Pastor Rick (0:02)

Hey there, everybody, and welcome to Pastor Rick's Daily Hope. And whether today is your first time tuning in or if you're a regular listener, we're really excited that you're here. Well, today, Pastor Rick is continuing his series called Discover your Destiny. So get ready to explore the practical steps to grow in all areas of your life, spirit, mind, body, relationships, and even your career. So stick with us as we uncover God's incredible plan for your future. And here's Rick with the final part of a message called how can I know my destiny Number three.

Mordecai (0:40)

Now, the third thing that Esther did, she not only got disturbed, and she not only looked at what God had given her, but you've got to take the time to hear God's call on my life. I must take the time to hear God's call on my life. You need a retreat. You need a getaway. You need to get away for at least a day, maybe two or three days, where you sit down and you listen to God. You sit down, you shut up, you be quiet, and you pray and you plan and you think about the next 10 years of your life. And you think, what does God want me to do? Given my gifts and given my passions and the needs I see around me, what does God want me to do? And you're not gonna do this on your own, so you gotta have like a little retreat time. Now notice this. Mordecai, who's her adopted father, they all know about this plot to kill all of the Jewish people. And in verse 13 and 14 of Esther 4, it says, Mordecai sent this word to Esther. Do not think because you're in the king's house that you alone of all Jews will escape. For if you remain silent and said, you can't remain silent. If you remain silent at this time, he said, relief and deliverance for the Jews will arise from another place. In other words, Mordecai said, I've got faith in God. He's not gonna let this God's chosen people be eliminated from the face of the earth. He's not gonna happen. So God will provide. But he says, if you don't do anything about it, you and your father's family will perish. Besides, he says, who knows but that you have come to this position for such a time as this. Now remember, Esther is a 20 year old in her 20s, young, poor, orphaned Jewish girl, and she's now the queen of Persia. And Mordecai's going, esther, you think this is by accident? I don't think so. Do you not think that God put you in this position for such a time as this. This is no accident. And don't just think you can ignore these disturbing trends out there in society. You cannot remain silent. You gotta do something about it. Now, I wanna tell you, that's not just true of Esther, it's true of you. Some of you young women, you're exactly where God put you for the reason he put you there. Some of you young guys, you're exactly where God put you. It doesn't matter what your age is. You are where you are for such a time as this. And God brought you to Saddleback Church not to sit, soak and sour, but to make a difference with your life. He has a destiny for your life. God says, I brought you to this place and I brought you to this time. And I want you to hear my call. Now, you gotta take the time to hear God's call in my life. Now, God has called everyone. We've talked about this before. A lot of people think God only calls preachers and missionaries and nuns and priests, and those are the called people. No, Everybody is called. Your calling is your vocation. As I told you, it's this Latin word, voce, which means vocal. Your vocation is your call, your voice. Everybody has a vocation. Everybody has a calling of God. God has called every one of you to make a difference with your life. Some of you are not picking up the phone. Now, here's the point. You don't call God. He calls you. You don't just go, what would I like to do with my life? Sorry, you don't get that option unless you don't want any blessing. God says, no, no, I created you for a purpose. I have a vision and values, and I have a purpose, plan and a destiny for your life. And God calls you, and you gotta pick up the phone. I wish what we were doing were just a matter of life and death. That'd be easy. But it's not. It's more important than life or death because eternity is in the balance. Heaven and hell. Jesus talked more about hell than he did about heaven. They're real. We're not just talking about helping people now. We're talking about their eternal destinies. It's bigger than life or death. And God has brought you to this place just like he brought Esther to her place, including the good and the bad that happened. I'm sure it was no fun going and having sex with a king you didn't even love. And knowing that the night before and the night after you, it's gonna be somebody else. God said, you know what? I can even use that. I can even use date rape. I can bring good out of anything. Esther, chapter 4, verse 15. Then Esther sent this reply to Mordecai. Go and gather together all the Jews who are in Susa. They're the capital, and fast for me. Said, I want you to find everybody. You can get everybody who's Jewish, and I get everybody to fast for me. Cause I'm gonna have to go confront the king. And I know that this is a scary thing. She's going, you know what? First place, it's against the law for me to go to him. You only go to the king if he invites you. It's against the law for me to take the initiative and go to the king. If you read the story, she said, in fact, he hadn't called for me in 30 days. So I haven't had any contact with him in a month. So I don't know if he still loves me or what. And number two, I'm gonna have to reveal that I'm Jewish, which means I'm gonna keep it a secret from my husband. And number three, I'm gonna ask him to publicly renounce a decree he's already signed, and he's gonna look forward foolish to reverse a command. So I'm gonna probably die for this. I'm gonna probably lose my life for this. I'm taking my life in my own hands. So she says, you go gather all the Jews who are in Susa and fast for me. And do not eat or drink for three days or night or day. And I and my maids will fast as you do. And when this is done, then I'll go to the king. She's saying, before I initiate any confrontation with the king, which is no light matter and can cost me my life, I'm gonna have to have a little retreat, and I'm gonna need to get off by myself. And I'm gonna fast and I'm gonna pray and I'm gonna think and I'm gonna plan out my words, and I'm gonna give some serious time to my destiny. Now, Esther does two things that you're going to need for your destiny in the next 10 years. Number one, just like Esther, you're gonna need all the support you can get. She said, go get everybody you can to pray for me. That's why you must be in a small group. Cause you cannot fulfill your destiny on your own. We get well in community, we serve in community, we share in community. God meant for us to be in community. The very first thing God said to man, it is not good for man to be alone. Whether you marry or not is irrelevant. You have to be in a family. You have to be connected. You have to be in community. She says, get everybody praying for me. You're gonna need that. And the second thing Esther did, and you're gonna need to, you're gonna need some time alone. You're gonna need to go on a retreat, at least an overnighter where you get alone. Because if I tell you, go home and make these lists of all the things that you're gifted in and make a list of all the things you care about, you know what? You're not gonna do it. You're gonna walk out of here and you're gonna forget it and you're not gonna do it. And you'll come back next week and it still won't be done. So I'm going to force you to do it. And in the next three years, I want everybody in this church to take a retreat, a life planning retreat, to plan goals in all the key areas of your life. What are my goals financially? What are my goals for my family? What are my goals for my personal life? What are my goals for my health? What are my goals in learning? And I'm gonna help you. Nothing becomes dynamic till it becomes specific. Now, number four, one last thing, the fourth thing you have to do is what Esther did is that is you must make a faith commitment. You must make a faith commitment. The Bible says without faith, it's impossible to please God. The Bible says, according to your faith, it will be done unto you. The Bible says the just shall live by faith. The Bible says all things are possible to him who believes. Now, Esther says, I know this is scary, and I know it's a big risk and I'm scared to death to take this initiative, to go to the king and tell him I'm Jewish and ask him to rescind a stupid decree that a bad guy got him to approve. But it's the right thing to do, so I'm gonna do it. She's an amazing woman. Now in Esther 4:16, she makes this faith commitment to do the thing that she's most afraid of. She says, and when this is done, my three day retreat, we've all prayed, we've all fasted, and I've thought through where I'm going. When this is done, I will go. That's a faith commitment. I will go to the king. Even though it's against the Law. And if I perish, I perish. What a woman. What a woman. What an amazing woman. If I perish, I perish. But I'm going to die doing the right thing. Friend, you're not ready to live until you know what you're ready to die for. You cannot live until you have qualified and clarified in your heart what you're willing to die for. You're not ready to live the next 10 years if you don't know what you're willing to die for. You're not living, you're just existing. Not knowing what's worth dying for makes life motion without meaning. You gotta know what's worth giving your life for. On the other hand, when you understand your destiny and you really get it, it grabs you, that calling grabs you. And you go after it with total abandonment. And you say, if it takes my life, it takes my life. And if I perish, I perish. But I'm gonna die doing what God tells me to do. Now I want you to write this sentence down. I can only manage what I measure. Would you write that down? I can only manage what I measure. If you don't have measurable goals, it's just a wish, it's a dream, it's a hope, but it's not a real goal. And if you don't set some measurable goals for the next three years in phase one of decade of destiny that you can measure, you're not gonna be any different in three years, much less in 10 years. And so I'm gonna help you set some spiritual goals. And I want them to be specific. And I'm telling you right now that on the last Sunday of this two month campaign, I'm going to ask you, I'm gonna challenge you to make four faith commitments. You don't have to write these down, but you'll say, four faith commitments. Number one. What do I wanna learn in the next four years? In the next three years, my goal for you is that you'll be smarter. As I said, smarter and sharper. And you'll be more skilled and more successful. What do I wanna learn? What am I gonna commit to become in the next three years? What am I gonna commit to contribute in the next three years? What am I gonna commit to do with my life in the next three years? These three year faith commitments come up in another month. Cause all the messages are worthless if we don't make it measurable, I don't need it. You need it. It's not for me, it's for your benefit. So you can measure your progress over the three years. Jesus said it like this on the screen. According to your faith, it will be done to you. You know, every morning I sit on the side of my bed and I pray a prayer. And that prayer, I pray the same prayer every day. It's a little prayer I've just written and memorized. And then I say the words to a song. I don't sing it. Cause I can't sing, especially in the morning. But I say this as I'm sitting on the bed. I don't even get out of bed till I've done this. I say, lord, Lord, I offer my life to you. Everything I've been through, Use it for your glory. Lord, I offer my days to you. Lift up my praise to you as a living sacrifice. Lord, I offer you my life. And I say it every day before I get out of bed. I think this is the attitude Esther had when she knew that going to her husband, the king of Persia, would likely mean her head would be cut off. Cause first she'd admit she's Jewish. And second, she's asking him to reverse a decree that would make him seem foolish. But Esther says, lord, I offer my life to you. Everything I've been through. My parents died. I was in the cattle call of a harem. Everything I've been through, use it for your glory. Lord, I offer my days to you. Lift up my praise to you as a living sacrifice. Lord, I offer you my life. And if I perish, I perish. And because she was willing to lay it on the line for the destiny God had planned for her, the Jewish nation was saved. You see, you wouldn't be saved without Esther. Because if the Jews had been annihilated, there would be no Jesus, the Messiah, and you would be hopeless. That's the impact of Esther. Let's bow our heads. Would you pray this prayer in your heart? Dear God, I want the rest of my life to be the best of my life. I want my life to count. I don't want to live for myself. I want to live for you and for the destiny you've created for me. Help me to recognize the gifts that you've put in my life. Not just the assets, but even the liabilities, the limitations, the handicaps, even the hurts. And to realize that even those are part of the plan to get me where you want me to be in the time and place and what you want me to do with my life. Help me to identify the needs that stir my heart. To realize that when I see something, I Go. That's wrong. That needs to be corrected. Somebody ought to do something about that. That you're speaking to me. Help me to take time to hear your call, to be quiet, to settle down. Lord, without even knowing when I'm gonna do it, I commit right now to going on retreat. And in the weeks ahead, help me to consider what faith commitments you want me to make in the key areas of my life. If you've never opened your life to Jesus Christ, regardless of your religious background, say Jesus Christ, please make yourself real to me. I don't understand it all, but if you're real, I open up my life to you. I want to know you. I want to learn to trust you and love you. Open up my life to your plan and purpose. Dear God, I want to fulfill your destiny that you have for me. In your name I pray. Amen.