Valley of Bones

In Ezekiel chapter 37, verse 9; Then said he unto me, Prophesy unto the wind, prophesy, son of man, and say to the wind, Thus saith the Lord God; Come from the four winds, O breath, and breathe upon these slain, that they may live.
I have heard it preached that this was teaching regeneration and also the resurrection of our bodies. I do not feel that either of these positions is correct due to the fact that man is involved in this work and I have not been able to see that Ezekiel was in the valley of the bones in his flesh. In verse 1; Ezekiel said; The hand of the Lord was upon me, and carried me out in the spirit of the Lord, and set me down in the midst of the valley which was full of bones. Notice that he said that the hand of the Lord was upon me. Other words, he is saying that the power, the strength of the Lord was upon me. That the Lord was exercising his power and had pre-eminence over me and lead me out in the spirit and set me down in the midst of the valley which was full of bones. He goes on to say; And caused me to pass by them and to see that they were very dry and asked me saying; Son of man, can these bones live? And I answered, O Lord God, thou knowest.
Ezekiel knew that it was impossible for those bones to live outside of the work of God or without the wind of the Lord blowing upon them. We are dealing with a vision that Ezekiel had concerning these bones. In verse 11; Then said he unto me, Son of man, these bones are the whole house of Israel: behold, they say, Our bones are dried, and our hope is lost: we are cut off for our parts. This whole setting is dealing with Israel being disobedient, strayed away from God and going about in their way, living in a way that broke their fellowship with their God and lost all hope for they had been cut off for their part. Can you imagine how it would be to lose your fellowship with Christ, the one that redeemed you from your sins and that you strayed so far away that you were cut off and forgot that you were once purged from your old sins and lost all hope of the resurrection, this would indeed be a sad state to be in.
So the Lord told Ezekiel to prophesy and say unto them, Thus saith the Lord God; Behold, O my people, I will open your graves, and cause you to come up out of your graves, and bring you into the land of Israel. And ye shall know that I am the Lord, when I have opened your graves, O my people, and brought you up out of your graves. And shall put my spirit in you, and ye shall live, and I shall place you in your own land: then shall ye know that I the Lord have spoken it, and performed it, saith the Lord.
This is telling Ezekiel to preach or speak to this backsliding Israel and I will use you to proclaim my word that they may know that I am the Lord and I will send my spirit upon them that they may receive this message and I will revive them with this great truth, that they may see and understand.
There are times in a child of God’s life that he is blessed to hear the gospel with hearing ears and able to understand the truth as it is in Jesus Christ. We are able to feel the sweet fellowship with Christ and have a closeness with him that he did not think was possible. We are able to believe all these great doctrines of grace, such as election, effectual calling, justification, glorification, the resurrection of these bodies from the grave, having our hope anchored into the veil, into the very death, burial and resurrection of Jesus Christ from the dead. Then we begin to follow the ways of the world, we begin to turn from the ways of the Lord and for some reason the gospel doesn’t have as much meaning as it once had and we begin to grow cold in God’s service. The truth that we at one time rejoiced in has become dead and cold and without meaning. Our hope is completely gone and the church doesn’t seem to have anything for you anymore. The preaching has become dead to you. Oh! you may continue to go thru the motions of going to church on Sunday morning, you may even try to sing the songs of Zion, you might even get down on your knees to try and lead in prayer, but you find a dead service. The things that you once loved so well has just gotten to be a hard work with no meaning. When we reach this point in our fellowship with God we are just a valley of dry bones and stand in need of life. Son of Man can these bones live?
The hand of the Lord reaches down with his power and strength and leads some poor preacher and carries him out in the spirit of the Lord and sets him down in the midst of the valley of dry bones and tells him to preach the everlasting gospel of the Son Of God. Tells him to just preach Jesus Christ. The Lord says preach and all the rest I will do. The Spirit takes this message of grace and applies it to our dried bones and we come alive again. This refreshes our soul and we feel alive once again. This truth has become sweet and we begin to rejoice, our hopes has been renewed and we are able to get down on our knees and pour out our heart to our Lord, thanking him for all his graces and making a new commitment to serve him. Yes; these bones can live, but only through the grace of God.