Ezekiel 37
1 The hand of the LORD was on me, and he brought me out by the Spirit of the LORD and set me in the middle of a valley; it was full of bones. 2 He led me back and forth among them, and I saw a great many bones on the floor of the valley, bones that were very dry. 3 He asked me, “Son of man, can these bones live?”
I said, “Sovereign LORD, you alone know.”
4 Then he said to me, “Prophesy to these bones and say to them, ‘Dry bones, hear the word of the LORD! 5 This is what the Sovereign LORD says to these bones: I will make breath enter you, and you will come to life. 6 I will attach tendons to you and make flesh come upon you and cover you with skin; I will put breath in you, and you will come to life. Then you will know that I am the LORD.’”
7 So I prophesied as I was commanded. And as I was prophesying, there was a noise, a rattling sound, and the bones came together, bone to bone. 8 I looked, and tendons and flesh appeared on them and skin covered them, but there was no breath in them.
9 Then he said to me, “Prophesy to the breath; prophesy, son of man, and say to it, ‘This is what the Sovereign LORD says: Come, breath, from the four winds and breathe into these slain, that they may live.’” 10 So I prophesied as he commanded me, and breath entered them; they came to life and stood up on their feet—a vast army.
11 Then he said to me: “Son of man, these bones are the people of Israel. They say, ‘Our bones are dried up and our hope is gone; we are cut off.’ 12 Therefore prophesy and say to them: ‘This is what the Sovereign LORD says: My people, I am going to open your graves and bring you up from them; I will bring you back to the land of Israel. 13 Then you, my people, will know that I am the LORD, when I open your graves and bring you up from them. 14 I will put my Spirit in you and you will live, and I will settle you in your own land. Then you will know that I the LORD have spoken, and I have done it, declares the LORD.’”
This passage is probably my favorite passage in all scripture. An odd one to say the least, not many people would choose a little piece of a chapter in Ezekiel as their favorite. But, since when am I ever conventional? I was asked recently why this was my favorite chapter, and I wasn’t quite sure what my answer was. Thankfully someone else started talking so I didn’t have to stutter and find an answer.
But that got me thinking.
Why do I like this chapter so much?
They say that “Familiarity breads contempt” I’d like to change that last word to “mundane”. Familiarity leads to thinking something is mundane, or not as special.
In the Bible we are so familiar with the miracles of Jesus that we don’t even realize how incredible they really were. How often do we stop and just marvel, in the middle of the story, when we read that Jesus raised Lazarus up from the dead? Or when Jesus turned the water into wine? Or when Jesus just spoke to the wind and the rain and it stopped? We have read those so many times, that we just think, “Yea, that happened a lot in Bible times.” The truth is, it didn’t. Not even close. It was just amazing and spectacular then, as it would be someone doing it now. If that happened today, the person doing it would get their own T.V. show.
This brings me to the story of the dry bones. This is not a story I grew up listening to. I just recently read straight through the Bible [something I regret to say didn’t happen earlier], and since I read everything, that also included this story.
To me, this story is more impressive than breathing breath back into a person’s body [not saying that isn’t pretty darn impressive, I’d like to see anyone try and do that].
Imagine it;
try putting yourself in Ezekiel’s shoes.
You are in the middle of a desert [okay, it only says it’s a valley, but I imagine the valley was in the desert], there is nothing there except a gigantic pile of bones, and you. You’re only here because this is where God told you to meet Him, and you’re probably thinking, “What, the heck? Why am I starring at a bunch of dehydrated bones Lord?”
God then tells you to prophesy… to a bunch of bones. And thinking that it would probably be a good idea to listen you skeptically prophesy to a mound of bones.
All of a sudden, you hear a noise, a rattling sound, and you see the bones coming together, with no one placing them anywhere, they fit themselves together perfectly, each bone knows exactly where its place is in the body.. You see tendons, and muscles appear and start to adhere themselves to the bones. Skin starts to grow and cover the bodies. Now, instead of a heap of bones, there are bodies.
Again, the Lord tells you to prophesy, this time to the wind. A gust brings together wind from all the corners of the earth, which then pours itself into the bodies, and the still chests begin to heave.
You are now starring at a standing army, where just a few short moments ago, only a jumble of bones sat.
Just sit back, and think about that for a moment. This seems more like a fairy tale than a story from a history book. But I assure you that this is no fairy tale. This is just as real as the attack on September 11.
Don’t let familiarity lead you to think something is mundane, because more than likely, it most definitely is not.
