The Valley of Dry Bones Part 1
Ezekiel 37:1-14

So where do we begin?

(PP) Sinews (Among other meanings…get with me after service for further explanation)
H1517 גִּידּ giyd (gheed) n-m.
1. a thong (as compressing)
2. by analogy, a tendon

Let me set the scene for you. The prophet Ezekiel is airlifted by Yahwah into a valley - but it is no ordinary valley. It’s a place of death and destruction. The scene of a heavy defeat, full of confusion and disorder. Ezekiel is in the valley of dry bones. In fact, they’re not just dry, but, as Ezekiel is given a guided tour, he notices that they are ‘very dry’.

It’s here that Yahwah asks Ezekiel a very important question: ‘Son of man, can these bones live?’ Is it possible to find life in the place of death? Could the valley of dry bones be the scene of victory?

Before we go any further, it might be helpful for us to get our bearings. You see, just as Ezekiel has been airlifted into strange surroundings, so we too have landed in the middle of very strange surroundings. We’re in the Old Testament, in the middle of a book, so we need to work out what’s going on before we can understand what God is saying in this chapter.

For the first 24 chapters of Ezekiel, he has declared Yahwah’s just judgement on the people. Judah has forsaken Yahwah and turned to idols.

There’s no hope, no reprieve, just doom and gloom. After chapter 24, Ezekiel speaks to the surrounding nations, and declares Yahwah’s judgement on them too. But then in chapter 33, there’s a hint of brightness, a glimmer of hope, like the first promise of dawn. Jerusalem has fallen, but could there yet be some hope for the people of Yahwah?

Can these bones live? Even though the people of Judah are in exile, far away from the land Yahwah had promised them, scattered among the nations under the judgement of Yahwah, can these bones live?

It’s a question we continue to ask to this day? We see the weakness of the church in the face of a confident secular state, with the government seeking to move forward with same sex marriage. Can these bones live?

It’s easy to feel down about the state of the world around us. We see what is being done to our streets by people who seem to have nothing better to do. We see how our churches are losing members and how no one really seems to care anymore. As a Christian society, we are in the middle of a dark, long winter. There’s no colour anywhere, it’s just shades of grey wherever we look. Some of us may even feel this way ourselves. We may feel like we’ve lost our colour, our passion, our excitement, and we’re living in the dark.

We see ministers who deny the cross and the resurrection; who spend their time in the pulpit talking about a poem or something they read in a magazine; the mood seems to be that we’re in decline; things aren’t what they used to be. Can these bones live?

But look at the promise of Yahwah he shared through Ezekiel, “I, Yahwah Elohim, am going to bring them back! I will bring you out of your graves and deliver you!” What a promise!

So this dark world in which we live, this world which rejects the Word of Yahwah, may seem like a huge, dry valley of bones. A place of little hope, a place with no true joy, no true focus for living out the example Yahwah Messiah has given to us, a place where we’ve been told to place our own needs above the needs of others.

And Ezekiel gives the only right answer. ‘O Yahwah Elohim, you know.’ Humanly speaking, the bones are beyond hope. But if we are depending on ourselves and our own strength and resources, then we are above all men to be pitied. O Yahwah Elohim, you know.

It’s when Ezekiel submits to Yahwah, that Yahwah demonstrates that he is the one who can give life to the dead ((PP) Heb 11:19) as he gives the instructions to Ezekiel. He commands Ezekiel to prophesy over the bones, so that they may live.

And so we see in verse 7, Ezekiel does it, and the bones do it. The bones rattle together, then the sinews, then the flesh. The bodies lie on the ground, whole, but there’s still something missing.