Reflections - Pentecost and Dried Up Bones

This week, I am thinking about the wind, the air we breathe, and some dried up bones.

Weird, I know - but it's this Sunday is Pentecost. It's the Sunday when we don the liturgical color of red and celebrate the birthday of the church. It's the story of how the disciples - after Jesus has ascended to heaven - are waiting around to see what will happen next. As Jesus promised, God sends the Holy Spirit in the form of wind and flames to fill them up and give them the ability to spread Jesus' message of love to the world.

(You can read the Pentecost story in Act 2: 1-21.)

But there is another scripture story I have been focusing on this week from the Old Testament.   It's kind of a creepy story- but the scripture telling the story of Ezekiel's dream about the valley of the dead bones is something that I can relate to.

Read Ezekiel 37:1-14

While the people of God were living far away from their homeland in Babylon, they often thought about their homeland. Prophets like Jeremiah and Ezekiel gave hope to the people. Ezekiel was a prophet that had a dream or vision. IN the dream Ezekiel was in a deserted valley where many people had died.  There were many bones in this valley and they were very, very dry.

God asked Ezekiel, “Can these bones live?”

“Oh God, you are the one that knows” answered Ezekiel.

“Speak to the bones,” God said. 

“Say, O dry bones, God will cause breath to enter you and you shall live.”

So in his dream Ezekiel spoke to the dry bones. And the bones rattled and came together and were covered with skin. But they looked like people with out any life in them—they did not breathe.

Then Ezekiel said, “Come from the four winds, O breath. Breathe upon these people—so that they may live." 

And breath came in to the bodies and life came into the bodies.  They stood on their feet and the dry valley was suddenly alive with too many people to count.

 I can relate - and you can probably - too - because we all have times that we feel like those dry bones. that we have no life or hope in us.  And I love the part where the bodies have come back together and are covered with skin - but still have no life in them.  I get it. When I haven't been praying and don't feel connected to God I feel exactly like this.  Like some bones just standing there waiting and lifeless.  Also  -  we can all often feel a little like the disciples in the Pentecost story - just hanging around waiting something to happen. 

The Holy Spirit is often described as God breathing or the winds blowing.  The Holy Spirit described as air is such an interesting image to me - mostly because air is the one thing that our bodies are completely are dependent on.  I mean, we can go with out food for long time and without water for a couple days - but our bodies can only survive a couple minutes without air. Most of us breathe involuntarily and we do it without even thinking about it. Yet it's the thing that keeps us functioning.  

For me, this is an analogy that works because my body can't live this life without breathing air and I really don't function well when I am not relying on God's love and holy spirit 

Here's what I am thinking this week: When we feel stressed. When we are waiting. When we are homesick or missing something or someone. When we feel like a lifeless body of dry bones - we need to stop. Breathe. And thank God for the gift of life. 

In Genesis, God breathed life in to the man God had created.

God showed the Prophet Ezekiel that his breath and spirit can give new life to some dried up old bones.

And God came in the wind and filled the disciples with the Holy Spirit and the desire to spread the message of God's love in the world.

God will fill us to, with the Holy Spirit - we just need to spot and breathe it in.