Esther 6:1

I. We have here a wonderful lesson in the illimitable plan of Providence. How events ripen to the close. How crime matures itself to its doom. The pathway of God's providence is a fixed idea; the pathway of Satanic design is a fixed idea; wide apart, they meet at last, only that the ruin of the one and the triumph of the other may be completed.

II. How from the wide sweep of immense providences we descend to trifles. How the insignificant circumstance is the culminating and completing link in the great chapter of causation. "In that night could not the king sleep."

III. How remote, and yet how distinct and minute, are the operations of God's providence! Here was a circumstance connected with the history of the Church, with the preservation of God's people, and with the conservation of Divine truth and the advent of the Messiah. How small a place is Shushan and the whole of Media. Where are they all now but in the words of that little episode?

IV. See the perfect compatibility, nay, unity of prayer with the plans of Providence. The prayers of Mordecai, the mourning of the Jews—they are the operating causes round the sleepless couch of the king.

V. May we not ask ourselves the meaning of some sleepless nights, some troubled days? What spirit has pressed your brow, and given you troubled dreams and sleep? The same that disturbed the king. Is it successful, or has the morning light dispelled all?

E. Paxton Hood, Sermons, p. 357.

I. It is hardly affirming too much to say that on the sleepless night of the Persian king was made to depend our rescue from everlasting death; at least, and undeniably, the restlessness of the king was one of those instruments through which God wrought in carrying on His purpose of redeeming our race through a Descendant of David according to the flesh. Observe, then, how wonderful is God in that He can accomplish great ends by insignificant means.

II. Notice how little there was which could be called supernatural interference, how simply, without any violence, the Divine providence effected its purpose. It was in no way singular that the king should be restless; no miracle was required to explain his choosing to hear the records of his empire; everything was just what might equally have happened had matters been left to themselves, in place of having been disposed and directed by God.

III. We are mightily encouraged in all the business of prayer by the broken rest of the Persian king. Look from Israel delivered from Pharaoh to Israel delivered from Haman, and we are encouraged to believe that God will not fail even us in our extremity, seeing that He could save His people through such a simple and unsuspected process as this.

IV. The agency employed on the king was so natural, so undistinguishable from the workings of his own mind, that he could never have suspected a Divine interference, and must have been perfectly at liberty either to do or not to do, as the secret impulse prescribed. It depends on ourselves, on the exercise of our own will, whether the suggestions of God's Spirit be cherished or crushed, whether the impulses be withstood or obeyed.

H. Melvill, Sermons, vol. i., p. 116.

References: Esther 6:1—G. W. McCree, Christian World Pulpit, vol. xi., p. 11. Esther 6:1-14.—A. D. Davidson, Lectures on Esther, p. 213. 6—A. Raleigh, Book of Esther, p. 134. 6-7—Ibid., p. 155. Esther 7:1-10.—A. D. Davidson, Lectures on Esther, p. 236. Esther 7:3.—Old Testament Outlines, p. 89. Esther 8:1-7.—A. Raleigh, Book of Esther, p. 180. Esther 8:1-14.—A. D. Davidson, Lectures on Esther, p. 257. Esther 8:6.—J. Edmunds, Sermons in a Village Church, p. 282. Esther 8:7 -ix.—A. Raleigh, Book of Esther, p. 205. Esther 8:15-17 -ix. 1-19.—A. D. Davidson, Lectures on Esther, p. 278. Esther 9:1.—Spurgeon, vol. xx., No. 1201. Esther 9:20-32—xi. 3.—A. D. Davidson, Lectures on Esther, p. 299. Esther 9:27, Esther 9:28.—G. Moberly, Sermons at Winchester College, p. 324. 9-11—A. Raleigh, Book of Esther, p. 231. Esther 10:3.—Spurgeon, Evening by Evening, p. 335.