Valley Experience [Part 1]
Topic: How the breath of God can restore life even to the dry bones of the church.
Big Idea: When Ezekiel saw the dry bones come to life through God’s Word and breath, it was a picture of what God could do for all of Israel - and for us.
Opening Illustration: In 1904 the Atlanta newspapers reported an amazing revival of prayer sweeping the city. On November 2nd the Supreme Court of Georgia closed so people could attend prayer meetings. Stores, factories, offices and even saloons followed suit. "For two hours at midday all Denver was held in a spell . . . The marts of trade were deserted between noon and two o’clock this afternoon," the Denver Post reported on January 20th, 1905. One Kentucky pastor died of overwork after receiving 1,000 new members in two months. Out of a population of 50,000 only fifty unconverted adults remained in Atlantic City, New Jersey!
Can it ever happen again here in the US? Is there anything too difficult / impossible for God?
Introduction & Background:
In Ezekiel 37:1-14, Ezekiel sees in a vision dead men raised to life; its meaning is given Ezekiel 37:11-14. In it, the doctrine of the Resurrection of the Body is at least implied. Such a figure would only have force with those who were familiar with this idea (compare 1 Samuel 2:6; Job 19:25-27; Psalm 16:10-11; Daniel 12:1-13). The vision was intended not only to comfort the despairing children of Israel - prefiguring the reinstatement of Israel now scattered and lifeless, as a community restored to their home, and rein-Vigo rated with spiritual life - but also to impress upon them the great truth of the Resurrection, which was greatly developed in the Scriptures of the Old Testament, but found its clear and unambiguous enunciation in the New. The prophecy concerns not only the Israel after the flesh but also the Israel of God; it points to a home in heaven and to a life of immortality. No created power could restore human bones to life. God alone could cause them to live. Skin and flesh covered them, and the wind was then told to blow upon these bodies; and they were restored to life. The wind was an emblem of the Spirit of God, and represented his quickening powers. The vision was to encourage the desponding Jews; to predict both their restoration after the captivity, and also their recovery from their present and long-continued dispersion. It was also a clear intimation of the resurrection of the dead; and it represents the power and grace of God, in the conversion of the most hopeless sinners to himself. Let us look to Him who will at last open our graves, and bring us forth to judgment, that He may now deliver us from sin, and put his Spirit within us, and keep us by his power, through faith, unto salvation. [Revival + Resurrection]
Ezekiel opens with, "The hand of the Lord was upon me."
What can a visit to the ‘Valley’ do?
1. Can dead bones live? [vs. 1 – 3]
Ezekiel gives the right answer to God’s question: "Lord, you know." [Apparently a Yes]
Ezekiel already sees his own people in this picture, who are in need of a revival.
The valley which was full of bones - This vision of the dry bones was designed, first, as an emblem of the then wretched state of the Jews; secondly, of the general resurrection of the body. Having announced (Ezekiel 36: 24-38) the restoration of the nation, Jehovah now gives in vision and symbol the method of its accomplishment. (Ezekiel 37:11) gives the clue. The "bones" are the whole house of Israel who shall then be living. The "graves" are the nations where they dwell. The order of procedure is:
(1) the bringing of the people out (Ezekiel 37: 12-14); (Ezekiel 37: 19-27).
(2) the bringing of them in (Ezekiel 37: 12);
(3) their conversion (Ezekiel 37: 13)
(4) the filling with the Spirit (Ezekiel 37: 14).
He shows by a great miracle that God has power and will deliver his people from their captivity, in as much as he is able to give life to the dead bones and bodies and raise them up again. Can these bones live? here implies that, humanly speaking, they could not; but faith leaves the question of possibility to rest with God, with whom nothing is impossible (Deuteronomy 32: 39). An image of Christian faith which believes in the coming general resurrection of the dead, in spite of all appearances against it, because God has said it (John 5:21; Romans 4: 17; 2Corinthians 1: 9).
Illustration: A U.S. Lutheran bishop tells of visiting a parish church in California and finding a stirring red and orange banner on the wall. “Come Holy Spirit. Hallelujah!” it declared in words printed under a picture of a fire burning. The bishop was also interested in the sign directly underneath the banner which said: “Fire extinguisher.” So much for that parish’s commitment to spiritual renewal.
How can revival take place when the church is dead and there is no voice to speak life into them? Such is the state of affairs of the churches today. Are there any people who will stand in the gap and not only pray but act on God’s behalf to revive and resurrect the church?
2. What did these bones need? [vs. 4 – 6]
God tells Ezekiel to preach to the bones, for they need God’s word.
V 5 – breath (HS); to live (to be revived)
V 7 – rattling (quaking & shaking)
Prophesy upon these bones - Declare to your miserable countrymen the gracious designs of the Lord; show them that their state, however deplorable, is not hopeless.
Behold, I will cause breath - signifies soul, breath, and wind; and sometimes the Spirit of God. Soul is its proper meaning in this vision, where it refers to the bones: “I will cause the Soul to enter into you.” And none could do this but the living God, who breathed the breath of life into Adam at first, and he became a living soul; to which there seems to be an allusion here; and when the Lord puts his Spirit into men, or bestows his grace on them, then they shall live, and not till then.
I will lay sinews upon you - Observe the progress:
(i) Here are the bones.
(ii) The ligaments, called here sinews, are to be added in order to unite the bones, that the skeleton might be complete.
(iii) The flesh (the whole muscular system, the subjacent and superjacent muscles, including the arterial and venous system) clothes this skeleton.
(iv) The skin (the dermis and epidermis, or cutis and cuticle) envelopes the whole of these muscles or flesh; and now these bodies are in the state that the body of Adam was before it received the animal and intellectual principle from God.
(v) There was no breath in them - they had not yet received their souls.
(vi) The wind, the soul, came into them. They were endued with animal and intellectual life; and they arose and evidenced a complete restoration to life, and began to perform its functions, Ezekiel 37: 10.
• God wants Ezekiel to tell the bones three things:
(a) I’ll change your status.
(b) I’ll put breath in you.
(c) You’ll become human and know I am the Lord.
• Ezekiel obediently preaches as he is commanded.
Illustration: Revival came to north China in 1932 in answer to several years of prayer. At one point, Norwegian missionary Maria Monsen wondered what good her praying could do. She longed to see God’s river of life flood spiritually dry China. Then she realized that the mighty Yangtze River began when the tiny drops of rain came together in the top of the mountains. Maria sought a prayer partner who would join her in claiming the promise "that if two of you agree on earth concerning anything that they ask, it will be done for them by My Father in heaven" (Mt. 18:19). When she finally found someone she exclaimed, "The awakening has begun! Two of us have agreed!" The rain drops of revival prayer were coming together.
In November of 1930 Maria announced, "A great revival is coming soon and it will begin in the North China Mission." She was convinced that the missionaries had fulfilled the conditions for revival found in 2 Chron 7:14. In 1932 about forty Christians were meeting in a town in North China for prayer four times a day beginning at 5:00 a.m. Believers were convicted of sin. Two men repented of hating each other. Love was strong and deep. Joy abounded. When revival came more people were born again than in any previous year in North China. One missionary estimated that 3,000 people came to Christ in his town. Pastors, missionaries, and Bible women experienced a deeper Christian life than they had ever known before. If this could happen in China, it can happen anywhere! Just breathe the ‘Living Word of God’ into any dead place or situation and see the miracles of God.
3. What happened to these bones? [vs. 7 – 14]
After Ezekiel obediently preached, amazing things happened in the valley.
V 10 - breath (HS); to live (to be revived); army (power)
V 14 - to live (to be revived) – God’s solemn vow / promise
and as I prophesied, there was a noise; or, "a voice" (w); this, in the literal sense, was the proclamation by Cyrus, giving the Jews leave to return to their own land, Ezra 1: 1, at the revival of the interest of Christ, a great voice will be heard from heaven, saying to the witnesses, come up hither, Revelation 11:12, and at the descent of Christ to raise his dead first, there will be the voice of the archangel, and the trump of God, 1Thessolonians 4:16, and, as while the prophet was prophesying, there was not only his voice heard, but the voice of God, perhaps a thunder clap: so in the ministry of the Gospel there is a voice heard, which, at first, is only externally heard; men hear a noise, a voice, but it is a confused one; they do not know what to make of it, and yet it has some effect upon them; it causes a noise in them, an outcry about sin, and hell, and damnation; and yet, at present, no spiritual life or breath is in them:
and behold a shaking; of the bones; a rattling among them, as may be conceived must be where there is, as here, a tumbling of dry bones one over another, to get to their proper bone: so in the first effect of the word upon the conscience of a sinner, which works wrath there, there is a shaking and trembling through fear of damnation; which in some issues in real conversion, as in Saul and the jailer, Acts 9: 6, but in others it goes off again, and comes to nothing, as in Felix, Acts 24: 25.
and the skin covered them above; and so looked comely and beautiful, as in the proper form of men; as did the Jews enriched and protected by Cyrus: and this may be an image of such persons so far wrought upon under the word as to look like Christians; to have the form of godliness, and appear outwardly righteous before men, submitting to ordinances, and performing the duties of religion; and yet no principle of spiritual life in them; but, like Adam’s body, of the earth, earthly, and breathless, before the breath of life was breathed into it; so here, but there was no breath in them; no spirit in the Jews to return to their land, though they had liberty, till the Lord stirred up their spirits, Ezra 1: 5, all this, in a spiritual sense, shows how far persons may go under temporary convictions by the word, and yet not be living Christians. V8 - Spiritually: a man may assume all the semblances of spiritual life, yet have none, and so be dead before God.
Prophesy, son of man, and say to the wind; ministers must not only preach, but they must pray for the Spirit to accompany the word with his power, and make it the savor of life unto life:
thus says the Lord, come from the four winds, O breath; or "spirit": implying that Israel is to be gathered from the four quarters of the earth (Isaiah 43: 5-6; Jeremiah 31: 8), even as they were "scattered into all the winds" because they will be brought from each of the parts where they were, as they will be at their conversion in the latter day; and so the Lord has a people in each of the parts of the world, that lie dead in sin, and must be quickened by the Spirit:
and breathe upon these slain, that they may live; though not slain with the sword, yet being as dead men, who are slain by death, are so called: so in a spiritual sense men are slain by sin, and are slain by the words of the Lord’s mouth; killed with the law, the killing letter; and it is only the Spirit of God that can give them life; and the breath or spirit here is applied to the Spirit of the Messiah by the ancient Jews (y).
v 10 - The second time he prophesied to the wind, as he had done to the bones, as he was ordered: and the issue of it was, a spirit of courage in the Jews, to go up to their own land; the Spirit of life from Christ, which will enter into the witnesses slain, and revive them; and into the Jews in the latter day, and convert them; and which enters into dead sinners, and quickens them; and this he does while ministers are preaching the Gospel to them; as men do spiritually, when the Spirit of God has produced a principle of spiritual life in them; they live by faith on Christ, in union and fellowship with him; they live in newness of life, and a holy life and conversation; and shall live and reign with Christ upon the first resurrection, and for evermore: an exceeding great army; as the Jews did when they returned from the Babylon’s captivity; they were many, and in a posture of defense; and as they will be in the latter day, when converted, Hosea 1: 10, and as the number of the saints will be upon the first resurrection, Revelation 7: 9, so when men are quickened by the Spirit of God, "they stand upon their feet"; they stand in the grace of God, and on the foundation Christ; they stand by faith in him, and in the doctrine of faith, and in the house of God; and they stand firm against all their enemies: they are an "army"; they are in a military state; fighting against sin, Satan, and the world; and though few in comparison of others, yet considered by themselves are very numerous; and as they will appear when the Jews will be converted, and the fullness of the Gentiles brought in; and especially when they will be all gathered together at the coming of Christ.
V 12 - Christ makes the same principle the ground on which the literal resurrection rests. God had said, "I am the God of Abraham, by taking the patriarchs as His, undertook to do for them all that Omnipotence can perform: He, being the ever living God, is necessarily the God of, not dead, but living persons, that is, of those whose bodies His covenant love binds Him to raise again. He can - and because He can - He will - He must [FAIRBAIRN]. He calls them "My people" when receiving them into favor; but "thy people," in addressing His servant, as if He would put them away from Him.
Out of your graves - out of your politically dead state, primarily in Babylon, finally hereafter in all lands. The Jews regarded the lands of their captivity and dispersion as their "graves"; their restoration was to be as "life from the dead" (Romans 11: 15). Before, the bones were in the open plain (Ezekiel 37: 1-2); now, in the graves, that is, some of the Jews were in the graves of actual captivity, others at large but dispersed. Both alike were nationally dead.
V 13 - That is, when I have brought you out of those places and towns where you are captives. When I shall have done for you what was beyond your hope, and deemed impossible, then shall ye know that I am Jehovah.
V 14 – here the Spirit is taken for the Holy Ghost. They were living souls, animal and intellectual beings, when they had received their souls, as mentioned above: but they could only become spiritual, holy, and obedient creatures by the Spirit of God actuating their spirits. Three degrees or processes have been remarked in this mystic vision. When the prophet was commanded to prophesy, to foretell on the authority of God there should be a restoration to their own land-
• Flesh formed on the dry bones, and the skeletons looked alive.
• God tells Ezekiel to prophesy to the wind to enter the skeletons, and they become a vast army.
• Likewise, we can look alive, but nothing happens until God breathes in us.
Illustration: In 1936 revival fires broke out on the campus of Wheaton College west of Chicago. A senior named Don Hillis arose in chapel to voice a plea for revival. Students responded with an all-day prayer meeting on Saturday. Both faculty and students confessed sin and made things right with one another.
The Wheaton campus was touched again in 1943 following a message on confession of sin during special services. The captain of the cross-country team arose to confess that he had violated college policy by leading his team in a Sunday race. Pride, criticism, and cheating were confessed by other students. Lunch and dinner slipped by unnoticed while the meeting continued into the evening service. "Stop the bus!" a member of the Wheaton College Glee Club shouted. The Glee Club was touring in Florida in 1950. A revival that had broken out on the campus in Illinois had touched this student hundreds of miles away. He confessed he had broken the rules and other students began to turn to God. God’s promise is still true. If we seek Him with all our heart, we shall surely find Him ready to pour the riches of His grace and love into the lives of His people (Jeremiah 29:13).
Just as those dead bones in the Valley were revived and resurrected, even today the spiritually dead churches across this country and around the world can be revived.
Conclusion:-
We can learn three things from Ezekiel’s trip to the valley-
(a) God wants dry, disjointed people to live.
(b) We can’t do anything without the breath (power) of God.
© Finally, it is God’s desire that people know that he is God.
