I was blessed to be raised by two wonderful human beings. They taught me by example to be fair, honest, hardworking, and trustworthy. My father was a true man of his word. When he made a commitment, he kept it, even when it wasn’t easy or convenient. Dad was a Barbershop Chorus singer and an active Mason. He poured hours of time into both those activities, never missing a rehearsal or a meeting unless he was very sick. On the night he died, he had gone to chorus practice and came home with a headache, which was the first symptom of the brain aneurism that took his life. All of his friends from both his lodge and his chorus talked about him being a “man of his word.” I knew this to be true as his daughter. He never made a promise to me that he didn’t keep, and if he felt he couldn’t do something, he never promised that he would.

I thought about my Dad today as I was reading Ezekiel 37, the famous “dry bones gonna rise again” passage. Ezekiel was the Southern Kingdom of Judah’s prophet during the exile in Babylonia and was told by God to prophesy to the Jewish refugees about the future of their nation. God showed him a vision of a valley filled with dry dead bones as far as the eye could see. God asked Ezekiel if he thought the bones could live, and Ezekiel replied, “Oh God, only you know.”

There are three things to take away from his response. First, Ezekiel had no hope in the bones, but great hope in God. Second, he certainly would never presume to know that God was planning to do with the bones. And third, while he didn’t know, he was confident that God knew.

This is a beautiful reminder to us when our hope has dried out. When we feel helpless and find ourselves at a loss for what to do next, when some aspect of our joy has flamed out and we can’t reignite the spark anymore, and when something has truly died in us, that is when we need to remember that God can bring anything back to life by simply saying the word. Or in our case, the Word: The Word that was with God in the beginning, the Word that was God, the Word we call Jesus.

Then God told Ezekiel to command the winds to breathe new life into the bones by the power of the Spirit. When Ezekiel did this, the bones knit themselves together and formed muscle and sinew until they stood on their feet as one huge living army.

Take a moment now to read the end of this passage. It is a lovely statement of how God always keeps his promises.

Ezekiel 37 (New Revised Standard Version)

¹¹ Then he said to me, “Mortal, these bones are the whole house of Israel. They say, ‘Our bones are dried up, and our hope is lost; we are cut off completely.’ ¹² Therefore prophesy and say to them: Thus says the Lord God: I am going to open your graves and bring you up from your graves, O my people, and I will bring you back to the land of Israel. ¹³ And you shall know that I am the Lord when I open your graves and bring you up from your graves, O my people.¹⁴ I will put my spirit within you, and you shall live, and I will place you on your own soil; then you shall know that I, the Lord, have spoken and will act, says the Lord.”

The bones that were the people of Israel were brought back to life even after all the destruction their apostasy brought on their heads. They indeed would return as one nation to Jerusalem and would rebuild the Temple in due time.

God always keeps his promises! He is a man of his word, and in his word is full of the power to heal, revive, and breathe new life. Do you need God’s life-giving intervention today? Call on his Spirit.

Rise Again by Becca Ziegler