Like Autumn said, this week we’re going to read through the book of Esther. Make sure you actually read the chapters so God can teach you through His word. His word is way more important than anything Kirsten, Autumn or I have to say.
After you read the passage, there will be some questions to help you remember what you read and the story overall. Answer them, reread if you need to.
Then we will spend some time discussing how the chapter relates to our theme for the week, “It’s not all about me!”
Read Esther 1.
So depending on what version you are reading the King is either named Ahasuerus or King Xerxes. He’s the same guy; don’t be confused when we talk about Xerxes if your version says Ahasuerus. What does King Xerxes do for 180 days?
Right after that he invites a bunch of people for a banquet which lasted how many days?
What does King Xerxes ask Queen Vashti to do?
Does she do it?
King Xerxes then asks his wise men what the law says he should do. What do they tell him?
Interesting first chapter, huh? The king has a weeklong drinking party and asks the queen to come do some scantily clad dancing for them. She says no. And as a result, the king’s counsel tells him to replace Vashti as queen and also make it a law that wives need to honor their husbands. This first chapter (along with some of the others we are going to read) leaves me scratching my head thinking, “What just happened?!”
As we read through Esther we are going to see some people who are good examples of understanding, “It’s not all about me!” and some bad examples as well. In this first chapter we definitely see bad examples!
King Xerxes starts off with 180 days (6 months!) of showing off his riches. Clearly he’s rather prideful to need to do so much showing off. He wanted people, whether it was his own people or foreigners, to see his riches and to be impressed by it. It boosted his ego to have people impressed by his stuff.
When we forget that “it’s not all about me!” we can easily become self-centered and prideful. We want to show off the things we have, whether it’s new clothes, new phones, or some other new fancy gadget. Or we make sure people know how lucky we are that we get to do fun experiences. We try to make ourselves feel better by showing off so we get praise from people.
Sadly this is something we all do from time to time. Write about a time you tried to show off new things or talk about fun experiences just to get praise from people.
The next bad example that we see of “It’s not all about me!” is King Xerxes asking Queen Vashti to come into a room of drunk men to display herself. He again is thinking only about himself. People who are all about themselves are not all about other people. Not once did King Xerxes think about the impact this would make on Queen Vashti. When we focus only on ourselves, we don’t think about the impact our decisions are going to have on others. Pride puts others to make ourselves feel better. Write about a time you made a decision that negatively impacted someone else.
The other people in this chapter who don’t realize “It’s not all about me!” are the wise men the king gets advice from. When King Xerxes asks them what to do about the queen, they think about themselves. They think their wives will start rebelling against them. So out of fear they tell the king that a law should be made saying women must honor their husband. Because they want it to be all about them, they fear it won’t stay all about them. Pride doesn’t let us share the spotlight with others. Write about you a time you tried to keep the spotlight on yourself instead of sharing it with others.
We all forget at times that “It’s not all about me!” However, the Bible warns us in many places about the dangers of pride and tells us to be humble.
1 John 2:15-16 Do not love the world or the things in the world. If anyone loves the world, the love of the Father is not in him. For all that is in the world--the desires of the flesh and the desires of the eyes and pride in possessions--is not from the Father but is from the world.
Prov. 11:2 When pride comes, then comes disgrace, but with the humble is wisdom.
What do these verses tell us about “It’s not all about me!”?
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
In August, we spent a week at Word of Life in New York doing some work projects. These are devotionals on the book of Esther and the theme "It's not about me!"
After you read the passage, there will be some questions to help you remember what you read and the story overall. Answer them, reread if you need to.
Then we will spend some time discussing how the chapter relates to our theme for the week, “It’s not all about me!”
Read Esther 1.
So depending on what version you are reading the King is either named Ahasuerus or King Xerxes. He’s the same guy; don’t be confused when we talk about Xerxes if your version says Ahasuerus. What does King Xerxes do for 180 days?
Right after that he invites a bunch of people for a banquet which lasted how many days?
What does King Xerxes ask Queen Vashti to do?
Does she do it?
King Xerxes then asks his wise men what the law says he should do. What do they tell him?
Interesting first chapter, huh? The king has a weeklong drinking party and asks the queen to come do some scantily clad dancing for them. She says no. And as a result, the king’s counsel tells him to replace Vashti as queen and also make it a law that wives need to honor their husbands. This first chapter (along with some of the others we are going to read) leaves me scratching my head thinking, “What just happened?!”
As we read through Esther we are going to see some people who are good examples of understanding, “It’s not all about me!” and some bad examples as well. In this first chapter we definitely see bad examples!
King Xerxes starts off with 180 days (6 months!) of showing off his riches. Clearly he’s rather prideful to need to do so much showing off. He wanted people, whether it was his own people or foreigners, to see his riches and to be impressed by it. It boosted his ego to have people impressed by his stuff.
When we forget that “it’s not all about me!” we can easily become self-centered and prideful. We want to show off the things we have, whether it’s new clothes, new phones, or some other new fancy gadget. Or we make sure people know how lucky we are that we get to do fun experiences. We try to make ourselves feel better by showing off so we get praise from people.
Sadly this is something we all do from time to time. Write about a time you tried to show off new things or talk about fun experiences just to get praise from people.
The next bad example that we see of “It’s not all about me!” is King Xerxes asking Queen Vashti to come into a room of drunk men to display herself. He again is thinking only about himself. People who are all about themselves are not all about other people. Not once did King Xerxes think about the impact this would make on Queen Vashti. When we focus only on ourselves, we don’t think about the impact our decisions are going to have on others. Pride puts others to make ourselves feel better. Write about a time you made a decision that negatively impacted someone else.
The other people in this chapter who don’t realize “It’s not all about me!” are the wise men the king gets advice from. When King Xerxes asks them what to do about the queen, they think about themselves. They think their wives will start rebelling against them. So out of fear they tell the king that a law should be made saying women must honor their husband. Because they want it to be all about them, they fear it won’t stay all about them. Pride doesn’t let us share the spotlight with others. Write about you a time you tried to keep the spotlight on yourself instead of sharing it with others.
We all forget at times that “It’s not all about me!” However, the Bible warns us in many places about the dangers of pride and tells us to be humble.
1 John 2:15-16 Do not love the world or the things in the world. If anyone loves the world, the love of the Father is not in him. For all that is in the world--the desires of the flesh and the desires of the eyes and pride in possessions--is not from the Father but is from the world.
Prov. 11:2 When pride comes, then comes disgrace, but with the humble is wisdom.
What do these verses tell us about “It’s not all about me!”?
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
In August, we spent a week at Word of Life in New York doing some work projects. These are devotionals on the book of Esther and the theme "It's not about me!"
No comments:
Post a Comment