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Sermon topic: Haman’s Plot - Let Go of Our Pride and
Turn Our Eyes upon Jesus Speaker: Date: 8.11.09 Church: Congregation: English Scripture: Esther
3:1-15 Hymn: Turn Your Eyes
upon Jesus Pre-amble Today’s message
starts to reveal a very important but evil character called Haman. His story
forms the core of the book of Esther.
Chapters 1 and 2, which we have learned in previous weeks, are only
the pre-amble of the story. The
rest of the story will be covered in the coming weeks by other speakers. Usually, people won’t tell you the
ending of the story until the very end.
However, I have no choice but to tell you that Haman was eventually
sent to be executed at the gallows by the king, for most of today’s message
would be meaningless without knowing his fate. I.
Introduction Before I continue, I
would just like to point out, that the king mentioned in this book has two
different names, as translated in different bible versions. The New International Version and many
other modern translations use the name Xerxes. However, many English bibles,
including the Chinese Union Version bible, use the name Ahasuerus. Chapter 3 paints a
gloomy picture for the Jews living under King Xerxes. It seems that genocide was eminent.
Racial genocide exists from ancient days to modern times. We know of the Holocaust - the term
used to describe the genocide of approximately six million European Jews during World War II by Nazi Germany, under Adolf Hitler. One might ask: “What makes these people
hate another race so much that they want to carry out genocide against that
race?” It’s a question so
complicated that I wish to leave it to social psychologists to find out the
answer. However, Haman’s case
does shed some light on at least one possible reason, i.e. being hurt by one
person of another race! Isn’t it
pathetic that one can hate the whole race because one person of that race
offended them? In order to accomplish his goal Haman had
to get the king on his side. He
did it by selling hatred – a strategy that racists always use. He said in verse 8 that: 1. “These people’s customs are different from
those of all other people”; and 2. They “do not obey the king’s laws”. The first reason might sound very
weak to us. However, history tells
us that this is often good enough reason why some people are being
discriminated against by others!
The second reason is actually saying that these people don’t respect
YOU as their king! This strategy
very often works because most people like other’s respect, and when they do
not get the respect, they feel hurt.
King Xerxes, being a king with great pride, fell into that trap. II.
The character of Mordecai Let us first look at Mordecai. When we learn that Mordecai refused to
bow, we might think it’s unbiblical to bow to people. However, there were a number of
occasions in the bible when we see bowing was quite acceptable. For example, David bowed to King Saul
and many people bowed to King David.
The bible was not very clear why Mordecai refused to bow, but there is
a high possibility that King Xerxes, being a proud person himself, considered
himself deity, and wanted his representative, i.e. Haman, to be bowed to as
deity, too. As a God-fearing
person, this was too much for Mordecai to obey, even though we learned from
Chapter 2, verse 21 to 23, that Mordecai was actually a loyal citizen. He reported an assassination plan and
possibly saved King Xerxes’ life.
Mordecai set a very good example for us
Christians, for he does not compromise his stand towards worshipping only God
Almighty, even though he knew that it could cost him his life. Put ourselves in Mordecai’s shoes, can we
make a firm Christian stand even to the extent of risking our lives? Here in Australia, we probably won’t
come across a similar scenario as Mordecai did. However, there are still a lot of
temptations that make us compromise our Christian principles. Last time I have mentioned the issue
of Christians wanting to marry non-Christians, and that is only one of the
many challenges we Christians face.
It does not cost us our lives, but can be stand firm? III. Analysis
of the psychological state of Haman After knowing more
about Mordecai, it would be interesting to do a bit of analysis of the state
of mind of Haman. 1. Haman felt insecured The Scripture tells us that Haman was the No.2 person in
the Kingdom of Persia – only second to the king. One would think that he should be
feeling content and secured, especially in those days when there was no
democracy, power was everything. “In a democracy it's your
vote that counts... in feudalism, it's your Count that votes.” In Haman’s case, he’s
definitely got all the votes – well, except one. Ironically,
often, the higher a person in the political hierarchy, the less secured they
feel. That’s why, as we can see
in earlier chapters, to King Xerxes, a simple ‘no’ said by the Queen was so
threatening. That’s why King Saul
wanted David’s life, despite the fact that David made it quite clear that he
did not want to overthrow him.
That’s why King Herod was so afraid of baby Jesus that he gave orders
to kill all the boys in Bethlehem and its vicinity who were two years old and
under. Haman feared
even the most modest challenge to his authority, even up to the extent that a
simple gesture of an ordinary person like Mordecai posed a huge threat to
him. So often, fear and hurt can
make people imagine things and inflate the consequence. We saw in Chapter 1 that the King’s
advisors inflated the consequence of the queen’s disobedience to the extent
that all women in the kingdom would disobey their husbands. Similarly, Haman feared that once he
let Mordecai ‘get away’, others might follow. Then no one would respect him. He would lose all his power. Haman did not know God. He did not know that only with God’s
permission that he could keep his power.
He thought only when people feared him, he had power. 2. Haman’s ego was deeply
hurt Haman saw
himself almost equal to the king, or a deity. He took so much pride in himself that
he believed that he was so important and powerful that people should bow down
to him and worship him. Now, with
Mordecai refusing to bow to him, his ego was hurt. He lost face. Do not underestimate the hurt felt by
self-centred people when they feel that they have lost face. They would do anything to save that
face. In HK, there
are many people who did not want to be looked down on by others. So, they put on Gucci jeans, Jimmy
Choo shoes, and Chanel handbags, etc. so that they look rich. In the end, all that expenditure cost
them the last bit of wealth that they have. Some of them even got into big credit
card debts. The more they try to
look rich, the further richness becomes beyond their reach. The feeling of
face and pride is very subjective and comparative. If I drove an old bomb and lived in an
ordinary suburb in Perth, it probably didn’t mean much. If I lived in Beverley Hills, I’d probably feel quite shameful for having a cheap old bomb. However, if I lived in the impoverished
so-called ‘African Village’非洲村 in
Guangxi province, which is the place where the Love China Mission goes to;
or, in most parts of Zimbabwe, I would be looked at as a super-rich person
and probably felt very proud of the fact that I had a car, even though it’s an old bomb. Haman wanted
to be worshipped by everybody. He
wanted to be God. You know who is
the god that many IV. Haman’s
Reaction – Anger & revenge What was Haman’s reaction to this
seemingly disrespect? Haman was
angry. Having one person not bowing to him was too much for him to take. He had to take revenge. He had to get
even. Does this quote sound
familiar?: “Uncle Ben would not like us
to take revenge. It’s like a
poison that can take us over.
Before you know it, it can turn into something ugly.” It was said by Spiderman’s aunt
in Spiderman III. We can
substitute ‘Uncle Ben’ in that line with ‘Jesus’, for Jesus ask the Father to
forgive the people who put him on the cross. Haman had certainly been taken over by
‘revenge’, and it had turned extremely ugly. Usually, people cannot think rationally
when they are angry. I don’t know
about you, but there were times when I made stupid decisions when I was
angry. Out of anger, Haman
made three stupid mistakes: 1.
He borrowed power from a dangerous person. Lord Acton of
England once said, “Power corrupts, and absolute power corrupts absolutely.” 英國阿克頓男爵曾說：「權力使人腐敗，絕對的權力使人絕對的腐敗。」I think he’s said only half of the truth. The other half is: People who are
corrupt seek absolute power.
Haman sought power from King Xerxes. He was probably aware of the fact that
he and his boss were of the same kind. Didn’t the
king punish the queen for his own fault and pride? Therefore, it’s likely that the king would support him. In Chapter
One, we learned that King Xerxes had a brash character, i.e. he acted faster
than his brain. He borrowed power
from the wrong person! A person like King Xerxes can be quite
unpredictable. It is very
dangerous to be close to an unpredictable person with absolute power. 2.
He overreacted His revenge
was totally out of proportion.
For the act of one person he wanted to eradicate the whole race! There are
things that happen in our lives we largely cannot control, e.g. unemployment,
sickness, dumped by girlfriend or boyfriend, etc. They may be quite big things to
us. The influence of these things
to us can be far less than what we think they will, depending on our
attitudes towards them. However,
when we let matters inflate, they will dominate our lives and lead us to
destruction. There were cases in In business or
in the stock market, people like to go all the way. That’s
perhaps an acceptable behaviour in that environment. However, in human relationships,
always leave some room for people to step back. If we do
not leave any leeway for people to back down, and we drive them up to the
wall, they will do anything to fight back. There is a Chinese saying that says, “If one chases a dog into a blind alley, the dog will bite back.” If Haman were to take
revenge to one person only, and he did it legally, the scenario would be
totally different. He could have
thrown Mordecai into prison for not obeying the king’s
command of bowing to him. In that
case, Mordecai might or might not turn to Esther for help. Even if Mordecai did ask Esther for
help and Esther wanted to help, it would be a totally different case before
the king. 3.
He did not do his homework Any army
general would tell you that before they go to war, they would find out all
the information about their enemies.
Haman thought he had the upper hand because of his power. He did not need to find out more
information regarding his enemies.
Here, I am not referring to intelligence information that discloses
the racial identity of the queen, for I think it’s so secret that Haman
probably would not be able to find out.
What Haman did not do was to find out the history of the Jews,
especially their historical relationship with God. The Israelites are God’s chosen
people, as can be seen in Deuteronomy
7:6, “For you are a people
holy to the LORD your God. The LORD your God has chosen you out of all the
peoples on the face of the earth to be his people, his treasured possession.” God will never
let His chosen people down. If
Haman did some more research on the history of the Israelites, he would know
what God had done to the Egyptians in order to save the Israelites from
bondage. Pharaoh failed to
enslave the Israelites. Hitler
killed lots but God’s wrath was on him in the end. Egypt tried again in 1967, this time
with Jordan and Syria, and was totally defeated in what is now known as the ‘Six-day
War’. Muslim fundamentalists are
also destined to fail as well.
Yes, This concept
is very important to us. There
are times in our lives that we are being persecuted because of our faith, our
race, or simply our being Christian in what we do. If we know that we are God’s children,
we know that God is still in-charge, God will take care of the
situation. If you are faced with
distress or the sky seems to collapse on you, stay put, relax, for God says
in Psalm 46:10, “ Be still, and know
that I am God.”, because “….If God
is for us, who can go against us?” (Romans 8:31) Haman was
stupid. He wanted to dominate
others. The irony is that, on the
contrary, he made himself living under people’s influence because his
behaviour was being dominated by how people think of him. His life was now
centred on how to get even.
Without realising it, instead of just losing his power to dominate
Mordecai, he was now dominated by Mordecai’s behaviour. If Haman did not expect people to bow
down to him in the first place, i.e. if he did not see himself anything
higher than others, it would not lead to his own destruction. V.
Haman’s pride and Christian service What do we Christians learn from Haman’s
pride? - Haman had forgotten that
it’s the King that he served. In
modern concept, it’s actually the people that he serves. If he had a servant’s heart, he should
have bowed to his people instead! For, “11The
greatest among you will be your servant. 12For whoever exalts
himself will be humbled, and whoever humbles himself will be exalted.”
(Matthew 23:11-12) Haman’s story sends a strong message for
those who serve. When we serve in the church, we should have a servant’s
heart. If people doze off during
my sermon, or do not respect me as a deacon, or think that my
choir/orchestral conducting is not up to scratch, surely it hurts, but I
should not get offended. I need
to find out why they think like that and try my best to improve myself so
that I can serve better. After
all, I am only God’s servant. Recently, I received an email about what
God would and would not ask us when we see him face to face in Heaven. In the context of relating Christian
ministries to ego, I have come up with two questions that God would and would
not ask when we see Him in Heaven: 1.
God would not ask what sort of key positions we held, but how
humbly and faithfully we had served Him.
In an
orchestra, the standard practice is that the better players sit at the front
desks. God’s orchestral seating
plan, however, is different from ours.
In the orchestra in heaven, with God as the music director, only the
humble and faithful servants deserve the front desks. Ask ourselves a question, in which
orchestra would we like to have the privilege to sit at the front desks? 2.
God would not just ask how many times we have forgiven our
brothers and sisters; but also how often we ask our brothers and
sisters for forgiveness We may tell
God that we have forgiven our brothers and sisters four hundred and ninety
times, i.e. seventy times seven.
Even though that it’s an excellent act to forgive, there may still be
a high level of pride in it; that is: “I am always right and you are always
wrong. I’m so great that I have
forgiven you!” It takes a lot of
humility to see our own faults and shortcomings, to admit it and to ask for
forgiveness. Haman focused on one man who did not bow
to him and neglect all the other tens of thousands of people who did. This is simply stupidity. But isn’t that common and could happen
to us as well? When we come
across some people who do not appreciate our work in church, we get
upset. We do not consider the
fact that there are still so many people who treasure our work and
input. We have forgotten that we
should be earning the approval from God rather than from man. VI. Antidote
– If pride is such an evil thing and we all
have a bit of Haman in us, how do we confront it? I can think of three antidotes that
can be used to prevent this poison of pride to take over us: 1. Be content Does this sound
familiar: “The
more you gain the more you have to lose.”? It’s a
TV ad. It refers to controlling
our body weight. However, it’s also a spiritual law.
The more power and grace we have, the more pride we need to lose. So many
Christians think that heaven starts after life. No, heaven starts here on earth. Whenever Jesus is with us, we’re in heaven! 耶穌同在就是天堂.
Only when we choose not to be with Jesus, then we’re in hell. Haman did not
realise that he was almost like in heaven. He was second only to the King. Yet, he chose to see himself in hell -
only because one person did not bow down to him. A Chinese saying says that “Trouble is self sought.” (煩惱自尋.), and Haman is a classic example of this. 2. Be honest to ourselves Pride in the
dictionary is described as “unduly
high opinion of oneself.”
That means, we think that we are a lot better than we really are. The Apostle Paul, in Romans 12:3
reminds us that “ 3For by the grace given me I
say to every one of you: Do not think of yourself more highly than you ought,
but rather think of yourself with sober judgment, in accordance with the
measure of faith God has given you.” When we are
being honest to ourselves, we will start to see our own short-comings. Being able to see our own
short-comings is crucial in appreciating the strength of others. Our egos need to shrink in order to
create space for Jesus to dwell in us.
3. Turn your eyes upon Jesus – It’s not how much
we hold, but how much we let go.
Letting go is often easier said than done. Only when we turn our eyes upon Jesus
then we can let go. There is no harm to lose face if we can gain Jesus. Earlier, we have sung the song ‘Turn
Your Eyes Upon Jesus’ and the chorus says: Turn your eyes
upon Jesus, “All the things of earth” include our
pride. Psalm 34:5 says, “Those who look to him are radiant; their
faces are never covered with shame.” Haman did not look up to God. And, as a result, his face was covered
with shame even though he held such a high position. When we see the wonderful face of
Jesus, our own face is no longer important. May I ask you to sing with me
just the chorus part 2 times? Let us pray Dear Heavenly Father, Please help us to let go of our ego and
turn our eyes upon Jesus. For
those of us who are doing well, please teach us to be humble, and not to forget
to honour you, and to give all glory to you. For those of us who are suffering, or
in the midst of a crisis, strengthen us, O Lord, so that we do not feel
despair, for we know that you are still in control, and you have your plans.
We only need to wait for you to reveal your glory in us. Through
Jesus Christ our Lord. Amen. |
