Revealed - Session 7 - Noah Seiple

When leaders fracture and communities lose their way, the question becomes painfully simple: where can we find a righteousness that actually holds? In this session, we open Jeremiah 23 and trace a golden thread through Israel’s story—Abraham’s faith, Moses’ covenant, David’s throne—until it resolves in a name that reorders everything: Jehovah Tsidkenu, “The Lord Our Righteousness.”

We walk through Jeremiah’s sharp indictment of failed shepherds and his tender promise to a scattered people. His prophetic rhythm—commands to do justice, warnings about covenant drift, and assurances of future restoration—builds toward the coming of a Righteous Branch who will reign with wisdom. That promise is not abstract; it points directly to a person. In Jesus, justice and mercy meet without compromise. The New Testament’s language of justification brings this home: our sin imputed to Christ, Christ’s righteousness imputed to us, and peace with God established as our new, unshakeable standing. From that standing grows a transformed life—one that seeks the good of the vulnerable, speaks truth in a world of tempting idols, and holds hope even when kingdoms tremble.

This session also brings the theme down to street level. If you’re anxious about the world your children are growing up in, worn down by constant outrage, or numb from the headlines, Jeremiah’s hope reaches into that exhaustion. The Good Shepherd doesn’t just comfort; He clothes His people in a righteousness they could never earn. That gift frees us to repent without fear, act justly without despair, and rest in the faithfulness of a King whose rule isn’t shaken by human failure.

“The Lord Our Righteousness” is more than a title—it is a shelter for weary hearts, a summons to integrity, and a steady joy for those who trust in the One who makes sinners whole and fractured communities new again.

We are Trinity Community Church in Knoxville, Tennessee.
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Chapters

• 0:00 Recap Of God’s Names
• 1:12 Reading Jeremiah 23:1–6
• 3:20 What Jehovah Tsidkenu Means
• 4:25 Jeremiah’s Call And Mission
• 8:48 Commands, Warnings, And Promises
• 11:20 The Covenant Thread From Abraham
• 16:15 David’s Line And Failed Kings
• 20:40 The Righteous Branch And Jesus
• 25:10 Justification And Imputed Righteousness
• 31:20 Secure Dwelling And The Good Shepherd
• 34:30 Hope Amid Decline And Final Prayer

Transcript

Noah Seiple: 0:19

Going back and listening to these offline has been awesome. For example, so let's let's do a quick recap on what we call here so far. So Jehovah Jira, award our provider, Abigail, a great lesson on that, Jehovah Rafa. We got De Heels by Adam. Jehovah Nisi, award our banner, and a silver Jehovah Rohi. I love the banner's off the winners. That's for camp. I love that. That was Jehovah Rohie, God our shepherd, right here, and Jehovah Shalom, God our peace, Kai Ra. Jehovah Meccadishim, Lord our sanctifier. And tonight, brings us to Jeremiah 23. If you want to return there, I can be reading through the ESD. Jeremiah 23, verses 1 through 6. And we will learn another name, another revealed name the Lord gives us Jehovah Satan, the Lord our righteousness. All right. Starting first one, chapter 23. Woe to the shepherds to destroy and scatter the sheep of my pasture, declares the Lord. Therefore, thus says the Lord, God of Israel, concerning the shepherds who care for my people, you have scattered my clock and have driven them away. You have not attended to them. Behold, I will attend to you for all your evil deeds, declares the Lord. Then I will gather the remnant of my flock of all the countries where I have driven them, and I will bring them back to the fold, they shall be fruitful and multiply. I will set shepherds over them, who will care for them, and they shall fear no more, nor be dismayed, neither shall any be missing, declares the Lord. Behold, the days are coming, declares the Lord, when I will raise up for dead a righteous branch, and he shall reign as king and deal wisely, and shall execute justice and righteousness in the land. In his days, Judah will be saved, and Israel will dwell securely. And this is the name while she will be called. Jehovah Sitkenu. Let's just pray real quick. Heavenly Father, we thank you for your word. We thank you for revealing yourself through history. Or help uh just open our hearts tonight, work, help our minds to more clearly, draw our attention to you. May you be glorified. Jesus' name, amen. Jehovah Sid Kenu, the word our righteousness. Um, verse 6 there, where it says, the Lord. Uh the Lord is our righteousness. That can be translated Yahweh Sedek, which that gives us Jehovah Sidkinu. Ryan Durfee actually gave a little exclamation Jehovah versus Yahweh, how we can understand that in scripture. And for there, you'll see a little QR code on your study page at the very bottom. That's just also for reference. You can look at later. Uh, it's a little video by Wesley Huff, uh, a Canadian apologist that does really good uh quick little snippets of great information. So that's just something to keep in mind as we're reading through these Hebrew translations. But um, getting back to the Jehovah Sidkenu, derived means to be stiff, to be straight, a straight pathway, or righteous in Hebrew. So when the two words are combined, we we understand them to be Jehovah Sid Kane. It's translated as the Lord, our righteousness. So I want to start through this text, and I want to thank tonight big picture, context of the people that Jeremiah is speaking to, where they've been through the generations, what is God calling the people to through Jeremiah? So that's kind of the approach we're gonna take with this big picture over many years. And too, we'll read several verses tonight, and I feel like that's okay because this is small, unique. Um, probably more Bible verses than I would have in a sermon or some kind of preaching, right? Normally, so uh we brought our brains and our Bibles, so that's how you can do it. But this will be good. We'll kind of be going through a lot of scriptures. You don't have to turn through all of them. Um so let's start with the background, the context of Jeremiah. Let's think of his role and what he did. The book of Jeremiah, major prophet, and it details the warnings and the messages from God delivered by Jeremiah to the people of Judah. At this time, there was a northern and a southern uh kingdom, if you will, Israel and Judah. So Jeremiah emphasizes the coming judgment due to idolatry. He calls the people to repentance and foretells actually the Babylonian exile. Yet he also offers hope for restoration. His message truly was a hopeful message, even though he's calling people to repent. He calls he he gives the promise, um, God gives him words to speak to the promise of the new covenant, Jesus. So Jeremiah was called by God at an early age, very young man, and he's often described as a leaking prophet, just really show his heart for the people of um of Judah and where he's called to speak to. And one more phase a Jeremiah prophesizer in the period standing in the reigns of the last five kings in Judah. So he's being Josiah, Jehoias, Jehoiakim, the boy again, Zedekiah. So his ministry, we didn't understand this. Think of it as about 627 BC until the fall of Jerusalem in 586. So a lot of instability going on. Right. Um, a declining kingdom, if you will, if you think of that way. And truly a pending judgment coming from Babylon. So this um the first verse I want to kind of read, setting up Jeremiah, is talking specifically about his call. So right in the beginning of the book, first chapter one through five, it says, Before I formed you in the womb I knew you. This is God's arching to Jeremiah. Before you were born, I consecrated you, and I appointed you a prophet to the nations. Then I said, Ah, Lord God, behold, I do not know how to speak, for I am only a youth. The Lord said to me, Do not say I am only a youth, for to you, for to all to whom I send you, you shall vote. And whatever I command you, you shall speak. Do not be afraid of them, for I am with you to live, declares the Lord. Somewhat unpopular message the Jemra had to share with our evil. Okay. And their nation as it was not could say that it was not direct, and they had a lot of enemies besides them. So he's selling the do not be afraid. I'm gonna be with you, I've appointed you as a prophet. So Jeremiah repeatedly calls Israel to repentance back to God. It was a call to righteousness and justice, and a reminder of the covenant God had made with the people. We could kind of understand this as three things that made up this professor uh prophetic message. Commands, which something like forsake evil and follow God in righteousness, the warnings or a reminder of coming judgments, and promises of hope. An example of the commands that he gave to the people. Jeremiah to you don't have to go there, but you can if you want. It's Jeremiah 22. Hear the word of the Lord, O King of Judah, who sits on the throne of David, you and your servants, and your people who carry these gates. Thus says the Lord, do justice and righteousness, and deliver from the hand of the oppressor him who has been robbed, and do no wrong or violence to the resident alien, the fatherless, and the widow, and all shed innocent blood in this place. He's calling people to justice. He's calling people to your righteous life, to walk before her. Number two, the warnings or reminders of the covenant in Jeremiah 11. This is an example. Thus says the Lord, the God of Israel, curse be the man who does not hear the words of this covenant that I commanded your fathers, where I brought them out of the land of Egypt, from the iron furnace, saying, Listen to my voice and do all that I command you. And then this phrase you see over and over and over again in Old Testament scripture, so shall you be my people, and I will be your God. He's calling them to the covenant, something that he established between two parties, God and Israel. And the promise we read it, verse 6, Jeremiah 23, 6. We've read the promise. I will raise up for David a righteous branch, and he shall reign as Cain and do wisely, and shall execute justice and righteousness in the land. In his days, Judah will be saved, and Israel will dwell securely. And this is in the name by what you will be called, the Lord of righteousness. Jehovah said King. That sounds really good. That is a promise that they can hold on to, that we can hold on to. How is this promise hope that this rule in Judah, as well as our current internal hope today? This was 600 BC. 400 years and or 400 years ago in righteousness to Israel who are already God's covenant people. So Israel was already was already called I doubt for a specific person or purpose and walked before him languistly. So Jeremiah's call is to something greater. Not just coexisting as a moral or kind of conservative who respected his peers and community. It was to remind Jia of the living God and the covenant he made with him. So let's talk quickly about the covenant. What was it? Um, I think it would be good to remind ourselves of the specific language God calls the nation to. Um the covenant in general could be thought of as a few things: a great nation that included land promises, that there would be a blessed nation or a blessed people. That they would be multiplied, that uh to be fruitful and multiply, there'd be many a number. Or to be righteous, a holy nation set apart. Um, an outward sign of this that God commanded them was circumcision. Then we see this phrase again: I will be their God, and they will be my people. No other gods. There's one God, Yahweh, the existing one. We see this with Abram in Genesis 12, where God says, I will make you a great nation, I will bless you, and to your offspring I will give this land, the land of Canaan. Genesis 15, he continues this down it to get uh it says to get an heir, his offspring will be great in number. And it says that Abram believed, he had faith in the Lord, and this was counted to him as his righteousness. Genesis 17, his Abram's name is changed Abraham, he father of a multitude, or our chief of multitude. And it says, he instructs Abram, I am God Almighty, walk before me and be blameless. This is the same message for all these generations that we hear in Jeremiah, reminding the people. God continues, I will make your descendants like the stars in the sky, a father of a multitude of nations, make in the nations, kings will come from you, and I will be their God, and they will be my people, a holy people set apart for God. It says in the next chapter that the Lord shows Abraham and says that his household Africa keep the way of the Lord by doing righteousness and justice. So there that aligns with the heart of God, calling people to walk equal and blameless, to be a people of executing justice and a righteous people. And this truly was an example for all future leaders, kings, and shepherds, hops, people, of all the people Israel to lead them into right relationship with God. We see that the Lord commanded that they walk with him as he, the only God, the one true God, and to walk before him in righteousness, the people anyways. So a holy God requires a holy nation under himself, a righteous people for God alone. So these texts also point to something else: that it's not only the covenant for Abraham, but rather the everlasting covenant for Abraham's descendants or his offspring. Okay, that set the example, the foundation of this covenant, and it continues with Isaac. We see that in Genesis 26. Jacob, who's renamed Israel, which means God prevails, from which the 12 tribes uses similar language. Um he says, I am God Almighty, be fruitful and multiply a nation and company of nations shall come from you, and king shall come from your own body, solidifying the covenant that he's made with people. God does not forget, and he calls us active, a righteous covenant that he makes with us. This continues with Moses from the tribe of Levi in Exodus 19. The Lord instructs Moses to tell the people of Israel, thus you should say to the house of Jacob, and tell the people of Israel, You yourselves have seen what I did to the Egyptians, and how I bore you on the eagle's wings and brohe and myself. Now, therefore, if you will indeed obey my voice and keep my covenant, you shall be my treasured possession. A kingdom of priests and a holy nation. Holy mean set apart for God Allah, that your heart is free from defilement and idolatry. This was in part done through the law of Moses, revealing men their shortcomings, how to obey God and what Moses' charge was telling the people to keep this covenant and the law. And that's the promise you will be a treasured people before God, a righteous people. Let's continue. We're almost getting up to, or we're almost at the place where Jeremiah here um takes off. Jeremiah called us to what? David. Why does he remind us from Data, who was also king of Israel? What we see in the text of Jeremiah is that through the line of David, this covenant continues, and that it's an everlasting covenant. 2 Samuel 7 tells us that. It says, Your house and your kingdom shall be made sure forever before me, and your throne shall be established forever. God continues his covenant with King David, saying that it will last forever. King David reigned from 1010 BC to 970 BC, a long time before Jeremiah. And Jeremiah is pointing back hundreds of years, generations ago, that don't forget the promise that's coming. Something is coming, an everlasting deterral that is changing everything. Probably arguably the most popular and one of the greatest kings of Israel that we understand in the Bible. Though sinful, all in the nature, God tells us, scripture tells us, he's a man after Nazareth. Well, we know David anoints Solomon. David personally does not reign. His throne does not last forever. David does an off throne. He anoints Solomon in 970 BC, king of Israel. Then David dies. David's personal kingship fails to last forever. Solomon, a wise and dead king, had his heart turned. Yeah. He disobeyed the Lord. He gave his heart over to the idols of his foreign lines. He did not shepherd in righteousness and could not execute justice. Solomon reigns. It was after Solomon's reign. The Israel splits in two, the northern ten tribes of Israel and the southern Judah, containing two tribes. And that brings us to at least a this structure that we understand that Jeremiah is. Jeremiah living in Shuddah. And that's what that's who the people specifically that he's talking to. That's the important of the covenant. It is speaking, it is drawing, it is teaching the people to something to while he was sitting before the Lord. At least one flaw, at least one phale plot, at least a sinful makesha. Unable to walk in the righteousness and justice. And oftentimes their hearts being turned by idols, by other things. In Jeremiah's day, I I told you that he um that he was a proper during the last five kings of Judah. The last five kings were no exception to, let's say, not being able to keep the covenant that the Lord had commanded at all times. Josiah, the first king, he was actually a really good king. The Lord commends him extremely well. But he still suffers from the Baalflah, the sinful nature. Jehoaz, the son of Josiah, who ruled for three months and then was deposed by Egyptian Pharaoh and taken to Egypt where he died. He actually predicts this in Jeremiah 22. It says of him, Woe to him who builds his house by unrighteousness, and his upper rooms by injustice, who makes his neighbor serve him for nothing, and does not give him his waities. We see the pattern here. And the last king, Zedekiah. His reign is often reviewed as a period of missed opportunities and tragic decisions, his failure to keep prophetic glories and his reliance on political alliances other than faithfulness to tell. Only they would have had a no king's protest. Maybe they needed all these poor shepherds and bad kings to see the true light. So Jeremiah, looking at it in a declining kingdom, kings and leaders and people falling away from the Lord. He references the shepherds. Woe to you. The Lord takes this seriously, those who leave after, and leads people into unrighteousness and injustice. So what can we learn? Jeremiah saw good kings and bad kings. Some the Lord commended, and others he detested. Yet all sinful and fallen. Jeremiah's priority was repentance and calling all to walk in righteousness, calling in who God was, the righteous king. So his prophetic ministry called people to sanctification. It's truly what it was. A quote from John Piper that I like it the study of prophecy does not produce sanctification, it is being studied wrong. If gazing into the future hinders our responsiveness to present needs, we may be sure that we are not gazing with the eyes of God. Jeremiah pointed to the one final solution and ultimate hope of fallen man, of fallen shepherds, of fallen kings. The eternal promise is the Lord of righteousness. Jehovah Sidkenu. The promises Jesus poured from the light of David. Righteousness incarnate to fulfill the law or to fulfill the law, the prophets, and the psalms. And isn't it interesting? Two verses after Matthew 5.17, the Lord says that unless your righteousness exceeds the scribes and Pharisees, you'll never enter the kingdom of heaven. For all time, every man, woman, king, and queen suffer the same problem. We in and of ourselves are unrighteousness, our nature opposed to God and his holiness, and history proves it. Let's think of this man sinned in the garden by failing to uphold the Lord's commands. We could think of this as the first cover, the covenant of works. Two parties involved, Adam and Eve and God. However, God intervened with a covenant of grace. Let's read this from Wayne Brian. In systematic theology, comments on the covenant of grace by saying, When man failed to apply to attain the blessing offered in the covenant of works, it was necessary for God to establish another means, one by which man could be saved, an amazing plan of redemption whereby sinful people come into fellowship, right relationship with God. The parties of this covenant of grace are God and the people who He will redeem. Christ, or the righteous branch of David, fulfills a special role as mediator between God and man in the covenant of works, and thereby reconciles us to God. What is the condition? Faith in God alone, the same faith God counted to Abraham as his righteousness. Paul echoes this in Romans 4, starting at verse 20. No unbelief made him waiter concerning the promise of God, the promise that Jeremiah called us to. But he grew strong in his faith as he gave glory to God, fully convinced that God was able to do what he had promised. This is why his faith was counted to him as righteousness. But the words it was counted to him were not written for his sake alone, but for ours also. It will be counted to us who believe in him, who raised from the dead Jesus our Lord, who is delivered up for our trespasses and raised for our justification. Justificate justification meaning declare righteous. Paul continues in Romans 5. Therefore, since we have been justified by faith, we have peace with God through our Lord Jesus Christ, the righteous branch. Through him we have also obtained access by faith into his grace in which we stand and rejoice. Hope of glory of God. The Lord our righteousness is our justification to a holy God through him. We walk blamelessly, like He commands, are the righteousness of Christ as our legal standing before Him. In wait your Lord. In Romans, in Romans five, we can see what is the doctrine of justification. It's Adam's sin imputed to us. That's one. That's part of it. Therefore, just as sin came into the world to one man and death through sin, and so death spread to all men, because all sin, for sin indeed was in the world before the law was given. But sin is not counted where there is no law. Yet death reigned from Adam to Moses, even as those who whose sinning was not like the transgression of Adam, who was a type of the one who was to come. The second part of this doctrine, our sin imputed to Christ on the cross. For our sake he made him to be sin, he knew no sin, so that in him we might become the righteousness of God. And number three, Christ's righteousness imputed to us. We see this in Romans 5, 17. For if, because of one man's trespass, death reign through that one man, much more will those who receive the abundance of grace and the free gift of righteousness reign in life through one man, Jesus Christ. Thank you, Roar. This hundreds of years ago, isn't it amazing? Hundreds of years of scripture that we have that point to this. That in and of itself is a miracle that this lines of, but this is the truth. The righteous life of Christ, his obedience, his life of enduring, penalty, daring, and suffering in our place, and his resurrection from the dead, seated on the throne as king, is our new life and legal standing before God, his righteousness. This is the promise, the eternal promise revealed to Jeremiah. It's how God chose to reveal Himself at this appointed time in a well of chaos to Judah. The circumstances got worse, but the promise remain. Yet it doesn't keep him from saying, I will cleanse them from all guilt of their sin against me. I will forgive all the guilt of their sin and rebellion against me. Behold, the days are coming, declares the Lord, when I will fulfill the promise I made to the house of Israel. And Jerusalem will dwell securely, and this is the name by which it will be called. The Lord. Is our righteousness. That little excerpt, Jeremiah 33, only too tired in scripture, Jehoola Sid Kane, is use. This is how we understand that we're fulfilling the promise, the law. It's how we can execute, both be just and merciful, how he can be righteous and loving at the same time towards us. Is what he says, he is our God and we, his people. This is the good shepherd, the one that attends to us, who is unlike any other shepherd. His righteousness. It is not comfort, but it's rather his righteousness imputed to us, is our secure dwelling place. For Israel, however you want to think of Israel in today's time, pray that they find their secure dwelling place like all other mankind in Christ's righteousness. Any story, this is the enduring love of Christ. It's what David looked to when he wrote Psalm 23. David, being a king, said, The Lord is my shepherd. I shall not want. Surely goodness and mercy shall follow me all the days of my life. What else would from a righteous king? And all and I shall dwell in the house of the Lord forever. The Lord shepherds his people in righteousness, and he executes justice. This is where we dwell secure. If you're looking for security, look no further than faith in Jesus. And if you're looking for a green pasture, if you're looking for rest or peace, look no further than faith and repentance to the Lord. This is the enduring love and how he has shown mercy throughout the ages. This is our God. I think personally, where this comes to me is that it's easy to get caught up in what's wrong with the world that we live in, thinking about the future. What will happen to my kids? What kind of world are they going to grow up in? There are so many people not having kids. They're not interested because they don't like the world they live in. A declining kingdom, a people far away from God. But do we trust him to execute justice because he's righteous? That's that's our hope. We have to hope in that, or we have nothing. And he's proved it. He's proved it with his word and what he's sent Jesus. Yeah. He's done the work for us. I think let me just say this that we don't ever move past. And I know we've heard these verses, we've heard these over and over again, but we never move past this. This is the highest where Jesus is our righteousness. Um, and that Jesus is our hope for all mankind for all time. So let's pray, and then we can go through these questions, uh, three questions. So Heavenly Father, thank you for tonight. Thank you for these awesome people in this awesome church. Thank you, Lord. Thank you for helping us to remember what you've done through your word. God, you were we just saw that you were praised and glorified by this. God, draw us, show us where we need to repent. Draw us near like you have your people for all time, Lord. We thank you for the finished work of Jesus, and that we can hope in you in Christ alone as our righteousness. Thank you for changing everything, Lord. Amen.