Can These Bones Live? Ezekiel 37:1-14 A Sermon Preached by Ernest Thompson First Presbyterian Church Wilmington, NC April 6, 2014 Our Scripture lesson this morning is centered on a strange question - Can these bones live? It s a question about life and death. Does death have the final say? Or is there life after death? It s also a question about hope. Can we live by hope, even when it looks like hope is lost? And is our hope something more than just wishful thinking? And it is a question about God. Does God see? Does God care? Will God act? Or has God abandoned us? I think it s helpful to try to put yourself in Ezekiel s place as we read this passage, and imagine what you see and hear and feel. So, listen with your imagination to God s word as it comes to us in Ezekiel 37. The hand of the LORD came upon me, and he brought me out by the spirit of the LORD and set me down in the middle of a valley; it was full of bones. 2 He led me all around them; there were very many lying in the valley, and they were very dry. 3 He said to me, Mortal, can these bones live? I answered, O Lord GOD, you know. 4 Then he said to me, Prophesy to these bones, and say to them: O dry bones, hear the word of the LORD. 5 Thus says the Lord GOD to these bones: I will cause breath to enter you, and you shall live. 6 I will lay sinews on you, and will cause flesh to
2 come upon you, and cover you with skin, and put breath in you, and you shall live; and you shall know that I am the LORD. 7 So I prophesied as I had been commanded; and as I prophesied, suddenly there was a noise, a rattling, and the bones came together, bone to its bone. 8 I looked, and there were sinews on them, and flesh had come upon them, and skin had covered them; but there was no breath in them. 9 Then he said to me, Prophesy to the breath, prophesy, mortal, and say to the breath: Thus says the Lord GOD: Come from the four winds, O breath, and breathe upon these slain, that they may live. 10 I prophesied as he commanded me, and the breath came into them, and they lived, and stood on their feet, a vast multitude. 11 Then he said to me, Mortal, these bones are the whole house of Israel. They say, Our bones are dried up, and our hope is lost; we are cut off completely. 12 Therefore prophesy, and say to them, Thus says the Lord GOD: I am going to open your graves, and bring you up from your graves, O my people; and I will bring you back to the land of Israel. 13 And you shall know that I am the LORD, when I open your graves, and bring you up from your graves, O my people. 14 I will put my Spirit within you, and you shall live, and I will place you on your own soil; then you shall know that I, the LORD, have spoken and will act, says the LORD. 1. Ezekiel s vision starts in a valley full of bones. If you ve seen the movie The Lion King you might remember the elephant graveyard. It s a dark and scary place where there are bones as far as you can see. That s the kind of place the Spirit takes Ezekiel. But this is not a graveyard. It s a battlefield. Towards the end of the movie Lincoln with Daniel Day Lewis, the President visits the battlefield where there was terrible fighting the day before. There are dead bodies everywhere, and you can see the weight of the world settling down on Lincoln, as he looks at these young men he sent to their deaths.
3 That s the scene that faces Ezekiel. But it s not the next day. It is many years later, and so all that is left is dry bones everywhere he looks. Unfortunately Ezekiel knew too much about battlefields and bones. He was sent to preach to the people of Israel when the people were tempted to rebel against Babylon, the dominant power of that day. Ezekiel warned the people not to rely on their own strength and their own wisdom, but to look to God instead. But the people did not listen. They rebelled. And so army of Babylon destroyed Jerusalem and destroyed the temple. They carried the leaders of the land including Ezekiel off into exile in a distant land. And so the people are grieving. They have lost their loved ones and lost their homes. They are afraid that God had abandoned them. And they have lost their hope. They don t think God will forgive them. They may not be willing to forgive themselves. So, Ezekiel knows about battlefields and bones. He knows about grief and loss. He knows what it means to feel abandoned by God and without hope. As Ezekiel looks out over this battlefield of dry bones, the Spirit asks him a question, Mortal, can these bones live? The obvious answer to the question is No - of course not. Dry bones do not come back to life. Death is a one way street and there is no coming back. But, when you re dealing with God, the obvious answer is not always the right answer. Ezekiel can t bring these dry bones back to life, but there is no telling what God can do. And so Ezekiel says, O Lord God, you know. And that s a pretty good answer to any question that God asks. Lord, you know. Now, we also know something about bones and battlefields and questions and doubts. There was a gathering of Presbyterian pastors this week in Minneapolis for a conference sponsored by a group called Next Church. They re asking what is next for the Presbyterian Church. For many Presbyterian churches today the signs are not encouraging. And so some people are asking, is our church dying? Or are we already dead? Is there hope for us? Some communities are struggling and asking the same questions. There are not enough jobs and there are too many problems. And so people wonder, is there hope for new life? Or is there only death?
4 Almost daily we face some news story about death or destruction shootings and disasters and wars and rumors of war. The question is often more personal. We face our own death. Or the death of a loved one. We know about bones and battlefields. And so we may also find ourselves confronted by this same question, Can these bones live? Is there a reason for hope? 2. Ezekiel s vision takes an unexpected turn. Ezekiel is told to preach to the dry bones. There is no standing on the sidelines. God tells Ezekiel to stand in the middle of the bones, in the middle of the battlefield, and to preach. In my first church I discovered the challenge of preaching to people who are asleep. Actually it was just one man who fell asleep. But he did it regularly, every single Sunday. Actually, he would first fall asleep in Sunday School. The class would continue their lesson over his snores. And at the end of class they would wake him up, and he d move to the sanctuary, where he always sat on the back row. And by the time we got to the second scripture lesson he was back asleep. Ezekiel has an even tougher job. His congregation is not just asleep. They are dead. Long dead. There s nothing left but bones. But God says preach. It sounds like foolishness. Ezekiel must have thought, What am I doing? But God says preach. And so he does. And then there is a noise, a rattling, and the bones came together. During my daughter s first Ash Wednesday service, when she was in 3rd grade, she watched me put ashes on people s foreheads and repeat those words over and over again, Dust you are, and to dust you shall return. After the service she said to me, Dad, you were freaking me out. If I were Ezekiel, when I heard that first noise, the rattling, I think I might have been freaking out. But Ezekiel keeps preaching. Notice that the new life comes in stages. It doesn t happen all at once. It s a slow and messy process. But God says preach. And so Ezekiel just keeps preaching. First the bones come together. And so now he s preaching to skeletons. I m not sure this is a big improvement. I d just as soon preach to the scattered bones. But Ezekiel keeps on preaching.
5 And then the sinews come, and then the muscles, and then the skin. Somewhere between the sinews and muscles I probably would have passed out. But Ezekiel keeps preaching. And finally all the parts and pieces have come together, and he s preaching to a valley full of bodies - but there is still something missing. All the parts and pieces are there - but there is no breath in these bodies. They re close, but they are not yet alive. And so the Spirit tells Ezekiel to keep on preaching - but now he needs to preach to the breath. The Hebrew word for breath also means wind and it also means Spirit. It s the same word used in the creation story. And so Ezekiel prays that the breath or the wind or the Spirit might come - and until the Spirit comes there is no real life. You can get all the parts and pieces in the right places. But if there is no Spirit, there is no life. And so God says, Pray for the Spirit to come. I shared Ezekiel s vision with the Session at our meeting on Wednesday night, and one elder said, This sounds like the mission of our Community Service Committee - we are reaching out to those places where there is death and despair, and to bring life and hope. I think it s actually a good description of all that we do here at the church. We keep preaching and teaching and serving and loving, and hope that through all these things God will use our words and our actions to bring life and hope. That s what we do in our community and in our families and in our world. And we keep asking God s Spirit to work in us and through us and to bring life. And so we share in Ezekiel s calling. In the midst of the battle and the bones, in the midst of death and despair, we keep preaching and teaching and spreading life. We keep praying for the Spirit of God to come and bring life. 3. Just in case he misses it, God reminds Ezekiel that God alone is the source of life. And he alone is the ground of our hope. God says, I will open your graves, and I will bring you up from your graves. I will bring you back to the land, and I will place you on your own soil. I will put my Spirit within you, and you shall live. Then you shall know that I the Lord have spoken, and I will act. It is God who gives life and God who gives hope. We simply receive God s gift. And then allow God to spread that gift through us.
6 Our Affirmation of Faith this morning which is printed in your bulletin, is taken from The Joy of the Gospel, a letter from Pope Francis to the church. Francis speaks of the power of Christ s resurrection which is the source of our life and our hope. We ll say it together in just a minute, but I d like to look at it first. It starts with a reminder. The pope writes, Christ s resurrection is not an event of the past. It contains a vital power that has permeated this world. That s the source of our life and our hope. Christ s resurrection is not just a onetime event. It is a present power that permeates our world. But sometimes God s power is hard for us to see. Look at the beginning of the second paragraph, which says, Often it seems that God does not exist; all around us we see persistent injustices, evil, indifference and cruelty. What we see are the battles and the bones. But there is more to life than meets the eye. And so Francis reminds us, In the midst of darkness, something new always springs to life. Such is the power of the resurrection, and all who evangelize are instruments of that power. And by the power of Christ s resurrection Francis says, the kingdom is already here. The resurrection is not just about our next life with God. It is about this life here and now, and how we become a part of God s coming kingdom that begins here and now. Now, Jesus says that God s kingdom might look like a tiny mustard seed, or it might be hidden like the leaven in the bread, or it might be like wheat growing in the middle of the weeds. But the kingdom is here. And it is growing. It is bringing life and hope. My favorite line here is the last. May we never remain on the sidelines of this march of living hope. We may find ourselves in a valley full of dry bones, feeling the scars of battle. And the question comes, Can these bones live? It may seems like the answer is no. We may just see death and sin and evil. We may feel like hope is lost. But God says preach. God says keep preaching. Keep teaching. Keep serving. Keep loving. Keep praying. It may not happen all at once. It may be a little messy. It may look like we re not making progress. But the Spirit will come, and the Spirit will give life and hope. The dry bones can live. And the battle will one day end, not with defeat, but with victory. And so, let us believe the gospel, and pray to the Spirit, and never remain on the sidelines in this march of living hope.