Bible study · Esther 5:1-14
Esther 5: All this avails me nothing
Read Esther 5:1-14 before you meet.
In a few lines
Offered "even to the half of the kingdom" (5:3), Esther asked for a banquet. Haman left it "joyful and glad of heart" (5:9), counted up his glory, told in the words of his promotion (3:1, 5:11), and said "all this avails me nothing" (5:13) so long as one man sat at the king's gate. The gallows was his wife's and friends' idea (5:14).
The verse to carry
“Yet all this avails me nothing, so long as I see Mordecai the Jew sitting at the king’s gate.”
Esther 5:13
To talk about
1. Haman had riches, children and the king's promotion, and still said, "Yet all this avails me nothing, so long as I see Mordecai the Jew sitting at the king’s gate" (5:13). Is there one thing that can take the joy out of everything else for you? What do you do with it?
2. Offered "even to the half of the kingdom" (5:3), Esther asked for a banquet (5:4) and waited another day (5:8). When you have something hard to say, how do you decide when to say it?
3. Angry, Haman went home and called for "his friends and Zeresh his wife" (5:10), and their answer "pleased Haman" (5:14). When you're angry, who do you go to, and do they calm you down or stir you up?