What if tonight I took this stick and I broke it in half, and then I was able to put it together and it became one? You would say, impossible. It is impossible to take bones, put flesh on it, and make it walk and talk and have life. And it's impossible to take a stick and break it in two and then put it back together. That is impossible. Now, if you believe that and understand that, you can understand Ezekiel chapter 37, because God wants you to see that it's impossible to put life on bones. It's impossible to take two sticks and make them one. And if you got that, you understand what he's trying to say. Ezekiel chapter 37, let's look to the Lord. As we read this, it says, the hand of the Lord came upon me and brought me out in the spirit of the Lord and set me down in the midst of the valley. Really, that word is the plains. Remember in Ezekiel chapter one or chapter three, verse 22, I think it was he was on the plains and it was on the plains that he saw the majesty of God. You remember that came crashing and running across the extent there of the plains. And in the same location where you saw the wonderful majesty of God, suddenly he's going to see something else. In fact, what he's going to see is somewhat desolate. It was full of bones. He caused me to pass by them all around, and behold, there were very many in the open valley. Indeed, they were very dry. So not only are they just bones, there's a whole bunches of them, and to make it even worse, they're very dry. That is to say, they've been laying around a long time. Anybody ever been someplace where you see bones and they've been laying around a long, long time? Sometimes that's true in the deserts, where a cow or an animal or a deer or whatever would die. As you look at that skeleton, you just say, well, God says to him, son of man, verse 3, can these bones live? And what's your answer? Well, it depends who's asking the question. If I said to you, do you think I can put life on these bones? You would say, impossible. But what if God were asking you that question? What if God were saying to you, do you think I could put life on these bones? Then you would say, whoa, I better be a little careful how I answer that one. Everything inside me says, impossible. But God's asking the question. And so Ezekiel's a little cautious. He does what a lot of us do when we're asked a question we don't really know the answer to, or the answer we think is right is really wrong. So we say, oh Lord, you know. I'll let you answer it. But the point is, it is something so awesome, so impossible, that Ezekiel is not about to go out on a limb on this one. Even with God. So God says, well, Ezekiel, here's what I want you to do. Verse 4. I want you to prophesy to these bones and say to them, O dry bones, hear the word of the Lord. Wouldn't you love to see that? Here's Ezekiel preaching to dry bones. Well, it might not be any more difficult than what he'd been doing anyway. He'd been preaching to dry hearts, and now he's going to preach to dry bones, and it says, Hear the word of the Lord. Thus says the Lord God to these bones, Surely I will cause breath to enter into you, and you shall live. I will put sinners on you and bring flesh upon you, cover you with skin and put breath in you, and you shall live. Then you will know that I am the Lord. So, I prophesied. Now, there's two stages in his prophecy, and it's significant that you catch them, and this is what was true in the ministry of Ezekiel as well, but this is true especially for his ministry to these dry bones. Two stages. First of all, he says in verse 7, I prophesied as it was commanded. I prophesied there was a noise and a sudden rattling, and the bones came together bone to bone. Indeed, as I looked, the sinews and the flesh came upon them, and a skin covered them over. He said, it's just like my preaching to Israel. I bring them the word of the Lord. And, you know, things are happening. The trouble is, I got all the meat on there, all the muscles on there, all the heart and livers all put in the right place, and the skin covering all the hairs on it, still dead. It's pretty amazing that it all came together. That's pretty impressive. But I still don't have anything but a dead corpse. Because there's no breath in it. There's no Ruha in it. There's no life in it. There's no spirit in it. There's no wind in it. Remember in Genesis chapter 2, God put together Adam and he had him laying there, except he was dead. And God then says he put a Ruha in him. He gave him the breath of life. You see, I think our doctors could take my arm and your arm and everybody's arms and legs and hearts and liver and somehow put a corpse together. It might even look pretty good. But they could never give it life. They could never make it live. And Ezekiel had been preaching to Israel like that. He brought him the Word of the Lord. Things seemed to be happening. The problem was they needed life. So the second stage of his ministry to these dry bones starts in verse 9. Verse 8 ended, but there was no ruha in them, there was no breath in them, there was no life in them. Also he said to me, prophesy, O son of man, and say to this ruha, or this breath, or this life, or this wind, thus does the Lord God come from the four winds, which you know from Ezekiel chapter 7 verse 2, the four corners of the earth, from every possible direction, O ruha, and breathe on these slain, in order that they may live. So I prophesied as he commanded me, and ruha came into them, and they lived. and stood upon their feet, an exceeding and great army." And so the second stage is, by his preaching he had somehow brought about the corpse, but it took God's ruha, took God's life into that corpse to make it living, as a life-breathing person. And you and I say, what is this all about? What is the purpose of this? What are you trying to say, God? And what are you trying to communicate, God? All I know is there's this thing called a skeleton, a whole bunch of bones scattered across the valley. And by the preaching of God's Word, the bones all came together and all the sinews and flesh came upon it. That wasn't enough. It took God's life, breathed into them, and all of a sudden they stood up, they walked, and they were alive. The impossible. became possible. That which even Ezekiel did not dare to say, yeah, you bring life to it, it happened. Well, you understand that the point is, this is something that's really, really impossible that I'm talking about, to bring life to dead people. So, God says to Ezekiel, now I'm going to tell you what that's all about, because you've been doing this in front of the people, and I'm sure that the people thought he was a little strange as he brought that vision to him, as he communicated that vision to him, and he explains it to him in verse 11 through 14. He said to me, son of man, these bones are the whole house of Israel. And indeed, say, our bones are dry, our hope is lost, and we ourselves are cut off. You know, Israel had come to the point in the days of Ezekiel, if you study their history from beginning to end, it's not a very pretty sight. The people of Israel in the days of Ezekiel had come to the point and just said, there's no hope. Thomas Cahill in his book about the Jews, he evaluated Jewish people and their belief system. He, of course, does not believe there is a God. He doesn't believe that God wrote the Bible. He doesn't believe any of that. He just thought the Jews came up with it, which is probably pretty impressive for a people who come up with something like the Bible. And he was really impressed with the Jews, but he said the one thing that stands out to the Jewish people's mind that no other religion in all the world has, The Jew alone was the one who said, history is linear. History does not repeat itself. History is not going around in circles. Every other religion in the world has us going around and around and around and around and we are not getting there. It was the Jewish people who came up with the religion that said all of history is moving forward in one direction towards something and that has been the secret, according to Thomas Cahill, for the Jewish people. They've always believed there's a future. And they're a part of it. But in the days of Ezekiel, that was not true. They had lost hope. They had been sent to exile. Their city was destroyed ten years before that, the city of Jerusalem. There is no hope. There is as much hope of their future as there is for these bones to put sinews on them and then find life. There is no hope. And Ezekiel's message to them is this. Verse 12, Therefore prophesy and say to them, Thus says the Lord God, Behold, O my people, I will open your graves and cause you to come up from your graves and bring you into the land of Israel. Then you will know that I am the Lord when I have opened the graves of my people and brought you up from your graves. I will put my spirit in you when you shall live. I will place you in your own land. Then you shall know that I, the Lord, have spoken it and performed it, says the Lord. and the illustration of a bunch of bones laying in a plains there in Babylon who suddenly come together, suddenly form bodies, suddenly have sinews and flesh and everything on it, and then God brings life into it, is a picture to Israel that when you think it's impossible, God can still do it. In fact, because it's impossible, if it happens, you have to give God the credit for it. And the Valley of the Dry Bones is a visual, if you would, an image, an illustration that says to the hopeless people who say, it's all over, Ezekiel, I know you're preaching hard and I know you think there's some future about this, but we do not believe in ourselves anymore. And he says, don't ever give up. God is able to take bones and give them life. And He has promised that He will bring you back together as a land and as a nation. And when that happens, you will know that the impossible happened. And only God could have done it. Only God could bring Israel together. Only God could not only just bring them together, but do that next step. Remember what Ezekiel is talking about? Actually give them life. You and I look at our news every night. And suddenly we recognize, and we've understood it for a long time, that something special has been happening in Israel for, well, a long time now. And suddenly they've come together. I mean, millions of them live there now. It's amazing. From every corner of the world they've come. And that first stage has already happened in some ways. They've been brought together. The problem is they just don't have life. God's going to have to do the most spectacular thing yet and give them Ruha, give them spirit, give them life, make them real, genuine, spiritually alive people. And when that day happens, then they will know that He is Lord and the world will know that He is Lord. Well, that's the first illustration he gives to them, to a hopeless people. He says, you know what? I know it seems impossible to you. God can do the impossible. And when it happens, you will know that I am Lord. But he says, I have another illustration, actually God's system. I have another illustration for the children of Israel to encourage them in this time, this time of difficulty. He says, I want you to take two sticks, verse 16. As for you, son of man, take a stick for yourself and write on it for Judah. and for the children of Israel his companions. Then take another stick and write it for Joseph the stick of Ephraim and for all the house of Israel his companions." And so he takes two sticks and you and I have studied the history of Israel enough from the Old Testament to recognize that those two, the ten northern tribes and the two southern tribes, never did get along. I mean, you start from get-go, and you know that it's ten against the two right from the get-go. They never got along. It was like northern United States, southern United States during the Civil War. I mean, they just never got along. But suddenly, under Saul, and then especially under David, David was able to put them together. Solomon held them together. And so for 120 years they were like one nation, and they acted as one nation. But then Solomon's son just kind of made a really dumb mistake. He could have been king over all 12, but he chose to make their taxes higher and their lives worse. And so the people followed Jeroboam from the north, and they split. What is the chance that those twelve will ever get together again? The chance of the twelve tribes ever coming together again is the same as the chance of me taking these two sticks, putting them together, and suddenly I can go, voila, one stick. You would say, impossible. It is absolutely impossible for me to do that. It is impossible for any man to do that. It is impossible for any person that you know to do that. Once they are broke apart, you cannot put them together. So he said, I want you to take these two sticks, one represents Judah, one represents Ephraim, or 10 northern tribes of Israel, who have been divided, who have been broken apart, here's what I want you to do. Verse 17, then join them one to another for yourself into one stick, and they will become one in your hand. He is just saying, can you imagine that? So he's in his one hand, it all comes together, and they can visualize that, they don't believe it, you wouldn't believe it if I said it's one, you just don't trust me on that one. He says, but do that in front of the people, and they will realize the impossibility of these coming together. Now, as you looked at it, if you were in the Ezekiel State, you saw Judah and Israel. There are several reasons why it could never happen. Humanly speaking, it could never happen that the 12 tribes would come together. They have always hated each other. They split under Jeroboam and Rehoboam in 920 BC. But most importantly, in 722 BC, the 10 northern tribes were taken captive by the Assyrians, and they were scattered before winds, and nobody knew where they were. You couldn't have regathered them if you wanted to. You didn't know where they were. Besides that, the ones who had stayed in the land had intermingled with the people who lived in the land, who had been sent by the Assyrians to live in the land, and they had become the Samaritans, so they weren't true Jews. How could you ever find the ten tribes? You couldn't. They did not exist anymore. for all practical reasons and now the two southern tribes have been taken captive and so he says to these people who have no hope ever of being united as a twelve tribe people who have given up all hope on that he says to them in verse 8 when the children of your people speak to you saying will you now show us what you mean by these things say to them thus is the Lord God surely I will take the stick of Joseph which is in the hand of Ephraim and the tribes of Israel and his companions and I will join them with it with the stick of Judah Make them one stick and they will be at one in my hand and sticks on which you write will be in your hand before their eyes. Then say to them, thus says the Lord God. Surely I will take the children of Israel from among the nations where they have gone and will gather them from every side. So that I will regather them somehow. I don't know how God can possibly do that. It's impossible. Except God can do the impossible. They do not know where the ten tribes are. People don't know who they are. God does. He's going to bring all twelve tribes together. He's going to settle them in the land, according to verse 21, and bring them into their land. So they're going to be regathered together, they're going to be resettled, and I will make them one nation in the land, in the mountains of Israel. they will be united. Impossible. In fact, there's a whole new religion that's not real new. It's been around for a long time. It's been talking about British and America as this promised seat of Israel. And that cult, which has been spreading itself through America, and hopefully it's going to die out one of these days, has been saying it's still impossible for the 10 tribes to ever be found, that the only answer to it is this, they must be the United States of America and Britain. That's the only one that could be. No, God can do the impossible. In fact, if you study it, you recognize later on in Ezekiel, he's going to talk about the 12 tribes. being regathered to worship at the temple of God. And Revelation, we'll talk about in Revelation chapter 14, there's 144,000, 12 from each tribe. God is really going to not only bring the people back to the land, He's going to bring all 12 tribes back to the land. And He's going to unite them as one. A stick that has been broken can never become one, but God can do the impossible. Here's what he says as well, I will unite them, verse 22, and one king should be king over them all, and they shall no longer be two nations, nor shall they ever be divided into two kingdoms again. Now you have to pick up some of the words that he uses here. They will never, how long is never? Quite a long time, really. You have to be careful when you say it to your kids, right? You're never gonna have ice cream again. Well, I never did that, but some of you did. Anyway, nor shall they ever be divided into two kingdoms again. nor they shall not defile themselves any more with their idols, nor with their detestable things, nor with any of their transgressions, but I will." Boy, this is pretty positive stuff. I mean, God's going out on a limb on this one. Never, never, never, ever, ever, ever. And this is what's going to happen. You who have always proven yourself to be a stiff-necked and uncircumcised people, I'm going to still change you that you're going to do the right thing. I mean, God is really going out on a limb on this one. And he says in verse 23, then they will be my people. I'll be their God. David, my servant, will be king over them, and they shall all have one shepherd, and they shall also walk in my judgments and observe all of my statutes to do them. And they will dwell in the land that I've given to Jacob, my servant, where your fathers dwell, and they shall dwell there, they, their children, their children's children, for at least a hundred years. My servant David shall be their prince for a long time. Moreover, I'll make a covenant of peace with them." Well, I guess I didn't read that right. "...make a covenant of peace with them, and it shall be an everlasting covenant with them. And I will establish them and multiply them, and I will set my sanctuary in their midst forevermore. My tabernacle also shall be with them. Indeed, I will be their God, and they shall be my people." And if that ever happens, and if ever these two sticks come together, And they've really become one. I'm no trickery here. I didn't glue them together. I didn't put a rubber band around them. I mean, they actually go right back to the way they ever were. You will know one thing. I didn't do it. You will know that day that God did that, because he's the only one who could do that. When the twelve tribes of Israel ever come together and are living the way God wants them to live, with one king, whose name is David. You will all know some, he says. The whole world will know something. Here's what it is. They will know that I, the Lord, have set, sanctify Israel or set it apart when my sanctuary is in their midst forevermore. Israel that night was very hopeless in the days of Ezekiel. They would never be restored to the land they were convinced of it. And they would never be united as that 12 tribe nation again. Those things were impossible. Nobody could possibly pull that off. That would be like taking bones and making a live human being and taking sticks that have been broken and making it one. And God says to Ezekiel, you just go tell the people. That's the way I like it. Because then you will know. It's got to get that bad, where you know it's impossible. Nobody could possibly do that. Because then when it happens, you will know that I'm the Lord, and all the nations will know that you're my people. Because nobody can do that but me. Ezekiel chapter 37 is the conclusion of Ezekiel chapter 33 through 37, which is a section on the trimes being restored. God said in the first 24 chapters of Ezekiel, I'm going to condemn you. In the second 24, He says, I'm going to console you. He says, your troubles are going to be removed, chapter 29 through 32. But now, He says, your tribes will be regathered. And here's the secret to it all. Notice these verses. Well, in chapter 33 through 36, you have the verbal communication of that, the restoration of Israel and the regeneration. And it ultimately came to these words, Ezekiel 36. Would you say them with me tonight as we close? I will give you a new heart. I will take the hardest stone out of you and give you a heart of flesh. I will put my spirit within you and cause you to walk in my statues and you will keep my judgments and do them." You and I recognize that Ezekiel chapter 37 is a great, great communication to the people. It visually shows them what he had said verbally in chapter 33 through 36. I'm going to pull this one off. Trust me. Now the question is, do you believe it? That's really the question. You see, this is so impossible to believe that a large number of Christians today do not believe that's going to happen. They say it's impossible. They say it cannot mean what it says. The obvious truth is not the real truth because it could never possibly happen. It has to be symbolic or figurative resurrection or the church or whatever. Tonight you have to go home and wrestle in your heart. Could it possibly mean just what it says? God has a future for his people that is so spectacular. The only explanation is God did it. Let's pray. Father, thank you that you are a faithful God who impresses us again and again. This is an event that you have not finished. And therefore, we have to distrust you on this one. Go home and really trust you. And Father, as a result of that, we want to be a people who can trust you for your other promises as well. You can do the impossible. We are thankful for that. Free prayer in Jesus' name.