While reading I came again to that question in chapter 37 of Ezekiel when he is led to a valley full of dry bones and the Lord asks, “Son of man, can these bones live?”
As Ezekiel surveyed the boneyard
he seemed to respond with as much faith as he could muster, “Sovereign Lord,
you alone know.”
The Lord told him to prophesy
life over the bones. He did and sure enough, the breath of God entered them. I’ve written a note in my Bible that the
average adult has 206 bones and scripture says when the bones stood on their
feet, they appeared a vast army. Can you imagine the sound of those people
rising?
This story is a reminder that no person
is beyond redemption—that the breath of God can bring new
life to any one if they would give themselves to Him.
When hope
has dwindled, time has passed, and it feels as if nothing will ever change,
this story gives us renewed hope that it is never too late as Ezekiel notes for
God to open the graves.
Months ago,
the cat we call Mama Kitty grew extremely sick. She was jaundiced, and had
stopped eating, which was complicated by other chronic issues including being
allergic to many kinds of food. In the scheme of world events, she was just one
formerly feral cat, but she had always been special to me because she showed up
at our door at a challenging time in our family’s life. On a Monday in October,
the vet gave her a couple of days. She was as good as dead, but I couldn’t give
her up yet. I brought her home and continued to do everything I could, but it
seemed there wasn’t anything that would move the needle. I awoke crying every
morning that week wondering if that would be the day I’d have to make the
dreaded decision to let her go. In the meantime, she laid in my lap while I was
working at the computer and any time I was sitting down. I prayed and prayed.
We didn’t
know if she was even drinking water at that point. Because Jerry’s back had
been acting up in a serious way, I covertly dug a grave for the cat. Jerry
would have intervened if he’d seen it. It was hard and I cried the whole time,
but I did it.
On the
third day I sat down with my dinner, a piece of salmon. She stood and sniffed—the
first time she’d shown interest in food in days. I gave her a bit and she ate
it. We knew salmon didn’t have all the nutrients she needed but it was better
than nothing, so we continued giving it to her finally finding a different kind
of limited ingredient food that included
salmon and addressed her allergies. That was over three months ago. The
jaundice disappeared from her skin after about a month, and I caught her
playing with a toy a couple of weeks ago. No, she’s not one hundred percent,
but we’ve had months with her that we wouldn’t have otherwise had. I have no
explanation for it except God did what only he could do.
That grave
I dug is still out there, the overturned earth mound beside it. I think I’ll
fill it in and plant spring flowers. But meanwhile, when I see it, the message
is nothing is impossible with God, and I’m encouraged about situations for
which I’ve long prayed. Because God can and He does bring the dead back to
life.