“The hand of the Lord was upon me, and car- ried me out in the spirit of the Lord, and set me down in the midst of the valley which was full of bones, and caused me to pass by them round- about: and, behold, there were very many in the open valley; and lo, they were very dry. And he said unto me, Son of man, can these bones live? And I answered O Lord God, Thou knowest.”’ Ezekiel 37:1-3.
Ezekiel!
The very name is synonymous with fire, force, fervor!
Like some fiercely flaming firebrand, his life, his word stand sharply silhouetted against the sable blackness of spiritual darkness and perfidy!
He lived in a day of retrogression and backsliding.
Israel, who had once marched as an army with banners, shields of faith gleaming in the sunlight of God’s abiding smile; Israel, whose tabernacles had once been bathed with the Shekinah of Jehovah; whose temples had once been so filled with the cloud of God’s glory that the priests could not minister; Israel, whose altar fires had gleamed upon a thousand hilltops as clear, sweet voices rendering praise as pure and fragrant as the wafted incense of their swaying censers —
Israel had fallen!
Fallen into idolatry!
Had become a worshipper of Baal and his satellites.
Her banners once proudly flung o’erhead, lofty as sunrise clouds over the mountains of dawn, were now trailing miserably, trampled in the mire of retrogression.
Flowers of prayer, purer than morning dew, were withered and gray as the ash of a crematory.
Action, progression, and Canaan claiming faith were as stilled and choked at the hand of apostasy as is a tree in the grey moss-enmeshed forest of the Everglade, funeral-shrouded by the deadly onslaught of the cloying, clinging parasites of recrudescent deterioration.
The living, throbbing, vitalized armies of faith which once marched valiantly and victoriously o’er hill and plain, had been o’ertaken, stripped of strength and shield, and a shadow of their former selves, were but a valley filled with skeletons, a gaunt reminder of their former God-enfolded, God-emboldened invincibility.
Rent and torn, the strings from their harps! Stilled and silent, their songs and their shouts! The grim, a shadowy pall of chill, silent death was everywhere.
Backsliding is not a twentieth century invention. Among those who have begun the march toward spiritual kingdoms during past centuries, many have fallen out of rank and fainted by the way.
Plentitude oft induces an unhealthy state of satiety.
Satiety induces torpor and even spiritual death.
To awaken and arouse the backslider to his dead and powerless condition, it has pleased God to draw strangely striking similes and pictures. He has given various visions, vividly depicting the status of those who have lost their first love.
The vision which He gave unto Ezekiel revolutionized men and nations.
Never in history has stranger experience been sent a prophet than that which caught him up, carried him out in the Spirit of the Lord and set him down in the midst of a valley which was ‘“‘full of dry bones.”
The grim and grizzly horror of the place, the emotions, the acts of Ezekiel, the subsequent revival in the midst of the unburied dead, reach out and grip the heart and mind with irresistible fascination.
One pictures him standing there motionless, staring, appalled.
Despair clings to the dank valley like a sodden funeral shroud. Dark visaged vultures couch on peak and precipice, full pouched and motionless.
What gusts of melancholy beset the soul of Ezekiel as the dismal chill breath from the vale of stagnant death sweep over him! As far as one can see in every direction lay gaunt, gloomy skeletons. —
Bones! Bones! Bones!
A long slit of daylight, like a pointing finger, brings them into startling whiteness against the dark, rockribbed canyon floor.
Could it be that this multitude represented that which was once the living, marching, victorious army of God?
Relating the experience later Ezekiel said of the Lord: ‘He caused me to pass by them roundabout; and, behold there were very many in the open valley; and, lo, they were very dry.”
“Behold there were very many.”
The pity of it!
Were there only a few, it would not seem so terrible, but the great number of these dry bones is astounding. There are so many precious Christians in so many churches, in so many climes, that are down in the valley with no spiritual strength or meat to cover ee aus of profession — nothing but bones! bones!
ones!
“Tn the open valley.”
Neither spade nor pickaxe is needed to discover this kind of bones. They are in the open valley. They may be close beside you now.
“And they were very dry.”
So dry they could not say ‘‘“Amen”’ or ‘‘Hallelujah”’; so dry they had not said “Praise the Lord’’ for years; so dry that they could neither shout nor clap their hands themselves, and would if possible have stopped the shouting and rejoicing of everyone else.
So dry there was no real victory in their lives, no ring to their testimony, no sterling worth to their profession —
Dry! Dry! Dry!
One can fairly hear the rattle of the bones beneath their cloak of profession.
“And he said unto me, Son of man, can these bones live?”’
A staggering question it was with which the Lord confronted Ezekiel — a question which would at once stop his murmuring over the dried-up condition of affairs in the bone-yard, and require unlimited hope apotae ts in the resurrected, life-giving power of the ord.
One sees Ezekiel walking among them, peering down into their cold, vacant eye sockets; sees him taking the lethargic hand of a Deacon; peer into grim faces, immobile as carved masks; beholding the irresolute listlessness of their impassive state; lifting his eyes to see the full length of that devastating, horrible scene of death; then shaking his head in the negative.
“Can these bones live?”’
As well might a dead leaf demand to return to a tree; a fallen star to return unto its blazing constellation; the dead Pharaohs of yesteryear be restored unto their crumbled throne; an army slain in heat of battle be expected to rise at the general’s command, lively, vivacious, vigorous and forceful.
Surely this was a revival-less valley!
Surely these icy, cold, clammy hands could never be lifted in worship unto Jehovah, or clapped in His exultant and enthusiastic praise!
But, behold! That which is impossible with man is possible with God.
Have you been placed in a valley, be it home or assembly or neighborhood or workshop, that is filled with dry bones? Is your minister dry? Your congregation?
Then God is confronting you today with the same question that faced Ezekiel. “Son of man, have you a faith that can cause these dry bones to live?” pad THE HOLY SPIRIT
It is one thing to find fault with and lament deplorable conditions of dearth and barrenness. It is quite another thing to have the faith and confidence in God which will bring life and strength and better conditions roundabout you.
If you have discovered that you are in the midst of a valley of dry bones, stop lamenting and complaining because you are there, and wishing that you had been placed in a different environment on the ‘mountain top where revival fires burn and live armies march. Thank God that you are alive and that God is alive, and that, as you believe and pray, life will banish death in those roundabout you today as surely as it did in the day of Ezekiel. Your having been placed in that hard, dry, difficult locality was not an accident, not an oversight or a mistake on the part of God. Just as surely as the hand of the Lord set Ezekiel down in that valley of drought and death, so surely has the hand of your loving Father set you down in that valley, or position, or home, or parish. “All things work together for good to them that love God; to them who are the called according to His purpose.” Romans 8:28.
And now, having placed you there, He has confronted you with the same question with which He confronted Ezekiel: ‘“Have you faith to believe and to lay hold upon me, the Life-Giver, and claim abundant life for these dry bones?”
“Son of man, can these bones live?”
And Ezekiel answered, ‘Lord, thou knowest.’’
Not an overly enthusiastic answer!
Here again we can sympathize somewhat with the hesitancy of Ezekiel; for many children of the Lord have answered the challenge of faith in the same way:
“Oh, Lord God, Thou knowest! They are very dry! There seems to be neither spark of life nor longing. It seems impossible that this church or these people could ever be brought to a living, definite spiritual place. Jesus, increase my faith! Help mine unbelief, for I long to see them live!’
“Then He said unto me, prophesy upon these bones and say unto them: Oh, you dry bones, hear the word of the Lord God, behold, I will cause breath to enter into you, and you shall live.”
Poor, dried-up, soul, there is hope for you!
Ye who do not believe in noise and shouting; ye who do not believe in so much earnest prayer and praise to the Lamb; He will cause breath to enter even you and you shall live.
“Let everything that hath breath praise the Lord.”
“So I prophesied as I was commanded.”
Ah! there was the secret of the power and success of Ezekiel’s valley prophecy!
Do you see it?
“As I was commanded.”
Not with enticing words of man’s wisdom, which seemed wise and plausible to Himself; not with words to please and lull his audience into a false security, nor yet a self-righteous tirade of condemnation that showed them their condition and dryness, and left them thereby more miserable than before; but a prophecy that was according to the commandment of the Lord.
Oh, for more Ezekiels who, instead of bringing in side issues, division and strife, would prophesy according to the commandment of the Lord! Then would we see a shaking in the valley of dry bones, and the wind of the Spirit would-blow, bringing life to those that slumber.
“And as I prophesied there was a noise.”
Whilst Ezekiel prophesied, there was a noise.
Whilst Peter yet spake, the Holy Ghost fell (Acts 10).
Oh, that our words might be so in accord with the commandments of God that whilst we yet speak, we too shall hear the ‘‘noise’”’ of men and women crying out: “What must I do to inherit eternal life? What shall I do to receive the Holy Spirit?”
Oh, for the noise of praise and intercession, the sound of an abundance of rain, the sound of His chariot wheels upon the mountains, and the stirring in the tops of the mulberry trees!
“And as I prophesied there was a noise, and behold, a shaking, and the bones came together, bone to his bone.”
As Ezekiel prophesied three distinct things took place in the valley of dry bones:
1. The noise.
2. The shaking.
3. The reuniting of the bones. prayer and all over the whole world there was an awakening and bringing to life of innumerable valleys of dry bones; there was a noise. Sinners wept their way to Jesus and cried aloud:
“What shall I do to be saved?”
Believers were filled with the Spirit and shouted the praises of God as the Spirit gave utterance. The noise of their joyous praises filled the sky. The glimpse which believers caught of the Church Body, and of the plan of God to restore the Church to her full Pentecostal power and life caused them to cry aloud before the glorious vision.
But hearken!
What is this remarkable shaking as of an earthquake, which surely and inevitably follows the noise of the Spirit’s outpouring?
It is the sifting and the.testing of the Church.
Who is not willing to ride on the band wagon and help beat the drum when the great day of parade is on? It is easy to clap hands and shout approval when the day is fair and the throng is applauding!
At the outset of every new awakening, the cradle of religious growth is rocked by the hand of enthusiasm. But after the first great noise of conquest, “Behold a shaking.”
Has your assembly or the company with which you are wont to worship, been going through a shaking? Have you personally been subjected to a severe shaking? Has your heart ached and have you asked a continual ‘“Why” and ‘‘Wherefore,” as you have seen brothers, who were bosom friends and comrades in the battle, separate and drift apart, and assemblies split in factions?
It was because of the shaking which followed the noise. It follows in the life of every assembly. It follows in the life of every believer. A mighty shakin gtime is on. 226 Tue Houy SPIRIT
Just as God shook Gideon’s army until there were but three hundred left that could not be shaken purging and shaking, “that those things which cannot be shaken may remain.” Heb. 12:27.
“And the bones came together, bone to his bone.”
Some of these days there is going to be a coming together after the shaking, and those that come together will be bound by such cords of unity and love that nothing can separate them again. When the body comes together it will be ‘‘bone to his bone.” This is no patched-up affair, no man-made peace, no temporary armistice, but a unity that shall remain.
When man tries in his own wisdom to assemble the body by choosing and ordaining pastors, teachers, evangelists, prophets, governments, etc., he is almost sure to pick the wrong bones or else put the right bones in the wrong places.
God sets His own church in order, first apostles, secondly prophets, thirdly teachers, etc. 1 Cor. 12:28.
When those that can be shaken and tossed about by every wind that blows are gone like chaff before the tempest then Christ Himself will gather together the firm, true, uncompromising, unshakable members ee will put them in their appointed places in the ody.
“For as the body is one, and hath many members, and all the members of that one body, being many, are one body: so also is Christ. For by one Spirit are we all baptized into one body . . . Now ye are the body of Christ, and members in particular.” 1 Cor. 12:12) 18sar
Not before the coming of the Lord shall we see
the body united in its entirety. Then from the east
and the west, from the sea and the earth, from the
heart of the home and the dust of the grave, from the
church of today and the apostolic churches of that
glorious yester-year shall they arise.
Each part of the body is made up of many members.
These are in one accord and work harmoniously, one - in conjunction with the other, joined by cords of love.
The members of the body are moved and controlled,
not by their own wisdom or the orders of one another,
but by the Head, which is Christ.
As each member, moved by the Head, obeys His
will, there will be unity and harmony and a drawing
together.
“And when I beheld, lo, the sinews and the flesh came
upon them and the skin covered them above: but there was no breath in them.
“Then said He unto me, Prophesy unto the wind, prophesy son of man, and say to the wind, Thus saith the Lord God; Come from the four winds, O breath, and breathe upon these slain, that they may live.
“So I prophesied as he commanded me, and the breath came into them, and they lived, and stood upon their feet, an exceeding great army.”
He who has been redeemed, covered with the sinews
and flesh, now needs the baptism of the Holy Spirit.
The same Holy Spirit who filled the house with the
sound as of a rushing, mighty wind on the Day of
Pentecost, shall come upon you, endue you with
power, stand you upon your feet, and join you to this
exceeding great army. Rev. 7:9.
Sinner, backslider, luke-warm professor, whoever and wherever you are, no longer need you remain lifeless and dormant. The Lord awaits to bring you forth from the graves of coldness and death, and cause you to know His Salvation, and to fill you with His Spirit.
“Therefore prophesy and say unto them, Thus saith the Lord God; Behold, O my people, I will open your graves, and cause you to come up out of your graves, and bring you into the land of Israel.
“And shall put my spirit in you, and ye shall live, and I shall place you in your own land: then shall ye know that I the Lord have spoken it, and performed it, saith the Lord.”
Here is a definite experience! You need not “‘guess’’ that the Holy Spirit has come but “‘You will know I have performed it.”’
Saved, baptized, brought into the land of fruitfulness and victory, a veritable Eden is spread before all who will obey.
No matter how dead and dry the bones in your particular valley may seem, be not discouraged nor question the Divine wisdom that placed you where you are. Respond to the eall of faith and prophesy as His Word commands. He will shine into the cold, benighted hearts about you, bringing warmth, healing and life, filling with His Spirit until from that valley of dry bones a transformed, triumphant army shall rise and march forth to join the great body of the redeemed.
What a wonderful day that will be when Jesus will speak from heaven and the noise of His triumphant shout shall be heard!
The graves shall be opened, fetters of mortality shall be shaken loose, and from the four quarters of the earth, both from the dead and from the living, each bone, each member of the body shall come together and rise to fill its allotted place in that body, bone to his bone.