After failing to turn Job’s heart away from God in Job 1, Satan told the Lord Job would abandon faith if his health was taken from him. God gave Satan permission to test his theory. Satan afflicted Job with disease and sores that covered his body, but Job’s faith remained steadfast. At the end of the chapter, Job is joined by 3 friends (Eliphaz, Bildad, and Zophar) who come to comfort him.

In Job 1, Satan appeared before God and God challenged him to test His servant, Job. Job was a righteous man who loved God, but Satan was convinced he could turn his heart. Satan caused Job to lose all his possessions and his 10 children, but by the end of chapter 1, Job’s heart still belonged to God. Satan’s oppression of Job is the setup for the rest of the book.

A short outline of the Book of Job in the Bible. This outline breaks the book’s 42 chapters down into 4 high level sections.

The last chapter of Esther is a very short piece of text informing the reader where they can read more about the deeds of King Ahasuerus and Mordecai, his second-in-command. All the acts of Ahasuerus and Mordecai were written in a book called the Book of the Chronicles of the Kings of Media and Persia.

Thanks to the decree of Esther and Mordecai, on the day the Jews were to be killed, they were prepared to fight back. They defended themselves against their enemies and were assisted by the local governors. The fighting lasted two days in Susa, and the Jews defeated all those who opposed them. After the fighting, Mordecai decreed that the Feast of Purim be celebrated annually to memorialize the Jew’s salvation.

After the king put Haman to death, Mordecai was elevated to his vacated role in the government. While the king’s first decree couldn’t be revoked, Esther and Mordecai wrote a second decree permitting the Jews to arm themselves and defend themselves against any hostile force that came against them.

In Esther 7, we see the tables turned and the script flipped on the evil Haman. At Esther’s second feast, she exposed Haman by revealing that she was a Jew, and asked the king to spare her life and the life of her people from Haman’s extermination plot. When the king realized Haman’s evil, he ordered him to be arrested and hung him on the gallows that were originally intended for Mordecai.

Esther 6, God’s providence is on full display as He thwarts the plan of Haman to kill Mordecai. Rather than getting to kill Mordecai, King Ahasuerus makes Haman parade Mordecai through the streets in honor as a reward for saving him from the violent plot of Bigthan and Teresh (2:19-23).

In Esther 5, Esther appeared before King Ahasuerus to counter Haman’s plot to kill her people. Before stating her intentions, she invited the king and Haman to two private feasts. After leaving the first feast, Haman was disrespected again by Mordecai, and he became furious. Together with his wife and friends, Haman put together a plan to hang Mordecai the next day.

After Haman’s decree to murder all the Jews in Esther 3, Esther 4 tells of Mordecai’s grief, and his attempt to convince Esther to go to the king of her people’s behalf. Esther was afraid because a person could be killed for entering the king’s presence without a royal invitation. But Mordecai finally convinced her and suggested that perhaps she was elevated to the throne of Persia for this special moment.

In Esther 3, King Ahasuerus promoted an evil man named Haman to the top of the government. When Mordecai refused to bow to Haman and pay him homage, Haman put together a plot to slaughter Mordecai and all his people, the Jews (this would have included Esther). The king, unaware of what Haman was really doing, gave Haman permission to execute the evil plan.

Four years after the events of Esther 1, following a failed military campaign in Greece, Ahasuerus returned to Susa. In order to find a new queen, many beautiful young women were brought to the king for his selection. He decided on a young Jewish woman named Esther. Esther was an orphan who had been raised by her cousin, Mordecai. At the end of the chapter, Mordecai saves King Ahasuerus by reporting on a violent plot he overheard from the king’s guards.

The Book of Esther opens by introducing the reader to King Ahasuerus of Persia and his queen, Vashti. Ahasuerus threw a 6-month celebration in Persia to celebrate the greatness of his kingdom. Towards the end of the feast, the king ordered Vashti to present herself before his friends so they could admire her beauty. Vashti refused! Ahasuerus was so angry that he stripped her of her royal title and banished her from his presence forever. This sets up the storyline of the book, and in Esther 2, we’ll see the King searching for a new queen.

Nehemiah 13 is the final chapter of the book. It documents Nehemiah’s short return to Persia and his reforms in Judah. These reforms included separating the people from the foreign nations, evicting Tobiah from the Temple grounds, reestablishing respect for the Sabbath Day, and restoring provisions for the Levites who served at the Temple.

The first half of Nehemiah 12 (verses 1-26) is a record of the leaders of priests and Levites who served God during the days of Zerubbabel and Joiakim. The second half (verses 27-47) is a recounting of Nehemiah and Ezra’s dedication ceremony to celebrate the completion of the walls of Jerusalem.

Nehemiah 11 documents the effort to repopulate the city of Jerusalem. The men of Judah cast lots and 1 out of every 10 men was chosen to relocate to Jerusalem to strengthen the city. Verses 3-24 record the number of the who lived in Jerusalem, while verses 25-26 list of the names of the inhabited towns and villages outside of Jerusalem.

Nehemiah 10 begins with a list of 84 leaders of Judah who signed a written oath to honor God and respect His commands. After their leaders signed, the rest of the people verbally committed to keeping the laws of God that their forefathers had so often neglected.

Far too many people rush into pet ownership without considering the spiritual side effects, and far too many Christians have taken pet ownership to an unhealthy extreme. In this article, I want to propose a few questions for people to consider before they run off to the pet store or humane society.

In Nehemiah 9, the people of Judah gathered for a period of repentance and confession. They and their fathers had neglected the Law of God, and their hearts were broken over it. The Levites stood up and prompted the people to worship the Lord by reciting some of His great deeds and His mercy on the nation of Israel throughout their history.

In Nehemiah 8, all the Jews gathered in Jerusalem to hear Ezra read from the Book of the Law of Moses. Ezra read from the book and then gave commentary to help the people understand. After hearing the reading, the people were sad, probably because they realized how negligent they had been in keeping God’s commands. They resolved to do better, and they started by observing the Feast of Trumpets and the Feast of Booths.