Then thou shalt remember thy ways, and be ashamed
When covenant grace is manifested and applied, it brings persons to a sense of their sins, and to an ingenuous acknowledgment of them, with shame and blushing; they remember their evil ways in which they have walked, and blush at the thoughts of what they have been guilty of; and how they have sinned against a God of love, grace, and mercy; and what vile ungrateful creatures they have been: when thou shalt receive thy sisters, thine elder and thy younger;
Samaria and Sodom, ( Ezekiel 16:46 ) ; the ten tribes, or Benjamin and Simeon, whose part was in Judah, as Ben Melech; rather the Gentiles, even of all nations, ancient and modern, great and small, where the Gospel should come, and such of them as are called and converted by it; these, according to this prophecy, should be received into the communion of the church, to participate of all the privileges and ordinances of it, under the Gospel dispensation. The passage respects the calling of the Gentiles, and the incorporating of them into the Gospel church state. The Syriac version renders it, "when I shall receive thy sisters" which the Targum interprets of greater and lesser provinces: and I will give them unto thee for daughters;
to be nursed up by the church, through the ministry of the word and ordinances, where they have a place, and a name better than that of sons and daughters; become members of the church, and so daughters of Jerusalem, the mother of us all, ( Galatians 4:26 ) ; to the laws, rules, and ordinances of which they submit, and yield an obedience, as daughters to their mother. The Targum is,
``I will deliver them unto thee for obedience.''The Septuagint renders it, "for edification"; to be built up on their, most holy faith: but not by thy covenant: