Week 16
Read Ezekiel 37:1-14 (see below)

Whose bones are dry, scattered across a desolate valley?

How many times does God tell Ezekiel to speak God’s very own words to the dry bones? 

What words were spoken? 

What does it means to be dry?

Today there are many places we call dry. Let’s hope the Church isn’t one of them. 

Dry bones can’t move, bring light or life; they lie at the mercy of the current climate. We are called as resurrected followers to speak whatever the Resurrection currently speaks. His words are not influenced by the climate, but in spite of it. We are always called to prophesy Life. 

Life is not complete without the breath. If Ezekiel had stopped speaking after he saw flesh reappear, he would have had a zombie army. Instead he continued to listen to the Spirit of the Lord and spoke to the breath. The breath, the ruwach, the Spirit of God, floods in as a mighty rushing wind, awakening, resurrecting a vast army of God’s broken people. God puts His Holy Spirit in them and they live again.

Why?

So they will know the Lord has done it, that His Word is alive and powerful, that He alone is the Lord.
So I speak right now to God’s people, the ones who have lost hope and feel dry, the ones who have been “burned” and have died in the searing pain of disappointment, those despairing because the atmosphere is dark.  I speak right now to you, this is what the Lord says, “Dry bones, hear the word of the Lord! I WILL MAKE BREATH ENTER you, and you will COME to LIFE. 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.” 

I prophesy to your breath, “COME, BREATH, from the four winds and breathe into these slain, that they may live. As Jesus breathed on his disciples, He breathes His Holy Spirit upon you and you live and are part of a vast army in the service of the LORD.” Selah and amen.
(Btw you can’t just read the words, speak means to utter sounds, so it must be vocalized.)
Ezekiel 37:1-14 NIV

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. 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. He asked me, “Son of man, CAN THESE BONES LIVE?” I said, “Sovereign Lord, you alone know.” Then he said to me, “Prophesy to these bones and SAY to them, ‘Dry bones, hear the word of the Lord! This is what the Sovereign Lord says to these bones: I WILL MAKE BREATH ENTER you, and you will COME to LIFE. 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.’ ” 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. I looked, and tendons and flesh appeared on them and skin covered them, BUT there was NO BREATH in them. 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.’ ” So I prophesied as he commanded me, and BREATH ENTERED them; they came to LIFE and stood up on their feet—a VAST ARMY. 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.’ 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. Then you, my people, will know that I am the Lord, when I open your graves and bring you up from them. 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.’