Justice

Good morning to all of you. I was listening to the two pieces from the wings and thinking, even in the wings where you can't hear like you do in the auditorium, those were absolutely lovely special music pieces. I'm reminded coming to Branson that those who attend the feast in Branson have the delight of being able to hear the musical selections from professional stages that are made for performers.

You have that unique privilege that your special music probably sounds better in terms of its production than anywhere else in the United States. How does it feel to be 142 years into the Feast of Tabernacles? You ever do the math? We're here for a millennium. This is day two. We're 142 years along in that thousand years. I was sitting down and making an imaginary family that had their first child the day the millennium started, and the family had a new son or daughter every 25 years.

Their children grew up, they married at 25, they had the first child. By right now, they would be five generations into the millennium, and their kids would be 17 years old. They'd be saying, dad, what's a wild animal? Dad would say, well, my great-grandfather told me, and he would pass on what his great-grandparents told him.

If there aren't any museums, they will also have to ask, what is war? Never seen a sword. I don't know what a battleship is. I've never seen a military base. And on it goes. You know, it doesn't take too long for Zachariah's statement about from year to year, every nation will come up to keep the feast, and if they don't, there'll be consequences that they can't even imagine people not sending representation to the Feast of Tabernacles.

They will have reached a time where nations, as individual nations, and peoples, which could include multiple nations of the same ethnic background, have been coming up to Jerusalem to be taught by God voluntarily. The rot of iron has been in the closet for so many decades, it's probably rusted into dust because there was no need for any rot of iron. You know, the beginning of the millennium has some very spectacular events, but as time goes along and things level out, you have to ask yourself on an ongoing basis, what is the greatest impact that God has?

What will be the greatest millennial change? In terms of impact, the greatest millennial change, in terms of its impact on daily life, will be the introduction of godly justice. You know, I think sometimes we sing on autopilot. I listened to the first hymn and the first stanza of the first hymn we sang this morning. Oh, sing a joyful song or sing a new song. The last sentence in that first verse said, his justice in the nation's sight he openly has shown.

It's surprising if you've never done it to see how many of our hymns focus on that particular part of the millennium. When Christ comes, He is going to model, He's going to teach, and He's going to administer justice at a never-before-seen level to all of mankind. Let's talk about millennial justice, but before we do, let's give a disclaimer so that we're not distracted.

I'm not naive or unaware at all that that particular word is an ouchy word in our society today, and especially during the time of the pandemic. What we need to understand is there are no models of godly justice to look at today. Absolutely none. There are no modern philosophies that equate to godly justice. There's not a governmental system on the face of this earth that you can look at and say there is the model of god's justice.

There's no political ideology, no party, no ism that can show us God's thinking. If you want God's view on justice, you have to go to God's word. It isn't available anywhere else. You know the parable in the New Testament about new wine and old wine skins applies perfectly here. Christ is not coming to remodel something. He's coming to replace. He's coming to discard and bring something totally new.

The new wine that he brings is not going in an old wineskin. You know one of the first things that we're going to be brought into our view, the first change, is that the whole world will have to come to the place that it comes to understand the fact that God's view of justice as an obligation is an obligation not just of government, but it's an obligation of the individual.

God sees justice as something that is a governmental obligation, and he sees it as something that is an individual obligation. In fact, he sees it so much that way that he has two totally different words to describe each of those responsibilities. I'm going to introduce you to those words at the beginning, but I'm not going to wade through consistently using the Hebrew words because I know they're foreign to our ears, and it's difficult to connect to them. But when God talks in the Old Testament about governmental justice, he uses a Hebrew word, and I'll take the time to spell both of these, and then we'll get on with it.

He refers to governmental justice as mishpat. M-I-S-H-P-A-T. And whenever that word appears in the Old Testament, he's talking about governments and governmental obligation, legislators, judges, police officers, anyone that has to deal with governmental justice. When he's talking about the individual and the individual's practice of justice, he uses the word tzedek, T-Z-E-D-E-K. And it appears over and over and over and over. You may be surprised that it's there in your Old Testament more than a hundred times.

But this is the individual. Governmental justice is hallmarked by impartiality and fairness. Individual justice is marked by exactly these same qualities with the addition of compassion, mercy, and respect for fellow man. Let me illustrate that. Turn with me to Deuteronomy 24. Here's a piece of Old Testament legislation. And in this Old Testament legislation, we're going to see admonition to practice both governmental and individual justice. Now, it's dealing with a very mundane situation. It's dealing with a man who needs a monetary loan of money, and he goes to somebody, and that somebody gives him a loan.

Now, God says justice, and I'll read it to you in a moment. God says, look, if you loan something to someone, you have the right to ask for collateral.

You have the right to say, give me something that I can hold on to until you pay back that loan. He says that's just. And so we'll enter at that particular point. Deuteronomy chapter 24 in verse 10. Would you lend your brother anything, you shall not go into his house to get his pledge.

You stand outside, and the man to whom you lend shall bring the pledge out to you.

And if the man is poor, you shall not keep his pledge overnight.

Okay, so he says implicit in this is the man has borrowed something from you. You take a pledge. The most valuable things people had back then were clothing items. He said, you take a clothing item.

Individual justice said you stood outside his house respectfully and let him bring it out to you. You didn't humiliate him. You didn't embarrass him.

Not only that, but when nighttime came, because all that man had was what's under here and what's over. And this was his blanket for the night. And he said, when nighttime comes, you have the responsibility to take that back to him so that he doesn't spend the night shivering in the cold.

He went on to say, verse 13, you shall in any case return the pledge to him again when the sun goes down that he may sleep in his own garment and bless you and it shall be sedek to you before the Lord your God. This is personal justice.

Governmental justice says you have the right if the man borrows from you to take a pledge. Personal justice says you treat him with respect. You return the garment so that he doesn't spend the night cold. And God will simply tally that as the exercise of personal justice. We need to go a step further because, as all of you know who speak more than one language, there's nothing more difficult than trying to take something that is culturally a part of one language and find a way to express it in words to another language when there isn't a direct parallel.

It's a struggle.

To the man who speaks Hebrew, to the man who thinks Hebrew, justice is righteousness and righteousness is justice. From where God sits, a man isn't righteous unless he is just. Righteousness is nothing more than a state of being.

In my own local areas, I've often said, look, take the us-ness off the word so that you can think.

It just means right. If you're right, you're just. And if you're not right, you're not just.

To a Hebrew speaker, there's no difference between the two.

If you're talking about righteousness, you're talking about justice.

And so, as we walk along through the Old Testament, there are some scriptures I'll read you where the word is righteousness. But the word is tzedek. And there are other times I'll read you a word, and it says justice. And the word is tzedek. It's exactly the same word. It's exactly the same concept.

You know, as you walk through the word of God, justice is the backbone of the entirety of the Old Testament. It is the backbone of the Old Covenant. And we'll show you just how alarmingly true that is. It will be when God in Jeremiah brings about the restoration of the house of Israel and the house of Judah and makes a new covenant with them, it will be the backbone of the new covenant. It is the backbone of the millennium. Let me walk you through, historically, step by step, the proof and the demonstration of that reality. But let me say it one more time.

Justice is the backbone of human-to-human relations in all of the Old Covenant, in all of the New Covenant, in all of the Old Testament.

You ever stop and think that the reason you're sitting in this hall, the reason that you go outside this hall and there are people out there, the reason you leave Branson and there are people out there, the reason that you go anywhere on the face of the earth and there are people is a reality for only one reason, because of justice. Turn with me to Genesis chapter 18.

The world reached a time where God said of mankind that every thought of the imagination of the heart of man was evil continually. Genesis chapter 6, I think I probably gave you the wrong reference. Genesis chapter 6. We all know the story backward and forward. God looked at a world. He said, I'm sorry, I made it. I'm going to destroy it. And he stopped.

He stopped because of one breathing human being named Noah. And you know what God said about Noah that made him say, I'll let the earth survive because of this one man?

Genesis 6 verse 9. This is the genealogy of Noah. Noah was a just man.

Blameless in his generations, Noah walked with God. God. We exist because of the justice of one man.

The man preached for 100 years trying to, you know, with God's backing, he preached for 100 years trying to sway humanity and swayed absolutely no one. Zero. Peter, when he described that preaching, said that Noah, so what did he preach? Noah was a preacher of righteousness.

Noah was preaching to humanity what he practiced, and he couldn't find another human being outside of his own household that would practice justice. You know, one of the best known conversations in Abraham's lifetime is the conversation he had with God after they'd had lunch together in his tent, and God and two angels were walking away from the tent headed toward Sodom to look the place over. You ever look at the details of that conversation? Oh yeah, I know. I know the details we know. The details are, God, would you destroy this if I can find 50 people? No. Well, bear with me.

We all know that part of the conversation. Let's look at another part of the conversation. Now, Genesis 18.

Why did God even stop and turn around and go back and say, you know what?

I really need to tell Abraham why I'm here. They'd finished eating. They'd finished talking.

They'd had a relationship for the last 25 years. In fact, it was shortly after this meeting that Isaac was born. 25 years they had walked. 25 years they had talked on occasion.

Abraham did the standard custom. He walked with them out a certain distance away from his tent, as was custom in that day of politeness, and then stopped and bid them farewell. And God said, I can't go down to Sodom without telling Abraham why I'm here.

Genesis 18, verse 19.

This is why he stopped and turned around.

He says, I know him. I've known him for 25 years. For I have known him in order that he may command his children and his household after him that they may keep the ways of the Lord to do righteousness and justice. Mishpat and Sadech.

He said, I know this man inside out. This man is a just governmental administrator.

You know, we look at Abraham as an individual, but you don't send 300 of your household out to rescue a lot without having significant influence over more than just your kids and your butler.

He said, I know the man. This man understands governmental justice and this man understands personal individual justice. And because of that, I'm going to stop and turn around and tell him why I'm here.

Very few people have, when I use the word argue, I don't mean attitude. I mean, have difference of view and share those with God. Moses did. So did Abraham.

You know what this conversation was all about?

Look at verse 21.

Excuse me. Verse 23.

When God told him what he was going to do, Abraham turned to God and said, would you destroy the Sadech with a wicked? This entire conversation was about the just. How about 50 Sadech?

How about fewer? How about even fewer?

And Abraham said to God, God, you can't destroy Sodom with just righteous people inside for one reason.

Because you are a Sadech.

Read all of 19 to 25. He's saying, God, I know who, Abraham turned the table. God said, you know I'm going to stop and talk to Abraham because of who he is. And Abraham said, God, I know you because that's who you are. This is why Abraham brought it down to the place that he did. And the New Testament says there was one righteous man who walked away from that city or those cities, and that was Lot. And he was described in the New Testament as righteous lot. Apparently the only individual in the entire city, not a whole lot different than the days of days of Noah. I want you now to turn to Deuteronomy 16. I'm walking you through these in the same spirit that Mr. Beam yesterday said, look, God never changes. God is the same yesterday, today, and forever. And to what Mr. Beam said, I say, Amen. If you know him a thousand years ago, you know him today. If you know him five thousand years ago, you know him today.

If you knew God from however far back in eternity, you would know him today. God's principles never change. The people may, the circumstances may, God does not. Deuteronomy 16, before the children of the children of Israel now go into the Promised Land, Moses is giving them a rehash of what their parents heard 40 years earlier. And in Deuteronomy chapter 16 verses 18 through 20, there's a portion of Scripture where the King James so woefully translates what is going on.

Now, you could read it a hundred times in the New King James or the Old King James and never understand the impact of what it's saying. Let me read it to you.

You shall appoint judges and officers in all your gates, which the Lord your God gives you according to your tribes. And they shall judge the people with just judgment. You shall not pervert justice. You shall not show partiality, nor take a bribe. For a bribe blinds the eyes of the wise and twists the words of the righteous. You shall follow what is altogether just, that you may live and inherit the land which the Lord your God gives you.

You know how a Hebrew reads that? And in fact, many of your commentaries will make the same notation. You and I, when we read the New Testament, we read Matthew, Mark, Luke, and John. When Jesus Christ says, verily, verily, our eyes perk up because we've all been taught to understand that when He says, verily, verily, He's saying, pay attention, listen up, because this is important.

In the Masoretic text, which is the Hebrew Old Testament, what I just read you, reads this way, justice, justice shall you follow, that you may live and inherit the land which the Lord God gives you. Moses said to them, not justice, but he said, justice, justice, you must follow. But that's just the tip of the iceberg, because you and I have the word follow as something where you just simply trot along behind somebody who's setting the pace, and wherever they go, you go, and when they stop, they stop. And that's not what it's all about. The Cambridge Bible for Colleges and Schools says follow in the Hebrew means not only desire, pardon the big word, but indefatigably hunt after, inquire, make search, and seek diligently. So what Moses was saying was not just, well, you follow around, and you look, and if somebody does the right thing, you do the right thing, too. That does nothing to do with it.

He says, you put your whole heart. Kyle and DeLeach on the same comment says, it's an emphatic admonition to strive zealously to maintain justice. The repetition of the word justice is emphatic, justice and nothing but justice.

To a Hebrew mind who heard that admonition, national survival depended on the zealous pursuit of justice. How did that admonition end? That you may live and inherit the land.

God, because of His long suffering, put up with Israel and Judah for a long time, but eventually they lost their land. Israel once, Judah twice, once to Babylon, later to Rome. And they both lost their land, the right to it, the right to occupy it, the right to administer it. They were gone. From the earliest classical prophet, which is Amos, and Amos has already been read to you, Amos is known among biblical readers and students as the prophet of justice.

From Amos to Malachi, for 300 years, God warned the house of Israel and the house of Judah.

And second, only to idolatry, was the warning about the injustice of the land.

Let's put some meat on the bones. Over the years, I've noticed surveys have come in from the membership, and we've read them at Cincinnati that members have said, I appreciate the description, but would you give us some prescription? Would you tell us not only what it is, would you tell us how it works? So let's put some meat on the bones. I've just shown you from Deuteronomy that Moses said emphatically, justice is the key to your survival. And if you don't pursue it with all your heart and all your might and all your soul, you will lose your country and you will lose your lives. And they experienced it. They experienced it. But what was it? What was it? When did God collectively to Israel, when did God begin preaching justice? How about as the smoke and the clouds and the lightning and the shaking took place and God thundered down from Mount Sinai, thou shalt not steal.

What do you call it when you take something from somebody that's not yours?

It's unjust. It's unjust.

Thou shalt not bear false witness. You know, sometimes, and I will say to myself also, I'd rather you steal my possessions and my reputation. And so what is bearing false witness?

You're stealing a man's reputation. Very unjust. Thou shalt not commit adultery for a man and a woman who are bound in marriage and love each other more than anyone else in the world. There's nothing more unjust you can do to them while they're living than to steal their mate.

Thou shall do no murder.

When all the theft and the unjust conduct toward them physically end, the end is to simply take their life, which is the ultimate injustice to another human being.

Justice starts out right square in the middle of the Ten Commandments.

As soon as God finishes teaching against idolatry, he begins teaching against injustice.

As you transition from the Ten Commandments, Israel said, Whoa, whoa, whoa, whoa. We don't want to hear any more. This shaking mountain, this smoke and thunder and all the rest is more than we can tolerate. You go talk to him. And so Moses went up the mountain. And then Exodus 21, 22, 23, 24, 25. The giving of laws, the giving of commandments, continues. But Israel has said, You bring it down to us. You go up and talk. As you walk through that, there's a whole class of very offensive sins that God covers randomly. And when you go to Amos through Malachi, it is covered over and over and over and over again.

As you step down from the Ten Commandments, one of the broadest categories in God's view is, any time you determine to take advantage of another human being, that you take that advantage because you have determined they can't withstand you.

You've got more power. You've got more clout. You've got more money. You've got whatever tool it takes to carry through your misuse of that person because you have the strength to do it.

He covers all of those. At the top of the list were widows and fatherless. And He said to those who would consider that because this is a widow and she can't defend herself, that I can cheat her. God says you need to understand something. I am a father to the fatherless. You know, you think twice about picking on a child when his 250-pound dad is standing there beside him. God says I weigh a whole lot more than 250 pounds and I am the father of the fatherless. The poor, the needy, the laborer. You know, among the commandments that God gave His look because everything was day labor then. He says at the end of the day, you hand that man his money. At the end of the day, when he finishes his shift, you put his money in his hand before he leaves. You don't withhold his wages. We're much more sophisticated today and so you can abuse the laborer in way more sophisticated and more numerous ways than that, but the laborer, the righteous. It's already been mentioned during this feast, one of the classic abuses of the righteous. Being told before you came to Branson that you don't have a job when you come back because I'm not giving you the time off.

And I think I have the power to do it. And so when you come home, find another job.

You know, equal opportunity employment laws have changed things for those of you who are younger because in the 50s, as a couple of speakers have mentioned, their feast going goes back to that point in time. It was as common as dirt to talk to people in a congregation, either going or coming back, that the job went when they went to the feast. The righteous are another class that God says, don't take advantage of them just because you can. And the stranger, the resident alien, over and again from Exodus to Deuteronomy, God reminded Israel, you were once a stranger in Egypt. Remember what it felt like to be there and don't treat somebody else as you were treated when you were there. It is the classic do unto others. Only it's the Old Testament version.

God warned ancient Israel against unjust business and governmental practices. We don't have the same high visibilities that they did, and we have some high visibilities they didn't. In their day and time, unjust weights and measures, falsifying a product, bait and switch. God warned probably as much against that as any other of the commercial sins of Israel. Buying favor, whether it's commercially, politically, judicially, all of these, God says, do not go that way. We already read in Deuteronomy, don't take a gift because it blinds you to being impartial. We also saw it said, nor take a bribe. The verse I read to you was verse 19 of Deuteronomy. You shall not pervert justice. Well, how do you pervert it? By showing poor chiality or by taking a bribe. For a bribe blinds the eyes of the wise and twists the words of the just.

You know you can have a good man, but you can turn him into something other than a good man and he says, don't let them do that to you. Don't let them twist you in the wind by tainting your wisdom and your justice.

Religious leaders, religious leaders who were bought by the state. Amos was one of those prophets that when he was chastised by the public said, look, I'm not a bought and paid for profit. You got all your bought and paid for profits. I'm not a bought and paid for profit. I came up from Judah to Israel to warn you because God told me to. And therefore, I don't have to ask, what do you want to hear? Okay, I'll tell you that. Now, what do you want me to say? Okay, I'll say that.

You know, we live in a world that when you look at history, many of the greatest churches, numerically in size, are state churches. They are state-sanctioned.

The crown says, you are the official religion of the nation.

God says, if you're bought and paid for and you act like you're bought and paid for, you can't administer, nor can you practice justice. But you know what, brethren? The personal exercise of justice, which is labeled as righteousness, goes beyond all of this. Personal justice takes a couple of steps even further. Deuteronomy 22. Deuteronomy chapter 22. Verse 1. You shall not see your brother's ox or his sheep going astray and hide yourself from them, and you shall certainly bring them back to your brother. And if your brother is not near you, or you do not know him, then you shall bring it to your house, and it shall remain with you until your brother seeks it, and then you shall restore it to him. You shall do the same for his donkey, and you shall do the same with his garment, with any lost thing of your brothers which he has lost, and you have found you shall do likewise. You must not hide yourself.

You know what he's saying?

He's saying, in the area of personal justice, there is no such thing as benign neglect.

There's no such thing as benign neglect. That's not my responsibility. Yes, it is your responsibility.

As he said, if you see your neighbor and something that belongs to him is in distress, you have an obligation. That's how I—this is God speaking—this is how I define righteousness.

It's how I define Sadeq. It's how I define personal justice.

You know, the old infomercial always does the same thing. But wait! There's more!

Okay, one more step. Exodus 23. I'm going to take you back to the future, meaning in this particular case, most people think what I'm going to read was inaugurated by Jesus Christ in the Sermon on the Mount. Well, surprise, surprise, it wasn't.

Exodus 23.

Verse 5.

Verse 5.

If you see the donkey of one who hates you, lying under its burden, and you would refrain from helping it—that's that old blankety-blank so-and-so's animal, good riddance—you shall surely help him with it. Why? Well, look at the next verse.

You shall not pervert the judgment of the poor in his dispute.

And it goes on from there to continue to talk about righteous conduct. Not only is benign neglect injustice or unrighteousness, so is not helping your enemy.

So the New Testament—you have heard it said, love your neighbor as yourself, but I tell you, love your enemy.

That's not New Testament. That's as old as old can be. Just because you don't like him doesn't give you latitude for unjust conduct.

Okay. Now we've got meat on the bones.

You know, the part that I relish every year when it comes to the Feast of Tabernacles is seeing all of justice ratcheted up to a level that this world under Satan's rule simply does not have the capacity to do. It is beyond the capacity of a carnal world to do the highest levels of justice that God will bring in the millennium. I won't take time to elaborate. You all know them. The sabbatical year. Every seven years, release from debt. It is the ultimate expression of the compassion and the mercy that is implied in personal justice.

And the granddaddy of them all is the Jubilee year when every 50 years the land of a family is returned to the family. No matter how bad a businessman your father was, no matter how poorly he managed things, God says you cannot take away from the children what belongs to the family because of the bad choices and mistakes of their fathers and their grandfathers.

You know what? No matter how normal a society is, there has never been a society in our modern world that could even begin to touch or dare to touch either one of these exercises of justice that God will bring in the millennium. With that on the plate, do you have any problem when you go back to Isaiah 2 and Micah 4 and you read those scriptures that say, and people from many places will come and say, come let us go up to the house of the Lord and He will teach us His ways.

You know, the rod of iron can force people to comply, but it can't win the heart. The rod of iron never wins a heart. It wins compliance. But when you model something that everybody wants, you don't need a rod of iron. You just need to stand back and watch the flood of people come.

And people are going to come. And they're going to come, as we read in Isaiah chapter 2, they're going to come and say, there has never been anything like this. I've never seen anything like this. I have to have it. I have to be taught it. We have the old scripture of 10 men grabbing the skirt of one who was a Jew and said, let us come with you because we want what you've got.

And so Isaiah chapter 2, verse 3, says, many people shall come and say, come, let us go up to the mountain of the Lord, to the house of the God of Jacob, and He will teach us His ways. And we shall walk in His paths, for out of Zion shall go forth the law, and the word of the Lord from Jerusalem.

God won't have to plead with people. He will model something that people want so badly. They'll send their delegations. They'll say, instruct us, teach us, guide us, lead us, give us some of this. I said to you at the beginning of the sermon that the greatest millennial change will be the introduction of godly justice. The place where the litmus test takes place is not where you say, this is what I'm going to do. The litmus test is when people say, this is what you did.

You know, you can put your very best forward, and you can walk away satisfied that I have done, and then take a census and find out that you went over people's head. They didn't get it. They didn't see it.

But when people give the testimony of what you've done, now you know you've made the connection.

Let's look at Isaiah and Jeremiah, and let's see how God records that connection.

Isaiah 62.

Isaiah 62.

Verses 1 and 2.

For Zion's sake, I will not hold my peace. And for Jerusalem's sake, I will not rest until her sedek, her righteousness, her justice, goes forth as brightness.

And her salvation is a lamp that burns. The Gentiles shall see your righteousness and all kings your glory, and you shall be called by a new name, which the mouth of the Lord will name.

God is going to give Jerusalem a new name.

I was looking at city names that cities are known by. Some have lived up to them.

Others get nothing more than a smirk because of the nobility of the name and the fact that it doesn't exist. And some of them are simply physical descriptions of characteristics. I didn't realize until I was preparing for this feast that Kansas City was known as the City of Fountains. I thought, who would have thunk? And then they said, Kansas City has more fountains than any city on the face of the earth outside of Rome, Italy. Wow! Okay. That means they deserve the name. You know, when you have more fountains within your city than any city except Rome, then you can say, I am the City of Fountains. And they say, that's true. God says, I'm going to give Jerusalem a new name. Turn to Jeremiah 31.

Jeremiah 31, a millennial scripture, verse 23, thus says the Lord of Hosts, the God of Israel, they shall again use this speech in the land of Judah. And in its cities, when I bring back their captivity, quote, the Lord bless you, O habitation of justice and mountain of holiness.

He said it will become the byword throughout all the cities of Judah as they look to Jerusalem, and they say, bless you, O dwelling place of justice.

Where would we go to look for it? Where would we go to be taught it?

Well, Jerusalem. Look at Jeremiah chapter 23.

What God will the nations come to inquire of?

God of wrath?

The God of a rod of iron? Not by this time.

Jeremiah 23, verses 5 and 6. Behold, the days are coming, says the Lord, that I will raise to David a branch of Sadech. Branch is capitalized because it's speaking of Jesus Christ. A king shall reign and prosper and execute, and the margin says he will execute justice and righteousness in the earth. In this case, it's Sadech and Mishpat. He will execute both governmental and personal justice. In his day, Judah will be saved and Israel will dwell safely, and this is his name by which he will be called. You see the English. You know what the Hebrew sees?

And this is his name by which he will be called. Yahweh Sadech.

I can't help but add one little sidebar that you would all instantly connect with.

Who did Abraham pay tithes to according to the book of Hebrews? Ah, easy. Melchizedek.

And we see that as a name. It's not a name, it's a title. Melchized is the word for king. He paid tithes to Melchizedek.

In the New Testament, it says interpreted or translated as king of righteousness, which is true. It's also interpreted king of justice.

As the nations say, let us come up to Jerusalem and learn from God, they say, let us go and learn from Yahweh Sadech. God, the just.

The final scripture is Jeremiah 33. We're right in the middle of the area where the New Covenant is created between the houses of Israel and the house of Judah. We're also very, very familiar with the creation of that New Covenant. In fact, we focus on that part almost to the exclusion of everything else in Jeremiah 33 and 34. But let's look at another piece that goes hand in hand with the creation of that New Covenant. Verse 14.

These words will sound familiar because we just read them with slight alteration.

Behold, the days are coming, says the Lord, that I will perform that good thing, which I promise to the house of Israel and to the house of Judah. In those days and at that time I will cause to grow up to David a branch of righteousness, and he shall execute justice and righteousness on the earth. We already read that, didn't we? In those days Judah will be saved and Jerusalem will dwell safely, but here's the part that wasn't in the last part. And this is the name by which she, that is the city of Jerusalem, will be called. The Lord our righteousness. Millennials, when people come up to Jerusalem, they will say, I'm going up to the city of the God of justice. And God says, I'm glad to hear that, that you actually are saying my name as I want to hear my name said. And I want you to know the city is in total lockstep with how I think and how I live. And that if you want a place to live that is perfect in that regard, it is the habitation of all that it embodies. Wild animal nature change and the end of war, the coming of nations to keep the feast. By this time in the millennium, 142 years, young people will have absolutely no memory of any of that. They'll have to ask what their great, great grandparents knew because they have progressed so far beyond those points. But in their day and time, and in the next decade, the next century, and the following centuries, the one thing that will hallmark life for all of them will be godly justice.