Today, I am reading and commenting on  Ezekiel 37-38.

I have always loved Ezekiel’s vison of the valley of dry bones.  It has such an important lesson for us.  It goes into great detail describing how God was able to turn a pile of bones that had no flesh of any kind left on them into a vast army.  The people who those bones had originally belonged to were long dead, but God was able to bring them back to life.  We read that and think that it teaches the lesson that no matter how moribund a group, an organization, may seem, God’s Spirit can bring it back to life.  And it does indeed teach that lesson, but I never noticed that there is another, related, lesson right at the beginning of that story.  The story starts with God asking Ezekiel if the bones could live and Ezekiel responds by saying, “Sovereign Lord, you alone know.”  Ezekiel did not look at those bones and say, “They can never live again.”  Nor did he say, “By the power of God, these bones will live again.”  No, he said, “Lord, you alone know if these bones can live again.”  So, while we are correct to interpret this vision as telling us that nothing and no one is so dead that cannot bring them back to life, we also need to remember that only God knows if the dry bones will live again.

Today’s passage ends with Ezekiel’s prophecy concerning Gog invading Israel.  He writes that God will muster a great army by allying with many nations to attack Israel when Israel was a land which had recovered from war and was at peace.  Many people read this prophecy and attempt to figure out what current countries represent those mentioned here.  Then, once they have figured out what countries will be part of the alliance with Gog, they try to determine when this prophecy will be fulfilled.  For all intents and purposes this prophecy says that all the nations will gather to make war.  What we often miss is God’s reason for allowing this to happen.  God allows this great war to happen so that He would have the opportunity show His great might and power.  When this battle comes to its conclusion, those who took part will know that our God is Lord over all.  Time and again, God gave Ezekiel a prophecy concerning the fall of different nations, and at, or near, the end of those prophecies, God tells Ezekiel, “Then they will know that I am the Lord.”

I use the daily Bible reading schedule from “The Bible.net” for my daily Bible reading.