Esther 6:13 …If Mordecai be of the seed of the Jews, before whom thou hast begun to fall, thou shalt not prevail against him, but shalt surely fall before him
Do you know anyone who cannot tell a joke? They try, but they just can’t succeed. I remember once hearing a joke that made me laugh my head off. I later attempted to tell it to a friend. I was literally laughing as I was telling the setup of the joke, but when I got to the punch line, I forgot what it was! The joke was on me. People who don’t have a sense of timing have a hard time telling a joke. Even if they remember the punchline, the joke just goes flat.
In Esther 6 a man named Haman is called an enemy of the Jews. He was a wicked man in the court of the Persian king. Because of an offense he felt he had endured from the Jew Mordecai, he intended to kill the entire nation of Jewish people in the Persian Empire. In fact, in Esther 6 he went to the king to request permission to hang Mordecai. What you find as you read the story is that the joke was on Haman because God’s timing is impeccable.
Esther 6:1 says, “On that night could not the king sleep.” This was subsequent to the king promoting Haman and other unjust things happening. Mordecai had literally saved the king’s life, yet wicked Haman was promoted. There are many such things in the story that make you ask, “What is the point of these incidents?” But, on that very night, the king could not sleep so they brought the record books to be read to him. What could be more boring and sleep inducing than chronicles and records! It was found written in the records that Mordecai had saved the king’s life. About this time Haman arrived to ask permission to have Mordecai killed. This happened at precisely the moment the king decided he wanted to reward Mordecai for saving his life. What ensures is a story of perfect timing. God is the master of timing.
A huge part of any successful story is timing. A big part of a successful joke is timing. God is the master of timing. We call this providence, seeing ahead of time. God saw ahead of time what the need would be and was providing all along even though no one knew what was going to happen. You see this in sequence here in three ways.
First, there was the past. Verse 2 says, “And it was found.” Mordecai had a good deed that had gone unrewarded. Haman had done wicked things, yet had been rewarded as if he had done good. It reminds me of the principle called Chekov’s Gun where if something is introduced in the first part of a story, it must be used by the end of the story. For instance, if there is a rifle hanging over the mantelpiece in Act I, it is there for a reason. It will be used by the time you get to Act III. Every element in a story is necessary. That is true in this story of Esther. God has been introducing little incidents that seem insignificant, but they are not.
This is also like your life. Your whole life is a setup. You may not know it. You may feel like things have been hard, boring, or maybe glorious, but the bottom line is that your whole life is a setup. I don’t have to know the future to know the one who does, and God is the master of timing. You see that in the past.
Then the story changes to the word now, the present. Esther 6:4 says, “And the king said, Who is in the court? Now Haman was come into the outward court.” Haman was there for the purpose of killing Mordecai at the very moment the king wished to reward Mordecai. Pride is impatient and Haman was a transparently impatient man. Pride is impatient because it does not cede control of timing to God Almighty. Just before this Haman had come home after being invited exclusively to a banquet held by Esther and told his friends and wife of “the glory of his riches, and the multitude of his children, and all the things wherein the king had promoted him, and how he advanced him.” Esther 5:13 says, “Yet all this availeth me nothing, so long as I see Mordecai the Jew.” Haman was feeling ill-treated even thou he had all these other wonderful things.
So, God is the master of timing. You see that in the past in the setup and in the increasing rapidity of the moment. You also see it pretty conclusively in Esther 6:10, 12, and 14 where there are references to the future. They are highlighted by the words make haste. Haman suggested that great things be done to the man whom the king wished to honor. His arrogance assumed the honored man would be himself. He did not know it would be Mordecai. Then the king said to Haman, “Make haste,” and told him to do all the things he had said to Mordecai. After Haman had completed this humiliating task, Haman “hasted to his house mourning, and having his head covered.” There is the idea of haste again and again. A flywheel begins slowly and when it begins to pick up steam, you can hardly stop it.
When Haman went home and told his friends and wife what had happened, Zerush his wife replied, “If Mordecai be of the seed of the Jews, before whom thou hast begun to fall, thou shalt not prevail against him, but shall surely fall before him.” Verse 14 says, “And while they were yet talking with him, came the king’s chamberlain, and hasted to bring Haman unto the banquet that Esther had prepared.” There wasn’t even time to think through what was happening. There was just a flurry of activity. Esther had prepared this banquet, but God had prepared everyone because God is the master of timing.
This means you can trust God now. You can’t see the future or change the past, but you can trust God for the present. Then, decide right now on the wisest setup for your future. You don’t know the future, but you can know God’s wisdom and have discernment about what is right and wrong based on absolute truth. God is the grand coordinator. We can’t see five years ahead how can we get our lives to coordinate, but we don’t have to. God coordinates and is the master of timing. Make the wisest decision for the best setup for your future and trust God to bring it all together.