Sermon: Holy War (Esther 9-10)

Holy War Sunday, March 16th, 2025 Christ Covenant Church – Centralia, WA Esther 9:1–10:3

Prayer

Father, we thank you that through Christ Jesus, your Word to us is peace. For as the angels sang to the shepherds on the night of Jesus’ birth, “Glory to God in the highest, And on earth peace, Good will toward men.” Please show to us again, as we conclude this book of Esther, your perfect peace and good will which you desire for all men. We ask this in Jesus’ name, Amen.

Introduction

This morning, we come to the happy conclusion of the story of Esther. This is the 17th and final sermon on this book, which has been a great joy and a great challenge to interpret.

• Recall that Esther is the book where the name of God is never mentioned on the letters of the page. And so, one of the major themes of this book has been: How do you live and act when God seems to be absent? What do you do when you feel alone in a vast empire that either ignores you or seems to be hostile to your very existence?
• It is here in these final chapters of Esther that God gives to the Church Militant, to his Royal Bride, a pattern and a plan to become the Church Triumphant.
  • For it is here that God gives us a pattern, not only for survival and self-defense, but for victory and even conquest.
• Of this martial spirit we read Exodus 15:3, “The Lord is a man of war: Jehovah is his name.”
  • And in Song of Solomon 6:4 God likens the church to a great army. He says, “Thou art beautiful, O my love, as Tirzah, Comely as Jerusalem, Terrible as an army with banners…Who is she that looketh forth as the morning, Fair as the moon, clear as the sun, And terrible as an army with banners?”
  • Who is she? She is you and me. She is the Christian Church. When we sing in Psalm 84:1, “How amiable are thy tabernacles, O Lord of hosts!” What we are saying is, “How beautiful is your war camp, O Lord of armies.” And so in keeping with this martial spirit, we find in the New Testament that the Apostles give many commands to the church to wage holy war.
  • Paul says to Timothy, “Endure hardness, as a good soldier of Jesus Christ” (2 Tim. 2:3).
  • He says in 1 Corinthians 16:13-14, “Keep watch, stand fast in the faith, act like men, be strong. Let all that you do be done in love.”
  • He says in Ephesians 6:10-13, “My brethren, be strong in the Lord, and in the power of his might. Put on the whole armour of God, that ye may be able to stand against the wiles of the devil. For we wrestle not against flesh and blood, but against principalities, against powers, against the rulers of the darkness of this world, against spiritual wickedness in high places. Wherefore take unto you the whole armour of God, that ye may be able to withstand in the evil day, and having done all, to stand.”
• The Church is a battleship, not a cruise ship. Christianity is warfare not a tropical vacation. And you would do well to remember that. As long you are in the body, you must heed the words of 1 Peter 2:11, “Dearly beloved, I beseech you as strangers and pilgrims, abstain from fleshly lusts, which war against the soul.”
  • If you are a citizen of heaven, then you are a stranger to the world.
  • And as long as you are in the body, on this side of glory, every day is warfare. Ev