“… This was the appearance of the likeness of the glory of the Lord…” Ezekiel 1:28
Whatever you may think you know about our Heavenly Father, no matter how deeply you have studied and pondered, my friend, even if you have spent years uncovering the riches of His Word (we don’t take away, but celebrate your devotion to the Word), all you or I can know only amounts to a small snapshot.
All the knowledge that has been acquired is only a drop in the ocean of the vastness of who He is. All that one could think or envision of our great God still can only be qualified as indescribable.
Ezekiel, a man privileged to see the things of heaven that we could only possibly dream about, still could not properly articulate the true glory of God. His description was basic compared to what his eyes really saw because God’s glory cannot be defined, described, or fully understood with our human scope of perception.
All one can do is live this life with a holy expectation. Live so that you may see beyond the human descriptions. Live in a way that your own eyes can behold His infinitely royal beauty, take in His true wonder, and view the fullness of His majesty for yourself.
One day, all the layers of living in this world that blur our clear vision of God will be pulled back. One day, we will no longer wonder. We will see God face-to-face for ourselves. Oh, what a day that will be when we experience the full revelation of our God!
“For now we see through a glass, darkly; but then face to face: now I know in part; but then shall I know even as also I am known.” 1 Corinthians 13:12
“And they shall see his face; and his name shall be in their foreheads.” Revelation 22:4
If looking at a valley of dead bones isn’t enough, then what follows would have blown my mind! God does some pretty amazing things in the Bible and this by far has to be one of my favorite stories that display His complete sovereignty and grace. It’s one thing to hear of people being brought back from the dead and it’s quite another to see the process unfold in such an extraordinary way, even if it is in a wonderful vision.
Can you imagine experiencing that moment with God, and Him asking what is supposedly a simple but not-so-simple question? “Son of man, can these bones live?” (Ez. 37:3). That question must’ve rolled through his mind, stunning him a bit. Awestruck, his response was as I believe mine would have been, “O Lord God, thou knowest” (Ez. 37:3).
At that point, I believe Ezekiel was probably starting to realize in a whole new way the magnitude of this wonderful God we serve. Looking out over the valley that he was drawn to, and seeing the waste of what was once life and trying to imagine them alive? His response was to appeal to the sovereignty of God – “You know!”
God does know, but perhaps He wants us to know that He knows. Right? It may sound confusing but God puts these questions out there to see where our belief lies. To see if we really see Him as the One who is in control of everything, including those things that appear utterly dead and beyond the hope of restoration.
I don’t know personally how it may have looked, but I can imagine the scene in my head. Going about through that place and seeing nothing but human remains here and there. I would have begun pondering all the “what’s, who’s, why’s and how’s” all this came to pass. What battle took place? Who was involved? Why did it have to come to this? How is it that there were none left to bury the dead? There before him, was a mass of unanswered questions covering a sea of death.
I wonder about that scene with the appearance of bodies upon bodies, stacked and scattered throughout. Lives were gone here and there remained nothing but death and dry bones. Nothing to cheer about, nothing to hope for if it were not for that question that came from the mouth of the Lord: “Can these bones live?”
Death in reverse? Is that what God was asking, he must have wondered? Taking an impossible act of nature and reenacting the process in rewind mode? If the question wasn’t enough, how about the command: “Prophesy upon these bones, and say unto them, O ye dry bones, hear the word of the Lord.” (Ez. 37:4). Standing reverently but in utter stupefaction, Ezekiel must have known that he was at a point of no return in his ministry. God was drawing him deeper into the process. “I don’t know about this,” may have been what most would be thinking as they did as He commanded.
What would it have been like? At the spoken command, to hear an unsettling sound. A noise permeates the atmosphere. Rattling began to disturb the quiet of the valley. In a place that knew only demise and decay would now be re-identified as something miraculous. The rattle was with purpose. It meant things were moving into their proper place. It meant brokenness was being made whole. It was the start of a brand new life where there was none before. This was incredible to not only witness but to be a part of!
After the re-attachment of limbs and other skeletal remains, the real stuff transpired. It’s one thing for bones to find their host bodies and reattach themselves. It’s quite another to witness those very bones, and the nothingness that was left, begin to take on a new life. Sinews and flesh began to re-cover the bleached, parched surfaces. All the while, Ezekiel just watches. What would you do? Like a train wreck, as horrible as it may seem you can’t tear your eyes away from it. Under it all, organs started to reform and the life supply of veins maneuvered their way throughout, spreading the possibility for more life.
But God was not done, yet. He was genuinely reversing the life process. The bodies were now formed and covered “but there was no breath in them” (Ez. 37:8). Then, God gave him a new command: “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” (Ez. 37:9). Ezekiel followed God’s command and said, “So I prophesied as he commanded me, and the breath came into them, and they lived, and stood up upon their feet, an exceeding great army.” (Ez. 37:10). Before they stood, did they gasp at the feel of air entering their lungs once again? When they stood, did they turn to each other recognizing the “what was” and processing the “what is now?”
To see dead bones live in this fashion would have been awesome and beautiful. Think about it. God showed Ezekiel an impossible situation and did a complete turnaround and restored life where only death resided (compare to Israel’s spiritual restoration found in Ezekiel 37:11-14). It’s as if He had His finger on the hands of some big clock and purposefully began to rotate it backward. Spinning it and spinning it until all the death that once was had to let go and make room for new life to come to the forefront once again. What would it have been like to witness this vision?
Don’t you know? We may have not been bones but what remained of us of what the world stripped away was given a new command in the valley. The valley, our lowest point of life, was shaken and rattled until it stood at the command of God. Our lifelessness was renewed when His Spirit breathed in us freshness untold. Before He had a vision of us, we were surrounded by spiritual death. But then there arose potential out of nothingness. Captured by grace and loved on through His mercy, we received in us His gift of a second chance.
There are a lot of things in that particular vision of the valley that would have left me unsettled but I only had to turn to the One who was commanding the change in me and see the love in His eyes for me. I only had to look and believe as He did that, there is something alive here, there is something that can be raised up for me. We have all been in that valley. Vision or not, many have been to the place of impossibility just to see Him make it possible.
To see those bones rise to new life and live would have been awesome. But to see what He has done in us is far better. I don’t know what it would have been like there but I know what it is like here. The Bible says, “Therefore we are buried with him by baptism into death: that like as Christ was raised up from the dead by the glory of the Father, even so we also should walk in newness of life. For if we have been planted together in the likeness of his death, we shall be also in the likeness of his resurrection,” (Romans 6:4-5). Because of Christ, we have received another chance to experience a new life outside of the valley. Just because it appears dead, doesn’t mean it’s so. God can raise up the most impossible of situations.
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“And they shall say, This land that was desolate is become like the garden of Eden; and the waste and desolate and ruined cities are become fenced, and are inhabited.
Then the heathen that are left round about you shall know that I the Lord build the ruined places, and plant that that was desolate: I the Lord have spoken it, and I will do it.” Ezekiel 36:35-36
Archaic and ancient, yet there is beauty within. Rubbled and ruined, but potential peeks through with the willingness to start again, to be reborn with purpose once more.
I must say, I am drawn to history and design in this manner. I love to learn about places of old. I am drawn to those shows and documentaries that feature taking these older places and structures, revitalizing them, restoring their ancient beauty, and making them livable and valuable once more.
If you are inclined to watch such programming, you will see that meticulous care is taken in the restoration process. And the older a place is, with more original features, the chances are the work that needs to be done cannot be done by just any rebuilder. Instead, those who are trained to deal with period pieces and materials are called in to work with their expertise on the structure to remake it to be as close to the original as possible.
God has always been in the rebuilding business. From the time of the Fall, and the Flood, and many points in between and beyond, though His people went through adversity, it was done with the intent of a new and fresh start from their sins and mistakes.
In ancient captivity, the children of Israel lived in bondage to the Babylonians due to their own sins and wayward ways. But God, in this chapter, looked forward to a time of restoration; a time of renewal for His people. A time and a moving that will bring glory to His name and not the dishonor that had been promoted by His people’s unholy living (36:21).
God was going to gather His people from where they had been dispersed and bring them back home (36:24), and the great rebuilding process would begin. Beginning with Cyrus (Ezra 1), followed by the help of other kings, God’s people would return home physically and spiritually, and the ruins would be rebuilt and lives would be restored in their relationship with God.
To accomplish this, God was going to give them a new heart and a new spirit (36:26-27). God was not just satisfied with cities becoming occupied again, but He wanted inner transformation. He wanted hearts that would make Him feel welcomed once more. A heart that would be in love with the Father and His ways once more. Those were the ruins God was most interested in rebuilding. The outward buildings were nice, but the new inner man who was being transformed, this is the real beauty God wants to see. To Him, this matters the most.
When David sought to be restored, he prayed, “Create in me a clean heart, O God; and renew a right spirit within me” (Psalm 51:10). He wanted to be restored to the Father because his own sins caused a separation. He wanted to be rebuilt from the inside out.
Today, our heavenly Father is still rebuilding ruins. Much like David, when a heart turns to Him in true humility and repentance, they can be restored. Jesus Christ became the way for this to happen: “For God so loved the world, that he gave his only begotten Son, that whosoever believeth in him should not perish, but have everlasting life. For God sent not his Son into the world to condemn the world; but that the world through him might be saved” (John 3:16-17); “Jesus saith unto him, I am the way, the truth, and the life: no man cometh unto the Father, but by me” (John 14:6).
When we come to Him and accept Him as Savior (Acts 2:38-39; John 3:5; Romans 6:4), He takes the old us and makes us something new: “Therefore if any man be in Christ, he is a new creature: old things are passed away; behold, all things are become new” (2 Corinthians 5:17), and we are ruins no more.
“Jesus answered and said unto him, Verily, verily, I say unto thee, Except a man be born again, he cannot see the kingdom of God” (John 3:3) – this is where the rebuilding begins.
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