Can These Bones Live?

Every so often I think that it might be good to be an ascetic, a hermit; these past few weeks of intentional isolation have really disabused me of that notion!  I miss the people of the Church, and singing in the choir.  And Sunday School.  I’m lonely for those others in Vestal Community Band and the Madrigal Choir; how good it is to be out with friends and make loud noises.  I’d even like to wait in line at restaurants.  One day looks like the others–has the sky fallen?  Those of us fortunate to hear the Bible read, this weekend, will be glad to hear a pre-Easter message that “It’s not over yet!”  I’ve been sustained by the words of Henry F. Lyte’s old (1847!) hymn–“When other helpers fail and comforts flee, Help of the Helpless, O abide with me…”

Our first reading is from Ezekiel 37:1-14, the famous Dry Bones allegory.  Ezekiel was probably in one of the early groups deported to Babylon.  The world as they knew it was turned upside-down:  food laws, the entire Torah, family ties–all were held in derision.  Was even GOD in this strange place?  We might as well curl up and die…Can these bones ever live again?  But comes God’s promise, a HOLY commitment to the renewal of Life!  Death will not have the last word, though the bones be very dry. “Change and decay in all around I see; O Thou who changest not, abide with me.”

St. Paul addresses this in his powerful Eighth Chapter of the Letter to the Romans.  I like the verse that assures his audience, “…if the Spirit of Him who raised Jesus from the dead dwells in you,  [God] who raised Christ from the dead will give life to your mortal bodies also through the Spirit that dwells in you.” (v.11)  (What is this “if”?  And what is life to our mortal bodies?  We can talk about this some other time…)  This Spirit seems to be the same RUACH which blew breath into dried-up Israel in Ezekiel’s story, and the same divine breath which restored Jesus on Easter morning.  Why stop there?  Can these bones live again?  “Who, like thyself, my guide and stay can be?  Through cloud and sunshine, Lord, abide with me.”

Ah, it’s traditional to visit the house and grave of Lazarus, just before Easter (John 11).  This well-told  story of John is the final meeting of Jesus with the outcast, in this case his dead friend Lazarus.  It also paves the way for Jesus’ own resurrection, the message being that “Yes, these bones CAN live again!”   John explores the pathos of sisters Mary & Martha, the terminal despair of other mourners, and the resultant faith of witnesses.  “I am the resurrection and the life.  Those who believe in me, even though they may die, will live.”  “Where is death’s sting, where, grave, thy victory?  I triumph still, if thou abide with me.”

The vision is one for every day, with it’s own share of death.  We who’ve been mainly pampered are face-to-face with isolation and fear of “getting it”.  Some around us have endured poverty and disdain for generations.  Some have decided against the message, and are hedging their bets on Today’s  crime & mayhem, or legally (?) grabbing power and material goods from the needy and already despairing.  Into the Valley of Broken Dreams echoes an unrelenting question, Can These Bones Live?  But “Heaven’s morning breaks, and earth’s vain shadows flee; in life, in death, O Lord, abide with me.”

God Bless Us, Every One                                 Horace Brown King

My encounter with Scripture assigned to the upcoming weekend can be witnessed every Tuesday at this spot on Facebook; or at horacebrownking.com