CAN THESE BONES LIVE?

Ezekiel 37: 1-14; John 11: 1-45 (selected verses)

Do you remember the terrific windstorm we had Tuesday night? The next day as I was out driving along, I saw that a lot of tree branches had come down and that considerable debris had blown up against buildings and fences. When I came to the intersection of John Marr Drive and Little River Turnpike, I noticed a “ONE WAY” sign with the arrow pointing straight up! “Good theology,” I said to myself, but on closer scrutiny it was quite evident the sign had come loose from its moorings and was free to turn any direction the wind blew like a weather vane.

Driving on, I continued to think about that arrow pointing up and the difficulty we sometimes have maintaining direction. Most of us want to go forward to embrace God’s future, but curiously often spend too much time looking the other direction and may even find ourselves going backwards for lack of forward momentum.

Ancient Israel’s history is replete with examples of folks tending to go backwards, rather than forwards. In the wilderness of Sinai after escape from Egypt, there developed among some a “back to Egypt” syndrome, wherein people actually convinced themselves it would be better to live in slavery than to “keep on keepin’ on” toward the Promised Land. Yes, the journey was difficult and fraught with danger, causing these reluctant travelers to think that at least as slaves they would eat and have a safe place to sleep.

Centuries later, well after Israel was well established as a nation, through sin she fell upon hard times. The Northern Kingdom fell to the Assyrians in 721 BC, and later the Southern Kingdom of Judah fell to the Babylonians in 597/6 BC. The leading citizens, including King Jehoiachin and the prophet Ezekiel, were carried into bondage in Babylon where they remained for over a half a century. It was a terrible national crisis as well as a crisis of faith in which many felt bereft of God. They lamented in their psalms, “How shall we sing the Lord’s song in a strange land?” (Ps.137) Even though some of them lived fairly comfortably in Babylon there was ongoing wonder as to whether they would ever again experience nationhood and their special experience with Yahweh as a covenantal God of provision and protection.

It was in this context that God came to his prophet Ezekiel in a vision and spoke with him about the future. Ezekiel describes his experience: “The hand of the Lord came upon me, and he brought me out by the spirit of the Lord and set me down in the middle of a valley; it was full of bones. He led me all around them, there were very many lying in the valley, and they were very dry. He said to me, ‘Mortal, can these bones live?’ I answered, ‘O Lord God, you know.’ Then he said to me, ‘Prophesy to these bones, and say to them: O dry bones, hear the word of the Lord. Thus says the Lord God to these bones: I will cause breath to enter you, and you shall live. I will lay sinew on you, and will cause flesh to come upon you, and cover you with skin, and put breath in you, and you shall live; and you shall know that I am the Lord.’”

This is a wonderful message of hope for God’s people in captivity. It assures them with a promise of life. We see the rattling bones coming together with sinews, flesh and skin, yet without life. Life comes only by the spirit. “Thus says the Lord God: ‘Come from the four winds, O breath, and breathe upon these slain, that they may live’,” and Ezekiel prophesied as God commanded, “and the breath came into them, and they lived, and they stood on their feet, a vast multitude.”

This vision shows that there will be a revival of nationhood after the Exile. The spirit of the Lord will make it so. People who have been beaten down to the point of thinking themselves dead are given the wonderful news that God is not through with them at all, that there is still much to be experienced. A wonderful future awaits the faithful.

Now let us advance hundreds of years to the ministry of Jesus and his encounter with death in the village of Bethany. It is his good friend Lazarus who has died and Mary and Martha, Jesus’ dear friends, the sisters of Lazarus, are in mourning. They are upset with him that he has not come sooner. Maybe he could have saved his friend. One cannot read this story without thinking of Jesus’ approaching death. It is, in fact, this event of raising Lazarus that precipitates his death.

The story can be read on two levels, one being the story of Jesus’ compassion in raising a dear friend, who has died during the delay in Jesus’ arrival. It is a demonstration of Jesus’ power over death. It is a thrilling moment when he calls Lazarus out of the tomb and declares, “Unbind him, and let him go!” But we must also understand that this is a sign story. As Fred Craddock puts it, “bleeding through the page from beneath is the deeper truth of which the death and resurrection of Lazarus is but a sign: apart from trust in God, the world is a cemetery, but into that world God sends Jesus Christ as the offer of resurrection. ‘I am the resurrection and the life’ (v.25). In chapter 6, the crowds wanted bread, and Jesus gave them that but offered also the bread of life; here the sisters want a brother, and Jesus gives them that but offers also life to the world through his own death and resurrection. Jesus is fully in control of the situation here, but each element in the story is a foreshadowing of what will soon happen to Jesus.

To see the many clues that point to Jesus’ own death and resurrection, one has but to read the story carefully. At verse 4, we are told that the end of this story will be the glorifying (death) of the Son. At verse 16, Thomas says, ‘Let us also go, that we may die with him.’ And verses 28-44 can best be understood in the light of Jesus’ having said that his own death would be effected by what takes place. So much here is reminiscent of Gethsemane, Golgotha, and Easter. Notice: Jesus is deeply moved and troubled (vv.33, 38); Jesus weeps (v. 35); the tomb is near Jerusalem; the tomb is a cave with a large stone covering it; the stone is rolled away; Jesus cries with a loud voice; the grave cloths are removed from the one dead but now alive. One can hardly read the account and continue to think of Lazarus; one thinks of Jesus.

Lazarus left the tomb, but the price was that Jesus had to enter it (vv. 45-53). Jesus himself said it: one cannot give life unless one dies (12:24). Jesus made no exception in his own case. ‘Now my soul is troubled. And what should I say? ‘Father, save me from this hour’? No, it is for this reason that I have come to this hour.’ This willingness to submit to the giving of life, which he had asked of his disciples, is dramatically stated in verse 34. When Jesus asked where Lazarus had been laid, they said to him, ‘Come and see.’ This expression, ‘come and see,’ is in the Gospel as an invitation to discipleship (1:39, 46; 4:29). Here the word is turned upon Jesus himself. The hour has come for the Son of Man to be glorified. Perhaps this realization interprets the next verse: “Jesus began to weep.” (Preaching Through the Christian Year, Year A.)

A favorite hymn of millions, “Amazing Grace, How Sweet the Sound”, has a verse that reads, “Through many dangers, toils, and snares, I have already come; ‘tis grace hath brought me safe thus far, and grace will lead me home.” (UMH, 378) The hymn bespeaks the ardent journey of life that takes us up steep mountains and through deep valleys, including the valley of the shadow of death. Ezekiel is given an entire plain of dead warriors’ bones and is asked by God, “Can these bones live?” As Craddock points out, “The prophet’s answer is not an evasion, but an acknowledgment of the source of life, ‘O Lord God, you know’ (v.3).”

Where are the dead bones in your life? One could go off in a number of directions to explore the ways people find themselves in deathlike situations, from which they feel there is no exit. Yet God can speak in the midst of a deathlike experience, asking, “Can these bones live?” And we are on the spot. If we are as smart as Ezekiel we will answer, “O Lord God, you know.”

God can knit the pieces together again and give them life by the spirit. It is God’s will and way to breathe new life into our death experiences, our tragedies both manmade and nature made. We see life coming back in Asia after a devastating tsunami; we see loved ones regain their footing after the loss of a loved one, and make the decision to live again. We see lives that have come through difficulty rebound by prayer and the grace of God, and by the infusion of the Holy Spirit.

I witnessed a touching moment last week during a memorial service for a wonderful young woman, who died unexpectedly in her early 30’s. Her parents had been divorced for many years and had had little if anything to do with one another. But on this day the parents walked up on the platform of this church, hand in hand. The father put his arm around his former wife and said, “In death, our daughter was able to do what she could not do during her lifetime; bring her parents together in peace.” It was a powerful moment of reconciliation that came out of deep grief. It was “a God moment”, an epiphany of the power of love over hatred, of healing in the midst of woundedness.

The church at times has had its death experiences. Sometimes they have come as real death, when we have had to give up the saints who have helped to make our communion what it is today. Sometimes it has come about through loss, when anger or upset has caused someone to walk away from our fellowship. Such moments are always painful to us and leave us wondering what we could have done differently. What was it in us that might have precipitated this event? What failure of understanding or communication? What shortcoming that kept reconciliation from happening? The loss of relationship is perhaps the worst loss of all. It is sad when it happens and we ought to try as hard as we can to keep it from happening.

Sometimes it is a deathlike experience when the church dips in attendance or its ability to grow with new members coming in like a tide, or when offerings are not what they once were. All churches experience dry seasons and must wait for God’s rain, God’s “showers of blessing” to return. Many churches in our area have experienced demographic shifts that have caused an ebbing in the population. Immigration has changed the cultural complexion of our city. We are challenged in many new ways. Some look at this and see a glass half empty; others look at it and see a glass half full.

The clergy and staff of AUMC, along with many of its leaders see a glass half full, and continuing to fill. Yes, we have had our dry seasons in certain respects, but there are now so many positive signs of vitality in our midst that I am convinced God has heard our many prayers for renewal and is bringing new life in greater measure than we can yet imagine. Faith is called for and the hard work of ministry. People are moving back to Annandale, tired of long commutes to the suburbs. Thousands are immigrating to our community. Great ministries in our church are drawing new people. ESL is helping newcomers find their place among us. We are being enriched on every hand by these dynamic changes. Can we see it? Can these bones live? Maybe that is the wrong question, because these bones have never died; they are alive and are growing stronger day by day by the amazing work of the Holy Spirit of God.

Our giving is strong. New members are joining and many are waiting to join. We are baptizing babies, youth, and adults right along and professions of faith are being made. We are active on the mission field at home, nationally, and abroad. We have highly committed people working in many phases of ministry. Could we do better? Absolutely, and we will. Do we have a great staff? Indisputedly, and they work extremely well together with the clergy and our gifted laity.

Do we have a great facility? Yes, one of the best ever, debt free, and efforts are underway to make the entire building aesthetically more appealing and spiritually instructive as people move about our corridors, classrooms, sanctuaries, and administrative work places.

Do we have a great vision? What could be greater than to be “Claiming God’s tomorrow through faithful witness to Jesus’ mission today?” That ONE WAY sign I saw at a major Annandale intersection pointing upwards, I feel, is emblematic of our church. This is a church traveling the upward way, moving forward to the Promised Land, seeking to bring everyone along, no one left behind.

Are we diverse? You’d better believe it. We are diverse in theology, politics, economic status, culture, race, age and gender. We have lots of “blues” and plenty of “reds”, along with many other colors in between, on our map and that is a great strength. How boring it would be if we were all the same. Our pluralism as United Methodists is a great advantage. It makes us think; it keeps the dialogue and discussion going; it keeps us honest and makes us question to be sure all aspects of our Wesleyan heritage remain in effect. We weigh our decisions by scripture, reason, tradition and experience. We are a thinking person’s church. We seek to “Unite these two so long disjoined – knowledge and vital piety.” John Wesley said that, and I think he would be proud of us in this regard.

We are a church on the move because we know where we are going. We are not looking back except to claim our story in Jesus’ love and to be sure we are writing the next chapter in a way that is consistent with the saints who preceded us, giving us the best of their heritage. We are living forward, “paying it forward”, always praying it forward, so to speak.

Longfellow once wrote, “Look not mournfully to the Past. It comes not back again. Wisely improve the Present. It is thine. Go forth to meet the shadowy Future, without fear, and with a manly heart.” I would amend that to say, “with a Godly heart.” With a Godly heart, without fear, we meet the future and find the God we seek waiting for us there, ready and willing to breath into us new energy, new life, and give us new opportunities to be as Christ to the world.

Prayer: Thank you, God, for the gift of new life, and for the promise that the future with you means life in its abundance with the promise of resurrection when this mortal journey ends. Thank you for keeping the people of Israel on track and not turning back as they made their way through desert wastes; for bringing your people home from Exile; for bringing life out of death as Jesus did with his friend, Lazarus; for raising Jesus from death as you did on Easter; and for leading your church into a grand future, instructing and strengthening us from our disappointments and setbacks, inspiring us with fresh dreams and visions, and empowering us with the Spirit of Christ in our souls for faithful living, now and forever. Amen.