By Melanie
Rigney
The hand of
the LORD came upon me, and he led
me out in the spirit of the LORD and set me in the center of the broad valley.
It was filled with bones. He made me walk among them in every direction.
So many lay on the surface of the valley! How dry they were! He asked me: Son of man, can these bones come
back to life? “Lord GOD,” I answered, “you alone know that.” Then he said to me: Prophesy over these bones,
and say to them: Dry bones, hear the word of the LORD! Thus says the Lord GOD to these bones: Listen! I will make
breath enter you so you may come to life. I will put sinews on you, make flesh grow over
you, cover you with skin, and put breath into you so you may come to life. Then
you shall know that I am the LORD.” (Ezekiel 37:1-6)
They cried to the Lord in their distress; from their straits he rescued
them. And he led them by a direct way to reach an inhabited city. (Psalms 107:6-7)
(When
the scholar asked about the greatest commandment, Jesus said:) “You shall love
the Lord, your God, with all your heart, with all your soul, and with all your
mind. This is the greatest and first commandment. The second is like it: You
shall love your neighbor as yourself. The whole law and the prophets depend on
these two commandments.” (Matthew
22:37-40)
Piety
Lord, fill
these bones with Your truth and nourishment.
Study
Back on the Fourth of July weekend, I clanged some
exercise equipment on my right ankle. It swelled up and turned black and blue,
but I still could walk without any pain. Now here it is practically Labor Day,
and my ankle still has a goose egg on it, albeit smaller and minus the colors
of the rainbows. I suppose I should go see the doctor anyway, but I keep
putting it off. I do know that I’ve spent a lot of time poking and probing and
testing that ankle instead of assuming good health and otherwise ignoring it.
Maybe it’s the same way with our spiritual health. When
all is well and we have an ongoing communication with the Lord, we don’t think
a lot about how the relationship could become even deeper or how we could live
in ways even more pleasing to Him.
How much harder life is when our spiritual “bones” dry
out, when we are confronted with the reality that what we want now, right now,
is not part of the Lord’s immediate plan for us. It’s like with my ankle. The
situation’s made me more conscious of the parts of my body that don’t work, and
more appreciative of the parts that do. Spiritual dryness can remind us to
appreciate the times when our souls are well watered and fed… and poke and prod
and test when our interior life isn’t working the way it should. We can pray
for the Lord’s breath to come upon us and heal us as no doctor’s visit or ankle
brace could ever do.
Action
Where are
you experiencing spiritually dry bones? Ask the Lord to reinvigorate them.
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