Raising the Dead
Listen here.
My dad used
to sing a modified version of the old spiritual “Dem Bones” when I was a kid.
He’d walk around singing, “Dem bones, dem bones, dem dry bones! Dem bones, dem
bones, dem dry bones! Dem bones, dem bones, dem dry bones! Dem bones gonna rise
again!” Then he’d sing about how the head bone was connected to the neck bone,
and the leg bone was connected to the knee bone, and so on.
That’s not
quite the lyrics. This was in the days before you could Google lyrics to your
heart’s content, and at some point … I think he was just making it up as he
went along. But I always think of him singing, “Dem Bones” whenever I read
Ezekiel 37 – the Valley of Dry Bones.
This really
is an incredible vision. It is eerie, powerful, thrilling, and wonderful all
wrapped together. It is a vision that really grabs hold of the imagination. So,
please, use your imagination and see what Ezekiel saw in your mind.
Stand there
and look around, and after the shock of seeing so many skeletons eases a bit,
ask, “What happened here? Who were these people?”
God told
Ezekiel that these bones were the house of Israel. The skeletons represented
their spiritual condition. They had worshiped other gods. They had indulged
their lusts. They had neglected God’s Word. And now they were dead in
trespasses and sins.
The wages
of sin is death. And it doesn’t get much deader than skeletons that are dried
out, lying on a valley floor, bleached by the sun.
On another
level, this is humanity. This is humanity apart from Christ. Ephesians 2
reminds us, “You were dead in trespasses and sins.” Before Jesus. Without the
breath – without the Spirit of God making us alive, this is us and this is the
World. Dead in trespasses and sins. Physically alive, yet spiritually dead.
I’d like
for you to use this vision as a filter, or better, as a lens. I want you to use
it as a lens to see the world through and to see your place in it. The world is
the valley – like Psalm 23 says, “Yea, though I walk through the valley of the
shadow of death, I will fear no evil, for thou art with me. Thy rod and thy
staff they comfort me.” We walk through the valley because we’ve been raised –
Jesus has called your name and said, “Come out!” at your tomb. And now he
shepherds you through the valley. He leads you as you walk – part of his vast
army who have been raised by his Word.
But we also
see the bleached bones of those who are still dead in trespasses and sins. Can
these bones live? Can these people who do not know Christ, these people who
reject him, these who are sometimes openly hostile to God – can they live in
him?
You alone
know, O Lord.
Prophesy
over the bones. That is what you are called to do – not necessarily to be a
preacher or prophet – but to speak God’s Word in this world where God gives you
the opportunity. To proclaim the world of the Lord to the dead whom you live
among. Remind them of their maker. Remind them of God’s Will. Remind them of
sin and salvation. The Word will shape them and form them. We are those who
speak God’s Word into the death of this world. We confront death and announce:
This is not God’s plan for you! Death, suffering, and separation from him was
not his plan.
But notice
that the skeletons only became corpses when Ezekiel first preached. There was
not breath in them. God told Ezekiel to prophesy to the breath. The word breath
in Hebrew is ר֔וּחַ (ruach) which also means wind or Spirit. We call upon the Spirit of
God to give life to the dead. It is God alone who can give life. It is God
alone who can give faith in Christ – which gives eternal life, and takes us
from being dead in trespasses and sins to being alive in him. So we pray for
the Spirit to move in the valley – in the world – to make people alive in
Christ.
Brothers
and sisters, see the valley around you. See the dead in their sin. Speak the
Word there – tell of God who raises the dead, of Jesus who calls forth his
friends from their graves. Speak of your Savior who assembled your bones, gave
you the life of faith, and who will raise you up on the Last Day. And speak to
the Spirit of God. Pray for him to enter the people around you to make them
alive in Christ. Intercede for them and ask God to place his Spirit upon them.
Pray for the Spirit to come and breath faith into those who do not believe in
the God who made and redeemed them.
Children of God, can these bones
live?
The answer is, yes! Yes, they can
live when God puts his Spirit in us he calls us out of our grave – he raises us
up – and then we know, because we are alive in Christ – we know he is the Lord.
Amen.
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