The Bible Recap - Day 251 (Ezekiel 37-39) - Year 5

Episode Date: September 8, 2023

SHOW NOTES:  - All the info you need to START is on our website! Seriously, go there.  - Join our PATREON community for bonus perks! - Get your TBR merch - Show credits - To enter to win a trip to the Museum of the Bible, click here!   FROM TODAY’S PODCAST:  - Genesis 2:7 - Judges 7:22 - Genesis 50:20 - TBR in Spanish   SOCIALS: The Bible Recap: Instagram | Facebook | Twitter D-Group: Instagram | Facebook | Twitter TLC: Instagram | Facebook | Twitter   D-GROUP: The Bible Recap is brought to you by D-Group - an international network of discipleship and accountability groups that meet weekly in homes and churches: Find or start one near you today!   DISCLAIMER:  The Bible Recap, Tara-Leigh Cobble, and affiliates are not a church, pastor, spiritual authority, or counseling service. Listeners and viewers consume this content on a voluntary basis and assume all responsibility for the resulting consequences and impact.

Hey Bible readers, I'm Tara Lee Cobble and I'm your host for the Bible Recap. Today we open with a Valley Vision and a Stick Sign Act. Ezekiel's vision in the Valley of Dry Bones is probably his 20 minutes of fame. This is what he's most known for. In fact, I've heard probably half a dozen sermons preached on this, using it to illustrate a variety of different things, like God making dead people into a powerful army, or how people have the power to speak life into things, but lots of them have nothing to do with what the text is actually teaching here, and some of them are even biblically inaccurate. So today, we're going to make sure we keep

our eyes on the text and the context to see what God is actually communicating to us about Himself and His plan. Ezekiel has a vision of a bunch of dry bones in a valley. As far as the eye can see, there's nothing but femurs and fibulose. Then, through Ezekiel, God commands the bones to live. This is God's command, not Ezekiel's. We can hear it in verses 4 through 6 where God says, Prophecy over these bones and say to them, O dry bones, hear the word of the Lord. Thus says the Lord God to these bones, Behold, I will cause breath to enter you, and you shall live,

and I will lay sin used upon you, and will cause flesh to come upon you, and cover you with skin, and put breath in you, and you shall live, and you shall know that I am the Lord. So we can see that God is the one who issued the command and God is the one who breathed life into them. And yes, of course, we know God could have done it without a Zekiel. God doesn't need a Zekiel for this, but he loves him and he's using him. So a Zekiel gets the joy of being part of God's process in this vision.

God says this vision represents the twelve tribes, the people of both Judah and Israel. He will give them new life and bring them back to their land. Here are three things I find interesting about this story. First, it connects us back to God's original creation of mankind in the Garden of Eden. Back in Genesis 2, God created Adam out of the dust of the ground and breathed life into him, too. God is recreating things here. Second, the word used for breath here is the Hebrew word Ruhak, which is also translated more often as Spirit. And third, did you notice that God doesn't command the bodies to breathe?

That seems like it would make more sense, right? Instead, he commands the breath to enter the bodies to breathe, that seems like it would make more sense, right? Instead, he commands the breath to enter the bodies. I think there's some spiritual symbolism for us in there somewhere. Then God tells Ezekiel to perform a sign act. Here's the plan. He'll take a stick and write, Judah and company, on it, to represent the Southern Kingdom. Then he'll write, Joseph and Ephraim and company,

on another stick, representing the Northern Kingdom. Then he'll tie the sticks together like a law firm merger, except it'll actually be the restoring of all that has been broken relationally in the 350 years since the kingdom divided. This is an especially big deal, because it's been 150 years since the Northern Kingdom was overthrown by the Assyrians.

So it's possible that the newly exiled people of the Southern Kingdom think that the Northern Kingdom has been destroyed entirely. But this sign act lets them know that God has preserved a remnant from the Northern tribes too. They get their own stick, and he'll bring them all back to their land and set one shepherd over them, a king from the line of David, and the remnant of Israel will be restored, reunited, and repinate, because God himself will be among them. He will sanctify them, and he will live out his eternal covenant of peace with them. In chapter 38 we meet a king named Gog. I'm going to pronounce his name Gog, so there's no

mistaking whether I'm saying Gog or God. So, Gog rules a nation named Megog, except no one knows who he is or where this is. And even the details Ezekiel gives us about him make things more uncertain. For instance, his army is comprised of people from all over the place, so that doesn't help us narrow down his location. What do we make of this mysterious king and kingdom? Lots of commentators think Ezekiel has invented this king as an amalgam of all the powerful nations that have opposed gods people throughout history. Ezekiel even uses a lot of the same imagery he used earlier with Tyra and Egypt.

So Gog seems to be an archetype that represents gods' enemies. For that reason, and the fact that God twice tells us that this will happen in the latter days, most commentators think this is a yet-to-beef-fulfilled prophecy about the end times. Ezekiel says some peculiar things will happen in the future that involve both Goge and the restored remnant. They'll be dwelling securely, then Goge will show up to attack them. What? Why?

Why is God bringing this big, bad enemy against His people? Fortunately, in verse 16, he tells us why. God says, in the latter days, I will bring you against my land that the nations may know me when through you, O Gog, I vindicate my holiness before their eyes. God says he's doing this to remind all the nations around Israel not to mess with him or his people. By demonstrating his dominance over a powerful enemy, the less powerful enemies won't risk attacking God's people. Clever. So when

Goag shows up on the scene, God will send an earthquake and fire and hail and pestilence and mass confusion where the people of Goag's army accidentally kill each other. We saw this happen before in Judges 7. And of course, God closes this with his traditional, then they will know that I am the Lord. In chapter 39, God lays it on even thicker for Gogue. He says he's not just going to show up at the side of Gogue's army and attack them, but he'll also throw fire on Maygogg, their homeland. And this is where my God shot appears. God says Israel will take all the weapons gog was going to use against them and recycle them into fuel.

Not only that, but Israel will also get the spoils of a war they didn't even have to fight. Who is this God? Who takes the enemy's efforts to destroy his people and turns them to bless his people instead? It's like Joseph said in Genesis 50, after running into the brothers who sold him into slavery years earlier,

you meant evil against me, but God meant it for good. God doesn't land on zero. God doesn't shift into neutral. This isn't him working out everything so that it's perfectly fair. Nothing about this is fair. This is absolutely undeserved generosity and unmerited favor.

Nothing God's people have done has earned them anything but eternal separation from Him. But He doesn't just say, I forgive you, now leave me alone. He says, here's a new heart to love me with. And here's my spirit to empower your obedience. And here's the eternal kingdom you're going to inherit. You guys, no one is like him.

He is where the joy is. October is right around the corner, and you know what that means. We're starting the New Testament. But did you know that we offer our New Testament reading plan in Spanish, too? It's called Los Anopsis de la Bibliá. And if you have Spanish-speaking friends who haven't started reading to the Bible with us yet, October 1st is a great time for them to join. To find out more about the Spanish reading plan, go to thebibelrycap.com-forwardslash-espenial or click the link in the show notes.

We have a brand new, exciting trip giveaway, and I think you're definitely going to want to enter. Sign up to win a trip with me to the Museum of the Bible in Washington, D.C. for you and a friend, nobibber, 1st, 2nd, 3rd. I've only been to the Museum of the Bible once, and I didn't get to spend too much time there, so I am super excited to go again with you. Museum of the Bible is an immersive experience that explores the impact and the history of the Bible, which we all know and love, and we'll get to see thousands of artifacts

from biblical times and even get to visit the Holy Land without even having to own a passport. Text Museum to 67101 to enter. That's M-U-S-E-U-M to 67101 or click the link in the show notes. you