The sermon 'Jehovah Tsidkenu' by Mike Davenport explores the concept of 'The Lord Our Righteousness' as a title given to Jesus Christ. It emphasizes that Christ is the fulfillment of the promise made in Jeremiah 33, where God declares He will raise a 'branch of righteousness' from David. This branch is Jesus, who embodies both the active and passive obedience necessary for our salvation. The sermon illustrates how Christ's life and actions perfectly fulfilled the Ten Commandments, emphasizing that true righteousness is attained through faith in Him, not by attempting to establish our own righteousness through the law. It stresses the importance of Christ's obedience, both in His suffering and His perfect adherence to God's law, as the basis for our justification, sanctification, and salvation. Through faith in Jesus, believers are clothed in righteousness, and this is their hope for salvation.

Well, as we begin, let's look again to the Lord and ask him to bless us as we consider his word together in the next few moments. Gracious God, we thank You and praise You for Your Son Jesus Christ. Indeed He is Lord, indeed Lord He gave Himself for the church and we thank You that all authority in heaven and earth is given unto Him. And we thank You Lord that He has given us this word that we might know what pleases you. And Lord, give us grace to look to Him afresh today and to see this great salvation that He has accomplished for us, His people, His bride.

And we thank you and praise you in Jesus name. Amen. Well if you can take out your copies of the Word of God and turn with me to Jeremiah 33. Jeremiah 33. Jeremiah 33 verses 14 down through 18.

Behold, the days are coming, says the Lord, that I will perform that good thing which I have promised to the house of Israel and to the house of Judah. And here's that promise. In those days and at that time I will cause to grow up to David a branch of righteousness. He shall execute judgment and righteousness in the earth. In those days Judah will be saved and Jerusalem will dwell safely and this is the name by which she will be called the Lord our righteousness for thus says the Lord David shall never lack a man to sit on the throne of the house of Israel, nor shall the priests, the Levites, lack a man to offer burnt offerings before me, to kindle grain offerings, and to sacrifice continually." Now here in our text, Yahweh is declaring the surety, the surety of the thing he has promised his people that he himself will cause to grow up to David a branch of righteousness that branch being none other than Jesus Christ himself he will be to his people an everlasting king and an everlasting priest.

God also declares here the name by which his people will be called. It's a name which defines who they are and what this branch of righteousness has made them to be they shall be called literally Jehovah Sid Kenu Jehovah Sid Kenu the Lord our righteousness And if you're writing that down children, that's that's spelled t s I D K e in you that's how we Write that word in our language Jehovah said can you You see that branch of righteousness will execute righteousness in the earth and will become for his people our righteousness, our righteousness. Now in what way has Christ become our righteousness? Well, Paul states it clearly in 2 Corinthians 521 where he says, For God made him Jesus, who knew no sin, to be sin for us. Why?

That we might become the righteousness of God in him, in him. You see, Christ had to become our sacrifice in order to become our righteousness. Our sin is made His and his righteousness is made ours. It's ours. Romans 321 says, but now the righteousness of God apart from the law is revealed, being witnessed by the law and the prophets even the righteousness of God through faith in Jesus Christ to all and on all who believe that's the righteousness Through faith in Christ and the righteousness on all who will believe first Corinthians 130 But of him you are in Christ Jesus who became for us wisdom from God and Righteousness and sanctification and redemption That as it is written he who glories let him glory in the Lord Well this message simply entitled Jehovah's in Kenya marks the end of our series on the Ten Commandments and if you come away from this series with a heart set on reaching a higher level of righteousness in the keeping of those commandments, then my friend, you have missed the whole purpose of the commandments.

If you were to come away with that intention Then you're no better than the Jews of Paul's day of Them he wrote in Romans 10 3 for they being ignorant of God's righteousness and seeking to establish their own righteousness Have not submitted to the righteousness of God You see of these same Jews he had just said at the end of Romans 9 verses 30 to 33 What shall we say then? That Gentiles Who did not pursue righteousness? Have attained they have attained to righteousness even the righteousness of faith But Israel pursuing the law of righteousness has not attained to the law of righteousness. Why? Because they did not seek it by faith, by faith, but as it were by the works of the law.

For they stumbled at that stumbling stone Christ as it is written, behold I lay in Zion a stumbling stone in rock of offense, and whoever believes on him will not be put to shame. When you come to the law of God, if you come with faith in Christ, then and only then will you not come away ashamed. You see, my friend, Christ is the end of the law for righteousness to everyone who believes. Romans 10, 4. So if you purpose to run after the commandments with a desire to establish your own righteousness, You will stumble over Christ in the process and will never attain to any level of righteousness at all, at all, Because all our righteousness is like filthy rags in the sight of God our salvation our regeneration our justification our sanctification our glorification All our salvation in its entirety rests upon the active obedience and the passive obedience of Christ What do I mean by those terms active obedience and passive obedience?

Well we hear much about the passive obedience of Christ. That obedience is the suffering that He willingly underwent as a sacrifice for our sins. You see, this passive obedience was necessary for the remission of sins We read of this obedience in places like Philippians 2 8 where we read that Christ Jesus became obedient to the point of death even the death of the cross And in Hebrews 5 8 where we read that he learned obedience by the things which he suffered. It was a passive obedience. But there is also the active obedience of Christ.

And dear ones, this obedience is as necessary for our salvation as is passive obedience. I cannot emphasize that too much. It's not just the death of Jesus Christ that saves us. It's his perfect living, keeping the law on our behalf as well. Romans 8, 3 to 4 talks about this obedience for what the law could not do in that it was weak through the flesh God did God did How by sending his own son in the likeness of sinful flesh on account of sin He condemned sin in the flesh that The righteous requirement of the law might be fulfilled in us who do not walk according to the flesh but according to the Spirit and we see in this text that God fulfilled in us the righteous requirement of the law.

How? By sending his own son. By sending his own son. So consider with me a brief overview of how Christ fulfilled the moral law on our behalf. The first commandment says you shall have no other gods before me.

You shall have no other gods before me. The earliest record of Christ as a youth sets before us actually the stage for his entire life as a man. He declared to Mary and Joseph who could not find him, where is our son? They were halfway back, where is our son? They went back to Jerusalem and in the presence of many witnesses Christ said what I?

Must be about my father's business That was his purpose. I must be about my father's business A few verses later we read that that Jesus indeed as he went home with them He continued to grow in favor with God He continued to grow in favor with God His testimony to his own disciples as they faithfully record for us was this, John 829, I always do those things that please him. I always do those things that please him. Jesus did always seek to keep the commands of his father, John 15 10. My food, he said, is to do the will of him who sent me and to finish his work.

John 434. I do not seek my own will, but the will of the Father who sent me. John 530. He indeed loved the Lord as God with all his heart with all his soul with all his mind and it was such obedience it was such up His purpose of serving God and God alone that God looked down at his baptism as he began As he began his ministry. He hadn't even started ministering yet.

God looked down and said, this is my beloved son. With him, I'm well pleased. Let that sink into you. He had not yet started his ministry. And God said with him, I'm well pleased.

It was the custom of Jesus from his youth to go up to the temple every year. We read that in Luke 2. You see God was at the very center of his life, not on the sideline like we heard this morning. He was front and center. God is Father.

God's will. God's purpose. And there at the start of His earthly ministry when confronted coming out of His baptism, confronted with an opportunity to bow the knee to Satan and thereby escape the path of suffering. Christ's answer actually reflected his obedience to this commandment. Get behind me Satan for it is written you shall worship the Lord your God in him only you shall serve Jesus worship and his will were for God and God alone second commandment you shall not make for yourself a carved image any likeness of anything that is in heaven above or is that in the earth beneath or that is in the water under the earth, you shall not bow down to them nor serve them.

For I the Lord your God am a jealous God visiting the iniquity of the fathers upon the children to the third and fourth generations of those who hate me but showing mercy to thousands to those who love me and keep my commandments. Jealousy and zeal for God, his father, that was first and foremost in everything that Christ did. He sought for the purity of the worship of his father by cleansing the temple and driving out the money changers turning the tables over and driving out the beasts with a whip that his own hands fashioned. Jesus words to the Samaritan woman revealed his grasp of this commandment and his commitment to it. He denounced the false worship perpetuated by the Samaritans and then declared to her that the true worshipers Will worship the Father in spirit and truth for the Father is seeking such to worship him God is spirit and those who worship him must worship in spirit and truth.

John 4 23 to 24. You see he himself was that which he called her to be. He was a true worshiper. He also denounced the kind of worship held out and practiced by the Pharisees. Why?

Why did he denounce that? Because it was a remaking of the image of God that focused, their religion focused on the traditions of men and elevated that above the commands of God. You see Jesus worshiped both in spirit and in truth in keeping with the law. Third commandment, you shall not take the name of the Lord your God in vain for the Lord will not hold him guiltless Who takes his name in vain? Jesus ever held his father's name and character in high regard.

It was he who taught his disciples to pray in this manner. Our father in heaven hallowed be your name. Hallowed be your name. He did not use his father's name flippantly, but always sought to make the will and ways of God known wherever he went. It was his testimony to his own disciples.

If you had known me, you would have known my father also. And from now on, you know him and have seen him. He who has seen me has seen the father. So how can you say, show us the Father? Do you not believe that I am in the Father in the Father in me?

The words that I speak to you. I do not speak on my own authority but the Father who dwells in me does the works believe me that I am in the Father and the Father in me or else believe me for the sake of the works themselves John 14 7 through 11 in another place Jesus said for I have not spoken on my own authority, but the Father who sent me gave me a command what I should say and what I should speak. And I know that his command is everlasting life therefore whatever I speak I speak just as the father has told me Jesus Always honored his father's name fourth commandment Remember the Sabbath day to keep it holy Six days you shall labor and do all your work But the seventh day is the Sabbath of the Lord your God in it you shall do no work you nor your son nor your daughter nor your male servant nor your female servant nor your cattle nor your stranger who is within your gates For in six days the Lord made the heavens and the earth, the sea and all that is in them and rested the seventh day.

Therefore the Lord blessed the Sabbath day and hallowed it. Let these words wash over your soul as Jesus' custom was. As Jesus' custom was He went into the synagogue on the Sabbath day Luke 4 16. It was his custom And as we saw when we studied this commandment Jesus saw this day as a day fully given over to his summary of the law, a day of loving God and a day of loving others. He brought physical healing to many on the Sabbath day in order that they may be uninhibited in their worship and in order that his father might receive glory even on that day.

Jesus also sought to lift the heavy burdens of those heavy man-made inventions concerning that day, thus enabling men and women to experience the delight that that day was created for and not only that but Jesus who is the Lord of the Sabbath, secured our eternal Sabbath rest, having rested during the current Sabbath day of the Jews and rising again on the morning of the new Sabbath, the day marking the completion and celebration of the new creation that he himself brought. Jesus was a Sabbath keeper. The fifth commandment, honor your father and your mother that your days may belong upon the land which the Lord your God is giving you. We know little of the early days of Christ, but what we know speaks volumes. The Spirit-led authors of the scriptures that we have in our hands defines the experience of the youth Jesus in the following way.

Jesus went down with Joseph and Mary and came to Nazareth and was subject to them. He submitted himself to them. Luke 2 51 no example is given and none is needed the perfect one The perfect one subjected himself to imperfect ones. He the sinless one obeyed his earthly sinful parents. The next verse there in Luke 2 declares that he grew not only in favor with God but in favor with men, in favor with men.

We also see the fulfilling of this commandment as Jesus is hanging upon the cross of Calvary looking down and seeing his mother there standing beside his beloved disciple John. He sees to it that she will be well taken care of after he leaves this world. John 19 26 to 27 and Jesus also manifested honor to whom it was due because that's what the commandment is the basis of what God established in the home and we take that honor with us into the other areas of our life. Jesus manifested honor to whom it was due by paying the required temple tax, Matthew 17 24 to 27, and we see it in his directions concerning our duty to earthly government to render to Caesar the things that are Caesar's. Mark 12 17, Jesus did always honor all in authority.

The sixth commandment, you shall not murder. You see far, far From bringing anything harmful upon his neighbor Jesus in his earthly ministry Fulfilled the very prophecy of Isaiah concerning himself Luke 4 17 and 19 Jesus turns in the scroll and he turns to Isaiah and he reads this, the spirit of the Lord is upon me because he has anointed me to preach the gospel to the poor. He has sent me to heal the brokenhearted, to proclaim liberty to the captives and recovery of sight to the blind, to set at liberty those who are oppressed, to proclaim the acceptable year of the Lord. That's the way he saw his neighbors. The very purpose of Jesus incarnation was by his own confession marked by the following.

I have come that they may have life and that they may have it more abundantly. John 10 10 And Jesus did this very thing bringing life not only eternal life to all his people but also as a sign of that life he healed many and even raised some from the dead. You see Jesus did all things that tended to life they were life-giving He is indeed the life The seventh commandment you shall not commit adultery Christ ministered among the outcasts of the earth, publicans, the immoral of the earth, harlots, and he did so without failing to keep the standard that he himself held forth to others in his Sermon on the Mount. But I say to you that whoever looks at a woman to lust for her has already committed adultery with her in his heart." Matthew 5 28. But how do we know that Christ kept this commandment?

Well he himself told us in that very same sermon, do not think that I came to destroy the law and the prophets. I did not come to destroy, but to fulfill, to fulfill the law, even the law, as he himself taught it in that sermon on the mount he kept that law in that way not just as the Jews had received it before and can we speak of the faithfulness of the church's bridegroom without a consideration of the text that we heard earlier today. Husbands, love your wives. How? How are we to love our wives?

Just as, just as, just as christ also loved the church and gave himself for no one else but her that he might sanctify and cleanse her with the washing of water by the word that he might present her to himself a glorious church not having spot or wrinkle or any such thing, but that she should be holy and without blemish. Jesus was pure in faults and he was pure in all his outward conduct. The eighth commandment you shall not steal you shall not steal. What did Christ take from others? What did he demand?

He himself declared the foxes, they have holes and the birds of the air have nests but the Son of Man has nowhere to lay his head. Matthew 820. You see, far from taking from someone else, Jesus would not even go as far as to turn stones into bread. Those weren't somebody else's stones lying there in the wilderness, but he would not even take those and turn them in to bread even when he was tempted to do so. He was not obtaining something for himself as an act of his own will apart from what was provided for him by his father.

And what happened later children? Jesus didn't turn those stones into bread but what happened? Angels came ministering unto him. He waited upon his God. He waited upon his God.

He did not even make something for himself. Remember the the verse that we also looked at when studying this commandment, Proverbs 3.27, do not withhold good from those to whom it is due, when it is in the power of your hand to do so, because it's not only taking what somebody else has, we can steal by not giving what they're due, by withholding it when it is due. But Christ practiced this beyond what the law required by giving of himself to those to whom it was not due. What Christ gives us, we're due none of that. We're deserving of hell.

And Christ pours out of himself. And then what he requires of us he actually gives us the ability It's a spirit that works in us both to will and the do of his good pleasure One has written quote he paid the ultimate price for what it would cost for him to redeem a people and establish the kingdom of God his cursed death on the tree under the wrath of God Jesus gave everything he had for the redemption of his people. He poured out his very life blood for the salvation of sinners. Additionally, he gave out of his own fullness spiritual and ministerial gifts to his people. Ephesians 4, 7 to 8.

Jesus never took what was not his and he never withheld what was due to others. The ninth commandment, you shall not bear false witness against your neighbor he himself is the truth John 14 6 and as the image of the invisible God he cannot lie Titus 1 2 Jesus ever gave wholesome and life-giving words. Even living among such a sinful bunch as his own disciples, he never gossiped about them. He never slandered them behind their backs. He never sought to flatter his neighbor, to speak words to his own advantage.

Rather, truth caused him at times to bring hurt to himself in the process of speaking the truth to others. His strong denunciations against the religious leaders of his day, they were not vengeful or hateful words, but indeed life-giving words, if only heeded. Words intended to turn sinners out of the error of their ways to save souls even souls under their watch care from death and in order to cover a multitude of sins as we see at the end of James You see the hard truth that he shared as with the rich young ruler it was given out of love. They were the faithful words of a true friend. No corrupt word proceeded from the mouth of Jesus, but only what was good for necessary edification, and it always, always imparted grace to the hearers.

And then the 10th commandment, you shall not covet your neighbor's house. You shall not covet your neighbor's neighbor's wife, nor his male servant, nor his female servant, nor his ox, nor his donkey, nor anything, anything that is your neighbor's. Jesus never coveted what another had. In fact, his whole incarnation testifies to his keeping of this commandment. Jesus himself, being in the form of God, did not consider it robbery to be equal with God.

In other words, he did not even covet what was already rightfully his from all eternity by nature of who he was, but instead made himself of no reputation, taking the form of a bond servant and coming in the likeness of men Philippians 2 6 to 7 He went through his life here on earth often homeless and hungry And then rather than seeking to be served he himself served seeking rest for his disciples feeding the multitudes Never demanding what was rightfully his but always seeking the good of others. He was content with whatever his God brought his way. And though he would pray for another path, he always bowed to the will of his heavenly father in all things. Jesus' heart was free from all covetousness. He was content with the will of his father in heaven.

As one author has helpfully pointed out, while so much more could be added to each of these, these examples should suffice to stir up gratitude in our hearts for the law keeping of the Redeemer He who was holy harmless Undefiled and separate from sinners is the one Who was born under the law in order to redeem us from the curses of the law. He now stands as our great high priest who can sympathize with our weaknesses because he was in all points tempted as we are yet without sin. Do you know this branch of righteousness? Are you called by the name which the church is known, the Lord our righteousness? My prayer is that God would make these words from the pen of Robert Murray Mishain, your very own words today.

I once was a stranger to grace and to God. I knew not my danger. I felt not my load. Though friends spoke in rapture of Christ on the tree. Jehovah's in Kenu was nothing to me.

I oft read with pleasure to soothe or engage Isaiah's wild measure and John's simple page. But even when they pictured the blood sprinkled tree Jehovah's in Ken you seemed nothing to me. Like tears from the daughters of Zion that roll I wept when the waters went over his soul Yet thought not that my sins had nailed to the tree Jehovah's in Kenu It was nothing to me When free growth grace awoke me by light from on high, then legal fears shook me. I trembled to die. No refuge, No safety in self could I see Jehovah-Sin-Kenyoo my Savior must be My terrors all vanished before the sweet name my guilty fear banished with boldness I came to drink at the fountain life-giving and free Jehovah-Tzedkenu is all things to me Jehovah-Tzedkenu my treasure and boast Jehovah-Tzedkenu to me.

Jehovah, send Kenu, my treasure and boast. Jehovah, send Kenu, I ne'er can be lost. In thee shall I conquer by flood and by field, my cable, my anchor, my breastplate and shield. Even treading the valley, the shadow of death, this watchword shall rally my faltering breath. For while from life's fever my God sets me free Jehovah-Sin-Kinu my death song shall be.

May God make it to be so. Let's pray. Father we thank you for the Lord Jesus Christ, who is the end of the law for righteousness to all who will believe. And we thank you that through Him we can have that perfect righteousness you demand of us. And Lord, that's our only hope, Is Christ and his shed blood and his righteousness on our behalf Oh may everyone in here be clothed in that righteousness, a righteousness without seam, not made by human hands.

Lord dress us in that wedding garment for none other will make us acceptable on that great day of the feast and we thank you for Christ. May all our eyes and all our hopes be on him alone. In his name we pray, Amen.