esther.
So those are the four people,and so Esther becomes queen.
(13:13):
Mordecai did not want to payhomage.
He didn't want to bow down tothe king, he only wanted to bow
down to God.
Well, haman hated Jewish peopleand so he wanted to get revenge
over Mordecai.
And things go back and forthover several chapters and Haman
(13:36):
wanted to destroy all the Jewsin the entire kingdom and Esther
found out about it, toldMordecai and in chapter 4, verse
14, maybe one of the mostimportant verses in the entire
Old Testament and it's quoted somany times outside of the Bible
, so relevant for our livestoday.
(13:59):
And Mordecai's talking toEsther.
Esther's trying to figure outwhat to do and Mordecai says to
her perhaps you need to realizethat you were born for such a
time as this.
What a powerful.
It is powerful, it is a powerfulstatement and it is so true and
(14:21):
it's like, okay, we see God'sprovidence in that, we see God's
wisdom in that.
God placed her in that veryposition because if there wasn't
going to be someone advocatingfor the Jewish people, the
Jewish people would have beendestroyed, at least in the
kingdom.
And so, with that encouragementand let's just stop right there
(14:43):
one of the most importantleadership principles that we
see from Mordecai here isencouraging other people, even
if that means encouraging yourco-workers, encouraging your
boss.
Encourage your employees,encouraging whoever, your
janitor, whatever, good leaders.
Encourage their people andencourage them to do something
(15:07):
that they may not really theyhave the ability to do.
Okay, it's not like you'retrying to get them to do
something illegal or immoral.
You know they have the skill todo it.
You know they have the talentto do it, they have the wisdom
to do it, but they're hesitantto do it for whatever reason.
Okay, mordecai knew all of thatabout Esther, and so he's there
(15:30):
just encouraging her to be bold, stand up for her faith and her
people.
And what an incredibleleadership principle from
Mordecai.
So Esther does that.
She encourages the people tofast for three days and they all
fast.
And then the rules back thenwas you couldn't as the queen,
(15:53):
you couldn't go in to see theking unless the king called you.
So even the fact that she wentto be bold enough to see the
king without her being summonedwas taking her life in her own
hands.
But she said I got to do thisfor my people was taking her
life in her own hands.
But she said I got to do thisfor my people and so let's just
stop right there.
With leaders like Esther,they're bold.
(16:15):
Sometimes you got to put yourreputation on the line.
You got to put not necessarilyyour life on the line, but your
reputation.
You got to put a lot of thingson the line to do what you know
is right.
Speaker 1 (16:26):
Yeah, she had courage under pressure.
I mean, that was one of thebiggest things that she looked
at and I think that the versethat if I perish, I perish, that
she was calling to a cause andshe says I'm going to stand up.
Speaker 2 (16:39):
Yeah, I'm going to stand up.
And so she stood up for whatshe believed in.
And so many times leaders bowdown under pressure because, I
don't know, the market might bebad or their social media thing
is going wrong, and so they kindof downsize or they cower to
the pressure instead of standingup for their values, and their
(17:01):
values change, or they don'tstand up, and then the
consequences of that are justhuge.
Their employees or theircompany or anything like that
and I see that in churches a lotSome people they need to stand
(17:22):
up for the truth of theScripture and sometimes, because
of what's going on in thecountry or the world or whatever
, they're just afraid to do that.
And so those of you who are outthere listening today, I
encourage you to learn somelessons from Mordecai and Esther
Be bold, not be obnoxious.
Don't be autocratic or puttingpeople down.
(17:43):
You know Jesus died for us.
He didn't make me better thanyou, he just made me better than
I was.
Okay and so.
But be bold for your faith.
Stand up.
Be the same person on Sunday asyou are on Monday, tuesday,
wednesday, thursday, friday,saturday.
Be the same person in church asyou are on the softball field.
(18:06):
Be the same person at work asyou are in church.
I field Be the same person atwork as you are in church.
I mean, be the same person, bebold enough to be the same.
And that's what Esther was.
She was quiet, she wasconcerned.
Mordecai came along, encouragedher and she made that bold
statement.
She went in to see the king.
(18:27):
He said what do you want?
And he said well, let's have adinner.
You and Haman and me, we'regoing to have this dinner.
Okay, what do you want?
Let's have a dinner the nextnight.
And so, finally, she exposedHaman.
Now, back then, once the kingmade a ruling, a decree, you
couldn't change it, but he couldmake another decree that
(18:48):
allowed the Jewish people todefend themselves.
And so that's what he did andthat went around through the
entire kingdom.
Now, just think about it.
They didn't have, you know,facebook and Instagram and
social media and all that stuff.
They had to carry this edict onhorseback, you know, for
thousands of miles and allaround the kingdom.
(19:11):
And so it took a while for thatfirst edict to go out, and then
took a while for the other oneto go out, but it got there in
time and the Jewish people wereable to defend themselves, and
Esther was just an incredibleexample of someone being bold
(19:34):
when her life was on the line,and so what a great lesson for
all of us.
Speaker 1 (19:37):
Yeah, and one of those things that you know
courage.
You know, if you have thatcourage, you know a lot of times
you stand up.
I mean, how many times peoplehave had courage where they you
know jobs or somebody started inthe garage.
They had that passion.
They know that this was part ofa bigger picture.
You know whether, whether youlook at it as your bigger
picture and your head, you knowit all ties back to.
(19:59):
Is it a bigger picture where,where your divine destiny is,
where what you're, what you'redriven to be part of the bigger
picture, of God's bigger picture?
you know, and and you, you know,and you look at that and I see
so many leaders, if you get tiedinto that purpose I mean, we've
been talking about thatpre-show you know, different
things are creeping up in bothof us, like different directions
(20:19):
.
I mean it's still similardirections, but there's little
tweaks that we've been noticinghere lately.
So I think that's veryinteresting that we both sort of
have acknowledged some of thosethings as well.
Speaker 2 (20:30):
Yeah, and here's the other thing.
We could look at this book andcompare it to things that are
happening today very easily,because we can look out on
what's happening in the worldand say where is God?
You know, there's so much evil,corruption, there's so much
(20:52):
hatred and violence, and whereis God in all of that?
And my thinking is sometimes,you know, we might think God is
hidden or God doesn't care, butthe story of Esther is so
powerful, that, um, that ittells us that God is still
sovereign and actively workingto protect his people.
(21:14):
Um, and you might be in a inthe very place right now that um
, esther was in, and it mightnot be saving your people, but
it might be saving your company.
You might, you might have anidea that your company's
struggling and you've beenthinking about it and you just
need to go and maybe sit downwith your boss or other
employees and say, hey, whatabout this?
(21:37):
And I would say that you areexactly where God wants you to
be right now, just like Esther.
God put you in that spot rightnow for a purpose, and the
question is have you thoughtabout what that purpose might be
?
And that could be in arelationship, that could be in a
(22:00):
business, that could be with anorganization, a nonprofit, it
could be anything.
But God doesn't do random, okay, he puts you there for a reason
and the question is are wewilling to listen to God and
find out?
Okay, what can I do to honorGod and bless people, no matter
what situation I'm in?
(22:20):
You might be coaching a littleleague team.
Okay, how can you do that?
Maybe you need to stand up forthe rules.
Maybe you need to stand up forpeople the parents that are just
yelling all the time andprotect the kids and so just be
thinking about okay, how doesthis story apply to me right now
?
And I just think to me.
(22:43):
I just lived this story out herein the last couple of months
because I was literally at adinner meeting for my triathlon
club when I got a call fromanother pastor.
It was a Thursday night, it wasthe end of January, darrell
Bock and my phone rang and I'mthinking who's calling me?
And if it's not Diana, I'm notgoing to answer it.
(23:05):
Well, it was a pastor that I'veknown for a long, long time and
I thought, okay, what'shappening?
And I took the phone call, wentout of the room and he asked me
about would I be willing to bean interim pastor at First
Methodist Waco?
And it's like that wasn'tsomething that it had to be.
God.
(23:26):
God put me in that position fora specific reason at a specific
time.
And I went home that night andI told Diana I said you'll never
believe who called me today andwhat they asked.
And she said you got to do it,you got to do it, you got to do
it.
And so that was a Thursdaynight.
(23:47):
That Sunday we were at thatchurch in Waco.
They introduced us.
We started like the next day orthe next two days or something,
and I was there for threemonths.
And so I think we have to justtrust God, that he's sovereign,
that he puts us where he wantsus, and we just have to realize,
okay, what does God want me todo where I am right now?
(24:09):
Okay, what is my role in thisright now?
Always blessing God and helpingpeople.
What does that mean in mysituation?
So I just experienced that itwas a real blessing and I
believe God is willing to youknow, bless you.
But we have to realize thatGod's at work in our life.
(24:30):
He's sovereign, he puts uswhere he wants us for the time
he wants us, and the question ishow are we going to respond to
that?
Speaker 1 (24:38):
Yeah, and a couple other things.
For one, it was good to see youon your sermons.
Speaker 2 (24:44):
I've been missing your sermons.
Speaker 1 (24:46):
I get my own little version of sermon in the studio
but I've been missing that so.
Speaker 2 (24:50):
I had to log on and watch you on TV or on social
media.
Well, I was just wonderingabout the shine on those lights.
I look good you know my kidswould say Dad, more powder?
Speaker 1 (24:59):
No, no, I'm all about it it was shining.
I want to do some.
I need to go talk to the church.
I want to update some stuff.
I was looking.
Speaker 2 (25:07):
I'm like ooh my construction and I'm like we
need to update that.
Speaker 1 (25:11):
We need to do that.
In my head I'm like, oh, we canmake some things down there.
It looked good, but there's Inmy head.
I was like no-transcript.
Speaker 2 (25:46):
So one thing that's unique about that church that I
don't think is in any otherchurch in the entire world, and
I don't know how this happened,but the chancel area, or the
stage as some people call it, ismade out of black granite.
It is, which is the same.
It was leftover extra materialfrom the Vietnam War Memorial in
Washington DC.
Speaker 1 (25:57):
Really, I don't know how they got that.
Speaker 2 (26:00):
I don't know the backstory behind that, but there
was enough that the churchacquired that somehow and they
used it for their chancel andit's absolutely stunning.
Speaker 1 (26:12):
It is.
Speaker 2 (26:13):
You know, when you walk in the building, I mean
they've got stained glasswindows that would just.
You could sit in that room forhours and take in the beauty of
the windows.
Um, but the chancel.
You know the history and ifyou've ever been to um
washington, dc and I encouragepeople to do that to go see the
vietnam memorial and all thenames, and there's so much.
(26:35):
There's so many stories andsadness about that part of our
country's history I see that youneed to call on tom.
Speaker 1 (26:42):
I didn't see that on their website because I was
looking.
I looked through old and tellthem I didn't see that on their
website because I was looking.
I looked through old picturesand these and I didn't see
anything about.
Speaker 2 (26:48):
That's where the granite come from.
It needs to be on their websitethat makes a whole different
thought process when you'relooking at that stage, right
it's amazing to stand in thatspot that had so much history
for America and preach and itwas just a humbling experience
to be asked to do that, even fora short time.
(27:10):
And I would think, esther, youknow, after the king agreed to
send out the second decree, tosay, hey, I understand you want
to save your people, I'm goingto give permission for that to
happen.
I can't imagine thesatisfaction.
She said it was worth it.
(27:31):
I risked my life and it wasworth it because I'm helping
people yeah.
Speaker 1 (27:39):
I sort of caught my thought because we went down a
rabbit hole there.
But you know, that's one of thethings that you know you need
to look at your life in openeyes.
But you also got to look atthat nagging.
Wife and I were talking aboutthat is that little nagging.
You know, if that littlenagging is just out there, then
you need to really pay attentionbecause maybe there's something
you're supposed to be doingthat you aren't doing, that you
(28:00):
need to and maybe you're.
You know, you could be,everything could be great in
life, but there's somethingyou're supposed to be doing,
that little nagging you.
You gotta pay attention.
She was, she was talking abouther grandpa used to tell her all
that and she's, she's reallybig, I'm really big at that as
well.
But her grandpa used to tellher he was a priest and he used
to always say, yeah, if you getthat nagging, you need to stop
(28:22):
and pray about it and listen toit.
Because you don't know where thepaths are going to lead you.
Speaker 2 (28:28):
Yeah.
And so, going back to the storyof Esther, esther was in the
palace, mordecai was outside,and I can only imagine the agony
that both of them felt,especially Mordecai.
He's sitting there, especiallyMordecai.
He's sitting there, you know,he's being looked down upon by
Haman and he's concerned aboutEsther.
(28:48):
And just, you have to read inbetween the lines, when you read
that story, just about theemotional drain that must have
been on him and also on Esther.
You know thinking about thosethree days of fasting and
thinking about I want to do this, but do I have the courage to
do it?
Do I have the boldness to do it?
(29:09):
And here's the other thingEsther was smart enough and wise
enough to ask for help, and Ithink that's a great leadership
principle that we can learn fromher.
She didn't go oh well, I can dothis by myself.
No, I need the people to prayand fast with me because I got
to make this decision.
And so you know for leaders,what a great thing to say hey,
(29:36):
you know my team, we need to bepraying about this or I need
your help.
Let's think about this, okay,let's think about how we're.
I need your help.
Let's think about this, okay,let's think about how we're
going to do this.
I've got an idea, but I don'tknow if it's the right idea.
Let's just brainstorm on thisand think it through.
And I need your help.
And I remember years ago we werein a building committee meeting
(30:00):
for a building and a church andthere was about 15 of us in the
room and we were talking andthe architect was there and we
started talking and we kind ofall agreed, except for one man.
His name was Russell.
I still remember this andRussell said I don't think
that's right, I don't thinkthat's a good decision, and it
made us stop and think.
(30:21):
We started processing it andyou know what?
He was right and we changed thedirection because of what that
one man said and the end of theproduct was so much better
because that one man had theboldness to stand up and say,
hey, I, but also because weasked for input.
And so just take the timeSometimes you don't have time,
(30:43):
but a lot of times you do andjust ask for help and other
people's input and to make awise decision.
Speaker 1 (30:51):
Now and wrapping up, before we get to some more dad
jokes.
Speaker 2 (30:53):
Oh, yes, of course I know.
Speaker 1 (30:55):
Is Esther the chapter that really God was never
mentioned in it?
Speaker 2 (30:59):
Is that the right one ?
Speaker 1 (31:01):
Okay, it was just sort of read it takes on a
timeline of you know throughlike a roller coaster, but it's
never really mentioned as God.
So I thought that was veryinteresting.
Speaker 2 (31:12):
Yeah, very interesting but powerful lessons
about faith and about theircommitment to their faith.
Speaker 1 (31:21):
But you're right, yeah, it was more about
assumptions and you putting thatin the story yourself.
Speaker 2 (31:29):
Right, you're reading it into the story, but it
actually is not there.
Speaker 1 (31:31):
Yeah, I thought that was interesting, you know,
because you know there's a fewthings like that that you, you
know you look at.
So anonymous, offalar, I think.
Right Is that?
Anonymous on Instagram.
Speaker 2 (31:40):
Yeah, something like that.
Speaker 1 (31:41):
Anyway, I'm just making sure.
Anyway, yeah, so we're comingup here at the end of the show.
Dr P Wow, I know right.
So you know what that means.
Dr Posey gets pretty excitedabout the beginning and the end,
because he's got like notes andthings.
He's got spreadsheets on thewall over here.
Speaker 2 (32:00):
I've got like 400 dead notes Literally.
Speaker 1 (32:07):
I've got like 400, maybe 500.
Speaker 2 (32:10):
And we haven't had a podcast for a couple of weeks,
so I could probably use somefrom last year and people might
not go.
If you go back and listen toone of our Christmas or New
Year's Eve specials it was alldad jokes.
We could probably fit one intothis one too.
One of our Christmas or NewYear's Eve special it was all
dad jokes.
Okay, here we go.
We could probably fit one intothis one too.
What is a tree's favorite radiostation?
Speaker 1 (32:30):
Oh, man Barks leaves Close Trunks.
Speaker 2 (32:38):
Anything that plays popular hits, anything that
plays Poplar hits.
Speaker 1 (32:48):
Oh my gosh.
Speaker 2 (32:48):
You know, I've learned the hard way that it's a
very bad idea to tell yoursecrets to a clock.
Speaker 1 (32:58):
You know why.
Speaker 2 (32:58):
Why?
Because time will tell.
Speaker 1 (33:01):
Nice, nice, I didn't even get any response will tell
Nice, nice.
Speaker 2 (33:04):
I didn't even get any response from that.
Speaker 1 (33:06):
Nice.
Well, I was seeing if I couldfind a good dad joke.
I was just running around andtrying to play with all our
equipment here making sure we'reall good, because we hadn't
been in the studio recording fora little bit.
Speaker 2 (33:23):
So I was in there looking at my little thing just
to see if I could get a goodjoke.
Okay, so my wife and I were.
Every time we go to the statefair, we always stop at the
mattress booth just for fun.
Lay on the mattress, and one ofthese days we have to buy a new
mattress.
Okay, so we go into themattress store and we said, hey,
we'd like to look at a bed.
(33:43):
And he said, well, do you wantone like a spring mattress?
And I said, no, I want to useit all year long.
Speaker 1 (33:57):
All right, all right.
So what do you call a night?
Who is afraid to fight?
Speaker 2 (34:03):
So what do you call a knight who is afraid to fight?
I know this one Knight that isafraid to fight.
Speaker 1 (34:08):
I can't remember Surrender.
Speaker 2 (34:10):
Surrender.
Ah, that's it.
Okay, that was.
I can't even read some buttonsanymore.
There we go, yeah.
Speaker 1 (34:19):
I've got all the buttons.
I took your ability to nottouch him away, didn't I?
Yes, you did.
Put him farther away from thetable, right?
Speaker 2 (34:23):
Yeah, I've got all the buttons.
Speaker 1 (34:24):
I took your ability to not touch him away, didn't I?
Speaker 2 (34:25):
Yes, you did Put him farther away from the table,
right, Okay?
Speaker 1 (34:38):
why did the sailboat start smoking?
How about peer pressure?
Oh Okay, yeah, that's bad,let's see.
Give us two more.
Okay, I'm going to tell youeverything I know about
(35:01):
leprechauns.
Speaker 2 (35:01):
All right, it's very little.
I'll give you that one.
Speaker 1 (35:03):
I'll give All right.
It's very little.
Speaker 2 (35:05):
I'll give you that one.
Speaker 1 (35:08):
I'll give you that one.
It's the little things thatmake me happy right.
Speaker 2 (35:19):
You know statistically, statistically
only one in seven dwarfs arehappy Statistically.
Yeah, statistically yeah, allright.
Speaker 1 (35:27):
Well, Dr P, it's been fun, I'm glad to have you back.
Speaker 2 (35:34):
Yeah, very nice to see you, oh yeah, I bet, oh, my
God, oh.
Speaker 1 (35:40):
Good people are like.
Oh my gosh.
Speaker 2 (35:42):
I'm glad this episode is over.
Oh my gosh.
I hope they say, wow, can youuse that at work tomorrow?
Speaker 1 (35:50):
I've got a couple to use when I get home tonight.
Speaker 2 (35:52):
Okay, good, yes, exactly right.
Speaker 1 (35:54):
All right guys.
Well, check us outbiblicalleadershipshowcom.
We're excited to be back withyou.
We're going to, you know,unless Dr P goes and decides to
start working in another churchhere, but you never know.
He can shake his head all hewants, but he's a man of.
God they call and he listensright.
(36:14):
So we'll see how it works.
But other than that, check usout BiblicalLeadershipShowcom
and Dr P and Tim Lansford.
But Dr P, take us out, make ita great day.
Make it a great day.
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