I AM, "says so", First Congregational UCC, Rock Springs, WY 4/10/2011

“I Am” Says So!
By Rev Steven R Mitchell
First Congregational UCC, Rock Springs, WY 4/10/2011
Based on Ezekiel 37:1-14 & John 11:1-45


We are just two weeks away from celebrating Easter Sunday! The day that we set aside for “praising” God and presenting Christ with the academy award for best “Savior” in his role of “Jesus of Nazareth, the Son of God”! The scene that critics point to in giving this award is that of Jesus’ resurrection, specifically the scene where he comes to Mary at the empty tomb!
Yet in today’s lection readings we find two more “resurrection” stories. You might possibly have remembered the story of Jesus calling Lazarus out of the tomb, knowing of at least two resurrection stories, but were you aware of the story in Ezekiel, where God helped in the resurrection of those who had been dead for years in the valley of the bones?
In Western European culture, we tend to relegate skeletons to the celebration of Halloween. Yet today, two weeks before Easter Sunday, we are reading a story that deals with Halloween images. Resurrection is a difficult topic for the modern rational scientific mind, thus making the resurrection of Jesus a pretty hard thing to wrap our brain around. The raising of Lazarus from the tomb is also a hard sell, but at least a person could raise the question of whether Lazarus was actually dead, or did he just appear dead and they buried him by mistake and somehow Jesus was aware of this. But how do you reconcile this story of Ezekiel, where you have bones that are bleached by the sun, coming together, muscle and skin forming and then them breathing?
If I were talking to my mother about these two stories, she would probably tell me, “Steven, don’t fret over whether science can support these stories or not, after all, God is the creator of all life and as creator, God has the power to do things outside of the laws of this world. After all, we don’t understand all of the physical laws of this world and who’s to say that God isn’t using some science that we don’t know about yet? Just accept what you are reading as hard fact!”
My problem is, I can’t share in that type of trust and faith that my mother is able to read scripture with. I am more of a doubting Thomas, I am a product of my generation that says, the laws of the universe are constant and that all things have a predictable behavior, such as, when you’re dead, your physical body is forever dead.
Now, I do however believe that we have very little science that can quantify and explain what we call a spirit world, so I can at least ponder upon “spiritual” things more freely and with a simpler level of faith. Meaning, I can look at these two stories and look for meanings that do not conflict with hard physical science. People who tend to look at scripture more like I do would then call the account in Ezekiel at the very least a “Myth”. A myth is a story that doesn’t rely on the details as having to be factual, but use the story as a vehicle to present a “truth.”
So what is the common theme running through these two stories? In one story, we have a prophet who is lead by God out into a valley of bones, and is told by God to speak to these bones and tell them basically to come to life, which they do! In the other story we have Jesus, son of God, speaking to a dead man who has been buried for four days to come out of the tomb.
Well, for starters we are dealing with two groups of people who are in deep despair. Martha and Mary have lost their brother and are in the midst of deep grief, feeling that their world has come crashing down around them. We feel this when we lose someone who is very dear to us. For Martha and Mary, this may be more acute than just losing their brother. There is never any mention in scripture about either of them having a husband, so when Lazarus dies, they could possibly be looking at poverty, since they no longer have a male figure to defend and provide for their necessities.
For Ezekiel, the story reveals itself as speaking about the loss of the Israelites, as they had been captured and taken off to a foreign land, living in exile, and the temple, which in their culture say’s, “God lives in” has been destroyed. For those who Ezekiel was a prophet to, there was a feeling of defeat, of no hope, of no joy, a feeling of being dead!
So God directs Ezekiel out to this valley and tells him, speak to these bones and say to them come together, and then tell the breath, “enter into them” so that they might live. Ezekiel does all that God has directed him to do and these bones gather, become flesh and blood again and then come to life with the breath that God gave them. Then a pivotal verse at the end says, “I will put my spirit within you and you shall live.” Essential to the recovery of these dry bones is the spirit of God. It is the very breath of God that makes a difference in the life and death of the community. Karen Georgia Thompson, from Sermon Seeds, UCC
One more point is brought out by theologian, Dennis T. Olson as he emphasizes this aspect of the story: “The how of this amazing skeletal resurrection will be through the ‘breath’ (ruah) – spirit, wind, breath of the Lord which will enter these bones and give them life. And that breath of God will come through a human priest/prophet speaking the word of the Lord in ordinary human language.”
This past Monday, in the group of ministers that I have bible study with, the primary question raised was, “how do we as pastors inspire our congregants to deepen their relationship with God?” You see, most pastors hold high expectations for their congregations. We are naive enough to assume that if a person comes to Worship on Sunday morning that they want to deepen their relationship with God. This is true for some, but not for all.
As we look at this story and the story of Jesus raising Lazarus, both are men speaking the word of God which brings life. It is through speaking the “truth” of God, through the spoken word of God, that the breathe of life enters into a person whose soul has been filled with hopelessness, despair, possibly even death.
This is powerful stuff that we are hearing about this morning. We are hearing about the truth that “God gives us life”, not just in the hereafter, but here and now! It is a truth for those of us who harbor pain, and hurt, who feel violated by life itself, it is through speaking “God truth” to these bones that have become dead and dried up, that we can once again be filled with life, with hope, with joy. We live when God’s breathe has entered into our soul! This is what the meaning of resurrection is all about. We don’t have to be waiting until we die as Martha was professing to Jesus, but as Jesus showed with the raising of Lazarus, resurrection is now.
One last thing for us to think about, in both stories, this coming back to life, this gift of new life is for the enhancement of God, not for the benefit of those who were dead. Jesus prayed to God, saying that he was doing this in order that those who see will believe. It wasn’t for Lazarus’ sake that he was given back his life; it was so that God might be glorified.
We speak a lot about the mission of the church, or another way to say it is the life of the church. The life of the church isn’t for the purpose of its members. The life of the church isn’t for us to revel in, to enjoy for ourselves; rather the life of the church is to glorify God! The mission of the church is to help bring people into an active relationship with their creator. If we are expecting anything other than that then we are misguided in our purpose. Last week at communion I made the point that the communion table wasn’t our table, but God’s table. This church isn’t our church. This church is God’s church. Its success in its outreach will be determined by how much we allow God to breathe the Spirit into our body! Our life line is through the “saying so” of the, “I Am”! Amen.