CaryCOG | Cary Church of God
Today's Message: "God's Army Rising"
By: Pastor Patrick Jensen
Ezekiel 37:1-14 NKJV
I. God’s army rises when we go to the slain (37:1-2)
a. What we have first is a heavy hand upon the prophet Ezekiel. Indeed some translations convey the following, “I felt the pressure of Yahweh’s hand…”
b. Note that the bones were situated in a valley
Quote:
Look down, O Lord, with pitying eye;
See Adam’s race in ruin lie;
Sin spreads its trophies o’er the ground,
And scatters slaughtered heaps around.
And can these mouldering corpses live?
And can these perished bones revive?
That, mighty God, to thee is known;
That wondrous work is all thy own.
Phillip Doddridge (1799)
II. God’s army rises when we decree a prophetic narrative (37:3-10)
a. I would like to begin this section with a closer inspection of verse 11. For this is the narrative of the slain.
b. Now, let us look at the prophetic narrative the church is to bring.
c. Prophecy is the invocation of sometimes shocking and odd images that provide a striking contrast between the dead’s reality and a new reality coming. We must set out to undo the old templates of perception by coming with bold language set to our souls, proclaimed to our situation, families, and communities. What if God asked you to preach to bones? This shocking image jolts one from hopelessness. As Fox has said in his commentary on Ezekiel (see quote)
Quote:
Strange, shocking and bizarre images are needed when one seeks to break down old frameworks of perception and to create new ones.
M.V. Fox
III. God’s army rises when we lay claim to the land (37:12-14)
a. Now we find where the people of God has risen to the occasion of faith and utterly failed in times past.
b. The promise in v12 is one of resurrection, the opening of the graves and the return to the land of promise.
c. Indeed, we find again the impetus behind the miracle in v. 14 – so that all will “know” the Lord. Knowing the Lord, Him getting glory, His kingdom coming is the end of any means of human instrumentality that He uses. He must get the glory! When we are debt free – He must get the glory! When we plant a church – He must get the glory! When we go to the field to reap a harvest of souls – He must get the glory!
Quote:
But if thy Spirit deign to breath,
Life spreads through all the realms of death:
Dry bones obey thy powerful voice;
They move, they awaken, they rejoice:
So when thy trumpet’s awful sound
Shall shake the heavens and rend the ground,
Dead saints shall from their tombs arise,
And spring to life beyond the skies.
Phillip Doddridge (1799)