God is omnipotent—meaning He has all power on heaven and on earth. But for reasons we do not understand, He chooses to work through people.
Ezekiel recorded an example of this when he wrote how God gave him a vision of a valley full of dead bones. As Ezekiel looked over the scene, God asked him, [C]an these bones live? (Ez. 37:3a NKJV)
Ezekiel knew God could make dead bones live, but He did not understand God’s plan. So, with the voice of one familiar with the ways of his inscrutable God, he replied, O Lord God, You know. (v. 3b)
Today almost everyone knows the story. In fact, it is such a familiar story that we might gloss over how God made a humble human being an instrument of such great and incomprehensible power.
The dead bones represented the Israelites, and God did want them to live. He could have spoken life into them directly without Ezekiel's help, but He chose to use a person. God said to Ezekiel, Prophesy to these bones and say to them, “O dry bones, hear the word of the Lord! (v. 4)
Ezekiel recorded, perhaps with a sense of irony and resignation, that he followed the Lord's instructions. So I prophesied . . . there was a noise, and suddenly a rattling; and the bones came together bone to bone . . . and breath came into them, and they lived, and stood upon their feet, an exceedingly great army.”(v. 7,10b)
Death cannot stand against God's Word. Even when spoken by a man, God’s Word brings life. Israel would live.
Originally published October 13, 1989.
Picture: Commercial landscaping, West Fargo, 2009. Photo by Solveig.
Ezekiel recorded an example of this when he wrote how God gave him a vision of a valley full of dead bones. As Ezekiel looked over the scene, God asked him, [C]an these bones live? (Ez. 37:3a NKJV)
Ezekiel knew God could make dead bones live, but He did not understand God’s plan. So, with the voice of one familiar with the ways of his inscrutable God, he replied, O Lord God, You know. (v. 3b)
Today almost everyone knows the story. In fact, it is such a familiar story that we might gloss over how God made a humble human being an instrument of such great and incomprehensible power.
The dead bones represented the Israelites, and God did want them to live. He could have spoken life into them directly without Ezekiel's help, but He chose to use a person. God said to Ezekiel, Prophesy to these bones and say to them, “O dry bones, hear the word of the Lord! (v. 4)
Ezekiel recorded, perhaps with a sense of irony and resignation, that he followed the Lord's instructions. So I prophesied . . . there was a noise, and suddenly a rattling; and the bones came together bone to bone . . . and breath came into them, and they lived, and stood upon their feet, an exceedingly great army.”(v. 7,10b)
Death cannot stand against God's Word. Even when spoken by a man, God’s Word brings life. Israel would live.
Originally published October 13, 1989.
Picture: Commercial landscaping, West Fargo, 2009. Photo by Solveig.
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