Can These Bones Live?

Ezekiel 37:1-14

Have you ever looked at something, or at a situation, and thought that it was beyond all hope?  Perhaps you have a person in your family, or a friend, for whom you have been praying, particularly praying for their salvation, and it seems hopeless.  In our Scripture passage for today, the prophet Ezekiel looked out at something that looked beyond all hope, something that looked completely dead, but God gave him reason to have hope.  Let’s look into this passage together.

Ezekiel was one of the prophets who ministered and preached to the Jewish people during the time of exile in Babylon.  Most of the Jewish people had been carried off from the land of Judah into captivity in the east, into the land of Babylon.  Ezekiel went with them into captivity, and proclaimed God’s Word to them there. In a vision, the Lord God brought Ezekiel to a valley that was filled with bones.  There were multiple hundreds of bones, scattered all throughout this valley. Different types of bones - leg bones, arm bones, spinal cord bones, ribs, skulls, etc.  They were all dried out, with no life in them at all.

Then God asks Ezekiel an odd question.  He asks him whether these bones could live (vs. 3).  If we were looking upon a similar scene, thousands of bones, all separated from each other, lying dried and bleached by the sun, we would answer no.  God then tells Ezekiel to prophesy to the bones, telling them to hear the Word of the Lord (vs. 4). In Ezekiel’s vision, the bones start to come together in their right positions and they stand upright.  Muscles and skin come upon the bones. However they were still dead. There was no breath upon them (vs. 7-8).

These bones represented the Jewish people, spiritually dead and scattered.  Not only were the Jewish people taken into captivity by the Babylonians in the late 6th century BC, but years later they were scattered around the world when the Romans destroyed Jerusalem in 70 AD.

Today Israel is a nation in unbelief.   They are the bones put together, with skin, but no breath, no spirit, no life (vs. 8).  The overwhelming majority of Jewish people have never accepted Jesus as the Messiah, and are spiritually dead, like these bones. However, as God proclaims in these verses, there is hope.  There will come a day in the future when the Jewish people will turn to Jesus, and acknowledge that He is, indeed, the promised Messiah (Zechariah 12:10). At that time they will then become spiritually alive, with God’s Spirit in them (vs. 14).  Until then, they are spiritually dead, like everyone else around the world who has never accepted Jesus Christ as their Lord and Savior. God says, though, that though their bones are dry, and it looks like there is no hope (vs. 11), that with Him there is hope.

We can take hope from this passage, as well.  Many of us have been praying for unsaved family members and friends.  They may be so spiritually lost and gone, just like a pile of dried and scattered bones.  We may look at them, and question within ourselves, “Can these bones live?” Is there any chance that they might get saved?  We must keep praying for our unsaved loved ones. I remember an older pastor that I had, whose very elderly father was unsaved.  My pastor had witnessed and shared the Gospel with him over many years, but his father stubbornly, and sometimes angrily, refused to believe.  He seemed like dry bones, without any hope of spiritual life. My former pastor and his wife continued to pray for him over many years. Several weeks before he would pass away, though, my pastor’s wife talked to him about Jesus one more time, and his dry bones came to life.  He accepted Jesus as his Savior! People may be spiritually dead and dry bones, like my former pastor’s father, but God can always breath spiritual life into them when they turn to Jesus. When they hear the Word of the Lord (vs. 4), and accept its truth, they will come spiritually alive.