We just looked at the first four
verses of this chapter for our Bible study. And for anyone who was not able
to be in here, I wanna give you a quick summary of what these
verses said, and then we'll continue on from there. Ezekiel, being called of God
to preach, said in verse one, The hand of the Lord was upon
me, and carried me out in the spirit of the Lord, and set me
down in the midst of the valley which was full of bones, and
caused me to pass by them round about, and behold, there were
very many in the open valley, and lo, they were very dry. If you look at verse 11, it says,
Then he said unto me, Son of man, these bones are the whole
house of Israel. These dead, dry, out of joint,
scattered bones represent all of God's elect people. that He specifically chose to
save and chose to give life to before the foundation of this
world. They represent all of God's chosen
people. And all of God's people are born
into this world dead. Dead. That's men and women, alright? Dead. This is a dead world. We talk about our brother just
went to be with the Lord, and you say, well, he died. Actually,
he just lived. He really just lived. He just
actually was rid of death. That's what, death died. He lived. That's this world. By nature,
very dead. And verse two says, He caused
me to pass by them round about, and behold, there were very many
in the open valley, and lo, they were very dry. And he said unto
me, Son of man, can these bones live? Can they live? If they are God's chosen bones,
they can. If they are bones that the Father
gave to Christ, they can. If they are bones that Christ
humbled himself for and came down into the midst of, and took
upon himself the nature of, and made himself to be joined together
with, bone of their bone. If they are bones who Christ
was broken for so that they would never be broken, if they're bones
who Christ died for in order to keep, then yes, these bones
can live. And this is how they will live. Verse 3, He said unto me, Son
of man, can these bones live? And I answered, O Lord God, thou
knowest. This is in your hands. If they're
going to live, it's going to be by your knowledge. It's going
to be by your choosing. It's going to be by your doing.
O Lord God, thou knowest. Thou knowest. Verse four. Again, he said unto me, prophesy
upon these bones and say unto them, O ye dry bones, hear the
word of the Lord. If men and women are going to
live, If dead in trespasses and sins, man or woman is going to
be made alive, it's going to be by the preaching of the word
of the Lord. Paul said, I'm not ashamed of
the gospel of Christ, for it is the power of God unto salvation. He said, the preaching of the
cross is to them that perish foolishness. I know the cross. I got the cross. Can't we move on to something
else? I mean, Christ died on the cross
for the sins of his people. I got that. Aren't we gonna go
on to other things? We're just going to talk about
they hung him on the cross and you know, father, forgive them.
We're just going to keep saying that over and over and over. Well, that's, that's foolishness. The preaching of the cross is
to them that perish foolishness, but unto us, which are saved,
it is the power of God. He said it pleased God by the
very thing that men call foolishness, preaching, preaching the cross
to save them that believe. And not just preaching anything,
but preaching the Word of the Lord. And here is the Word of the Lord,
okay? Here is the Word of the Lord. The Lord God Almighty said,
Ezekiel, this is what you say, verse 5. Thus saith the Lord God unto
these bones." When God speaks, He speaks right
to the bones. When God speaks, He speaks right
to the bones. He speaks directly to the heart
of His bones. His word is not just a general
word. That's what people think. You
know, well, God said some things and it's just kind of out there.
You can get a lot of it on the Internet now. You know, it's. Listen to it if you want to,
don't listen to it if you don't want to. He didn't say things for men
to just pay attention to or not pay attention to. Heed or not
heed. His word is not a general word. When God speaks, he speaks directly
to his dead, dry sinner, and this is what he says. Behold. Verse five, thus saith the Lord
God unto these bones, behold. Behold me. Look. Live. Verse five, thus saith the Lord
God unto these bones, behold. I will. Whenever I write my notes,
I'm interesting. Most people say, how come you
don't type your notes? I could never do on a computer what I
do to a page. I write tiny. I write huge. I can take up half a page with
two words. That's what I did with the two words, I will. That's
because I was so passionate about it when I wrote it. If I scream
this as loud as I've written it, I'm going to scare everybody.
I didn't know if I was going to do that or not, and I'm not.
I'm not doing it. But I'm hoping that the Spirit of God will scream
it. I really am. Thus saith the Lord God unto
these bones, Behold, I will. I will not want you. I pray the Spirit of God Almighty,
come Holy Spirit, heavenly dove, with all your quickening. I pray
that the Spirit will just knock somebody in the heart with this.
I do. When he, the word of the Lord,
when he comes to his bone, he doesn't say, won't you? Shouldn't
you? Isn't it about time that you? When He comes, I'm telling you,
we're about to see something happens. When quickening comes,
it's a quickening. You ever had to get quick, quick? Something happened and it's time
to get quick right now? You pull out and realize, I'm
about to die. Time to get quick. But when a quickening comes,
these bones get quick. I will. I will. Hold your place right here in
Ezekiel and go to Isaiah 40. Isaiah 40 verse 6, the voice said cry and he said
what shall I cry? All flesh is grass. And all the goodliness thereof
is as the flower of the field. The grass withereth, the flower
fadeth, because the Spirit of the Lord bloweth upon it. Surely
the people is grass. The grass withereth, the flower
fadeth, but the word of our God shall stand forever. O Zion that
bringest good tidings, get thee up into the high mountain. O
Jerusalem that bringest good tidings, lift up thy voice with
strength. Lift it up, be not afraid, say
unto the cities of Judah, Behold your God! Behold, the Lord God
will come with strong hand, and his arm shall rule for him. Behold, his reward is with him,
and his work before him. He shall feed his flock like
a shepherd. He shall gather the lambs with
his arm and carry them in his bosom and shall gently lead those
that are with young. He, he, he, behold him. Stop
looking to you and behold him. Stop turning to man And behold him. That's what man
does, man looks to man, man looks to man, man looks to man until
God comes and says stop. Look at Isaiah 42. This is the office of Christ.
Speaking of Christ, verse 1 says, Behold my servant. Man, this is what happens when
the gospel comes. This is what happens when life
comes. Behold my servant, whom I uphold,
mine elect, in whom my soul delighteth, I put my spirit upon him. He shall bring forth judgment.
to the Gentiles. Look at verse 8. He said, I am
the Lord, that is my name, and my glory will I not give to another,
neither my praise to graven images. Look at Isaiah 43, verse 11. It says, I, even I, am the Lord,
and beside me there is no Savior. I have declared and have saved
and I have showed when there was no strange God among you.
Therefore, you are my witnesses, saith the Lord, that I am God. Yea, before the day was, I am
he, and there is none that can deliver out of my hand. I will
work, and who shall let it? I, I, I. Look at Isaiah 65. Verse 1 says, I am salt of them that asked
not for me. I am found of them that sought
me not." Why? They were dead. They were dead. I said, behold
me. That's how life comes to dead,
dry sinners. The word of the Lord God Almighty
says, behold. You, behold. You, you. You know, when the
Lord raised Lazarus from the dead, he didn't give a general
call. He said, Lazarus. Flip back to Ezekiel 37. Verse five, thus saith the Lord
God unto these bones. Behold, I will cause breath to
enter into you and you shall live. I will and you shall. If I do, you will. I will do something. And you
shall see the result of it. Verse five, he said, I will cause
breath to enter into you. If breath enters into you, it's
going to be because I caused it to enter into you. I wrote verse five and six just
so big. I almost should have used two
pages for this right here. So you, you listen to this real
loud. Okay. Verse five. Thus saith
the Lord God unto these bones. Behold, I will cause breath to
enter into you, and you shall live. And I will lay sinews upon
you, and will bring up flesh upon you, and cover you with
skin, and put breath in you, and you shall live. And you shall
know that I am the Lord. Not just this religious God Jesus
that everybody's talking about. This is what he said right there.
I will. I will. I'd love to preach this
loud one day. I will. I will. I will. I will. I will. And at the end of it
all, he said, you're going to know that I am. Thus saith the Lord, I am, I
am God. I am your God. Behold me. Behold me. You've beheld the
law, you've beheld your flesh, you've beheld your morality,
you've beheld your mama and your grandmama. Behold me. After I do everything
that I'm gonna do to you, you're gonna know that I'm the Lord.
I'm the sovereign Lord over you. He said, Ezekiel, tell them that. Tell them that. Say, O ye dry
bones, hear the word of the Lord. Thus saith the Lord. And then
tell them that. Verse seven, Ezekiel said, So I prophesied as I was commanded. And as I prophesied, there was
a noise. When God speaks, there always
is. And it's not an outward open
noise. That's what false religion is.
False religion is a loud, obnoxious, open noise. That's what false religion is. It's the noise of man. The lie of man. That's what the
lie of man is. It's a outward open noise. That actually all becomes silent.
People start out in false religion loud, loud. We're going to get
the flesh real loud. We're going to make the flesh
get as loud as the flesh can get. And then the word of the
Lord comes and that shuts up. And that goes silent. to the point that all that is
heard is a noise in the soul. All of a sudden there's a great,
disturbing, shattering, disquieting noise in the soul. Verse 7, so I prophesied as I
was commanded and as I prophesied there was a noise and behold
a shaking. That's the shaking of man's false
hope that he had been standing on. That's the shaking of the ground
of man's false assurance that he thought he had. It's a shaking of his confidence
in himself. It's a shaking up of what he
knows about God and what he knows about man. He starts to realize,
I don't think I know God, I don't think I know me. God's not like
I thought he was. I'm not like I thought I was. All of a sudden, it's a shaking
of the fear of standing before this holy, just judge of the
earth with whom we now realize we're going to have to do. Verse seven, so I prophesied
as I was commanded, and as I prophesied, there was a noise, and behold,
a shaking, and the bones came together, bone to his bone. It's not just that any old hip
bone attached to any old femur bone. This particular man's hip
bone found its way through the bones and attached to that particular
man's femur bone. When our Lord said, I'm going
to do this for you. He didn't mean I'm going to do
it for y'all. He meant I'm going to do it for you. Individually. I'm going to restore you, not
something similar to you. You, I will restore you. Verse seven, so I prophesied
as I was commanded, and as I prophesied, there was a noise, and behold,
a shaking, and the bones came together, bone to his bone, and
when I beheld, lo, the sinews and the flesh came up upon them,
and the skin covered them above, but there was no breath in them. In order for true life to be
given, in order for it to be returned and restored to God's
people, A work of God can't only be done on the outside, a work
of God has to be done on the inside. Verse nine says, then he said
unto me, prophesy unto the wind. That's God's Holy Spirit. Our
Lord told Nicodemus, the wind blows where it listeth. That's
how it is with everyone that is born of the spirit. Our Lord
said, you cry out for the Spirit to come and to breathe that quickening
breath of life into these saints. The word of the Lord in the mouth
of the preacher must have the breath of the Spirit of God.
Must, in order for it to be blessed, in order for it to be made effectual
to the heart, the Spirit has to move. Verse nine, then said he unto
me, prophesy unto the wind, prophesy, son of man, and say to the wind,
thus saith the Lord God, come from the four winds, oh, breath,
and breathe upon these slain that they may live. So I prophesied
as he commanded me, and the breath came into them, and they lived
and stood up upon their feet in exceeding great army, by the
word of the Lord, by the hand of the Lord, by the spirit of
the Lord, they lived. Verse 11. Then he said unto me, Son of
man, these bones are the whole house of Israel. These are God's people. And he said right here, this
is how you can know who they are. This is how you can know who I've done this for. This
is how you can know that I've done this work for them. This will be the evidence that
I've given them life. Verse 11. And he said unto me, Son of man,
these bones are the whole house of Israel. Behold, they say. All right, this is what will
come out of their mouth. This will be the confession of
their heart that they'll make known to everybody. Behold, they say, our bones are
dried and our hope is lost, for we are cut off for our parts. No, you've just been made alive. You were dried. Your hope was lost. You used to be cut off from your
parts. But you're made new in the Lord
your God. You're complete in Christ your
Savior and your Redeemer. They say, well, we sure don't
feel like it. We feel so dead. We feel so hopeless. We feel so separated from God.
I don't feel like a child of God. I don't feel like a believer. Verse 12, therefore prophesy
and say unto them, thus saith the Lord God, behold, oh my people,
I will open your graves and cause you to come up out of your graves
and bring you into the land of Israel and you shall know that
I am the Lord when I have opened your graves. Oh my people and
brought you up out of your graves and shall put my spirit in you,
and you shall live, and I shall place you in your own land, then
shall you know that I, the Lord, have spoken it and performed
it, saith the Lord. God's people, even though they
have been made alive and made complete and in Christ been made
to stand upright again, They're still living in the valley. They're
still in the valley. As long as we're in this world,
we are still in the valley of the shadow of death. But our
Lord promised his people, I'm going to take you out of this
place. I'm going to deliver you from
your body of death. I feel like I'm living in a grave
here. Your body ever feel like a grave
to you? I feel like I'm enclosed in a grave. This body is so dead. Our bones are dried. Every time
I look at this, I think my hope is lost. You know, you think, well, maybe
I can, I can clean this thing up a little bit. Maybe I can
make it a little bit better. I think I've lost all, I think
my hope is lost. In this flesh, I feel so cut
off from God. This is a grave. And he said,
I promise you, I'm going to deliver you from this worldly grave of
death that your soul is living in. And I'm going to bring you
up. I'm going to bring you to a place
that you will know to be your own land. And when I do, you're gonna know
that what I promised you, I performed it. I make a covenant promise
to you, and if I promise, I'll do it. You have my covenant promise.
You have my covenant promise on that. Now, the Lord willing,
tonight, we're gonna hear a little bit more about that covenant
promise, okay? He said, I promise you, I'm gonna take you out of
here. I'm gonna raise you up. And the Lord willing, we'll look
at that tonight.