Symbolic Representations (Part 1)

It's good to be here, and we're going to continue now our study that we've entitled Conquering the Dilemma of Christian Living.

! And study allegory in the book of Esther that's based on a book by Major Ian Thomas called If I Perish, I Perish.

Or early on, it was called Wrong Man Out, Right Man In. And that's significant from some things we'll see tonight. Last session, when we were kind of closing of the session, we gave to you the representations of the major players in the book of Esther.

So here's your open book test tonight. I'm going to see if you remember what they are. King Ahasuerus of Persia.

Who does he represent? Pardon? The spirit. The human spirit.

Ahasuerus, the human spirit. What about the kingdom of Persia? Anybody remember what that was? The body.

The human body. All right. All 127 provinces of that kingdom represent the human body. What about Haman? Ah, yeah.

He's a vastardly deed guy, right? Yeah. He represents the flesh, the natural man, the sin nature that dwells within us. What about Esther?

Who does she represent? Eh, time's up. The human soul.

Yeah, the soul of man. All right. And then that leaves one, and that's Mordecai. And he, of course, represents the Holy Spirit. So those are the basic major players and the roles that they play in the allegory that we find in our study in the book of Esther.

But first, so we're going to kind of break these down and take a closer look at each of these as we continue on this evening. So we take a look, if you will, tonight at Haman.

The one that represents the flesh, the natural man, or the nature of sin, whichever you want to refer it to or refer it as.

The basis of what he represents or why he represents the sin nature, the basis for why Haman represents the sin nature, is found really in chapter 3 and verse 1, which says, After these things did King Ahasuerus promote Haman, the son of Hamadathah, the Agagite, and advanced him and set his seat above all the princes that were with him.

The key phrase for us in that is that he is the son of Hamadathah, the Agagite. Interesting and important for us.

You'll remember this from Lee's study of Esther, that being an Agagite gives us the idea of why we represent him as, or he represents for us, the sin nature.

Go to Exodus chapter 17 in your Bible, if you will, and that will give us a good reference to what we're talking about here. In Exodus chapter 17, it is a familiar passage to us, and Moses is directing the people of Israel, if you will.

He's already brought them out of Egypt, directing them to Canaan, the land of their inheritance, that God has promised them. Didn't take them long. Once they got out of Egypt that they began to murmur against Moses.

In this case, he says, we don't have anything to drink. You brought us out here, and we're going to die of thirst because there's nothing to drink. So God gives Moses instructions, you remember, and tells them that I'll stand upon the rock, and you're to take your rod, and you're to smite that rock.

And he did, and God provided water for them there in that journey. Now, look at verse number 8, if you will. Of course, the question for them, or question in their mind is, since we're about to thirst to death, is the Lord really with us?

Okay. And God proves that he is. Now, in verse 8, take notice, if you will. Then came Amalek and fought with Israel in Rephidim.

Now, Amalek, according to the book of Numbers, chapter 24 and verse 20, we will not take time to go back there, but according to that passage, we find the scripture that there's kind of a riddle that was developed back in that day concerning Amalek.

And the idea is that Amalek was the first and foremost of the enemies of the people of Israel. Don't know why. Well, we do kind of basically as we travel back further into this thing.

As Israel was trying to go to their place of inheritance, the Amalekites come to try to prevent that from happening. No reason, reason, giving. But if we go back to Genesis, if you will, chapter 36, we see something here.

Well, that didn't work right. Okay. Go to Genesis 36 in verse 12. I thought I had written that up there, but I haven't. Genesis chapter 36.

Take note what it says there. Concerning this descendancy from which we find Esau. In Genesis chapter 36. In verse 12.

Timnah was concubine to Eliphaz, Esau's son. And she bared to Eliphaz Amalek. These were the sons of Ada, Esau's wife.

Now, we recognize, if you will, Esau plays in the mix here. You remember who Esau is? Who is Esau? Esau. Twin brother of Jacob.

All right. Who becomes Israel. Through the 12 tribes as well. 12 sons. Remember when those two boys were born? Jacob and Esau? Who was the firstborn?

Esau. What was Jacob doing when Esau was being born? What little brothers do? He became the heel grabber, didn't he? He grabbed a hold of that heel.

All right? And so, you know, animosity begins probably already in the womb. We kind of get that idea from some of the things the scripture says.

God had said to their mother prior to their birth, something strange is going to happen here because the older is going to serve the younger. And so we know that that transpired.

And as a result then, you know, Esau, Esau begins to hate, hate his brother Jacob.

And who becomes, of course, a beginner of the 12 tribes of Israel. I've got too many things hanging on here. Now, Esau is well known, of course, as a result of that, about his attitude toward God.

Take notice and remember what happens here. He was willing at one point as a young man to sell his birthright for some food. He had no desire to know how that birthright pertained to God's provisions for him.

He just didn't care. Had no desire for the things of God. In other words, in Genesis 25, 32, Esau said, Behold, I am at the point to die.

And what profit shall this birthright do to me? So he didn't really care. So it reveals the heart that he has that has no desire for God.

And in reality is opposed to any authority God might claim on his life. Now, that heart passed on down through to his descendants all the way to Haman.

So you see the reason why Haman is very suitable here to represent the natural man or the sin nature. So we then begin to see the natural enmity between Haman and the people of God.

Now, Romans chapter 7. Turn there just a moment. Romans chapter 7. Now, if I start going too fast through this, let me know and I'll slow down.

There's just a lot of stuff to cover. But I don't want to get in such a hurry that we don't catch what we need to catch. Remember Romans chapter 7.

Paul's conundrum here. Paul's been saved by God's grace in that encounter with God, with Jesus on the road to Damascus.

And so later on he finds himself troubled. He's been in the desert for a few years learning from the Spirit of God how all this thing works. He's, you know, partaking the Old Testament law and what all that represents.

I really think the Spirit of God taught him all of that in that wilderness journey for him. So he's already been there and done that, but he's still finding the difficulty here.

You know, the things that I find I want to do, I find myself not doing. And vice versa, the things I know I shouldn't be doing, I find myself doing.

Oh, wretched man that I am, who shall deliver me from this bondage of death? So there's a natural hostility there that Paul recognizes.

Aren't you glad that God gave the insights to Paul that he did? Paul recognizes in that there's a hostility there. And it's within me.

It's that hostility of Satan and his enmity to God that's at operation within me through an indwelling principle, if you will.

He calls it a law, a law of principle here, of sin that's dwelling within my life. Now, so, he finds that operating principle preventing him from doing the things that he wants to do that he knows to be the will of God.

Did it make any difference what the desire of his own heart was in that? He still finds that he cannot do that. So it all overwhelmed him because it wouldn't allow him to do what his heart knew to do.

It's not just what he wanted to do. It's what he knew his heart knew to do that God's will, that was God's will for him in his heart and in his life.

And that created a real difficulty for Paul. So that's where we see Haman then in the picture. Now, recognizing all of this, we're beginning to build up and see, if you will, the wickedness of the natural man within us.

Sometimes I think we have a problem not recognizing we know he's there or he. We know Haman's there. We know the natural man's within us. But I think sometimes we fail to see just how dastardly he really is.

Ah. Now, in Esther chapter 3, verse 1, is what we have here. Notice that Haman, the flesh, from the beginning is deeply, very deeply entrenched within the palace.

That gives him access, if you will, to the king. The king's affections, the king's mind and heart, and the king's confidence, if you will.

Ah. Now. Again, provides for us something that Paul equates to that in Ephesians chapter 3, or chapter 2, rather.

Notice. He said, Now notice that.

He said, It was in time past. That's before the day you got saved. Your old life, you walked according to the course of the world, according to the prince of the power of the air.

The spirit that now worketh. It's not an earthquake. That's kids upstairs. Worketh in the children of disobedience. All right. He had control.

Satan had control of the natural man within us, which led us into the ungodliness and the sin that he speaks of here.

Among whom also we all had our conversation in time past, in the lust of our flesh, fulfilling the desires of the flesh and of the mind, and were by nature the children of wrath, even as others.

Now, controlling every aspect of the unbeliever prior to regeneration.

All right. The mind, the will, the emotion, the human spirit, if you will. Satan had control. Now, don't misunderstand that.

That's the natural man within us. Now, don't say that every one of us all lived in complete ungodliness before we got saved.

I didn't. I didn't. My mom and dad are both gone to be with the Lord now. But if they were still alive, they could tell you I was a good kid. Amen? Yeah.

I still am. Yeah. My wife would tell you that. Mostly I'm still a kid. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. But the reality is the propensity for all that ungodliness and wickedness still lay inside me because I had that natural man within me.

That becomes outwardly manifest to different degrees and in different fashions by different people. All right. It just depends on their upbringing, background, and all of those things that we have.

But that is present there. All right. Now, realize, it just controlled every aspect of the life. Now, in the story of Esther, remember with me, if you will, that Haman had constant unhindered access to the king, in his own way, colored the king's thinking, stirred the king's emotions with his influence, and molded the king's decisions.

Now, the first step in becoming totally yielded instruments of God, or totally yielded to God, so that we become an instrument of God to be used for him and by him, is to realize the influence and control that the natural man has within us.

All right. All right. Everything that Haman determined he wanted to do, he could do because he had the control of the king's mind, will, and emotions.

All right. Same thing the natural man does in the life. All right. So that first step in really becoming yielded to God so that we can be used by him is to understand exactly what the sin nature is, what his influence is, and what his control upon us is within our life.

Now, whoa, where'd that go? Back up a minute. I got a touchy finger here. There we go.

Now, although we're saved and have the spirit of God dwelling within us, the natural man is also within us. He's still there. All right. Remember, we saw that Sunday morning, I believe it was, maybe even Sunday night.

The fact that the spirit of God and the natural man are at odds with one another because both of them still dwell within us. And they each have the same amount of desire to control us.

And that's that passage in Galatians 5.17. For the flesh lusteth against the spirit and the spirit against the flesh. These are contrary to one to the other so that you cannot do the things that you would.

Oh, the control of the natural man striving and and longing to take control within our particular life.

now let's see where this goes to allow the natural man to control this is to deny God his rightful place and authority in our life now I hope we can understand that you know I think the longer we go having been saved not only do we become senior saints where we become antiques amen think of it spiritually just a moment the more accustomed we get to our spiritual life our walk with God if that walk doesn't grow what's going to happen here we begin we begin to get lax in this idea of allowing the spirit of God to control our lives when that happens then sin

I mean sin's right there like like air being sucked into a vacuum when it has the chance sin by the natural man will enter into that life into that portion of our life and try to take control what do we do when that happens I know what we should do but what do we normally do when that happens a lot of times we'll take a look at it we'll analyze it to try to determine is that really as bad as it seems it is or is it not we begin we begin to make excuses for it we begin to belittle it a little bit in our lives so that we don't think a whole lot about it that's the natural that's Haman inside of us controlling the mind and when we allow that to happen and allow sin to be a part of our lives what happens we are denying

God his rightful place and his authority in our life and that's not a good thing I don't think there's a one of us here I know there's not a one of us here that would deliberately do that but we need to recognize when we allow sin into our lives that in reality that's exactly what we're doing let's see here 1 Corinthians 6 verses 19 and 20 what?

know you not that your body is the temple of the Holy Ghost which is in you which you have of God and you're not your own for you are bought with a price therefore glorify God in your body and in your spirit which are God's it all belongs to God he's purchased us through the blood of his son but just like Haman the natural man is ruthless cunning deceptive it's evil and it's wicked and it'll do everything that's necessary to prevent God from taking control and being all he is and wants to be within us so we've got to be keenly aware of what the natural man is and realize that we can't trust it we cannot trust ourselves and here's the key we cannot trust ourselves to deal with it how many of you if you really think about your life how many of you are like me really down deep inside in your mind you think you're self-sufficient amen yeah

I can handle this I really can sometimes we're taught that when we're younger come on you can handle this you can do that you know so we just suck it up and do it a lot of times we do that in the spiritual realm oh I can handle this you know as we approach temptation of sin I can handle this I can take care of this on my own and when we usually do that when we do that we usually fall flat on our face so we cannot trust ourselves to be able to deal with that sin nature only God has the ability to do that that's why he's placed his spirit within us so we're going to see more of the provisions that God's made for us in that as we progress in the study realize God's desire for us is to know him alright we know that he desires for us to know him and to know and to know all that he desires to be to us and in us yeah we know that we know in our heart and mind

God saved us God's made provisions for us in eternal life when we die or when he comes for us whichever happens first we know all of that but what about right now what does God want to do right now in our lives he wants us to know him alright Jesus said was it in John 17 somewhere in there talking about coming so that they might have eternal life and he says this is eternal life that they may know you God and the one that you sent that he may that we may know him that word know is the word knowledge by experience it's experiential knowledge and the desire that God has for us is that we come to know him and to know everything he desires to be to us and in us in our life now

I don't know about you but that excites me it really does it's you know so many people have a concept of God that he's far off in the distant stars you know has no real contact with his people but nothing could be so farther from the truth God desires that intimate relationship with us he has done all the work necessary for that to be a reality for us so that we can know who and what he is and I would venture to say I don't care how long a person's been saved how spiritual he's been in his walk with God through those years all of us have just barely scratched the surface of knowing who and what he is so that should be an exciting journey for us throughout our lives every day of our lives you know something I thought comes to mind something that would be good for us to do I just had another birthday a few weeks ago a good thing for us to do on our birthday

Mike when's your birthday it's in December coming up all right on your birthday take a moment take a number of moments however long it takes be by yourself you and God and just remember think back say God show me and remind me what you have been to me this past year and write it down write it down so we can remember this is what God showed me this is what and chances are he'll show you something that you didn't realize that's what he was doing yeah but write those things down God here's what you've been to me and just when you finish the list just look at it and soak it in and say God thank you for being that to me that's what God desires for us all right let's move on here a moment let's take a look at Mordecai who is representative of the

Holy Spirit all right Esther chapter 3 and verses 3 through 5 I think that's on here I think that's what that is then the king's servants which were in the king's gate said to Mordecai why transgresseth thou the king's commandment now it came to pass when they spake daily unto him and he hearkened not unto them that they told Haman to see whether Mordecai's matters would stand for he had told them that he was a Jew and when Haman saw that Mordecai bowed not nor did him reverence then was Haman full of wrath all right now back up a minute and all of the dealings of the kingdom that went on there's one thing that made that just drove Haman up the wall if you will and that was the fact that there was one man in all the kingdom there was one guy that sat outside at the king's gate and never would bow to Haman wouldn't back down to Haman and that man was

Mordecai he would never bring himself to bow down to the one that insisted on keeping God from being God in his life he wouldn't do that so instead of bowing to Haman I kind of imagine he just as Haman would walk by he'd just look at him maybe even just smile you know like drove Haman crazy all right because he wouldn't bow it was Mordecai that Haman saw in Mordecai that Haman saw his ultimate hatred for the Jews because he wouldn't bow he hated the Jews anyway because of stemmed from Esau but Mordecai like rubbing salt into the wound this one Jew sat at the king's gate and dared to stand up against

Haman so that threat personified personified the unbending defiance of Mordecai look at Esther chapter 3 and verses 6 through 9 notice that if you will Esther chapter 3 verse 6 and he thought scorned to lay hands on Mordecai alone for they had showed him the people of Mordecai wherefore Haman sought to destroy all the Jews that were throughout the whole kingdom of the Hazarus even the people of Mordecai in the first month that is the month Nisan in the twelfth year of King Ahasuerus they cast purr that is the lot before Haman from day to day and from mouth to mouth to the twelfth month that is the month Adar and Haman said unto the King Ahasuerus there is a certain people scattered abroad and dispersed among the people in all the provinces of thy kingdom and their laws are diverse from all the people neither it is not for the king's prophet to suffer them if it please the king let it be written that they may be destroyed and

I will pay ten thousand talents of silver to the hands of those that have the charge of the business to bring it into the king's treasury now that threat that he makes here just personified the defiance that Mordecai showed the accusation brought against the people what was it there's a certain people scattered abroad and dispersed among the people in all the provinces and their laws are diverse from all the people neither keep they the king's laws therefore it is not for the king's prophet to suffer them now what was his real fear here that the Jews would grow to such a number that they would eventually be able to!

the Haman and the natural man within us Haman's fear was these people with their own law would begin to make the law their law the law of the kingdom and then things would drastically change if that were allowed to happen a radical change of government would come that should introduce an entirely new way of life and that would be a life that would be incompatible with that that came out of Haman's own influences his wicked influences so you see the fear there alright so that that begins the real fight here and the decree then that is introduced and made all of that had to be resisted at all costs as far as Haman was concerned now what were those laws of which he was afraid those were the laws of

God to the people of Israel or if you will the oracles of God trusted or entrusted to the Jews Romans chapter 2 verse 28 chapter 3 verse 2 says for he is not a Jew which is one outwardly neither is that circumcision which is outward in the flesh but he is a Jew which is one inwardly and circumcision is that of the heart in the spirit and not in the letter whose praise is not of men but of God what advantage then hath the Jew or what profit is there of circumcision unto them were committed the oracles of God in Psalm 147 verses 19 and 20 he showeth his word unto Jacob his statutes and his judgments unto Israel he hath not dealt so with any nation and as for his judgments they have not known them praise ye the

Lord the uniqueness one of the uniquenesses of the people of Israel the chosen people God's covenant nation now Romans chapter 8 verses 5 through 7 for they that are after the flesh do mind the things of the flesh but they that are after the spirit the things of the spirit for to be carnally minded is death but to be spiritually minded is life and peace because the carnal mind is enmity against God it is not subject to the law of God neither indeed can it be notice that last phrase there it says the carnal mind right there the carnal mind is at enmity with God it's not subject it will not bring itself into subjection to the law of God neither indeed can it be it just can't so what does that tell us what does it say to us not only the animosity of the natural man to the things of

God but the impossibility for the natural man to even have any desire for the things of God that does us something we'll see later on about the natural man the fact that we can't dress it up clean it up change it make it look better no it's at enmity with God it does not have any desire for the things of God they are at enmity diametrically opposed one to another alright so being hostile to God himself it follows!

then that the flesh! is hostile to the law of God any steps which God may take to reestablish his law in the heart will be resisted to the farthest degree yeah it will be resisted by the natural man and there's the battle within us alright oh that's a good place to stop because our time got any thoughts questions comments about anything as we as we move along all right let's pray then father we are thankful grateful tonight for who you are again father we thank you for the fact that you have such a desire for us to know you for us to experience and know what you are in us and to us and what you want to be so father we praise you for that we thank you for that and we thank you as well for your word that speaks to us and shows us father that battle we have within us but shows us as well that you have the key to all of this that you are going to this evening and pray

God you continue to speak to our heart enable us to meditate on all of this to absorb it and then to put practical application of it to our lives so we'll thank you and praise you as you honor your son and thus honor yourself through it it's in Jesus name we do pray Amen!

Amen!