Ezekiel 37:1-14
There’s something difficult about stepping into the pulpit to preach on a day when every lectionary reading begins at a point of death. For Ezekiel, it’s being confronted with a valley filled with the remains of the dead. The psalmist calls to God from out of the depths. Paul warns the church in Rome that it’s death to put their minds to things of the physical world rather than the spiritual one. And Jesus arrives in Bethany in the aftermath of the death of Lazarus.
Four sources rooted at a common point – death – and four separate journeys a preacher could take. Today though I’m going to follow the journey of Ezekiel, a member of the priesthood in the line of Zadok. Unlike the Levitical order of priests who saw the work of transformation being done through Moses and others on behalf of God, Zadokite priests saw more direct action by a tangible and present God in and among the people.[1] As we’ll soon see, God does indeed work directly and tangibly in this valley of dry bones.
Ezekiel, who by his position as a priest would have been considered a member of the aristocracy of his time, first entered captivity in Babylonia in 597 BCE and was active among that community of exiles. His first prophetic vision was in 593 BCE, the beginning of a line of prophecies directed at a nation in exile. The vision we have in today’s passage – perhaps one of the most familiar resurrection-themed stories in the Old Testament – is symbolic of that nation, an exiled people dwelling in a landscape filled with dry and scattered bones.
The scene begins with something that would have been abhorrent to observant Jews. To encounter unburied bodies or bones was considered unclean, and a priest would have been ritually defiled by such contact. Knowing that, then, it’s even more remarkable that it’s not enough for God to simply show Ezekiel the valley filled with the dead. God appears to want to hammer home the true bleakness of what’s there before him, leading Ezekiel around and through the bones and magnifying his ritual defilement.
He then asks Ezekiel a question: Do you think the dead lying scattered around you can live again? In his response Ezekiel hedges a bit, answering neither “yes” or “no,” but in doing so also demonstrates faith in whatever God chooses to do. O Lord God, you know. Ezekiel has been led to look upon the reality of his people’s exile – the reality of death – and despite that reality acknowledges his belief in the eventual triumph of God over the present circumstances.
God tells Ezekiel to prophesy to the dead – and then God goes to work. In reading the passage we find in 10 different places views of the beautiful layers of Rûaḥ, the work and motion of God through spirit, wind, and breath. This isn’t a moment of resurrection as we see in John’s Gospel, the bringing back to life the recently dead. This is a moment of re-creation, of God taking the scattered remains of the long dead and giving them new life, building layer upon layer before at last filling their lungs with his breath and their lives with his spirit. This isn’t reanimation; it’s restoration.
For the exiled people hearing these words this would have been a clear sign of God’s promise that they would be restored, a nation again free from bondage and living in safety and security. It was a promise that the scattered bones of their people would be rejoined, the people of Judah once again brought back to life. A prophecy beginning in their exilic death ended in their new restored life.
Here I return to the beginning and to the difficulty of being confronted with four passages rooted in death. Why are they important to us now? To begin with, we live our lives facing a countless series of little deaths, moments when we feel scattered across a valley and separated from life in community and life with God. A devastating diagnosis is, amid our life, the moment of a little death. An unexpected loss – of a job, of a friendship, of a home, of one of many other points of stability – is, amid our life, the moment of a little death. Feeling that God is absent when we so desperately long to hear God’s voice is, amid our life, the moment of a little death. Looking to see the light of God before us or beside us and seeing instead only darkness is, amid our life, the moment of a little death. Every one of us has something that has scattered us across the valley, leaving us to dry out and bleach under the harsh sun, bringing amid our life the moment of a little death.
It’s important that we acknowledge these little deaths because without them there’s no new life, and without them we don’t see the totality of where and how God is at work. The preacher and pastor Luke Powery writes that “It is critical to note, especially for those who only see the Spirit in the mountaintops of life and moments of prosperity, that the Spirit is also present in the lowest of valleys, even the valleys of dry bones.”[2]
Yes, it’s important to acknowledge the new life springing from these little deaths. However, it’s also important to acknowledge the belief many hold that these moments are the work of the devil, or even the harm that can be caused by preachers and others we may encounter – well-intentioned or otherwise – who place the blame for these moments on our shoulders. Powery writes of them being “relegated as part of human faithlessness.”[3] But as he and many others remind us, “Good news is not the totality of the gospel; thus to tell the whole gospel truth one must preach the bad news, too.”[4]
As this passage shows us, and as we see in all the readings for today, beginning with the reality of death and separation also leads us to acknowledge other realities, those of resurrection and freedom. Whatever burdens we carry; however we feel we’ve been left broken and dry in the valleys of life; whatever little deaths make our journeys incredibly difficult: the prophetic call of Ezekiel reminds us that new life, new breath, and new spirit await us. Suffering and pain may seem to be all there is, but they’re only the prelude to the greater joy and greater life that’s to come.
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.[5]
Amen.
[1] Stephen L. Cook, John T. Strong, and Steven S. Tuell. The Prophets: Introducing Israel’s Prophetic Writings, p. 195.
[2] Luke A. Powery. Dem Dry Bones: Preaching, Death, and Hope, p. 52.
[3] Powery, p. 7.
[4] Powery, p. 12.
[5] Ezekiel 37:14 (NRSV).