The Lord keeps bringing the valley of dry bones to mind. I'm no Old Testament scholar so I can't say Ezekiel is at the top of my list of things to think about in a day but it keeps coming back around. I do admit to finding myself encamped in a place called Weary these last months. I'm not sure how I got here but I have lots of friends in tents around me. Flags in patterns of grief, loss, disappointment, entrenched sin, fatigue, and more flutter in the wind around me. It's a quiet place, no one feels like talking. You could say it was a valley of dry bones.
In Ezekiel 37:11 God speaks to a similar camp. "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;" OUR BONES ARE DRIED UP AND OUR HOPE IS GONE. Mine feel that way and I think that's how God and I ended up in this conversation.
All would seem lost, right? Well, it isn't. Ezekiel 37:3 "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."..."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.’ ”
"Breathe into these slain that they may live"...God raised up a bunch of dead men. What did you die from? What has sucked the very flesh from your bones and the breath from your lungs? The Lord set Ezekiel in the middle of a valley full of dry bones. That's where you are, right? Here's what God says: "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" Ezekiel 4 YOU WILL COME TO LIFE. "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." Ezekiel 10
A word of encouragement from the Word. All is not lost. God is going to pull you out of the grave and not only restore you, He's going to raise you (and I) up as an army for Him. How? I think the key is this: "‘Dry bones, hear the word of the LORD!" We have to be listening. We have to be reading His Word. Take your Bible into your tent today. It's really quiet here at camp. Once in a while my flag snaps in the wind, but I'm listening for the sound of His voice on the breeze. Want to join me?
