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Why Is Ezekiel 37 the Most Important Chapter in the Bible · truthunedited

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  Speaker 1: Picture this. A prophet stands alone in a valley, stretched
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  Speaker 1: as far as the eye can see. But this is
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  Speaker 1: no ordinary landscape. The ground is covered completely covered with
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  Speaker 1: human bones, thousands upon thousands of skeletons, bleached white by
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  Speaker 1: the sun, scattered in every direction. The silence is deafening.
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  Speaker 1: The smell of death hangs in the air. This is
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  Speaker 1: the end of everything. Then God asks the most impossible
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  Speaker 1: question ever posed to a human being? Can these bones live?
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  Speaker 1: What would you say? What could anyone say when standing
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  Speaker 1: in the middle of a graveyard of the entire nation?
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  Speaker 1: This isn't just another Bible story. This is Ezekiel thirty seven,
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  Speaker 1: the chapter that reveals God's ultimate power over death itself,
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  Speaker 1: the prophecy that predicted Israel's impossible return after two thousand
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  Speaker 1: years of exile, and the promise that continues to unfold
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  Speaker 1: before our eyes today. What happened next in that valley
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  Speaker 1: defied every law or of nature, challenged every limitation of
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  Speaker 1: human understanding, and proved that with God, absolutely nothing is impossible.
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  Speaker 1: Are you ready to witness the most dramatic resurrection scene
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  Speaker 1: in scripture? Something extraordinary happened to Ezekiel one day. The
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  Speaker 1: Bible tells us in Ezekiel thirty seven one, that the
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  Speaker 1: hand of the Lord was upon me, and he brought
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  Speaker 1: me out in the spirit of the Lord and set
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  Speaker 1: me down in the middle of the valley. It was
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  Speaker 1: full of bones. This wasn't a dream. This wasn't something
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  Speaker 1: Ezekiel imagined while sitting in his house. God's hand, his
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  Speaker 1: actual power, grabbed hold of the prophet and transported him somewhere.
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  Speaker 1: The spirit of the Lord lifted him up and carried
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  Speaker 1: him to a specific location. When Ezekiel landed, he found
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  Speaker 1: himself standing in the middle of a valley, not on
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  Speaker 1: the edge where he could observe from a safe distance,
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  Speaker 1: not on a hill overlooking the scene. Right in the
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  Speaker 1: middle of it. God Deliver placed him there, surrounded on
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  Speaker 1: all sides by what he was about to see. The
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  Speaker 1: valley stretched out before him, and immediately Ezekiel knew this
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  Speaker 1: was no ordinary place. God had brought him here for
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  Speaker 1: a reason. Something important was about to happen. The prophet
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  Speaker 1: stood there, probably trying to process where he was and
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  Speaker 1: what was happening. He had experienced God's power before, he
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  Speaker 1: had seen visions and heard God's voice, but this time
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  Speaker 1: felt different. This time God physically moved him from one
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  Speaker 1: place to another through the power of the spirit. Ezekiel
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  Speaker 1: couldn't have gotten to this valley on his own. He
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  Speaker 1: didn't choose to come here. God chose it for him.
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  Speaker 1: God wanted him to see something specific, something that would
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  Speaker 1: change everything. The fact that God's hand was upon Ezekiel
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  Speaker 1: shows us the intensity of this moment. This wasn't a
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  Speaker 1: gentle touch or a subtle prompting. This was God taking
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  Speaker 1: full can control, moving his profit exactly where he needed
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  Speaker 1: him to be. Ezekiel was living among the exiles in Babylon,
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  Speaker 1: probably going about his normal day, when suddenly God's spirit
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  Speaker 1: swept him away. There was no time to prepare, no warning,
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  Speaker 1: no chance to say goodbye to anyone. One moment he
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  Speaker 1: was in one place. The next moment he was standing
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  Speaker 1: in this valley. This is how God sometimes works in
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  Speaker 1: our lives. He doesn't always give us advanced notice. He
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  Speaker 1: doesn't always explain what's about to happen. He just moves
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  Speaker 1: us into position and shows us what he wants us
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  Speaker 1: to see. As Ezekiel stood there, he began to take
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  Speaker 1: in the scene around him. The valley was full of bones,
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  Speaker 1: not just a few scattered remains, not a small battlefield
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  Speaker 1: where soldiers had fallen. The entire valley floor was covered
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  Speaker 1: with human bones as far as his eyes could see.
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  Speaker 1: Ezekiel thirty seven too describes what happened next. And he
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  Speaker 1: led me around among them, And behold there were very
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  Speaker 1: many on the surface of the valley. And behold they
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  Speaker 1: were very dry. God made Ezekiel walk through them. Step
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  Speaker 1: by step, the prophet moved among thousands upon thousands of skeletons.
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  Speaker 1: Everywhere he looked bones to his left, bones to his right,
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  Speaker 1: more bones behind him, and in front of him, nothing
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  Speaker 1: but the remains of what used to be living, breathing,
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  Speaker 1: human beings. The sheer number was overwhelming. This wasn't the
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  Speaker 1: aftermath of a single battle. This was the complete destruction
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  Speaker 1: of an entire population. And the Bible emphasizes something crucial
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  Speaker 1: about these bones. They were very dry, not recently dead,
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  Speaker 1: not fresh remains with any flesh still clinging to them.
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  Speaker 1: These bones had been here for a long long time.
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  Speaker 1: The sun had bleached them white, the wind had scattered
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  Speaker 1: them across the valley floor. Any moisture, any life that
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  Speaker 1: once existed in these bodies had completely vanished. They were
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  Speaker 1: as dead as dead could possibly be. There was no
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  Speaker 1: hint of life anywhere in this valley, just death, complete, total,
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  Speaker 1: absolute death. Ezekiel walked and walked, and no matter how
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  Speaker 1: far he went, there were always more bones. The magnitude
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  Speaker 1: of what he was seeing must have been crushing. This
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  Speaker 1: represented total annihilation. Whatever happened here had wiped out an
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  Speaker 1: enormous number of people, leaving nothing behind but their dried remains.
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  Speaker 1: God didn't just show Ezekiel this scene from a distance.
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  Speaker 1: He made him walk through it. He made him get
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  Speaker 1: close to the bones to see them up close, to
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  Speaker 1: understand just how dead they were. The prophet had to
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  Speaker 1: step carefully to avoid tripping over skeletal remains. He had
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  Speaker 1: to navigate around skulls and rib cages and leg bones
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  Speaker 1: scattered everywhere. This wasn't a quick glance at a tragic scene.
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  Speaker 1: This was a detaililed up close examination of death on
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  Speaker 1: a massive scale. God wanted Ezekiel to truly understand the
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  Speaker 1: hopelessness of the situation before showing him what he was
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  Speaker 1: about to do. After Ezekiel had walked through this massive graveyard,
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  Speaker 1: after he had seen the impossible number of dried bones
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  Speaker 1: covering the valley, God asked him a question. Ezekiel thirty
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  Speaker 1: seventy three records this moment, and he said to me,
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  Speaker 1: son of Man, can these bones live? Stop and think
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  Speaker 1: about this question for a moment. God was asking Ezekiel
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  Speaker 1: if bones that had been dead for years, bones that
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  Speaker 1: were completely dry and scattered across a valley, bones that
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  Speaker 1: had absolutely no life left in them, whatsoever could these
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  Speaker 1: bones live again? On the surface, the answer seemed obvious.
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  Speaker 1: Of course, not dead is dead. Bones don't suddenly stand
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  Speaker 1: up and walk around. Dried skeletons don't transform back into
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  Speaker 1: living people. It goes against everything we know about how
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  Speaker 1: the world works. Yet God wasn't asking this question to
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  Speaker 1: hear the obvious answer. He was testing Ezekiel. He was
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  Speaker 1: preparing the prophet for what was about to happen. The
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  Speaker 1: question hung in the air between them. Can these bones live?
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  Speaker 1: Is there any possibility, any chance, any hope that what
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  Speaker 1: is completely dead could somehow become alive again? God addressed
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  Speaker 1: Ezekiel as son of Man, a term he used throughout
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  Speaker 1: the Book of Ezekiel. It reminded the prophet of his humanity,
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  Speaker 1: his limitations, his mortal perspective. From a human standpoint. The
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  Speaker 1: answer to God's question was impossible, but God wasn't asking
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  Speaker 1: from a human standpoint. He was asking from a divine one.
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  Speaker 1: The question itself was designed to make Ezekiel think beyond
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  Speaker 1: what seemed possible and consider what God might be able
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  Speaker 1: to do. This question wasn't just about the bones in
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  Speaker 1: the valley. It was about Israel's situation. It was about
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  Speaker 1: whether a nation that had been completely destroyed could ever
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  Speaker 1: live again. It was about where the people who had
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  Speaker 1: lost everything, their land, their temple, their identity, their hope
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  Speaker 1: could somehow be restored. God was asking Ezekiel to consider
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  Speaker 1: the impossible, to imagine the unimaginable, to believe in what
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  Speaker 1: seemed absolutely crazy. The very fact that God asked the
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  Speaker 1: question suggested that he had an answer Ezekiel wasn't expecting.
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  Speaker 1: Ezekiel had to answer. Standing in that valley of death,
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  Speaker 1: surrounded by evidence that life had been utterly destroyed. He
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  Speaker 1: had to respond to God's impossible question, and his answer
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  Speaker 1: shows us everything about his character and faith. The second
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  Speaker 1: part of Ezekiel thirty seven three tells us and I answered, O,
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  Speaker 1: Lord God, you know Ezekiel didn't say yes. He didn't
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  Speaker 1: say no. He didn't try to explain the natural laws
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  Speaker 1: that make resurrection impossible. He didn't laugh at the absurdity
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  Speaker 1: of the question. Instead, he threw the question back to
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  Speaker 1: God in the most humble way possible. You know, Lord,
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  Speaker 1: only you know if these bones can live. Ezekiel understood
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  Speaker 1: something profound in that moment. He understood that his human wisdom,
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  Speaker 1: his natural understanding, his logical mind, none of that mattered here.
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  Speaker 1: This was God's territory. This was about God's power, not
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  Speaker 1: human capability. If these bones could live, it would be
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  Speaker 1: because God decided to make it happen. Ezekiel's answer was
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  Speaker 1: an act of faith. He was basically saying, I don't
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  Speaker 1: know what's possible for you, God. I only know what's
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  Speaker 1: impossible for me, But you you know what you can do.
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  Speaker 1: It was the perfect response, Not prisent, sumptuous, not doubting,
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  Speaker 1: just honest humility before the one who holds all power
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  Speaker 1: in his hands. Ezekiel refused to limit God based on
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  Speaker 1: what seemed logical to human thinking. He left the door
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  Speaker 1: open for God to do whatever God wanted to do.
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  Speaker 1: This kind of faith is rare. Most people would have
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  Speaker 1: either dismissed the question as ridiculous or tried to sound
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  Speaker 1: spiritual by claiming faith in something they didn't really believe.
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  Speaker 1: Ezekiel did neither. He simply acknowledged that God's knowledge and
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  Speaker 1: power were far beyond his own. By saying, O, Lord, God,
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  Speaker 1: Ezekiel used the covenant name of God Yahweh. He was
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  Speaker 1: appealing to the God who had made promises to Israel,
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  Speaker 1: the God who had brought their ancestors out of Egypt,
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  Speaker 1: the God who had always done the impossible for his
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  Speaker 1: people throughout their history. Ezekiel was essentially saying, You're the
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  Speaker 1: God of the impossible. You're the God who makes when
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  Speaker 1: there is no way, if these bones can live, it's
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  Speaker 1: because you can make them live. I'm not going to
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  Speaker 1: put limits on you now. To understand why God showed
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  Speaker 1: Ezekiel this vision, we need to step back and look
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  Speaker 1: at what had happened to Israel. The Jewish people had
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  Speaker 1: experienced the worst disaster in their entire history decades before
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  Speaker 1: this vision. The Babylonian army had come against Jerusalem like
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  Speaker 1: a flood. They were ruthless, powerful, and unstoppable. King nebucad
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  Speaker 1: Nezar had laid siege to the Holy City, surrounding it
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  Speaker 1: with soldiers until the people inside were starving. When the
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  Speaker 1: walls finally fell, the Babylonians poured in and destroyed everything.
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  Speaker 1: They killed thousands of people. They burned the city to
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  Speaker 1: the ground. They took the survivors, the strongest, the smartest,
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  Speaker 1: the most useful, and marched them hundreds of miles away
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  Speaker 1: to Babylon. This wasn't just a military defeat. This was
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  Speaker 1: the end of Israel as a nation. The people were
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  Speaker 1: ripped from their homeland and scattered across a foreign empire.
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  Speaker 1: Families were torn apart. Children grew up in a strange land,
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  Speaker 1: learning strange customs, surrounded by strange gods. Everything that made
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  Speaker 1: them who they were had been stripped away. Ezekiel himself
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  Speaker 1: was among these exiles. He had been taken to Babylon.
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  Speaker 1: Living among his fellow captives by the Kibar River, he
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  Speaker 1: knew first hand what it felt like to lose everything.
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  Speaker 1: The exile wasn't just about being in a different place.
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  Speaker 1: It was about being cut off from God's promises, from
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  Speaker 1: the land he had given them, from the future they
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  Speaker 1: thought was guaranteed. The Jewish people watched their nation die.
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  Speaker 1: They watched everything their ancestors had built crumble into dust.
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  Speaker 1: They were now prisoners in a foreign land, with no army,
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  Speaker 1: no king, no power, no hope of ever going home.
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  Speaker 1: The journey to Babylon had been brutal. Imagine being forced
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  Speaker 1: to walk hundreds of miles across desert terrain, chained together
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  Speaker 1: with other captives, watching the weak and elderly fall along
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  Speaker 1: the way. The Babylonians showed no mercy. If you couldn't
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  Speaker 1: keep up, you were left behind to die. When they
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  Speaker 1: finally arrived in Babylon, they found themselves in a completely
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  Speaker 1: foreign world. The language was different, the food was different,
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  Speaker 1: the customs were strange and often offensive to their beliefs.
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  Speaker 1: They were given plots of land to work, but it
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  Speaker 1: wasn't their land. They were allowed to build houses, but
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  Speaker 1: they weren't their homes. Everything about their new life reminded
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  Speaker 1: them that they didn't belong there. The destruction of Jerusalem
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  Speaker 1: meant more than just losing their homes. The Babylonians had
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  Speaker 1: done something unthinkable. They had destroyed the Temple. This wasn't
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  Speaker 1: just another building. The temple was the dwelling place of
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  Speaker 1: God on earth. It was where his presence lived among
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  Speaker 1: his people. It was where sacrifices were offered, where sins
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  Speaker 1: were forgiven, where heaven and Earth met. Inside the Temple
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  Speaker 1: was the Holy of Holies, the most sacred space in
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  Speaker 1: the entire world, where the ark of the Covenant rested,
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  Speaker 1: and where God's glory appeared. When the Babylonians burned the
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  Speaker 1: Temple to the ground, they didn't just destroy stone and wood.
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  Speaker 1: They shattered the Jewish people's connection to God. How could
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  Speaker 1: they worship without the temple? How could they offer sacrifices,
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  Speaker 1: How could they meet with God? The entire religious system
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  Speaker 1: that had defined their relationship with the Lord for centuries
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  Speaker 1: was gone. The priests had no altar to serve at.
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  Speaker 1: The festivals couldn't be celebrated properly. The daily sacrifices stopped.
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  Speaker 1: Everything that connected them to their God seemed to have
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  Speaker 1: been ripped away. The land itself was also taken from them.
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  Speaker 1: God had promised Abraham that his descenddents would inherit the
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  Speaker 1: land of Canaan. That promise had defined Israel for generations.
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  Speaker 1: The land wasn't just property, It was proof that God
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  Speaker 1: kept his word. It was their inheritance, their home, the
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  Speaker 1: place where they belonged. Now they were sitting in Babylon,
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  Speaker 1: hundreds of miles away, watching foreigners live in their land,
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  Speaker 1: plow their fields, harvest their crops. The land that was
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  Speaker 1: supposed to flow with milk and honey was being enjoyed
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  Speaker 1: by pagans who didn't know the Lord. And perhaps worst
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  Speaker 1: of all, they were losing their identity as God's chosen people.
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  Speaker 1: Their children were growing up speaking Babylonian languages, adopting Babylonian customs,
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  Speaker 1: learning Babylonian ways. How long before they forgot the stories
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  Speaker 1: of Abraham, Isaac and Jacob. How long before they stopped
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  Speaker 1: remembering the exodus from Egypt? How long before they became
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  Speaker 1: just another conquered people, absorbed into the Empire, with nothing
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  Speaker 1: left to distinguish them from any other nation. The pressure
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  Speaker 1: to assimilate was enormous. It would have been so much
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  Speaker 1: easier to just blend in, to forget about being Jewish,
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  Speaker 1: to stop holding on to traditions that made them different
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  Speaker 1: and kept them separate. But something in them refused to
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  Speaker 1: completely let go, even as they felt everything slipping away.
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  Speaker 1: The exiles had given up. You could see it in
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  Speaker 1: their faces, hear it in their voices, feel it in
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  Speaker 1: their spirits. They sat by the rivers of Babylon and
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  Speaker 1: wept when they remembered Jerusalem. They hung their harps on
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  Speaker 1: the willow trees because they couldn't bring themselves to sing
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  Speaker 1: the songs of Zion in a foreign land. Their captors
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  Speaker 1: would sometimes mock them, asking them to sing one of
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  Speaker 1: the songs of Jerusalem. But how could they sing the
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  Speaker 1: Lord's song in a foreign land. The Book of Lamentations
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  Speaker 1: captures their despair perfectly. They felt abandoned by God, for
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  Speaker 1: God cast aside like trash. Many of them believed it
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  Speaker 1: was over. This was the end of their story. They
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  Speaker 1: would die in Babylon, and their children would die in Babylon,
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  Speaker 1: and their grandchildren would die in Babylon, and eventually there
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  Speaker 1: would be no more Israel. The nation would simply cease
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  Speaker 1: to exist, becoming a footnote in history. Some of them
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  Speaker 1: questioned whether God even cared any more? Had he broken
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  Speaker 1: his promises? Had he given up on them forever? They
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  Speaker 1: remembered the covenant God made with Abraham, with Moses, with David,
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  Speaker 1: But those covenants seemed like ancient history now, like fairy
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  Speaker 1: tales that had no connection to their current reality. What
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  Speaker 1: good were promises when everything was destroyed? What hope was
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  Speaker 1: there when they were powerless, captives in a foreign land,
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  Speaker 1: with no way to change their circumstances. The younger generation,
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  Speaker 1: those born in Babylon, had never even seen Jerusalem, only
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  Speaker 1: knew exile. They only knew what it felt like to
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  Speaker 1: be outsiders, strangers, people without a country to call their own.
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  Speaker 1: The older generation would tell them stories about the Temple,
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  Speaker 1: about the City of David, about the glory days when
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  Speaker 1: Israel was strong and free. But to the young people
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  Speaker 1: these stories sounded like legends from another world. They couldn't
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  Speaker 1: imagine what it would be like to live in their
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  Speaker 1: own land, to worship freely in God's Temple, to be
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  Speaker 1: citizens instead of captives. The future looked dark and empty.
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  Speaker 1: There was no path forward, no plan, no strategy, no hope.
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  Speaker 1: They were stuck in a permanent state of mourning for
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  Speaker 1: everything they had lost and would never get back. Some
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  Speaker 1: of them stopped practicing their faith altogether. What was the point.
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  Speaker 1: If God couldn't protect Jerusalem, if he couldn't save the Temple,
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  Speaker 1: if he couldn't keep them in their land, then maybe
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  Speaker 1: he wasn't as powerful as they had been taught. Maybe
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  Speaker 1: the Babylonian gods were stronger. Maybe they had been wrong
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  Speaker 1: about everything, but the physical destruction of Jerusalem and the
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  Speaker 1: exile to Babylon weren't the real problem. They were symptoms
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  Speaker 1: of something deeper, something more serious. The truth was that
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  Speaker 1: Israel had died spiritually long before the Babylonians ever showed
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  Speaker 1: up at their gates. For generations, the people had turned
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  Speaker 1: away from God. They had worshiped idols, treating the gods
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  Speaker 1: of other nations as if they were real and powerful.
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  Speaker 1: They had built altars to boo and a sharer right
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  Speaker 1: in the land God had given them. They had sacrificed
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  Speaker 1: to demons and bowed down to carved images. They had
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  Speaker 1: broken every part of the Covenant, ignoring God's commands, rejecting
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  Speaker 1: his prophets, doing whatever seemed right in their own eyes.
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  Speaker 1: The prophets had warned them over and over. Isaiah had
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  Speaker 1: warned them, Jeremiah had warned them. Prophet after prophet. It
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  Speaker 1: had pleaded with the people to return to God, to
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  Speaker 1: turn away from their sins, to repent before it was
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  Speaker 1: too late. But the people wouldn't listen. They didn't want
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  Speaker 1: to hear it. They thought they were safe because they
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  Speaker 1: had the Temple in their city. They thought God would
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  Speaker 1: never let anything bad happen to Jerusalem because it was
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  Speaker 1: his city, his dwelling place. They were terribly, tragically wrong.
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  Speaker 1: The Babylonian invasion was God's judgment on their rebellion. He
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  Speaker 1: had been patient for so long, giving them chance after
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  Speaker 1: chance to repent and return to him. He had sent
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  Speaker 1: prophet after prophet with warnings and calls to repentance. Finally,
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  Speaker 1: when they refused to listen, he allowed the consequences of
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  Speaker 1: their choices to crash down on them. The scattered bones
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  Speaker 1: in Ezekiel's vision represented more than just physical death. They
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  Speaker 1: represented spiritual death. Israel had cut themselves off from the
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  Speaker 1: source of life by rejecting God and turning to worthless idols.
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  Speaker 1: They had abandoned the fountain of living water and dug
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  Speaker 1: for themselves broken cisterns that could hold no water. As
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  Speaker 1: Jeremiah had told them, their idolatry wasn't just about bowing
• 21:16
  Speaker 1: to statues. It was about trusting in things that couldn't
• 21:20
  Speaker 1: save them, depending on alliances with foreign nations instead of
• 21:24
  Speaker 1: depending on God, following the ways of the world, instead
• 21:28
  Speaker 1: of following God's law. They had become spiritually dead while
• 21:33
  Speaker 1: still physically alive, and now their physical condition matched their
• 21:37
  Speaker 1: spiritual condition. They were scattered, dried up, lifeless, just like
• 21:43
  Speaker 1: those bones in the valley. The exile was a picture
• 21:47
  Speaker 1: of what had already happened in their hearts. They had
• 21:50
  Speaker 1: exiled God from their lives long before he allowed them
• 21:54
  Speaker 1: to be exiled from their land. After Ezekiel gave his
• 21:57
  Speaker 1: humble answer, God didn't waste any time. He immediately gave
• 22:02
  Speaker 1: the prophet a command that must have sounded completely crazy.
• 22:05
  Speaker 1: Ezekiel thirty seventy four records God's instructions. Then he said,
• 22:10
  Speaker 1: to me, prophesy over these bones and say to them, Oh,
• 22:14
  Speaker 1: dry bones, hear the word of the Lord. Think about
• 22:18
  Speaker 1: what God just asked Ezekiel to do. He told him
• 22:21
  Speaker 1: to talk to bones, not to living people, not to
• 22:24
  Speaker 1: a crowd gathered in a town square, to dead, dry
• 22:28
  Speaker 1: bones scattered across a valley floor. Bones don't have ears,
• 22:32
  Speaker 1: they can't hear anything. They've been dead for years, maybe decades.
• 22:36
  Speaker 1: Yet God commanded Ezekiel to speak to them as if
• 22:40
  Speaker 1: they could listen. This wasn't a suggestion or a gentle request.
• 22:44
  Speaker 1: It was a direct command, Prophesy, speak my words over
• 22:49
  Speaker 1: these bones. God was about to do something that had
• 22:52
  Speaker 1: never been done before, and he wanted his prophet to
• 22:55
  Speaker 1: participate in it. Ezekiel had to open his mouth and
• 22:59
  Speaker 1: deliver God's menage to an audience that seemed impossible to reach.
• 23:03
  Speaker 1: But this is how God works. He often asks his
• 23:07
  Speaker 1: people to do things that don't make sense to the
• 23:10
  Speaker 1: natural mind. He asked them to step out in faith
• 23:13
  Speaker 1: and obey even when the task seems ridiculous. Ezekiel could
• 23:17
  Speaker 1: have questioned God. He could have asked for clarification or
• 23:21
  Speaker 1: a different assignment, but he didn't. He had learned to
• 23:24
  Speaker 1: trust God's commands, no matter how strange they seemed. God
• 23:29
  Speaker 1: then told Ezekiel exactly what to say to the bones.
• 23:32
  Speaker 1: Ezekiel thirty seven five to six continues. Thus says the
• 23:36
  Speaker 1: Lord God to these bones, behold, I will cause breath
• 23:40
  Speaker 1: to enter you, and you shall live. And I will
• 23:42
  Speaker 1: lay sinews upon you, and will cause flesh to come
• 23:45
  Speaker 1: upon you, and cover you with skin, and put breath
• 23:48
  Speaker 1: in you, and you shall live, and you shall know
• 23:51
  Speaker 1: that I am the Lord. God gave Ezekiel the entire message,
• 23:56
  Speaker 1: word for word. He was promising to do the impossible.
• 23:59
  Speaker 1: He was going to make dead bones live again. He
• 24:02
  Speaker 1: was going to add sinews, flesh, and skin. He was
• 24:06
  Speaker 1: going to breathe life into them, and through this miracle,
• 24:09
  Speaker 1: everyone would know that he is the Lord. The message
• 24:14
  Speaker 1: wasn't just about physical resurrection. It was about revealing God's
• 24:18
  Speaker 1: identity and power to a world that had forgotten who
• 24:22
  Speaker 1: he was. So Ezekiel obeyed. He stood in that valley
• 24:26
  Speaker 1: and began to prophesy just as God commanded him. He
• 24:29
  Speaker 1: spoke God's words over the dry bones, addressing them as
• 24:33
  Speaker 1: if they were living beings who could hear him. And
• 24:36
  Speaker 1: then something happened that Ezekiel would never forget for the
• 24:39
  Speaker 1: rest of his life. Ezekiel thirty seven seven describes the moment.
• 24:45
  Speaker 1: So I prophesied as I was commanded, and as I prophesied,
• 24:49
  Speaker 1: there was a sound, and behold a rattling, and the
• 24:53
  Speaker 1: bones came together, bone to its bone. As soon as
• 24:58
  Speaker 1: Ezekiel started speaking, a sound filled the valley, a rattling,
• 25:03
  Speaker 1: a clicking, a clattering noise that shouldn't have been possible.
• 25:07
  Speaker 1: The bones started moving all across the valley floor. Skeletal
• 25:12
  Speaker 1: remains that had been still and silent for years suddenly
• 25:16
  Speaker 1: began to shake and shift. It wasn't a gentle, quiet movement.
• 25:22
  Speaker 1: It was loud. The sound of bone hitting bone echoed
• 25:26
  Speaker 1: through the valley. Imagine standing in complete silence among thousands
• 25:31
  Speaker 1: of dead skeletons, and suddenly everything around you starts moving
• 25:36
  Speaker 1: and making noise. The ground itself seemed to come alive
• 25:41
  Speaker 1: as bones rolled and tumbled in shifted positions. Leg bones
• 25:46
  Speaker 1: lifted off the ground, arm bones spun through the air.
• 25:49
  Speaker 1: Skulls turned and moved toward their proper places, spines straightened out,
• 25:54
  Speaker 1: ribs curved upward. Every single bone in that valley responded
• 25:59
  Speaker 1: to the word of God spoken through Ezekiel's mouth. This
• 26:03
  Speaker 1: wasn't slow or gradual. It happened as Ezekiel prophesied while
• 26:08
  Speaker 1: he was still speaking. The power of God's word was
• 26:11
  Speaker 1: immediate and undeniable. The prophet watched in amazement as the
• 26:15
  Speaker 1: impossible began to unfold right before his eyes. The rattling
• 26:19
  Speaker 1: sound was the sound of death being reversed. It was
• 26:23
  Speaker 1: the sound of God breaking the laws of nature to
• 26:26
  Speaker 1: demonstrate his supreme power. It was the first sign that
• 26:30
  Speaker 1: what seemed completely impossible was actually happening. What Ezekiel witnessed
• 26:36
  Speaker 1: wasn't random chaos. It was divine order being restored. The
• 26:41
  Speaker 1: bones didn't just move around aimlessly. They moved with purpose
• 26:45
  Speaker 1: and precision. Each bone found exactly where it was supposed
• 26:49
  Speaker 1: to be. The text tells us the bones came together
• 26:52
  Speaker 1: bone to its bone. In a human body, there are
• 26:56
  Speaker 1: two hundred and six bones, and every single one has
• 27:00
  Speaker 1: a specific place and function. A shoulder bone belongs in
• 27:04
  Speaker 1: the shoulder, A tow bone belongs in the foot. A
• 27:08
  Speaker 1: vertebra belongs in a specific spot in the spine. The
• 27:12
  Speaker 1: bones in that valley were reassembling themselves with perfect accuracy.
• 27:17
  Speaker 1: Think about the complexity of what was happening. Thousands of
• 27:21
  Speaker 1: complete skeletons had been scattered and mixed together across this
• 27:24
  Speaker 1: massive valley for years, maybe even generations. These bones had
• 27:30
  Speaker 1: been lying there, separated from their original bodies, mixed in
• 27:34
  Speaker 1: with bones from hundreds or thousands of other people. Yet somehow,
• 27:38
  Speaker 1: each bone knew which body it belonged to. The hand
• 27:41
  Speaker 1: bones from one person didn't attach to someone else's arms,
• 27:45
  Speaker 1: the feet from one skeleton didn't end up on another
• 27:48
  Speaker 1: person's legs. The ribs from one body didn't connect to
• 27:51
  Speaker 1: someone else's spine. Every single bone found its way back
• 27:55
  Speaker 1: to its original skeleton and connected to the exact bones
• 27:59
  Speaker 1: it had been connected in life. Shin bones connected to
• 28:03
  Speaker 1: knee bones, knee bones connected to thigh bones, thigh bones
• 28:08
  Speaker 1: connected to hip bones. The pelvis assembled itself. The spines
• 28:13
  Speaker 1: stacked up vertebra by vertebra in perfect order. Shoulder blades
• 28:17
  Speaker 1: positioned themselves on backs. Collar bones stretched across chests. Arms
• 28:22
  Speaker 1: formed with upper arm bones connecting to elbow joints, which
• 28:27
  Speaker 1: connected to forearm bones, which connected to wrist bones, which
• 28:31
  Speaker 1: connected to hand bones, which connected to finger bones. The
• 28:35
  Speaker 1: same precise assembly happened with the legs, feet, and toes.
• 28:41
  Speaker 1: Skulls came together with jaw bones. The tiny bones inside
• 28:45
  Speaker 1: the ears found their places. Every rib curved into its
• 28:49
  Speaker 1: proper position. This was divine engineering on display. God was
• 28:54
  Speaker 1: showing that he knows every detail of his creation, down
• 28:57
  Speaker 1: to the smallest bone in the human body. He was
• 29:01
  Speaker 1: restoring order to what had been chaos and destruction. But
• 29:05
  Speaker 1: God wasn't finished. The bones had come together, but they
• 29:10
  Speaker 1: were still just skeletons. They needed more to become complete
• 29:14
  Speaker 1: bodies again. Ezekiel thirty seven eight tells us what happened next.
• 29:22
  Speaker 1: And I looked and behold there were sinews on them,
• 29:27
  Speaker 1: and flesh had come upon them, and skin had covered them.
• 29:31
  Speaker 1: After the bones connected, sinews began to appear. Sinews are
• 29:35
  Speaker 1: the tendons and ligaments that hold bones together and attach
• 29:39
  Speaker 1: muscles to bones. Without sinews, a skeleton would just fall apart.
• 29:45
  Speaker 1: The bones would have no way to stay connected or
• 29:48
  Speaker 1: move together. God added these connecting tissues to every single
• 29:53
  Speaker 1: skeleton in the valley. Then came the flesh. Muscles began
• 29:58
  Speaker 1: to form over the bone, not randomly, but in exactly
• 30:03
  Speaker 1: the right places. The heart muscle appeared in the chest,
• 30:07
  Speaker 1: the arm muscles wrapped around arm bones. Leg muscles covered
• 30:11
  Speaker 1: leg bones, the stomach, the liver, the kidneys, the intestines,
• 30:15
  Speaker 1: every internal organ took shape inside the bodies. The muscles
• 30:20
  Speaker 1: that control movement layered themselves over the skeletal frames. The
• 30:25
  Speaker 1: diaphragm formed to enable breathing. Blood vessels spread throughout the
• 30:29
  Speaker 1: bodies like intricate networks of roads. Nerves connected from the
• 30:33
  Speaker 1: brain down through the spine, and out to every part
• 30:37
  Speaker 1: of each body. This was a complete recreation of human
• 30:41
  Speaker 1: anatomy happening right before Ezekiel's eyes. Finally, skin covered everything.
• 30:47
  Speaker 1: The skin didn't just appear as a flat covering. It
• 30:50
  Speaker 1: formed with all its complexity, multiple layers, pores, hair follicles,
• 30:56
  Speaker 1: sweat glands. The skin stretched over the muscles and organs,
• 31:00
  Speaker 1: sealing everything inside, giving each body its complete form. What
• 31:05
  Speaker 1: had been scattered dry bones just moments before were now
• 31:08
  Speaker 1: fully formed human bodies lying on the valley floor. They
• 31:12
  Speaker 1: looked like people again. They had faces, hands, feet, They
• 31:16
  Speaker 1: had complete bodies, with all the parts in the right places.
• 31:20
  Speaker 1: The transformation was stunning, from death and decay to perfect
• 31:24
  Speaker 1: human form, but something was still missing. Ezekiel noticed it immediately.
• 31:30
  Speaker 1: These bodies were complete on the outside, but they weren't alive.
• 31:34
  Speaker 1: Ezekiel stared at the scene before him. Thousands of complete
• 31:38
  Speaker 1: human bodies now lay in the valley where only bones
• 31:41
  Speaker 1: had been moments before. They were physically perfect, Every part
• 31:46
  Speaker 1: was in place, but something crucial was absent. The end
• 31:51
  Speaker 1: of Ezekiel thirty seven to eight states the problem clearly,
• 31:55
  Speaker 1: But there was no breath in them. The bodies had form,
• 31:58
  Speaker 1: but no life. They had structure but no spirit. They
• 32:02
  Speaker 1: looked like people, but they weren't people yet. They were
• 32:05
  Speaker 1: like extremely detailed statues lying motionless on the ground. This
• 32:10
  Speaker 1: detail is important God could have brought these bones to
• 32:15
  Speaker 1: life instantly. He could have skipped all these steps and
• 32:19
  Speaker 1: just made living people appear in the valley, but he didn't.
• 32:24
  Speaker 1: He showed Ezekiel the process step by step. First the
• 32:28
  Speaker 1: skeletal structure, then the connecting tissues, then the muscles and organs,
• 32:34
  Speaker 1: then the skin, each stage building on the previous one.
• 32:38
  Speaker 1: And now with complete bodies formed, they still weren't alive
• 32:42
  Speaker 1: because they had no breath. In Hebrew, the word for
• 32:45
  Speaker 1: breath is the same word for spirit ruach. It means wind, breath,
• 32:50
  Speaker 1: and spirit all at once. What these bodies lacked was
• 32:54
  Speaker 1: the breath of life, the spirit that animates a body
• 32:57
  Speaker 1: and makes it a living being. This was the same
• 33:00
  Speaker 1: breath that God breathed into Adam when he created the
• 33:03
  Speaker 1: first man. Genesis tells us that God formed Adam from
• 33:07
  Speaker 1: the dust of the ground, and then he breathed into
• 33:10
  Speaker 1: his nostrils the breath of life, and Adam became a
• 33:13
  Speaker 1: living being. Without that breath, Adam was just clay shaped
• 33:18
  Speaker 1: like a man. With that breath, he became alive. The
• 33:22
  Speaker 1: same principle applied here in the valley. These bodies were
• 33:25
  Speaker 1: formed and complete, but without God's breath in them. They
• 33:29
  Speaker 1: were just empty shells. They couldn't think, couldn't feel, couldn't move,
• 33:35
  Speaker 1: couldn't live. Form without breath is death. Structure without spirit
• 33:40
  Speaker 1: is just matter arranged in a certain way. God was
• 33:44
  Speaker 1: teaching Ezekiel a profound truth. Life comes from God alone.
• 33:49
  Speaker 1: Humans can't create life, They can only receive it from
• 33:52
  Speaker 1: the one who is the source of all life. God
• 33:55
  Speaker 1: had more for Ezekiel to do. The bodies were ready,
• 33:59
  Speaker 1: but they needed breath. So God gave his prophet another command,
• 34:04
  Speaker 1: and this time it was even more unusual than the
• 34:07
  Speaker 1: first one. Ezekiel thirty seventy nine records the instruction. Then
• 34:12
  Speaker 1: he said to me, prophesy to the breath. Prophesy, son
• 34:16
  Speaker 1: of Man, and say to the breath, Thus says the
• 34:19
  Speaker 1: Lord God, Come from the four winds, O breath and
• 34:23
  Speaker 1: breathe on these slain that they may live. Now God
• 34:27
  Speaker 1: told Ezekiel to speak to the wind itself. He had
• 34:30
  Speaker 1: already spoken to dead bones. Now he had to speak
• 34:33
  Speaker 1: to something invisible, something that moves and flows but can't
• 34:36
  Speaker 1: be seen or touched. The four winds represent the winds
• 34:40
  Speaker 1: that blow from the north, southeast, and west from every direction.
• 34:45
  Speaker 1: God was calling for the breath of life to come
• 34:47
  Speaker 1: from everywhere at once, to fill the valley and enter
• 34:51
  Speaker 1: these bodies. This command reveals something powerful about the nature
• 34:56
  Speaker 1: of life and spirit. The breath of life isn't something
• 34:59
  Speaker 1: that belong to humans or that humans can control. It
• 35:03
  Speaker 1: comes from God and goes where God sends it. Just
• 35:07
  Speaker 1: like the wind blows wherever it wants, and you can
• 35:10
  Speaker 1: hear the sound of it but can't tell where it's
• 35:12
  Speaker 1: coming from or where it's going. So is the spirit
• 35:16
  Speaker 1: of God. Ezekiel had to call for this breath to
• 35:20
  Speaker 1: come and breathe on the slain. The word slain reminds
• 35:25
  Speaker 1: us that these weren't people who died naturally. They were killed, destroyed,
• 35:29
  Speaker 1: cut down in their prime. Yet even the slain can
• 35:33
  Speaker 1: be brought back to life when God breathes his breath
• 35:37
  Speaker 1: into them. Notice that God didn't breathe on the bodies himself.
• 35:41
  Speaker 1: He commanded Ezekiel to prophesy to the breath and call
• 35:45
  Speaker 1: it to come. God was involving his prophet in this miracle,
• 35:49
  Speaker 1: teaching him that the spoken word of God has creative power.
• 35:54
  Speaker 1: When God's word is spoken in faith and obedience, things happen.
• 35:59
  Speaker 1: Reality chees, the impossible becomes possible. Ezekiel had to exercise
• 36:04
  Speaker 1: his faith again by speaking to something invisible and commanding
• 36:08
  Speaker 1: it to do something that had never been done before.
• 36:11
  Speaker 1: Ezekiel obeyed once more. He prophesied to the breath, just
• 36:15
  Speaker 1: as God commanded, and immediately the miracle reached its climax.
• 36:20
  Speaker 1: Ezekiel thirty seven ten describes what happened. So I prophesied
• 36:25
  Speaker 1: as He commanded me, and the breath came into them,
• 36:28
  Speaker 1: and they lived and stood on their feet an exceedingly
• 36:32
  Speaker 1: great army. The breath came not slowly, not gradually, but
• 36:35
  Speaker 1: it came from the four winds. The breath of life
• 36:38
  Speaker 1: rushed into the valley and entered those bodies. Imagine the
• 36:42
  Speaker 1: sound of it, like a mighty wind sweeping through, carrying
• 36:46
  Speaker 1: life with it. As the breath entered each body, something
• 36:49
  Speaker 1: incredible happened. They lived. Eyes that had been closed suddenly opened,
• 36:54
  Speaker 1: Lungs that had been still suddenly filled with air. Hearts
• 36:58
  Speaker 1: that had been silent suddenly began to beat, Blood began
• 37:01
  Speaker 1: to flow through veins, Nerves fired signals to brains, mines
• 37:07
  Speaker 1: became conscious. These bodies that had been nothing but form
• 37:11
  Speaker 1: and structure, suddenly became living human beings. But they didn't
• 37:16
  Speaker 1: just lie there breathing. They stood up, every single one
• 37:20
  Speaker 1: of them. All across the valley. People who had been
• 37:23
  Speaker 1: dead for years rose to their feet. Legs that hadn't
• 37:26
  Speaker 1: walked in ages suddenly had strength, Muscles that hadn't moved,
• 37:31
  Speaker 1: suddenly responded to commands from living brains. Thousands upon thousands
• 37:36
  Speaker 1: of people stood up simultaneously, fully alive, fully restored, fully functional.
• 37:43
  Speaker 1: The valley that had been a graveyard of despair was
• 37:46
  Speaker 1: now filled with living people standing on their feet, and
• 37:49
  Speaker 1: the text tells us they were an exceedingly great army,
• 37:53
  Speaker 1: not just a crowd, not just a group of survivors,
• 37:57
  Speaker 1: an army, a fighting force, a nation of warriors ready
• 38:02
  Speaker 1: for action. This detail points to the complete restoration God
• 38:06
  Speaker 1: was promising. These people weren't brought back as weak invalids
• 38:10
  Speaker 1: or struggling refugees. They were strong, capable, organized, and ready.
• 38:16
  Speaker 1: This was resurrection in its fullest sense. From death to life,
• 38:21
  Speaker 1: from scattered bones to standing soldiers, from hopelessness to power
• 38:26
  Speaker 1: and purpose. The transformation was complete. What had begun as
• 38:30
  Speaker 1: a valley full of very dry bones was now a
• 38:33
  Speaker 1: valley full of living, breathing, standing people. The magnitude of
• 38:38
  Speaker 1: this miracle cannot be overstated. The text emphasizes that this
• 38:42
  Speaker 1: was an exceedingly great army. The Hebrew phrase suggests a
• 38:46
  Speaker 1: massive number, an enormous host of people. This wasn't a
• 38:51
  Speaker 1: small group, This was a nation sized population. Ezekiel watched
• 38:56
  Speaker 1: as this vast multitude stood before him, alive, strong. Every
• 39:01
  Speaker 1: person who had been represented by those scattered bones was
• 39:05
  Speaker 1: now restored. No one was left out, no bone was forgotten.
• 39:10
  Speaker 1: Every skeleton that had been lying dead in that valley
• 39:13
  Speaker 1: was now a living person, standing upright. The image of
• 39:16
  Speaker 1: an army is significant. Armies represent strength, organization, purpose, and power.
• 39:23
  Speaker 1: An army is not a random mob. It's a structured
• 39:27
  Speaker 1: force with unity and capability. By calling this resurrected multitude
• 39:32
  Speaker 1: and army, God was showing that he wasn't just bringing
• 39:36
  Speaker 1: people back to life. He was restoring them to power
• 39:39
  Speaker 1: and giving them purpose. They were ready for battle, They
• 39:43
  Speaker 1: were prepared for whatever came next. This vision showed Ezekiel
• 39:47
  Speaker 1: what God can do with what seems completely dead and destroyed.
• 39:52
  Speaker 1: He takes dry bones and makes them into a mighty army.
• 39:56
  Speaker 1: He takes scattered remains and creates a unified fighting force.
• 40:00
  Speaker 1: He takes death and turns it into overwhelming life. The
• 40:03
  Speaker 1: prophets stood there, surrounded by living people, where moments before,
• 40:08
  Speaker 1: only death had existed. Every stage of the miracle had
• 40:12
  Speaker 1: unfolded exactly as God said it would. First the bones connected,
• 40:17
  Speaker 1: then the sinews, flesh, and skin appeared. Then the breath entered,
• 40:22
  Speaker 1: Then they stood. Each step happened in order, building toward
• 40:27
  Speaker 1: this final result. God had proven his point completely. Nothing
• 40:31
  Speaker 1: is too dead for him to resurrect, nothing is too
• 40:34
  Speaker 1: destroyed for him to restore, Nothing is too scattered for
• 40:38
  Speaker 1: him to bring back together. The question he had asked
• 40:41
  Speaker 1: Ezekiel at the beginning, can these bones live? Had been
• 40:45
  Speaker 1: answered in the most dramatic way possible. Yes, they can live.
• 40:49
  Speaker 1: Not only can they live, but they can become a vast,
• 40:53
  Speaker 1: powerful army. After showing Ezekiel this incredible vision, God didn't
• 40:58
  Speaker 1: leave him wondering what it all meant. He explained it
• 41:01
  Speaker 1: directly Ezekiel. Thirty seven eleven gives us the interpretation. Then
• 41:06
  Speaker 1: he said to me, son of Man, these bones are
• 41:10
  Speaker 1: the whole house of Israel. God made it crystal clear.
• 41:15
  Speaker 1: The dry bones in the valley weren't just random dead people.
• 41:19
  Speaker 1: They represented Israel, the whole house of Israel, not just
• 41:23
  Speaker 1: Judah or just the northern tribes, but the entire nation,
• 41:27
  Speaker 1: every tribe, every family, every person who belonged to God's
• 41:31
  Speaker 1: chosen people. This was about the Jewish nation that had
• 41:35
  Speaker 1: been destroyed and scattered. The bones represented their current condition
• 41:39
  Speaker 1: as exiles in Babylon. Just as those bones were dead,
• 41:45
  Speaker 1: dry and scattered across the valley, Israel was spiritually dead,
• 41:51
  Speaker 1: dried up in hope, and scattered across foreign lands. Just
• 41:54
  Speaker 1: as those bones seemed beyond any possibility of living again,
• 41:59
  Speaker 1: Israel seemed beyond any hope of being restored as a nation.
• 42:04
  Speaker 1: God was using this vision to paint a picture of
• 42:08
  Speaker 1: what Israel looked like from his perspective. They weren't just
• 42:12
  Speaker 1: going through a hard time. They weren't just facing temporary difficulties.
• 42:17
  Speaker 1: They were dead, completely totally dead. Their nation was finished,
• 42:22
  Speaker 1: their future was gone, their identity was lost. Everything that
• 42:26
  Speaker 1: made them who they were had been stripped away. But
• 42:30
  Speaker 1: the vision didn't stop at the bones. It showed the
• 42:33
  Speaker 1: bones coming back to life, and that was the message
• 42:37
  Speaker 1: God wanted Israel to hear. What he did for those bones.
• 42:41
  Speaker 1: In the vision he was promising to do for Israel.
• 42:44
  Speaker 1: In reality, he was going to bring them back to life.
• 42:47
  Speaker 1: He was going to restore what had been destroyed. He
• 42:51
  Speaker 1: was going to make them a nation again. The whole
• 42:54
  Speaker 1: vision was a prophetic picture of Israel's future restoration. When
• 42:59
  Speaker 1: Godd said the whole house of Israel, he was being specific.
• 43:04
  Speaker 1: This wasn't just about a remnant or a small group
• 43:07
  Speaker 1: of survivors. This was about the entire nation being brought
• 43:11
  Speaker 1: back together, all twelve tribes, everyone who belonged to the
• 43:15
  Speaker 1: Covenant people of God. The northern Kingdom of Israel had
• 43:19
  Speaker 1: been carried away by Assyria over a century before Babylon
• 43:23
  Speaker 1: conquered Judah. Those ten tribes had been scattered and lost
• 43:28
  Speaker 1: to history. Yet God was promising to restore the whole house,
• 43:32
  Speaker 1: north and South together, reunited as one nation under him.
• 43:37
  Speaker 1: God continued explaining the vision to Ezekiel, and he quoted
• 43:41
  Speaker 1: the actual words the exiles were saying among themselves. The
• 43:46
  Speaker 1: second part of Ezekiel thirty seven eleven records their cry, Behold,
• 43:51
  Speaker 1: they say, our bones are dried up, and our hope
• 43:55
  Speaker 1: is lost. We are indeed cut off. This was how
• 43:59
  Speaker 1: the people of Israel felt in their exile. They weren't
• 44:03
  Speaker 1: just sad or discouraged. They were in complete despair. They
• 44:06
  Speaker 1: had given up entirely. Noticed their exact words, our bones
• 44:12
  Speaker 1: are dried up. They felt exactly like those dry bones
• 44:16
  Speaker 1: in the valley, dead, finished, with no life left in them.
• 44:21
  Speaker 1: They had been in Babylon for so long that they
• 44:23
  Speaker 1: felt like their very bones had dried out. There was
• 44:27
  Speaker 1: no moisture, no vitality, no energy left. They were spiritually
• 44:32
  Speaker 1: and emotionally drained. Everything had been squeezed out of them
• 44:36
  Speaker 1: by years of captivity and suffering the image of dried
• 44:41
  Speaker 1: bones was something they used to describe themselves. They looked
• 44:45
  Speaker 1: at their situation and saw no possibility of change. Dried
• 44:48
  Speaker 1: bones can't become living people again. That's impossible. That's how
• 44:53
  Speaker 1: impossible their restoration seemed to them. Then they said, our
• 44:57
  Speaker 1: hope is lost. Not our hope is fading or our
• 45:01
  Speaker 1: hope is weak. It was lost, gone, vanished. They couldn't
• 45:05
  Speaker 1: see any possibility of things getting better. They had stopped
• 45:08
  Speaker 1: believing in a future. They had stopped dreaming about going home.
• 45:12
  Speaker 1: They had accepted that this was it. They would die
• 45:15
  Speaker 1: as captives in a foreign land. And that would be
• 45:18
  Speaker 1: the end of Israel's story. Hope is what keeps people
• 45:22
  Speaker 1: going during hard times. When hope dies, everything dies. These
• 45:27
  Speaker 1: people had reached that point. They had no hope left. Finally,
• 45:32
  Speaker 1: they said, we are indeed cut off. They felt separated
• 45:35
  Speaker 1: from everything, cut off from their land, cut off from
• 45:38
  Speaker 1: their temple, cut off from their past, cut off from
• 45:41
  Speaker 1: their future, and most painfully, cut off from God himself.
• 45:46
  Speaker 1: They felt like God had abandoned them, cut them off
• 45:49
  Speaker 1: from his presence and his promises. The word cut off
• 45:52
  Speaker 1: in Hebrew carries the sense of being completely severed, like
• 45:56
  Speaker 1: a branch cut from a tree. Once it's cut, it
• 46:00
  Speaker 1: withers and dies. That's how they saw themselves, severed from
• 46:04
  Speaker 1: the source of life, with no way to be reconnected.
• 46:08
  Speaker 1: This wasn't just one or two people feeling this way.
• 46:11
  Speaker 1: This was the collective cry of the nation. Everyone felt it.
• 46:16
  Speaker 1: The despair had become so thick you could almost touch it.
• 46:19
  Speaker 1: These words came from the depths of broken hearts that
• 46:23
  Speaker 1: had suffered too much for too long. God knew exactly
• 46:26
  Speaker 1: what his people were saying and feeling, and he was
• 46:29
  Speaker 1: about to answer their despair with a promise that would
• 46:32
  Speaker 1: seem too good to be true. But God wasn't going
• 46:35
  Speaker 1: to leave them in that despair. He had a message
• 46:38
  Speaker 1: for them, and it was a message of impossible hope.
• 46:41
  Speaker 1: Ezekiel thirty seven twelve contains God's response to their cry, Therefore,
• 46:46
  Speaker 1: prophesy and say to them. Thus says the Lord God. Behold,
• 46:51
  Speaker 1: I will open your graves and raise you from your graves,
• 46:54
  Speaker 1: o my people, and I will bring you into the
• 46:57
  Speaker 1: land of Israel. God told Ezekiel to prophesy to the people.
• 47:02
  Speaker 1: He wanted them to hear this message directly. And the
• 47:05
  Speaker 1: message started with a promise that must have sounded insane
• 47:09
  Speaker 1: to people who felt dead and buried. God said he
• 47:13
  Speaker 1: would open their graves. He was using their own language
• 47:16
  Speaker 1: against their despair. They said their bones were dried up,
• 47:20
  Speaker 1: they said they were cut off. They felt buried and dead.
• 47:23
  Speaker 1: So God said, fine, you're in graves. I'll open those graves.
• 47:30
  Speaker 1: You're dead, I'll raise you from death. This wasn't just
• 47:34
  Speaker 1: poetic language. God was promising to do for Israel exactly
• 47:39
  Speaker 1: what Ezekiel had just seen in the vision, bring the
• 47:42
  Speaker 1: dead back to life. The graves represented Babylon, the place
• 47:46
  Speaker 1: of their captivity and death. God was promising to break
• 47:50
  Speaker 1: them out of that prison, to lift them from that tomb,
• 47:53
  Speaker 1: to resurrect them from their place of burial. Notice that
• 47:57
  Speaker 1: God called them my people, even in their state of
• 48:02
  Speaker 1: death and despair, Even when they felt cut off and abandoned,
• 48:06
  Speaker 1: God still claimed them as his own. They were still
• 48:09
  Speaker 1: his people. The relationship wasn't over, The covenant wasn't broken
• 48:14
  Speaker 1: from God's side. He hadn't forgotten them or given up
• 48:17
  Speaker 1: on them. And he didn't stop there. He said, and
• 48:21
  Speaker 1: I will bring you into the land of Israel. This
• 48:24
  Speaker 1: was the ultimate promise they longed to hear. They would
• 48:28
  Speaker 1: go home, not their children or grandchildren, but them. God
• 48:33
  Speaker 1: would personally bring them back to the promised land, the
• 48:37
  Speaker 1: land their ancestors had lived in, the land they had
• 48:40
  Speaker 1: been forced to leave, the land they thought they'd never
• 48:42
  Speaker 1: see again. God was promising to reverse everything that had happened.
• 48:47
  Speaker 1: The exile would end, the graves would open, the dead
• 48:51
  Speaker 1: nation would live, and they would return home. This wasn't
• 48:55
  Speaker 1: just about being released from captivity. Anyone could theoretically be
• 49:00
  Speaker 1: least from prison, but God was promising to personally escort
• 49:04
  Speaker 1: them home, to bring them himself into their land. He
• 49:08
  Speaker 1: would be directly involved in every step of their restoration.
• 49:12
  Speaker 1: God continued with more details about this promised return. Ezekiel
• 49:16
  Speaker 1: thirty seven to thirteen adds another layer to the promise.
• 49:20
  Speaker 1: And you shall know that I am the Lord when
• 49:23
  Speaker 1: I open your graves and raise you from your graves. O,
• 49:27
  Speaker 1: my people. When God brought them back to their land,
• 49:31
  Speaker 1: it wouldn't just be a random historical event. It would
• 49:35
  Speaker 1: be a revelation of who God is. They would know, truly, know,
• 49:39
  Speaker 1: deeply understand that He is the Lord, the covenant keeping God,
• 49:44
  Speaker 1: the God who never breaks his promises, the God who
• 49:47
  Speaker 1: has power over death itself. For years in Babylon, many
• 49:52
  Speaker 1: of them had questioned whether God was still with them.
• 49:55
  Speaker 1: Some wondered if He had forgotten them. Others thought maybe
• 49:59
  Speaker 1: He wasn't power enough to save them from the Babylonians. Still,
• 50:03
  Speaker 1: others began to think that the Babylonian gods were stronger.
• 50:07
  Speaker 1: But when God brought them home, all those doubts would
• 50:10
  Speaker 1: be shattered. They would see with their own eyes that
• 50:13
  Speaker 1: the Lord is the one true God. He's the God
• 50:16
  Speaker 1: who controls nations and empires. He's the God who can
• 50:20
  Speaker 1: take a people who are as good as dead and
• 50:22
  Speaker 1: bring them back to life. He's the God who keeps
• 50:26
  Speaker 1: his promises, even when circumstances make those promises seem impossible.
• 50:31
  Speaker 1: The return to the land would be more than just
• 50:34
  Speaker 1: a physical journey. It would be a spiritual awakening. They
• 50:38
  Speaker 1: would understand in a new way who their God really is.
• 50:42
  Speaker 1: They would see his faithfulness, his power, his love for them.
• 50:47
  Speaker 1: The land itself was important because God had promised it
• 50:51
  Speaker 1: to Abraham and his descendants forever. For Israel to return
• 50:56
  Speaker 1: to that land meant God was picking up the thread
• 50:59
  Speaker 1: of his ancient promises and continuing the story He had
• 51:03
  Speaker 1: started generations before. The Abrahamic Covenant had promised three main things,
• 51:09
  Speaker 1: numerous descendants, the land of Canaan as an inheritance, and
• 51:12
  Speaker 1: blessing to all nations through Abraham's seed. When Israel was
• 51:17
  Speaker 1: in exile, it seemed like all three promises had failed,
• 51:21
  Speaker 1: But God was about to demonstrate that his promises cannot fail.
• 51:25
  Speaker 1: The return to the land would prove that God meant
• 51:28
  Speaker 1: what he said to Abraham all those centuries ago. But
• 51:31
  Speaker 1: God's promise went even deeper than just bringing them home physically.
• 51:35
  Speaker 1: Ezekiel thirty seven fourteen reveals the most important part of
• 51:40
  Speaker 1: the restoration. And I will put my spirit within you,
• 51:45
  Speaker 1: and you shall live, and I will place you in
• 51:48
  Speaker 1: your own land. Then you shall know that I am
• 51:51
  Speaker 1: the Lord. I have spoken and I will do it,
• 51:54
  Speaker 1: declares the Lord. This was the game changer. God wasn't
• 51:58
  Speaker 1: just promising to move them from one geographical location to another.
• 52:03
  Speaker 1: He was promising to put his spirit inside them. Remember
• 52:06
  Speaker 1: in the vision how the bodies were complete but had
• 52:09
  Speaker 1: no breath, and they weren't alive until the breath entered them.
• 52:13
  Speaker 1: The same principle applied to Israel's restoration. They could return
• 52:18
  Speaker 1: to their land, rebuild their cities, and re establish their nation,
• 52:22
  Speaker 1: but without God's spirit living in them, they would still
• 52:25
  Speaker 1: be spiritually dead. God was promising an internal transformation, not
• 52:30
  Speaker 1: just an external one. He would put his spirit within them,
• 52:34
  Speaker 1: not just among them or near them, but inside them.
• 52:38
  Speaker 1: His spirit would dwell in their hearts. This was a
• 52:41
  Speaker 1: completely new kind of relationship with God. In the past,
• 52:45
  Speaker 1: God's spirit would come upon certain people for specific tasks. Prophets, priests, kings, judges,
• 52:52
  Speaker 1: Moses had the spirit, Joshua had the spirit. The judges
• 52:55
  Speaker 1: had the spirit come upon them when they needed to
• 52:58
  Speaker 1: deliver Israel. David had them spirit, but these were special cases,
• 53:02
  Speaker 1: exceptional people chosen for specific purposes. The average Israelite didn't
• 53:07
  Speaker 1: experience God's spirit dwelling within them. Now God was promising
• 53:12
  Speaker 1: that his spirit would live inside his people permanently. This
• 53:16
  Speaker 1: indwelling spirit would give them life in a way they
• 53:19
  Speaker 1: had never experienced before. It would change them from the
• 53:23
  Speaker 1: inside out. It would give them the power to obey
• 53:26
  Speaker 1: God's commands, the desire to follow his ways, and the
• 53:30
  Speaker 1: ability to know him personally. The text says, and you
• 53:35
  Speaker 1: shall live real life, abundant life, spiritual life that flows
• 53:40
  Speaker 1: from God's own spirit living within them. This wasn't just
• 53:44
  Speaker 1: about being physically alive or nationally restored. This was about
• 53:48
  Speaker 1: having true spiritual life that comes from being connected to
• 53:51
  Speaker 1: God through his spirit. Then God repeated his promise about
• 53:55
  Speaker 1: placing them in their own land, connecting the physical restoration
• 53:59
  Speaker 1: with the spiritual one. Both would happen together. They would
• 54:04
  Speaker 1: be in their land, and they would have His spirit
• 54:07
  Speaker 1: within them. And he added a declaration of certainty. I
• 54:11
  Speaker 1: have spoken, and I will do it, declares the Lord.
• 54:14
  Speaker 1: When God speaks something, it's as good as done. He
• 54:17
  Speaker 1: doesn't make empty promises he doesn't say things he doesn't mean.
• 54:21
  Speaker 1: If he said it, he will do it. This declaration
• 54:25
  Speaker 1: was God staking his reputation on the fulfillment of this promise.
• 54:30
  Speaker 1: The vision of the dry Bones works on two levels,
• 54:33
  Speaker 1: and both are important. On one level, it's about the
• 54:37
  Speaker 1: physical restoration of Israel as a nation. The bones coming
• 54:42
  Speaker 1: together and being covered with flesh represented the people returning
• 54:46
  Speaker 1: from exile, rebuilding their cities, and re establishing themselves in
• 54:51
  Speaker 1: their land. This happened historically when the Persian king Cyrus
• 54:56
  Speaker 1: issued a decree allowing the Jews to return to Jurierusalem
• 55:00
  Speaker 1: and rebuild the temple. Thousands of exiles made the journey home.
• 55:05
  Speaker 1: They rebuilt the walls of Jerusalem under Nehemiah's leadership. They
• 55:10
  Speaker 1: restored the temple under Zerubbabel. The nation of Israel came
• 55:14
  Speaker 1: back to life physically, just as the bones in the
• 55:17
  Speaker 1: valley became bodies. Families returned to their ancestral lands. The
• 55:22
  Speaker 1: city of Jerusalem was repopulated. The religious system was re established,
• 55:27
  Speaker 1: with priests serving in the temple again. Sacrifices were offered,
• 55:31
  Speaker 1: festivals were celebrated. The nation that had been dead and
• 55:35
  Speaker 1: buried for seventy years was alive again. But there's a deeper,
• 55:40
  Speaker 1: more important level to this vision. It's about spiritual resurrection.
• 55:46
  Speaker 1: The breath entering the bodies and making them alive represents
• 55:50
  Speaker 1: God's spirit entering his people and giving them spiritual life.
• 55:55
  Speaker 1: This is about more than political restoration or national identity.
• 56:00
  Speaker 1: It's about dead hearts being made alive. It's about people
• 56:04
  Speaker 1: who were separated from God being brought into intimate relationship
• 56:08
  Speaker 1: with him. It's about internal transformation that makes external obedience possible.
• 56:14
  Speaker 1: The physical return from Babylon was amazing, but it was
• 56:18
  Speaker 1: just a shadow of the greater spiritual reality God was promising.
• 56:24
  Speaker 1: Many of the Jews who returned from exile still struggled
• 56:27
  Speaker 1: with the same sins that had gotten their ancestors into
• 56:30
  Speaker 1: trouble in the first place. They rebuilt the temple, but
• 56:33
  Speaker 1: their hearts weren't always fully devoted to God. The books
• 56:37
  Speaker 1: of Ezra, Nehemiah and Malachi show us that even after
• 56:41
  Speaker 1: the return, the people still had problems with intermarriage with pagans,
• 56:46
  Speaker 1: neglecting God's law and failing to honor him properly. The
• 56:51
  Speaker 1: complete fulfillment of Ezekiel's vision required something more than just
• 56:56
  Speaker 1: coming back to the land. It required the spirit of
• 56:58
  Speaker 1: God living in sight them, changing them, giving them new
• 57:02
  Speaker 1: hearts that naturally wanted to follow God. This promise of
• 57:06
  Speaker 1: God's spirit dwelling within his people connects directly to other
• 57:10
  Speaker 1: prophecies in the Bible about a new covenant. The prophet
• 57:14
  Speaker 1: Jeremiah had spoken about a time when God would make
• 57:18
  Speaker 1: a new covenant with Israel, not like the old covenant
• 57:22
  Speaker 1: that they had broken. Jeremiah thirty one records God's promise
• 57:26
  Speaker 1: that he would put his law within them and write
• 57:28
  Speaker 1: it on their hearts. He would be their God and
• 57:32
  Speaker 1: they would be his people. Every One would know the
• 57:34
  Speaker 1: Lord from the least to the greatest. God would forgive
• 57:38
  Speaker 1: their sins and remember them no more. Ezekiel himself prophesied
• 57:43
  Speaker 1: about this new heart and new spirit in chapter thirty six,
• 57:46
  Speaker 1: just one chapter before the Dry Bones vision. God promised
• 57:51
  Speaker 1: to sprinkle clean water on his people and cleanse them
• 57:54
  Speaker 1: from all their impurities. He would give them a new
• 57:57
  Speaker 1: heart and put a new spirit within them. He would
• 58:00
  Speaker 1: remove their heart of stone and give them a heart
• 58:03
  Speaker 1: of flesh. He would put his spirit within them and
• 58:06
  Speaker 1: cause them to walk in his statutes and carefully observe
• 58:10
  Speaker 1: his rules. All of these promises point forward to something
• 58:14
  Speaker 1: greater than the return from Babylon. They point to the
• 58:17
  Speaker 1: coming of the Messiah and the new Covenant he would establish.
• 58:21
  Speaker 1: Jesus spoke about being born again, about receiving the Spirit
• 58:25
  Speaker 1: of God, about having eternal life. He told Nicodemus that
• 58:31
  Speaker 1: unless some one is born of water and the Spirit,
• 58:34
  Speaker 1: he cannot enter the Kingdom of God. He promised his
• 58:37
  Speaker 1: disciples that he would send the Holy Spirit to be
• 58:40
  Speaker 1: with them for ever, to teach them and guide them
• 58:43
  Speaker 1: into all truth. When Jesus died on the cross and
• 58:48
  Speaker 1: rose from the dead, he made it possible for people
• 58:51
  Speaker 1: to have their sins forgiven and to receive the Holy Spirit.
• 58:55
  Speaker 1: His death paid the penalty for sin that separated people
• 58:58
  Speaker 1: from God. His resurrection proved he had conquered death, and
• 59:03
  Speaker 1: through faith in him, people could be born again, spiritually
• 59:07
  Speaker 1: brought from death to life, just like those dry bones.
• 59:12
  Speaker 1: On the day of Pentecost, fifty days after Jesus rose
• 59:15
  Speaker 1: from the dead, the Spirit of God came upon the
• 59:18
  Speaker 1: believers in Jerusalem with power. They were filled with the
• 59:21
  Speaker 1: Holy Spirit. They spoke in different languages. Peter stood up
• 59:25
  Speaker 1: and preached, and three thousand people believed and were baptized
• 59:29
  Speaker 1: that day. This was the beginning of the fulfillment of
• 59:33
  Speaker 1: Ezekiel's prophecy. God's spirit was now available to dwell inside
• 59:37
  Speaker 1: anyone who believed in Jesus, not just Jews, but also Gentiles.
• 59:42
  Speaker 1: The apostle Paul later wrote about how believers are the
• 59:45
  Speaker 1: temple of the Holy Spirit. God's spirit lives in them.
• 59:50
  Speaker 1: Their bodies are temples where God dwells. The dry bones
• 59:54
  Speaker 1: coming to life through the breath of God is a
• 59:56
  Speaker 1: perfect picture of what happens when someone comes to faith
• 1:00:00
  Speaker 1: in Jesus. They were spiritually dead, separated from God without hope,
• 1:00:05
  Speaker 1: but when they hear the Gospel and believe, God's spirit
• 1:00:08
  Speaker 1: enters them and makes them spiritually alive, they become new creations.
• 1:00:14
  Speaker 1: Old things pass away, and everything becomes new. But there's
• 1:00:19
  Speaker 1: still more to this prophecy. While it had an initial
• 1:00:22
  Speaker 1: fulfillment in the return from Babylon and a deeper fulfillment
• 1:00:27
  Speaker 1: through the New Covenant in Jesus, many Bible scholars believe
• 1:00:31
  Speaker 1: Ezekiel thirty seven also points to events that are still future.
• 1:00:35
  Speaker 1: The vision speaks of the whole House of Israel, which
• 1:00:39
  Speaker 1: includes all twelve tribes, When the exiles returned from Babylon,
• 1:00:44
  Speaker 1: it was primarily from the tribes of Judah, Benjamin, and
• 1:00:47
  Speaker 1: some Levites. The northern tribes had been scattered by Assyria
• 1:00:51
  Speaker 1: over a century earlier and never fully returned as a
• 1:00:54
  Speaker 1: unified nation. The promise that all Israel would be gathered
• 1:00:58
  Speaker 1: and restored suggests a future fulfillment yet to come. Throughout history,
• 1:01:04
  Speaker 1: the Jewish people have been scattered across the world for
• 1:01:07
  Speaker 1: nearly two thousand years. After the Romans destroyed Jerusalem in
• 1:01:11
  Speaker 1: seventy a d. There was no Jewish nation in the
• 1:01:14
  Speaker 1: land of Israel. The people were dispersed to every corner
• 1:01:18
  Speaker 1: of the earth. They lived in Europe, Asia, Africa, and
• 1:01:22
  Speaker 1: eventually the Americas. They faced persecution wherever they went. Many
• 1:01:27
  Speaker 1: thought Israel as a nation was finished forever, just like
• 1:01:31
  Speaker 1: those dry bones scattered in the valley. But in nineteen
• 1:01:35
  Speaker 1: forty eight, something remarkable happened. The modern state of Israel
• 1:01:39
  Speaker 1: was established. After centuries of being scattered, Jewish people from
• 1:01:44
  Speaker 1: all over the world began returning to their ancient homeland.
• 1:01:48
  Speaker 1: Immigrants came from Europe, Russia, Ethiopia, Yemen, Morocco, and dozens
• 1:01:55
  Speaker 1: of other countries. Cities were rebuilt. Tel Aviv became a
• 1:01:59
  Speaker 1: modern metropolis. The desert bloomed as irrigation systems brought water
• 1:02:05
  Speaker 1: to dry land. Hebrew, which had been a dead language
• 1:02:09
  Speaker 1: used only for religious purposes, became a living language again.
• 1:02:13
  Speaker 1: Children grew up speaking Hebrew in the streets. A nation
• 1:02:17
  Speaker 1: that had been dead for centuries was suddenly alive again,
• 1:02:21
  Speaker 1: with a flag, an army, a government, and a place
• 1:02:24
  Speaker 1: on the world stage. Many see this as a partial
• 1:02:28
  Speaker 1: fulfillment of Ezekiel's prophecy the bones coming together and being
• 1:02:32
  Speaker 1: covered with flesh and skin. The physical restoration of Israel
• 1:02:36
  Speaker 1: as a nation is clearly happening before our eyes. But
• 1:02:40
  Speaker 1: according to the vision, the complete fulfillment includes the breath
• 1:02:45
  Speaker 1: entering them and God's spirit dwelling within them. This spiritual
• 1:02:50
  Speaker 1: awakening on a national scale has not yet fully happened.
• 1:02:55
  Speaker 1: Most Jewish people today do not recognize Jesus as them
• 1:02:59
  Speaker 1: as say they're back in the land physically, But the
• 1:03:03
  Speaker 1: spiritual resurrection Ezekiel prophesied about is still future. The apostle
• 1:03:08
  Speaker 1: Paul wrote in Romans eleven about a future time when
• 1:03:10
  Speaker 1: all Israel will be saved. He said that a partial
• 1:03:14
  Speaker 1: hardening has come upon Israel until the full number of
• 1:03:17
  Speaker 1: gentiles comes in, and then all Israel will be saved.
• 1:03:22
  Speaker 1: The prophet Zechariah spoke about a day when the inhabitants
• 1:03:26
  Speaker 1: of Jerusalem will look on the one they pierced and
• 1:03:29
  Speaker 1: mourned for him as one mourns for an only child.
• 1:03:32
  Speaker 1: God will pour out a spirit of grace and supplication
• 1:03:36
  Speaker 1: on them. This describes a future national recognition of Jesus
• 1:03:41
  Speaker 1: as the Messiah by the Jewish people. This would be
• 1:03:44
  Speaker 1: the final and complete fulfillment of the dry Bones vision,
• 1:03:48
  Speaker 1: not just physical restoration to the land, but spiritual resurrection
• 1:03:53
  Speaker 1: through God's spirit. The prophecy in Ezekiel thirty seven spans
• 1:03:58
  Speaker 1: from the Babylonian exile through the first coming of Jesus
• 1:04:02
  Speaker 1: and extends all the way to the end times, when
• 1:04:05
  Speaker 1: God will complete his plan for Israel and bring about
• 1:04:08
  Speaker 1: the full restoration he promised. Every stage of the vision
• 1:04:12
  Speaker 1: will be fulfilled. The bones have come together, the nation
• 1:04:16
  Speaker 1: exists again, but the breath, the full outpouring of God's
• 1:04:21
  Speaker 1: Spirit on all Israel, is yet to come. When it does,
• 1:04:25
  Speaker 1: the world will witness the most dramatic spiritual transformation in history.
• 1:04:29
  Speaker 1: As an entire nation turns to God and recognizes their Messiah.
• 1:04:35
  Speaker 1: That will be the day when Ezekiel's vision is completely
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  Speaker 1: spoke to you most about Ezekiel's vision. Let keep exploring
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  Speaker 1: God's word together, discovering the incredible promises He has for
• 1:05:05
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