Dry bones

[ZiSunka]

MEETING GOD IN THE GARDEN
Number 15

DOG BONES
Ezekiel 37

Yesterday I was out in the backyard, cleaning up in preparation for a good, close mowing. I always have to search the grass for hidden objects that might become dangerous projectiles if caught in the mower blades. Usually I find tennis balls, squeeky toys, raw hide chewies, and other assorted things that Max the lumbering Labrador retriever has hauled outside for safekeeping.

To my surprise, while reaching for a toy, I came across a huge hole under the back porch. It's about three feet deep and four feet wide. Max is digging under there, and apparently has established this place to store his amazing collection of ancient soup bones. I would have never thought there could be so many bones in one place!

As I peered between the steps into that hole filled with bones, I recalled the valley of dry bones in
Ezekiel 37. The LORD showed the prophet a deep valley filled with bones, bones that had been desiccated, with no trace of life anywhere in them; bones that had been dead a long, long time. God asked Ezekiel, "Do you think these bones can be made alive again?" Ezekiel answered, "Only You know, LORD."

The Lord stood at the rim of the valley with Ezekiel and commanded to him speak aloud to the dead bones that He would make them alive again. And when Ezekiel repeated the words, he witnessed the astonishing flow of life back into the bones. Millions of people who were once dead suddenly became alive. A great army got to its feet, ready to serve the Lord who had revived them. What an event to behold!

Before we were saved, our skeletons were part of that bone pile. There was no spiritual life in us at all. We were dry, lacking blood and sinew; lacking any signs of spiritual life. In many cases, we were lean on temporal life as well. Some of us were sick, some were drug addicts or workaholics, and some were emotionally empty. We experienced and comprehended our lifelessness but were powerless to resuscitate ourselves. We could only lay around helplessly with the other dead bones.

At some point, God sent a prophet to each of us, someone to speak His words of eternal, abundant life, and we responded. The Lord resuscitated our spirits and covered the dryness with lushness. We stood up rejuvenated, ready to serve the One who gave us life!

As I thought this over, I understood that all around me, at the store, at the park, at work, there are piles of old, dry bones who comprehend their aridness and wonder if there shouldn't be something vibrant going on inside. They wish God would send them a prophet to speak the words of life.

Then, with a shock, I realized that I am that prophet. God is showing me my own valley of dry bones to whom I must speak His words of Life.

God willing, my valley will rise up into a great army, ready to serve the Lord.


(Then He said to me, "Speak to the wind, speak, Son of man, and say, 'Listen to the Lord God; Come from the four winds, O Breath, and breathe upon these who are slain, and make them alive again!'" Ezekiel 37:9)

 

[Sweet Pea]

 

[Vessel Of Mercy]

Wait a minute, did you respond to the Lord's call and then he put muscles and sinews on you and brought you back to life? Or did he bring you to life so you could respond to him? Seems like dead bones don't talk.

 

[AJ]

Good stuff LL! Thanks for sharing!

 

[Jeffrey A]

Wait a minute, did you respond to the Lord's call and then he put muscles and sinews on you and brought you back to life? Or did he bring you to life so you could respond to him? Seems like dead bones don't talk.

This is the problem with allegory -- people take it too far. Your metaphor, "dead bones don't talk", is correct to a point. But a metaphor consists of three parts: the vehicle, the tenor, and the ground. The vehicle is the figurative image, in this case, the dry bones, or let's say, a corpse. A dead body. The tenor is the true thing the figurative thing stands in for. In this case, the true thing is a person who has not yet called on God for mercy and so has been saved (what you might call an unregenerate; what we call an unsaved one). The ground is the characteristic(s) that is/are being compared between the two disparate things, the vehicle and the tenor. Not every thing about the vehicle is applicable to the tenor, rather, only the thing being described in the allegorical passage by comparison between the two is applicable.

For instance, Jesus is called "the Lamb of God." That is a true metaphor. Lamb is the vehicle, the figurative symbol, while the tenor, the true thing being pictured, is the man Jesus. Not everything that is characteristic about a lamb will be applicable to the true thing, the man Jesus. Only those things about the vehicle that is applicable to the tenor as described in the context of the metaphor will form the ground -- the specific thing being compared from the vehicle to the tenor as applicable. In the case of Jesus as the Lamb of God, the fact that a lamb can be led to its slaughter while putting up no protest forms a good part of the ground. But the fact that a lamb has a wooly coat and eats grass is absolutely of no consequence relative to the purpose of the metaphor.

Now back to the metaphor in question -- "dry bones (aren't alive)." The vehicle is the dry bones, and the tenor is an unsaved person. The ground is that neither "are alive", neither dry bones walk and talk, nor is an unsaved person able to say they are alive. They are dead. That both are "dead" is the ground. But like saying Jesus must eat grass, because he is a lamb, so some say the unsaved must not have the ability to call on God because they are dry bones. In both cases, the metaphor has been taken too far. ONLY the 'ground' between the vehicle and the tenor is applicable, and NOT all the characteristics of the vehicle. Jesus does not have a wooly coat and four legs, and being "dead in trespasses and sins" does not mean an unsaved person cannot call on the name of the Lord in response to when he calls on that one to repent.

But that is not to say that "being dead in trespasses and sins" is a metaphor as well! In actuality, spiritual death is as much a reality as physical death! But then we are obligated to 'define' each. And it is just this simple -- physical death is the separation of our soul from our body, and spiritual death is the separation of our soul from God.

"Dead in... sins" is not a metaphor, it is a true reality. But it does not mean a person cannot -- does not have the ability to -- call on the name of the Lord for mercy in response to the Holy Spirit's convicting work. To say so is to have taken the figurative picture of a corpse, of dry bones, too far, applying the characteristics of the vehicle onto the tenor beyond the applicable ground. It is to put Jesus in a pasture on all fours in a wooly coat eating grass and calling, "baaaa!"

Death is separation. Physical death is a soul separated from the body. Spiritual death is the separation of a soul from God. No metaphor. True condition. But God calls across the chasm of sin that separates the sinner from the holy God, "repent and be saved", and the dead sinner, seeing his peril of separation, and no way across, doomed to be forever separated from God -- eternally dead -- calls back, "save me!" At that moment, God crosses over the divide himself, and reconciles that dead one -- that separated one -- back to himself. He "buys back" -- redeems -- that one from death with his own propitiation -- payment in full. Since they are no longer separated, but rather God has saved that one, that one is now spiritually alive, for s/he and God are no longer separated. That one is now spiritually alive. No longer dead in sins. Made alive. For if death IS separation, reconciliation IS life!

Jeffrey A