Names of God - Jehovah Tsidkenu
Knowing God • Sermon • Submitted
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Introduction:
Introduction:
I. The Meaning of Jehovah Tsidkenu
I. The Meaning of Jehovah Tsidkenu
The name of God “Jehovah Tsidkenu” is a marvelous name that means, “The LORD our Righteousness.”
This name of God appears in one of the prophecy of Jeremiah during which time there was a national moral and spiritual decline in Judah.
During the time of the reign of Solomon’s son, Rehoboam, Israel became split.
Mostly because of why things spit today, jealousy and because seem to want to do things their own way.
Rehoboam would not listen to the wise counsel of the old people, but listened to the advise of his immature friends and would not lighten the people’s burden.
So, the Kingdom was split; ten tribes to the nothern that make up Israel and two tribes to the south that make up Judah.
Now, it was during this time of the spiritual and moral decline of the people that Jeremiah began to prophecy.
Now, more than a century earlier the ten tribes of the northern kingdom of Israel had been taken into the Assyrian captivity.
Now, the minstry of Jeremiah took place during the last 40 years of Judah’s existence, from the 13th year of Josiah to the destruction of Jerusalem by the Babylonians.
And this period was characterized by immorality, political corruption, and apostasy.
Now, in Jeremiah 2:4-37 we find the shocking truth of Judah’s sin and Jeremiah indicts the spiritual leaders for spiritual defection.
The priests said not, Where is the LORD? and they that handle the law knew me not: the pastors also transgressed against me, and the prophets prophesied by Baal, and walked after things that do not profit.
The priest did not seek after God and the prophets are prophesying by Baal and following useless idols.
For of old time I have broken thy yoke, and burst thy bands; and thou saidst, I will not transgress; when upon every high hill and under every green tree thou wanderest, playing the harlot.
And of course that verse is a reference to ball worship and what he is describing was a fertility rite practices in sacred groves and on hilltops.
And because of the sexual acts involved in this worship, the nation truly deserved the title “harlot” or “Prostitute.”
Sadly, Judah had learning nothing from Israel fall, a century earlier when they turned away from the Jehovah God.
They were guilty of the same sins as Israel, but theirs was worse because they had seen God’s punishment on Israel through the Assyrians.
Now, in chapter 22 God sends Jeremiah to Shallum, the king of Judah and son of Josiah, to call the nation to repentance.
Notice what God said would happen it they did not repent.
But if ye will not hear these words, I swear by myself, saith the LORD, that this house shall become a desolation.
God also predicted through Jeremiah that if the king of Judah did not lead the nation to repent that he would die in the land of captivity and never see Judah again.
But he shall die in the place whither they have led him captive, and shall see this land no more.
Absolutely nothing could stop the nation of Judah from ruin and captivity except repentance and a return to righteousness, which the king and the nation as a whole refused to do.
Woe be unto the pastors that destroy and scatter the sheep of my pasture! saith the LORD.
Therefore thus saith the LORD God of Israel against the pastors that feed my people; Ye have scattered my flock, and driven them away, and have not visited them: behold, I will visit upon you the evil of your doings, saith the LORD.
Notice what God said that He was going to do.
Behold, the days come, saith the LORD, that I will raise unto David a righteous Branch, and a King shall reign and prosper, and shall execute judgment and justice in the earth.
The spiritual leader will be call, “Jehovah Tsidkenu,” The LORD our Righteousness.”
In his days Judah shall be saved, and Israel shall dwell safely: and this is his name whereby he shall be called, THE LORD OUR RIGHTEOUSNESS.
Keep in mind that the word LORD being in all caps means, “Jehovah,” the self-existent One.
Tsidkenu cannot be adequately translated by one English word.
In Jeremiah it is the word “צֶ֫דֶק” (se-deq) and has the idea of that which is accurate, what is correct, straight, righteous.
We could read this name for God as, “The LORD is the author of our righteousness and justification.”
II. The Manifestation of Jehovah Tsidekenu
II. The Manifestation of Jehovah Tsidekenu
There are a couple of things that this name reveals to us about God.
A. Immortal Righteousness
A. Immortal Righteousness
This name shows that God Himself is perfectly righteous.
Justice and judgment are the habitation of thy throne: mercy and truth shall go before thy face.
The only way that one can give righteousness is for that person to be perfectly righteous Himself.
You cannot be for others what you are not yourself.
Since The LORD is our Righteousness, He must and is perfectly righteous.
B. Imputed Righteousness
B. Imputed Righteousness
The only way that we can become righteous ourselves for the God to be out righteousness.
We under that God is righteous, but notice what the Scripture say about us.
As it is written, There is none righteous, no, not one:
For all have sinned, and come short of the glory of God;
Because the carnal mind is enmity against God: for it is not subject to the law of God, neither indeed can be.
So then they that are in the flesh cannot please God.
But we are all as an unclean thing, and all our righteousnesses are as filthy rags; and we all do fade as a leaf; and our iniquities, like the wind, have taken us away.
Any righteousness that we have must come from God because we cannot produce the righteousness ourselves.
All of the blessings that the Children of Israel enjoyed were not as a result of their goodness and worth, but it was because of the worth of the LORD who is our Righteousness.
Understand therefore, that the LORD thy God giveth thee not this good land to possess it for thy righteousness; for thou art a stiffnecked people.
God blessed Israel in spite of who they really were not because of who they were.
III. The Material of Jehovah Tsidkenu
III. The Material of Jehovah Tsidkenu
Because we are all sinners, we are absolutely unable to make ourselves righteous.
Because we are lovers of sin and pleasure, we not only lack the ability to be righteous we lack the desire to be righteous.
God is holy and cannot overlook the sin of His creation.
Therefore, for us to be made right with God something must be done to rid us of the sin problem.
Therefore being justified by faith, we have peace with God through our Lord Jesus Christ:
This is very possibly one of my favorite aspects of Biblical Theology.
We must be clear when discussing the Doctrine of Justification that Justification is a legal, or forensic, declaration of righteousness.
This does not infuse the believer with actual righteousness, but declares them to be righteous.
It is not a change of the believers nature, but it a change in the believers status before God.
This is a declarative statement, not a transformative one.
Notice this verse:
And all the people that heard him, and the publicans, justified God, being baptized with the baptism of John.
Now if this was a transformative move then that would be blasphemous, because that would denote that God BECAME righteous, but this is an example of a declarative statement.
Who shall lay any thing to the charge of God’s elect? It is God that justifieth.
Who is he that condemneth? It is Christ that died, yea rather, that is risen again, who is even at the right hand of God, who also maketh intercession for us.
Therefore as by the offence of one judgment came upon all men to condemnation; even so by the righteousness of one the free gift came upon all men unto justification of life.
He that justifieth the wicked, and he that condemneth the just, even they both are abomination to the LORD.
However, all of these things are wonderful but how can a such a declaration by God be just?
Especially in light of the verse above.
But how can God justify those that are truly guilt of crimes against Him and He still be righteous?
The answer to that question is in the great doctrine of Imputation; which we would call the grounds of justification.
This follows in a twofold act; God imputes- that is, counts, credits, or reckons our sins to Christ and punishes him in our place, and imputes Christ’s righteousness to believers and grants them eternal life.
For he hath made him to be sin for us, who knew no sin; that we might be made the righteousness of God in him.
Biblical Doctrine: A Systematic Summary of Bible Truth Forgiveness of Sins: The Imputation of Our Sin to Christ
Now, in what sense did the Father “make” the Son “sin” on our behalf? In only one sense: the Father counted Jesus to have committed all the sins of all those who would ever repent and believe in him.
He did not make Christ a sinner, that would be blasphemous, but rather he counted Jesus to have committed all the sins of all those who would ever repent and believe in Him.
The Father judicially reckons Christ to have committed those sins, and then imputed those sins on Christ and paid for them in full.
Who his own self bare our sins in his own body on the tree, that we, being dead to sins, should live unto righteousness: by whose stripes ye were healed.
Therefore, God can still be just, holy, and righteous even when he declares sinners righteous, because His holy demands were satisfied in Christ.
The law of God, which mankind has broken, carries both positive demands and penal sanctions.
That is to say, God’s law requires both (1) that his creature perform certain duties suitable to his righteousness and (2) that they undergo certain punishments if they fail to perform those duties.
Man has failed in both.
Therefore, if we are to be saved, our substitute must not only pay our penalty by absorbing God’s wrath agains our sins, but must also obey all the positive demands of the law that were required of us.
This is sometimes referred to the active and passive obedience of Christ.
His passive obedience refers to the fact that Christ came under the curse and condemnation due to sin.
The Active obedience refers to the fact that Christ actively fulfilled the demands of righteousness that the holiness of God demands.
In this great doctrine of Justification; (1) I cannot pay my own sin debt because I am the one that is guilt so Christ (the guiltless one) takes on God’s wrath for me and absorbs all His wrath for sin; (2) but also in His life he obeyed the demands of the law perfectly.
God came then come and declare me righteous because Christ absorbed His wrath and the payment is made in full.
And just as he imputed my sin to Christ and judged Him, he imputes Christs’ righteousness to me.
So, the facts behind “Jehovah Tsidkenu” is the fact that He is my righteousness.
It is not a righteousness of my own.
And be found in him, not having mine own righteousness, which is of the law, but that which is through the faith of Christ, the righteousness which is of God by faith:
For Christ is the end of the law for righteousness to every one that believeth.
Christ both paid our penalty and achieved our righteousness.
Since he is the LORD our Righteousness and has given me that righteousness, why should I allow sin to defeat me?
The fact is that I do sin, but the fact is also that God’s wrath for that has been laid on Christ and He took the blame and the suffering for me.
Now that does not, for the true believer, give him a permission to sin; for the true believer it gives him increased desire for righteousness.
For the love of Christ constraineth us; because we thus judge, that if one died for all, then were all dead:
True love for Christ will increase a true desire for righteousness.
Because God is the LORD our Righteousness, He is all I need to be made right with God.