BibleTools.info

Thou hast bought me - You have not purchased this - implying that it was not produced in Palestine, but was an article of commerce. It was to be obtained only from abroad. This is expressly affirmed in Jeremiah 6:20: ‹To what purpose cometh there to me incense from Sheba, and the sweet cane from afar country?‘ That it was an article of commerce is also apparent from Ezekiel 27:19: ‹Dan also and Javan going to and fro occupied in thy fairs (that is, Tyre): bright iron, cassia, and calamus (קנה qâneh ), were in thy market.‘

Sweet cane - The word used here (קנה qâneh ), denotes properly “cane, reed, calamus” (Greek κάννα kanna and κάννη kannē Latin canna, whence the English, cane; French, canne; Italian, canna ). It usually refers to a reed growing in wet or marshy ground. It denotes also sweet cane, calamus aromaticus. It is sometimes joined with the word בשׂם bôs'em aromatic, odor, fragrance, spice, as in Exodus 30:23; see also Jeremiah 6:20. According to Pliny (xii. 22) it grew in Arabia, Syria, and India; according to Theophrastus, in the vales of Lebanon (Hist. Plant. ix. 7). It was used among the Hebrews in compounding the sacred perfumes Exodus 30:23. It is a knotty root, of a reddish color, and contains a soft white pith - in resemblance probably not unlike the calamus so well known in this country. Strabo and Diodorus Siculus say that it grew in Saba. Hasselquist says that it is common in the deserts of the two Arabias. It is gathered near Jumbo, a port town of Arabia Petrea, from where it is brought into Egypt. The Venetians purchase it, and use it in the composition of their ‹theriaca.‘ It is much esteemed among the Arabs on account of its fragrance. See Calmet (Art. Cane), and Gesenius (Lex. and Commentary in loc ). It was not probably used in the worship of God anywhere except among the Hebrews. The pagans made use of incense, but I do not know that they used the calamus.

Neither hast thou filled me - Margin, ‹Made me drunk,‘ or ‹abundantly moistened.‘ The word used here (רוה râvâh ), means properly “to drink to the full, to be satisfied, sated with drink.” See it explained in the notes at Isaiah 34:6. It is applied to water which is drank, or to fat which is sucked in or drank rather than eaten Psalm 36:9; or to a sword as drinking up blood. Here it means to satiate, or to satisfy. They had not offered the fat of sacrifices so as to satiate God. Probably this passage does not mean that the Jews had wholly neglected the public worship of God; they had not worshipped him with a proper spirit, and had thus served him with their sins, and wearied him with their transgressions. It is true, also, that while they were abundant in external rites and ceremonies, they frequently made oblations to idols, rather than to the true God. Perhaps, therefore, an emphasis is to be placed on the word ‹me‘ in this passage, meaning, that however diligent and regular they had been in the performance of the external rites and duties of religion, yet that God had been neglected.

Thou hast made me to serve with thy sins - You have made it oppressive, burdensome, wearisome for me, like the hard and onerous service of a slave (see the note at Isaiah 43:23; compare the note at Isaiah 1:14).

Ellen White's Letter a Message From God—You ask if the Lord gave me that letter to give to you. I say He did. That Holy God of Israel will not serve with your sins. That message was given of God. If you have had, since that message was given, a new sense of what constitutes sin, if you have become truly converted, a child of God in place of being a transgressor of His law, then there is no one who will be more pleased than myself.—Letter 95, 1893. 3SM 79.1

So Little Sense of Sin—I had presented before me several, living in different States, who were engaged in the canvassing work who were unfit to have any connection with the work of God. They would dishonor God, and bring the truth into reproach. They would make light of sin. They were dishonoring their own bodies. But not one among the number was having so little sense of what sin was, as you. Anyone pursuing the course you did, and belied apparently to the criminality and degradation of such a course, was just terrible. You had not a sense of the aggravated character of sin. TSB 164.1

God's Patience With Sinners—The message was given Jonah to Nineveh, that in forty days it should be destroyed. Nineveh repented, and God spared the wicked city, because kings and nobles humbled themselves greatly before God, and the Lord gave Nineveh chance for repentance. If the Lord in His great mercy treats your case in a similar manner, oh, I shall be so thankful. If He grants you probation in which to manifest that repentance that needeth not to be repented of, because you see and sense the real nature of sin, that you abhor yourself because of your sin, and have an abhorrence likewise of the sin, the Lord is gracious, of pitying tenderness and loving kindness. “If we confess our sins, He is faithful and just to forgive us our sins, and to cleanse us from all unrighteousness” [1 John 1:9]. TSB 164.2

I believe you have confessed your sin, and that God will pardon the sin as He has promised. The only drawback in my mind is that the very same want of perception of what constituted sin, in the prostituting of your body, giving it up to the use of an adulterer, a whoremonger, and you connected with the work and cause of God giving Bible readings, as though the Lord would serve with your sins while you were engaged in His work and voluntarily seeking the embrace of an adulterer [is still a weakness with you]. TSB 164.3