Transcript for Day 231: The Valley of Dry Bones (2023)

Hi, my name is Father Mike Schmitz and you're listening to the Bible in a year podcast where we encounter God's voice and live life through the lens of Scripture. The Bible in a year podcast is brought to you by Ascension, using the Great Adventure Bible timeline will read all the way from Genesis to Revelation, discovering how the story of salvation unfolds and how we fit into that story today is Day 231. We're reading today from Jeremiah chapter 8. Easykill, chapters 37 and 38. And Proverbs 14 verses 33-35. As always, the Bible translation that I'm reading from is the Revised Center version, second Catholic edition. I'm using the great Adventure Bible from a sentient if you want to download your own Bible in the reading plan. You can visit ascensionpress.com slash Bible in a year. You can also subscribe to this podcast by clicking on subscribe and you receive daily episodes and updates. And all those fun things speak in of days. It is Day 2-3-1, which is the opposite of 1-2-3, not really. But reading Jeremiah chapter 8, and as I mentioned, Ezekiel 37 to 38, the dry bones, the value of dry bones, the sticks, the prophecy about Gog, if you remember, over to that guy. Well, you will today, and Proverbs 1433 through 35. The Book of the Prophet Jeremiah, chapter 8, a lament for Judah. At that time, says the Lord, the bones of the kings of Judah, the bones of its princes, the bones of the priests, the bones of the prophets, and the bones of the inhabitants of Jerusalem shall be brought out of their tombs, and they shall be spread before the sun and the moon and all the host of heaven, which they have loved and served, which they have gone after, and which they have sought in worshiped. And they shall not be gathered or buried. They shall be as dumb on the surface of the ground. Death shall be preferred to life by all the remnant that remains of this evil family and all the places where I have driven them says the Lord of hosts. You shall say to them, thus says the Lord. When men fall, do they not rise again? If one turns away, does he not return? Why then has this people turned away in perpetual backsliding? They hold fast to deceit, they refuse to return. I have given heed and listened, but they have not spoken rightly. No man repents of his wickedness, saying, what have I done? Everyone turns to his own course, like a horse plunging headlong into battle. Even the stork in the heavens knows her times, and the turtle dove, swallow and crane, keep the time of their coming, but my people know not the ordinance of the Lord. How can you say we are wise, and the law of the Lord is with us? But behold, the false pen of the scribes has made it into a lie. The wise men shall be put to shame, they shall be dismayed and taken. Behold, they have rejected the word of the Lord, and what wisdom is in them. Therefore, I will give their wives to others, and their fields to conquerers, because from the least to the greatest everyone is greedy for unjust gain, from profit to priest everyone deals falsely. They have healed the wound of my people lightly saying, peace, peace, when there is no peace. Were they ashamed when they committed abomination? No. They were not at all ashamed. They did not know how to blush. Therefore, they shall fall among the fallen. When I punish them, they shall be overthrown, says it the Lord. When I would gather them, says it the Lord, there are no grapes on the vine, nor figs on the fig tree, even the leaves are withered, and when I gave them has passed away from them. Why do we sit still, gather together, let us go into the fortified cities and perish there? For the Lord our God has doomed us to perish, and has given us poison to water to drink, because we have sinned against the Lord. We looked for peace, but no good came, for a time of healing, but behold, terror. The snorting of their horses is heard from Dan, at the sound of the name of their stallions the whole land quakes. They come and devour the land and all that fills it, the city, and those who dwell in it. For behold, I am sending you among serpents, adors which cannot be charmed, and they shall bite you, says the Lord. My grief is beyond healing. My heart is sick within me. Listen, the cry of the daughter of my people from the length and breadth of the land is the Lord, not in Zion. Is her king not in her? Why have they provoked me to anger with their grave and images, and with their foreign idols? The harvest is past, the summer is ended, and we are not saved. For the wound of the daughter of my people, my heart is wounded. I mourned, and dismay has taken hold on me. Is there no balm and guillied? Is there no physician there? Why then, has the health of the daughter of my people not been restored? The Book of the Prophet Ezekiel, chapter 37, The Valley of Dry Bones. The hand of the Lord was upon me, and he brought me out by the spirit of the Lord and sent me down in the midst of the valley. It was full of bones. And he led me round among them, and behold, they were very many upon the valley, and behold, they were very dry. And he said to me, son of man, can these bones live? And I answered, O Lord God, You know." Again he said to me, prophesied to 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 use 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, I prophesied as I was commanded, and as I prophesied, there was a noise, and behold, a rattling, and the bones came together bone to its bone, and as I looked, there were sinews on them, and flesh had come upon them, and skin had covered them, but there was no spirit in them. Then he said to me, prophesied to the Spirit, prophesied son of man, and say to the Spirit, thus says the Lord God, Come from the four winds of spirit and breathe upon these slain that they may live. So I prophesied as he commanded me, and the spirit came into them and they lived and stood upon their feet and exceedingly great host. Then he said to me, son of man, these bones are the whole house of Israel. Behold, they say our bones are dried up, and our hope is lost. We are clean cut off. Therefore prophesied, and say to them, thus says the Lord God. behold, I will open your graves and raise you from your graves, oh my people, and I will bring you home into the land of Israel. And you shall know that I am the Lord when I open your graves and raise you from your graves, oh my people, and I will put my spirit within you, and you shall live, and I will place you in your own land. Then you shall know that I, the Lord, have spoken, and I have done it, says the Lord. the two sticks. The word of the Lord came to me. Son of man, take a stick and write on it for Judah and the children of Israel associated with him. Then take another stick and write upon it for Joseph, the stick of Ephraim, and all the house of Israel associated with him. And join them together into one stick that they may become one in your hand. And when your people say to you, will you not show us what you mean by these? Say to them, thus says the Lord God. Behold, I am about to take the stick of Joseph, which is in the hand of Ephraim, and the tribes of Israel associated with them, and I will join with it the stick of Judah, and make them one stick that they may be one in my hand. When the sticks on which you write are in your hand before their eyes, then say to them. Thus says the Lord God, behold, I will take the sons of Israel from the nations among which they have gone and will gather them from all sides and bring them to their own land. And I will make them one nation in the land upon the mountains of Israel and one king shall be king over them all. And they shall be no longer two nations and no longer divided into two kingdoms. They shall not defile themselves anymore with their idols and their detestable things, or with any of their transgressions, but I will save them from all the back slidings in which they have sinned. And we'll cleanse them. And they shall be my people. And I will be there, God. My servant David shall be king over them, and they shall all have one shepherd. They shall follow my ordinances, and be careful to observe my statutes. They shall dwell in the land where your father's dwelt, that I gave to my servant Jacob. They and their children and their children's children shall dwell there forever, and David, my servant, will be their prince forever. I will make a covenant of peace with them. It shall be an everlasting covenant with them, and I will bless them and multiply them, and will set my sanctuary in the midst of them forevermore. My dwelling place shall be with them. And I will be there, God. And they shall be my people. Then the nations will know that I, the Lord, sanctify Israel, when my sanctuary is in the midst of them forevermore. Chapter 38, Prophecy Against Gog The Word of the Lord came to me, Son of Man. set your face toward Gogg, of the land of Magog, the chief prince of Meshik and Tubal, and prophesied against him and say, thus says the Lord God. Behold, I am against you, Ogog, chief prince of Meshik and Tubal, and I will turn you about and put hooks into your jaws, and I will bring you forth and all your army, horses, and horsemen, all of them clothe in full armor, a great company, all of them with buckler and shield wielding swords. Persia, Kush, and Putt are with them, all of them, with shield and helmet. Gomer, and all his hordes, bet to Garma, from the other most parts of the north with all his hordes, many peoples are with you. Be ready, and keep ready. You and all the hosts that are assembled about you, and be a guard for them. After many days, you will be mustard. In the latter years, you will go against the land that is restored from war, the land where people were gathered from many nations upon the mountains of Israel, which had been a continual waste. Its people were brought out from the nations and now dwell securely all of them. You will advance, coming on like a storm. You will be like a cloud covering the land, you and all your hordes, and many peoples with you. Thus says the Lord God. On that day, thoughts will come into your mind, and you will devise an evil scheme, and say, I will go up against the land of unwalled villages. I will fall upon the quiet people who dwell securely, all of them dwelling without walls, and having no bars or gates. To seize, spoil, and carry off plunder, to assailed the waste places which are now inhabited, and the people who were gathered from the nations who have gotten cattle and goods who dwell at the center of the earth. Shiba and Adan in the Merchants of Tarshish and all its villages will say to you. Have you come to Caesar's soil? Have you assembled your hosts to carry off plunder to carry away silver and gold to take away cattle and goods to seize great spoil? Therefore, son of man, to prophesy. and say to God, thus says the Lord God. On that day, when my people Israel are dwelling securely, you will be stir yourself and come from your place out of the other most parts of the north, you and many peoples with you, all of them riding on horses a great host, a mighty army. You will come up against my people Israel, like a cloud covering the land. In the latter days, I will bring you against my land, that the nations may know me when through you, O God, I vindicate my holiness before their eyes. Thus says the Lord God. Are you he of whom I spoke in former days by my servants the prophets of Israel, who in those days prophesied for years that I would bring you against them? But on that day, when Gog shall come against the land of Israel, says the Lord God. My wrath will be roused. For in my jealousy, and in my blazing wrath, I declare, on that day, there shall be a great shaking in the land of Israel. The fish of the sea and the birds of the air and the beasts of the field in all creeping things that creep on the ground, in all the men that are upon the face of the earth shall quick at my presence, and the mountains shall be thrown down, and the cliffs shall fall, and every wall shall tumble to the ground. I will summon every kind of terror against God, says the Lord God. Every man's sword will be against his brother. With pestilence and bloodshed, I will enter into judgment with him. And I will reign upon him and his hordes, and the many peoples that are with him, torrential reigns and hailstones, fire and brimstone. So, I will show my greatness and my holiness, and make myself known in the eyes of many nations. Then they will know that I am the Lord. The Book of Proverbs 14 verses 33 through 35. Wisdom abides in the mind of a man of understanding, but it is not known in the heart of fools. Righteousness exalts a nation, but sin is a reproach to any people. A servant who deals wisely has the King's favor, but his wrath falls on one who acts shainfully. Father and have we give you praise and glory. You are good. You are our Father. You are dead. We thank you so much. God, you have made your heart known to us and you've called us back to yourself. You who can raise the dead to life. You who conquered death. And so that death doesn't have power to conquer us. We ask you to send that Spirit the Spirit that came upon the dry bones as easy guilt prophesied the Spirit that raised Jesus Christ from the dead the Spirit that you gave to the apostles and you give to us your children now We ask for that Holy Spirit to bring us to life especially Lord the broken parts of us though the dead parts of us the parts that seem lost and without hope The parts of us that disqualify us, we believe they disqualify us. Lord God, let your Holy Spirit come upon us in those parts. Bring us to life. Bring us to you. Bring us home. And we ask this in Jesus name in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit. Amen. Okay, bones. Bones are the is the word today because we started that with bones and Jeremiah chapter eight. I mean, it talks about the bones of the priests and the bones of the prophets, the bones of the inhabitants of Jerusalem, the kings of Judah, the princes, all their bones gonna be brought out. And that's just something so remarkable about this because what is it? What is Jeremiah talking about? Obviously. Here's Jeremiah. And he's turned on the barrel. He knows what's coming because the word of the Lord keeps speaking to him. Remember, that has not yet happened. This massive destruction of Jerusalem has not yet happened. And Jeremiah is calling them to brace for impact, right? Now, when we hear Ezekiel, it's already happened. And we're going to get to that in just a second. But Jeremiah, it has yet to happen. And gosh, this is so incredible. We're talks about the bones. What is gonna happen? The bones of the kings of Judah, princes, bones of the priests, prophets, and the inhabitants of Jerusalem, they should be brought out of their tombs and spread before the sun and moon and all the host of heaven, which they have loved and served. They have sought in worshiped, right? They all these false gods, that the people of Judah, the gods own people, they have gone after foreign gods of foreign peoples in foreign lands. And so what is God saying? Okay, what's gonna happen is you're gonna be brought to foreign lands. I mean, essentially, you love the gods of these foreign peoples, okay? You're gonna be brought to them. That you're gonna be uprooted from this place. You're gonna be taken away from the land that God has given to you, the land that the God has promised to you. You want those things, okay? You can have them, and I'll take you to those places, and you will belong to those people as slaves, and you'll belong to those false gods as slaves, because that's what our idols do, our idols and slaves. We recognize that, gosh, the Lord God, when we belong to Him, we don't belong to Him as slaves. We actually Scripture says again and again, Jesus makes it possible that we belong to the Lord as sons and daughters. But the false gods in our lives, we have to serve them, right? We belong to them. We are the slaves of those things that we give our heart to, except God. Because God brings us into this relationship where He raises us up as opposed to the false gods, the idols that drag us down. And drag us back, and so here's Jeremiah, and he keeps saying, why is this people turned away in perpetual backsliding? They hold fast to deceit and refuse to return. And there's something about this that, you know, Jeremiah uses the example of, you know, even stalks, they know the time to fly. Turtle love, swallow the crane. They know, I mean, if you've ever been to Israel, you know that it's incredible, migratory epicenter. I don't know if that's the right word, but it's a location where you can see every different species of bird, not literally every, but you don't think they have penguins. But so many species of birds that pass through that land. And here's Jeremiah pointing out, all these birds look up. They know when it's time to migrate. Why don't you know that this is the time to migrate? How can you say, he's at verse 8, we are wise and the law of the Lord is with us. But behold, the false pen of the scribes has made it into a lie. And remember, Jeremiah is going to be talking about those false prophets that keep on saying he repeats himself. In fact, from chapters before in verse 11, they have healed the wound of my people lightly. Remember that just the booboo kind of a situation where it's a compound fracture. saying peace, peace when there is no peace. Were they ashamed when they committed abomination? No, they were not at all ashamed. They did not know how to blush. And so what God is saying is I have to. I'm going to let them fall because they continue to be of two minds and they continue to not repent. perpetual backsliding and it's just so so awful and devastating because we recognize that that can be us. We can give our hearts as well to these false gods that promise everything and deliver nothing. They promise everything and they take everything. It's such a difficult word but the encouraging word of course is in chapter 37 of Ezekiel. Remember that Jeremiah is preaching ahead of the fall of destruction of Jerusalem. But Ezekiel is preaching after the fall, the destruction, and where there's no home anymore. There's no Judah anymore, there's no Jerusalem, essentially anymore. It's been destroyed, the temple has been destroyed, and it is dead, it is done, it is over, and that's where you have this incredible incredible vision, this incredible action, and chapter 37, and the valley of the dry bones. Because what does God say? Here's a valley of dry bones. All there is is just death. If you see a bunch of bones, There's no future for the bones. There's only past, right? It's over with. And yet God says prophesy, speak the word of God. My words, He says, over these bones, and they all come together, and then continue to speak them, the Holy Spirit, and the breath of life comes into them, and this whole massive host, it says, and they lived, the Spirit came into them, and they lived, and stood upon their feet, and exceedingly great host. He says, these bones are the whole house of Israel. They say, our bones are dried up, and our hope is lost. We are clean cut off. And that's what, I mean, honestly, the people who are living in Babylon at this point, yeah, there's no way to go home. There is no home to go back to. It's done. Just like a bunch of bones. And yet, here's God who says, I promise, I will put my spirit within you. And you shall live, and I will place you in your own land. And then you shall know that I, the Lord of Spoken, and I have done it, says the Lord. Remember, God has used Babylon, not to destroy his people, but to call his people back to him. God has used what looks like complete destruction. You convert their hearts so that they can know that we can know that he is the Lord God truly and forever. And so that's what the image of the dry bones is. That's what the image of the two sticks are, right? Here is not just Judah, but also Israel, those two nations. And here's easy gul holding those two sticks in one hand, making them one stick saying, I'll restore all of the nations. And I will bring back King David, remember that why were people waiting for the Messiah? They're waiting for the Messiah for many reasons. This is one of them in chapter 37, but verse 24. It says, my servant David, she'll be king over them. and they shall all have one shepherd. Remember that when we look forward to the Messiah, when they look forward to the Christ, which is the same thing, right, means anointed one. They're looking for this promise here in chapter 37 and in other places of that future king in the line of David, who would be the anointed one, who would be the one shepherd of the one people, the one king of the one kingdom. And we're going to hit the next Messianic checkpoint in a few weeks. I guess a couple weeks from now. But we're going to hear in Matthew's Gospel so so clearly how Matthew completely sees Jesus. And he understands that Jesus truly is the fulfillment of this promise. That Jesus is the Messiah. He is the king who has come to restore the kingdom. Remember, this is the promise that Yeah, that one nation, right, remember the people of the north, the kingdom of Israel, that was gone. It's destroyed, right? It's never to be found again, and yet it will be. In Jesus Christ, reestablishing the kingdom with himself as the king, as theointed one, as the perpetual David forever. He is able to bring all peoples to himself and restore the kingdom of Israel in its fulfillment in Christianity. And that's just such an incredible, incredible thing. One last note that we're going to hear about Gog tomorrow as well. The prophecy against Gog today and tomorrow the fall of Gog. And we ask who's Gog and the answer is, it's a mystery. It's a mystery. It is Yeah, not a lot of, uh, not a lot of information when it comes to who Gog is. It could be he could be Nebuchadnezzar. I'm a Gog, the land of Magog. It could be Babylon. That could be the case. Uh, but in this case, it's just a mystery. I don't believe that bad. You want to do some extra research on that. That'd be great. But I want to say we're kind of running out of time today. And so if I don't have anything wise to say about Gog, the land of Magog, that I might have to have to you know call it for the day man what a gift honestly you know to be in God's word sometimes it makes clear sometimes it's not clear sometimes we say later on oh my gosh I see that now sometimes when it comes to chapter 38 or thinking Magog and Gog? I don't know, I still don't know. Maybe you know, in which case you can share your knowledge with all of us above all. Let's share God's grace with all of us that Ezekiel spoke. He preached the prophesied and the Spirit of God came upon dry bones. We ask the Lord in the power and the name of Jesus Christ, send us Holy Spirit into the dry bone areas of our lives. Where we think that we're done, we think that it's over, we think that there's no hope. There is hope wherever the Lord is present, there is always, always hope, and the Lord is present in your life and in my life. And so there's hope. That's why I'm praying for you. And I ask you, please pray for me. We all need it, don't we? My name's Father Mike. I cannot wait to see you tomorrow. God bless.