Let's go ahead. Jeremiah chapter 6 is where we'll be tonight. My message is entitled, What's the Purpose of the Sweet Cane? What's the Purpose of the Sweet Cane? Now, I want to look at two verses tonight, one out of Jeremiah 6, verse 20, and then another one I want to look at, Exodus chapter 30, verse 23. So first of all, we'll look at Jeremiah 6, verse 20. And we'll let you know that the word cane, C-A-N-E, not Cain, the son of Adam, C-A-I-N, the word cane, like a walking cane and so forth, we think of, is mentioned twice in the Bible. And tonight, I think, I told you it may not be a short message, but it will be a sweet message, because you're getting a cane tonight. You might not be able to walk with this cane, but you might be able to eat the cane, but be careful, be sure to watch your sugar and all that good stuff. But tonight, hopefully all ages, both young and wise, will be able to enjoy What's the Purpose of the Sweet Cane. I want to read you this verse here, Jeremiah 6 verse 20. If you have your place in your Bible, please say Amen. Okay, you're still looking, that's fine. I'm going to go ahead and read this verse here to you. because I know you all reverence the Word of God in your heart. And the Bible here says, to what purpose, now this is God speaking, he says, to what purpose cometh there to me incense from Sheba and the sweet cane from a far country? Your burnt offerings are not acceptable, nor your sacrifices sweet unto me. All right, then there's another verse I want to read. Thank you, Brian. Another verse comes out of Exodus chapter 30, verse 23. Now, the reason I'm reading this verse to you is because the sweet cane is actually defined in Exodus 30, verse 23. Now, by the way, what is being spoken of here is the recipe for the anointing oil that would be used to anoint the object in the tabernacle and later in the temple. And this recipe was not supposed to be copied by anyone outside of the priesthood. So if you were out on the street selling this, you could be captured, even be put to death because of that. But anyway, in verse 23, listen to what he says. Well, verse 22 says, Moreover, the Lord spake unto Moses, saying, verse 23, Take thou also unto thee three principal spices, a pure myrrh five hundred shekels. Now, by the way, this is not referring to monetary value. although there was the shekel of the temple. Rather, this shekel is the system of weight, all right? So, the myrrh is supposed to be 500 shekels, and of sweet cinnamon, half so much, so that would be even 250 shekels. Now, watch this. Here it is. And of sweet calamus, 250 shekels. So, there it is. That defines what the sweet cane is the sweet cane is actually, in reality, the sweet calamus, part of the recipe that would be used for the anointing oil that would have been used to anoint Aaron, his sons, the Ark of the Covenant, all of these different items that would be used in the worship of the tabernacle. So, with the verses of the Word of God read, let's go to Lord in prayer. Father, tonight we thank you for your precious Word. Lord, we thank you for this Christmas season. And now, Father, just speak to our heart tonight. Just move in our midst as you would just move us, Father, not we ourselves, but thee. And Lord, just have your will and your way be done in our midst tonight. Father, we humbly ask it in Jesus' name. Amen. Now, some people say, well, what in the world is calamus? Well, calamus, it is known in some places as lemongrass. And that would have been later found, of course, in that day and age, it would have been found in the area where they were at Mount Sinai because they were in Arabia. Now, some people look over to the Sinai Peninsula and they say, hey, this stuff ain't even around here. But here Moses is being told to use it to make the anointing oil. Well, the problem is, God, they're in the wrong country. They're supposed to be in the right country. The Bible says Mount Sinai is in Arabia. Today we call that Saudi Arabia and you can find lemongrass there and you can find it as far over as the country of India. But here in Jeremiah 620, that's where we're actually at, the Bible says in the sweet cane from a far country. So this would indicate that by the time of Jeremiah that the sweet cane would have been imported from afar off. By the way, that 250 shekels weight back in Exodus, I told you it was weight, right? Well, that 250 shekel is usually defined as 7 pounds and 14 ounces, close to 8 pounds. Now that's a lot of spice right there, if you ask me. So tonight what I want to do, guys, is I want to get this, and I've told you what the meaning is. Basically God here in Jeremiah 6 is telling people, I'm sick and tired of all of your sacrifices and all of your sweet smelling offerings and all these different things. God abhors that. And so tonight what I want to do is I want to take this sweet cane out of the Bible. I want to shake off the meaning and I want to use it as an object lesson. So tonight hopefully all of you have a sweet cane, the candy cane as we call it. So I'm going to be using this as the points in my message tonight, so hopefully you'll get something out of this. Now, there's been a lot of stories about the origin of the candy cane. If you trace the candy cane back, guys, I hate to bust our bubble, but the story or the legend of the candy cane has been disproven as a myth or as a hoax. But still, I don't care if it is a myth or a hoax, it'll still make a lot of sense to me. Candy canes have actually been dated back as far back as the 1600s. That means they're about 400 years old, about the same age as our King James Bible. However, when candy canes first come around, they were usually all white. The red was not added in yet. So one of the stories that is told to us is that there was a Catholic choir director, if you will, and he had a bunch of kids that he was training in what we would call a youth choir. And he found out they just wouldn't be quiet and they wouldn't settle down so he went to a candy maker, probably somewhere in Germany, and he got out some sweet canes, some candy canes, white candy canes, gave them out to the kids and that quieted them down a little bit and then they were able to go on with their singing and their practicing. So you fast forward several years and you get over here about the 1870s, 1880s and you find mention of candy canes here in America. The story of the candy cane comes around and it comes around about the early 20th century or at the very earliest about the late 1890s. And the story somehow usually you read on the internet somewhere or you might get it in a Christmas card somewhere. It generally goes something about a candy maker in Indiana will seek to put a message in a candy cane. He will stripe red around the white candy cane He will bend it, crook it, and he'll then start to tell people the story of Jesus. I blew that one out of the water because in my research, when I found out the crook candy cane, guess what? That's a southern thing. It come out of Georgia, guys. The candy cane was always straight for many, many years. But it wasn't until the crook part, the machine that automatically crooks the candy cane, came out of the great state of Georgia. And so, wonderful, wonderful invention. I'm just amazed at the intellect that God puts in our minds. But regardless of the story about the candy cane, whether it is true or not, the message is still there and it's stuck around. And so every time I see a candy cane today, I'm always reminded of that legend that I was told when I was a little boy and what you were probably told too. But if you've never heard of the story or the legend of the candy cane, you're going to hear it tonight. Because this message is, what's the purpose of the sweet cane? We're coming out of Jeremiah 6.20 on that. So tonight we're applying the word sweet cane to this, the candy cane. So, what do you have in your hand if you have a candy cane? Basically you have candy, right? And candy is normally bitter? Sweet, right. Well, if you think candy's sweet and if you love Easter and you love, I don't know, really Thanksgiving, because we generally focus on food, but I know around Christmas time you get a whole bunch of candy a lot of times. I know Halloween. A lot of people like Halloween because you get candy. Well, let me tell you something else, God. There's something sweeter than candy. You know, the Bible talks about something sweeter than honey come out of the rocks. I tell you, to me, you know, we sing a song called Jesus is the sweetest name I know. But there's something even sweeter to me than the very name of Jesus. And that's the love of Jesus. You know, if you think this candy cane's sweet, if you've never tasted the love of Jesus Christ, my friends, my dear and beloved, that's sweeter than any candy. That's sweeter than the best pure cane sugar. That's sweeter than the best honey you could ever get out of the honeycomb. It's sweeter than anything, sweeter than any love you'll ever know, sweeter than any sweetheart you could ever love. The love of Jesus is the greatest, and the sweetest, and the greatest, and the largest, and the most wonderful, and the most loveliest, and the most amazing out of all. You know, there's some people out there, they are just hungry for a husband, or there are some people out there, they're hungry for a wife. They just want to be loved. I cannot tell you how many people, God, I have heard say, I just want to be loved. There is somebody that loves you and loves you and I enough that He sent His only begotten Son to this sin-cursed, rotten, cruel world to die on a beam of wood nailed by His own creation between heaven and earth, and He died on that cold, rugged cross for your sin and my sin. And when I look at the way I live for Jesus and what I've done for Him, it pales. It pales in minute comparison. I have not done enough. I cannot do enough to merit His love or to tell Him I love Him enough. I tell you folks, it's the sweetest love we could ever know. And I tell you this, the love between husband and wife, it is pretty sweet. But this is the sweetest love you'll ever know. That is the love of Jesus Christ, the Lord of Lords and King of Kings. How about this? You look at your candy cane again, if you haven't ate it already. If you ate it, then you can get another one. I got plenty of them. There's two colors on that thing. What's them colors on there? Red and white. That reminds me of an old confederate war song, the red, white and red. Anyway, that's another story. All right. White. The candy cane started out as white. When I think of white, I'm thinking of the Bible. The Bible tells us that our sins, which also were scarlet, they have become white as snow. White has long represented in many ages, in many cultures, in many ways. It has long represented purity. It is long-represented righteousness. When you study the history of flags, you will find that even in flags, the colors on those flags have meaning. When I look at Old Glory, I am also reminded of the white, the purity of our cause, the purity of the foundation upon which this country was in the beginning originally founded. It's the same thing with our Confederate ancestors, the white there. It was the same foundation, the foundation of righteousness and the Bible and the Constitution and rights. Both countries, same foundation, purity. You look over here at the greater flag, the Christian flag, the banner of white righteousness and purity. And where does that righteousness and purity come from, beloved? It sure doesn't come from you and I. It doesn't come from any good that we do. The Bible says your righteousness and my righteousness is nothing but filthy rags. But it is the righteousness, the sinlessness, the perfection of Jesus, our Lord and our Savior. You look at the best you and I could ever hope to do. It is the purity that is in Christ. And then you say, well, you know what? Maybe God will just let me in heaven. He cannot allow sin into heaven. And that's why when you get saved, you gain the righteousness, the purity, the perfection of Him who never knew sin. When God looks at you, He sees the purity and the righteousness of His Son, Jesus Christ. How these people, Brother Ryan, I do not know. How they can hope to gain entry into heaven based on their works, it does not matter. It does not make sense. It does not add up. But when I look at what Jesus did for me, and what He did for you, and see what He did with all my sins, past, present and future, how one drop of His blood had turned it all from the darkest black pitch of midnight into the purest, whitest of snow." Wow! What a Savior! What a Lord we serve! So we've seen that His love is sweeter than we could ever know. We've seen that the first color there is white, and that represents the purity of Jesus and how He purified us from our sin. I mean, when you stop and really wrap your mind around it, God, it really doesn't make sense at how God keeps on loving you and I. even when we sin, even when we mess up. Probably the closest thing you could ever come to that would be the love of a parent to a child, to their own flesh and blood. I well remember my mama saying and my daddy saying and still does, they may not like what I do, they may not like some things I have done. But at the end of the day, I know that no matter where I do, what I've done wrong, or what I have done, or what I've said, at the end of the day, I still know in my heart of hearts that my daddy loved me, and mama, when she was alive, she loved me. And you know what's sad to me? That in many churches, that we who claim the love of Christ, that there are people in churches tonight that cannot say to each other, I love you. because they don't connect, they have not connected with the love that is above all other loves? If we cannot love one another, what hope is there for us to show the love of Christ that rises above all sectarian strife and all political strife and every kind of strife there is? If Jesus loved you and He loved me when we were a hell-bound rotten, stinking sinner, where in the world can you see that love? You're supposed to see it between you and I. and each other within our churches up and down the road. But when the lost man looks and he sees bickering and feuding and infighting and grudges and all the other manner of heartfelt sin, even within families, where is the love of Christ? They can't even see it. God forgive us. May God burden our hearts to get back to that love. But then there's another. color we see. And we, you and I, could not have had our sins, call it as though they were, turned white as snow, unless it was by that second color, what it represents. That big, long, bold red stripe running around the cane represents the blood of Jesus Christ. You know, there are hymn books today that they have taken out There's power in the blood. They've taken out the blood. One never loses power. You know, there's Bibles today that have taken out the blood. And you know what? When you take out the blood, you lose the power. You lose what our faith and our understanding of what we believe is all about. If you take away the bloody cross, we do not have Christianity anymore. Because how did Jesus get to the tomb and rise again? Through the cross. Some people say, why don't you have a crucifix? Because my Lord ain't on a cross. He's alive. Because my God said, make unto thee no graven image. So many people worship that thing. And it has become an idol. much like the brass serpent that Moses made in the days of Hezekiah. He called it Nechtun, which was a thing of brass, and he had it destroyed. So many people have turned the crucifixes, and yes, even the cross, into an idol that they bow down before. You know, even historians tell us that people have been after pieces of the cross. If you go back and study Adolf Hitler, you'll find that one of the reasons he wanted the Annunzis, that is, the annexation of his home state Austria to take place, was because in Wien, or Vienna, Austria was a museum. And in that museum they supposedly had the spear that pierced the side of Christ, called the Spear of Destiny. Supposedly, Hitler thought if he got that sphere, he would become invincible. Do you realize that when they allied with Vichy France and they conquered France in 1940 and France fell, do you realize that there was a town in southern France, in Vichy France, that Hitler sent his archaeologists to because they thought that maybe they could find the Ark of the Covenant or the the cup that Jesus used at the Last Supper. He was interested in these figures of power in his mind. The Catholics have long sought after relics. They have long sought the relics of the dead saints and the popes and all these other different things unto its sheer madness. Even if we were to have in our own possession an actual piece of the cross of Christ, That would be awesome. But there's no way should we bow down to it. No way should we elevate it to a thing that it is more than it is. It was an instrument that was used as a torture device and a device for death that enabled man to crucify the Son of God and it caused God to dismiss His Spirit and He dismissed His soul and He died. They didn't kill Him. He chose to die. And He laid down His life willingly and He took it back up again to die and pay for the sins of the whole world. The Bible says without the shedding of blood there is no remission of sin. That means there is no forgiveness of sin. If you take away the blood from this Bible and you take away the blood from our faith and from our hymn, you are taking away the very bedrock and the very foundation upon which we know that our sins have been forgiven. There's something else I remember back from the Bible revival I studied about three years ago. There was a man who loved the King James Bible. He went to a place, I can't remember where it was, it's just coming out of my mind right now, that there was one of the publishing divisions that published one of these modern Bibles. And he went up there and he says, I want to talk to somebody that was on the translating committee. I want to ask them about the blood of Christ. You see, a lot of modern Greek scholars say the blood of Christ is just a fancy way of saying, a symbolic way of saying the death of Christ. That's one way how they're taking away the blood. And this translator was there. He actually got to speak to one of the translators. I can't remember what Bible it was or version or whatever, but anyway, it doesn't matter. He was talking to this person, and he's asking him about the blood, what they thought it meant and how that the blood of Christ, if it had not been shed and it wasn't the actual blood of Christ, then how could we be forgiven of our sins? And you know what the translator responded? I don't have no idea what you're talking about. See? They have no idea about the cornerstone of our faith because Jesus had shed His blood. The Bible says in the book of Hebrews, I believe it is chapter 9, that He entered in once into the Holy of Holies by His own blood. You see, Jesus went up there on Easter Sunday when He came up out of the tomb and He took His own physical blood there. And He went in and there the Ark of the Covenant was. And there the devil was. He thought he had won. And Jesus entered in and He went to the Ark, the Ark of the Covenant, and He put His blood there on the mercy seat. And now every time the devil stands up in heaven and accuses you and I And he says, look at there what they did. Look at there what they thought. Look at there what they've done. Jesus points to the blood. The blood. The blood. And he says, Father, it's been forgiven. It's paid for. It's under the blood. The Confederate soldier on the battlefield of Gettysburg, he said, it's the blood, it's the blood, it's the blood. He had been shot right near the stone wall, and the Yankees were there taking care of him, trying to make him come before he died, trying to get a medic there to help him out. And he kept saying that, it's the blood, it's the blood, it's the blood. And the man said, yes, I know, you're bleeding profusely. He said, no, it's the blood, it's the blood, it's the blood. He said, yes, we're getting a medic. We're getting a doctor over here as fast as we can. We've got a tourniquet coming. It will help save your life. He said, no, it's the blood, it's the blood, it's the blood. He said, what do you mean? He said, it's by the blood of Jesus Christ that I will enter here in a few moments into glory and I will worship there at his feet forever. And he passed away. And how did he have such hope? How did he have such faith on such a fated field of battle? It was by the blood of the Lamb of God. As John the Baptist said, we've taken away the sin of the whole world. If I can't have the blood, I ain't got duly got to have the blood. Look there again on your candy cane if you've still got it. I've told you about the candy, I've told you about the color, I've told you about the other color, white and red, but look at the next thing on there. What else do you see? You see the big bold red line and the big white line, but what else is there? Stripes. Red stripes. The prophet Isaiah said in Isaiah 53 verse 5, He says, and by his stripes ye are healed. You see, beloved, it wasn't only the crucifixion. The Romans had another way of disciplining people and it was called the flagellum. It was also called the cat of nine tails. The standard military issue, and I hope to get one of these one day, not to use, but to show you, The standard issue was generally 9 or 10, sometimes 8, sometimes 11, tails of leather. And there on the bottom would be two what would be called barbells. And they would be about as big as my finger. One end would be a circular, rounded piece of steel. Then there would be another round. So you've got two balls of steel connected by a center bar. Around that center bar they would wrap and they would tie the straps of leather. The standard Roman issue would be that flagellum, the cat of nine tail. The prisoner, who was to be disciplined, would then be taken, stripped off of his shirt, taken to a pole. His legs would be tied around at the bottom and his arms tied around there. But now he's hugging, against his will, this cement or wooden pole. If it was a minor infraction, they would have one. He would take his cat of nine tails and whip. When the whip went in, the barbell, by the velocity of the force, would sink down into the skin. Then, to add insult to injury, the Roman soldier would not pull back, he would pull down. That would then drag the metal bars towards him until finally, by the force, they would pull out on their own. making deep grooves into the back. Then he would take again and whip again. When it was a very severe case, there would be two. One would strike, pull down and out. The other one on the other side would strike, pull down and out. Paul talked about how he had been beaten by 39 strikes. The standard whipping was 40. They believed that if you went to 41, man would die. Why? Because what you've done is you've lacerated his back to be hamburger meat. It's not just going to be just wounds. It's going to be flowing, bloody, bloody wounds. When you think about that deep reaching down, ribs would be broken on both sides, possibly damage to the vertebrae, the backbone. You know what happens in some of those cases. Possibly paralyzation. A man would be cut down and suddenly he'd fall down. He can't walk no more. Sometimes it would latch up here, beat into his head. I didn't care. It was there to teach everyone out there a lesson. That was the thing. Now sometimes you couldn't get a government issue, Cat and I tell. Sometimes you just had to be creative. Those were the more wicked ones. They put on heavy leather gloves. They would take away their barbells if they had them. And then they would get very creative. They'd get shards of metal, like nails, or what we would call barbed wire. The little barbs off of the wire, they would twist the metal all around. They would get shards of bone. They would get shards even, reports have been recorded, of glass. Now imagine that. striking at a person's back. Those are the stripes that our Lord received on the morning of His crucifixion. And His suffering had only begun. When they pulled Him away from the flagellum post, they put a purple robe around Him, put a reed in His hand, and someone had plaited a crown of thorns and pushed it down upon him. Those are not briars. Those are inch, inch and a half thorns. Pushing down. Jesus' back is a bleeding mess. His head now is beating, bleeding. And now they put that purple cloth around Him and a reed in His hand. And the Bible says they bent down, the soldiers did, and they worshipped Him. It doesn't say they acted. It's as if they mocked Him. But do you realize that's what a lot of people in churches are doing tonight? They are mocking Jesus in a form of worship. There are a lot of people in churches tonight sitting there, listening to a preacher preach, and their heart is not there. There's a lot of people that have sat inside of the pew, they've sang Him. The Bible says that there are people that pay lip service to God, basically. Jesus told the scribes and the Pharisees, He said, yea, hath the prophet spoken of you? Your lips praise him, but your heart is far from him. There's a lot of folks that have, even a lot of preachers, that have mastered the art of lip service to God. God forgive us and may God convince us if that's all we're doing to Him. Jesus was whipped and His stripes, and by there His blood flowed. But even before that, go back, go back, go back to the Garden of Gethsemane. That's when the blood first flowed. You remember? Jesus there, praying in that Garden of Gethsemane. The Bible says that He began to sweat, and the sweat was actually blood. I've thought about that, about people paying lip service to God. And I thought about the blood. It's the blood that saves us from our sins. And then what did old Judas do? He walked in. Now, guys, you've got to remember this. In 2 Samuel, the Bible tells us how they greeted one another and men would kiss each other's beards. That was a sign. That's when he said, Hail, Master, and they kissed him. That's what it is. They didn't kiss him on the cheek like I used to think you did. They kissed him on his beard. I thought that was weird, but that's what they did. Now imagine, Jesus has been bleeding and his bleeding has went down into his beard. When Judas went and he kissed the beard of Jesus as a sign of ultimate respect, what did he have on his lips? He had the blood, the blood, the blood! But it was on his lips. It wasn't on his heart. And the man died and split hell wide open. Jesus could have saved him. Would have saved him. But Judas made his decision to betray the Lord for 30 pieces of silver, about $113 in today's currency. There are a lot of parents out there that will spend that much or more on their children. How many people are trading Jesus for money, for fame, for wealth, for lip service? Too many people. Just remember, by His stripes we are healed. But look at the shape. The regular shape of that candy cane looks like a shepherd's staff. That points to the fact that Jesus is our Great Shepherd. We all remember Psalm 23. The Lord is my Shepherd. I shall not want. You've seen pictures, supposedly, of Jesus. being the great shepherd, the good shepherd, having a little lamb around his neck. Why is that? Well, here's why. Because the little lamb would wander off from the ninety and nine, shepherd would leave the ninety and nine, go after the little lamb, reach down with his shepherd's crook, draw him up, then he'd take him up and break his legs. Why would he break his legs? Because he would then put that lamb around his neck and he would hold that lamb in splinters and braces with his hands. until those legs, those bones grew back. So what would happen then? When that lamb was ready and healed, he would set that lamb down and guess what he'd do? Follow him around like a little puppy dog. Because he knew if he wandered off, danger would be there. You know what? I've done that too. I've wandered away from the shepherd. I've got my legs broke spiritually before. How about you? I've got whooped by God many a time. And it ain't good. So I know, as the old saying goes, some people don't believe Calhoun's a hook. Well, sometimes they just got to go to the University of Howard Knox. I'm glad we have a good shepherd. I'm glad we have a great shepherd. He's ready and willing and able to fish us out. of disasters many times that befallen. But now you turn that candy cane upside down, and what do you have there? You have a J, the first letter in the word, in the name of Jesus. You know, nothing against our Latino friends, but every time I see a Jesus, I see Jesus. I would not in a million years. Nothing against the Jesus's in the world, because that's a regular name. Like Joshua. Joshua is Jesus's Hebrew name. I would never name my child Joshua or Jesus. Why? Because when I see that name Jesus, that is the name above all names. There is only one Jesus. There might be a million, five hundred thousand Jesus's, Josh's and Joshua's out there. And no offense to all of them, Because they couldn't name themselves. Somebody else did. But there is only one Jesus. There's only one Good Shepherd. There's only one who receives stripes, stripes that can heal us. There's only one whose blood can save us. There's only one whose righteousness will be ours. There is only one out there, beloved, who is the reason for not only this, but all seasons on the calendar year. And that is Jesus Christ, the King of kings and Lord of lords. He is no longer the babe in the manger. He's no longer the young child that was worshipped by the wise men. He is now the one who is well sitting at the Father's right hand, ready and waiting for that order, bring my children home. And he's coming again. So what's the purpose of the sweet King? Well, for some of us, its purpose is to eat it. But others, there's a message, there's a story in that sweet cane. As it makes your breath smell good and goes down inside of your belly and you think of the wonderful taste of the peppermint, you surely must remember the first time you tasted Jesus and how sweet He was and how sweet He is and how good He is. How good He is to you and I, even though we still miss Him, even though we still do wrong, of how good He is to us. So remember, He is what it's all about, beloved. So with that said, let's bow our heads and close our eyes.