By: Pastor Jarren Rogers

“Jesus, You’re the one who saves us / Constantly creates us into something new / Jesus, surely you will find us / Surely our Messiah will make all things new” – Gungor

We live in the valley of dry bones.

Your neighbors, your co-workers, the bank teller, the grocery store worker, the postman – how many people do we encounter each day who are but dry bones? Creaking and toiling their way through life with no faith, no longing, and no rest. “Our bones are dried up and our hope is gone; we are cut off”, they cry (Ezekiel 37:11).

We live in the valley of dry bones.

We spot their white, rattling figures in our workplaces and schools. They fill our governments and sit next to us in restaurants. They wait with us in the BMV. Their bony fingers hand us our change as we pay for our groceries. Their sightless eyes meet ours as we order our food, but there is no life in them.

We live in the valley of dry bones.

We hear their groaning as the bounce into the church doors, Sunday after Sunday. They come in dry and they leave dry.

We live in the valley of dry bones.

We feel there is no hope. This is a valley of dry bones after all. What solace can be found here? It’s too far gone. There’s nothing to be done. Our ears ring with the question, “Can these bones live?” (Ezekiel 37:3).

We live in the valley of dry bones.

But God is at work, even in such a desolate place as this. “The Sovereign Lord says to these bones: I will make breath enter you, and you will come to life. I will attach tendons to you and make flesh come upon you and cover you with skin; I will put breath in you, and you will come to life. Then you will know that I am the Lord” (Ezekiel 37:5-6).

We live in the valley of dry bones.

But where once was bone, tendons and flesh appeared and skin covers. Breath filled their lungs and these dry bones now have life. True Life. Life that was spoken into them by their Creator.

We live in the valley of dry bones.

But, thank God, for our Creator sent His Son, born to a virgin. His Son ushered in a Kingdom that spoke Truth and Life into these dry bones. It was because of His sacrifice that bone can now be rendered into flesh.

We live in a valley of dry bones.

But there is hope.

Parents: Explain to your children how, even though we live in a fallen world, there is hope for the future.