Insight for Today
A Daily Devotional by Pastor Chuck Swindoll

When God Calls the Shots

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Then Harbona, one of the king’s eunuchs, said, “Haman has set up a sharpened pole that stands seventy-five feet[a] tall in his own courtyard. He intended to use it to impale Mordecai, the man who saved the king from assassination.”

“Then impale Haman on it!” the king ordered. So they impaled Haman on the pole he had set up for Mordecai, and the king’s anger subsided. (Esther 7:9–10)

The plot thickens as the excitement builds. Esther plans a banquet for the king and Haman. Blinded by his own conceit, Haman thinks the queen wants to honor him. But when the king asks Esther what request she might have that he can grant, she says, "I want both of you to come to another banquet tomorrow. Then I will tell you what I want."

Haman was thrilled! The queen was going to honor him twice with a feast in the presence of King Ahasuerus. She must really think I'm something, he thought.

On the way back home, he saw Mordecai, that Jew who would not give him the homage and deference he felt he had coming. Haman was infuriated at the sight of his nemesis.

You see, when God calls the shots, nobody can stop the action! The most powerful man in the land next to the king gets his hands tied and his mouth silenced. God and God alone can do such things.

When I come to this book that never mentions God, I see Him all the more profoundly and eloquently portrayed throughout it. It's there in invisible ink. Just like life. I've never seen skywriting that says, "I'm here, Chuck. You can count on Me." I've never heard an audible voice in the middle of the night reassuring me, "I'm here, My son." But by faith I see Him, and inaudibly I hear Him on a regular basis, reading Him written in the events of my life—whether it be the crushing blows that drive me to my knees or the joyous triumphs that send my heart winging. When I pause long enough to look back, I realize it is the unsearchable mind, the unfathomable will, the sovereign control, the irresistible providence of God at work, because He, though invisible, remains invincible.

Are you letting God call the shots in your life?