Follow Bill's slides as you listen to his talk at Bristol Vineyard - 7-7-2013

1. Be Reverent – Part 5
The book of Ezekiel

2. 1 The hand of the Lord was on me, and he
brought me out by the Spirit of the Lord and set
me in the middle of a valley; it was full of bones.
2 He led me to and fro among them, and I saw a
great many bones on the floor of the valley,
bones that were very dry. 3 He asked me, ‘Son
of man, can these bones live?’
I said, ‘Sovereign Lord, you alone know.’

3. 4 Then he said to me, ‘Prophesy to these bones
and say to them, “Dry bones, hear the word of
the Lord! 5 This is what the Sovereign Lord says
to these bones: I will make breath enter you,
and you will come to life. 6 I will attach tendons
to you and make flesh come upon you and cover
you with skin; I will put breath in you, and you
will come to life. Then you will know that I am
the Lord.”’

4. 7 So I prophesied as I was commanded. And as I
was prophesying, there was a noise, a rattling
sound, and the bones came together, bone to
bone. 8 I looked, and tendons and flesh appeared
on them and skin covered them, but there was no
breath in them.
9 Then he said to me, ‘Prophesy to the breath;
prophesy, son of man, and say to it, “This is what
the Sovereign Lord says: come, breath, from the
four winds and breathe into these slain, that they
may live.”’

5. 10 So I prophesied as he commanded me, and
breath entered them; they came to life and
stood up on their feet – a vast army.
11 Then he said to me: ‘Son of man, these bones
are the people of Israel. They say, “Our bones are
dried up and our hope is gone; we are cut off.”

6. 12 Therefore prophesy and say to them: “This is
what the Sovereign Lord says: my people, I am
going to open your graves and bring you up from
them; I will bring you back to the land of Israel.
13 Then you, my people, will know that I am the
Lord, when I open your graves and bring you up
from them. 14 I will put my Spirit in you and you
will live, and I will settle you in your own land.
Then you will know that I the Lord have spoken,
and I have done it, declares the Lord.”’
Ezekiel 37: 1-14

7. 24 ‘“For I will take you out of the nations; I will
gather you from all the countries and bring you
back into your own land. 25 I will sprinkle clean
water on you, and you will be clean; I will cleanse
you from all your impurities and from all your
idols.

8. 26 I will give you a new heart and put a new
spirit in you; I will remove from you your heart
of stone and give you a heart of flesh. 27 And I
will put my Spirit in you and move you to follow
my decrees and be careful to keep my laws. 28
Then you will live in the land I gave your
ancestors; you will be my people, and I will be
your God.
Ezekiel 36: 24-28

9. 31 ‘The days are coming,’ declares the Lord,
‘when I will make a new covenant
with the people of Israel
and with the people of Judah.
32 It will not be like the covenant
I made with their ancestors
when I took them by the hand
to lead them out of Egypt,
because they broke my covenant,
though I was a husband to them,’
declares the Lord.

10. 33 ‘This is the covenant that I will make with the
people of Israel
after that time,’ declares the Lord.
‘I will put my law in their minds
and write it on their hearts.
I will be their God,
and they will be my people.
Jeremiah 31: 31-33

11. 4 Even if you have been banished to the most
distant land under the heavens, from there the
Lord your God will gather you and bring you back.
5 He will bring you to the land that belonged to
your ancestors, and you will take possession of it.
He will make you more prosperous and numerous
than your ancestors. 6 The Lord your God will
circumcise your hearts and the hearts of your
descendants, so that you may love him with all
your heart and with all your soul, and live.
Deuteronomy 30: 4-6

13. “The real problem of the Christian life comes
where people do not usually look for it. It comes
the very moment you wake up each morning. All
your wishes and hopes for the day rush at you
like wild animals. And the first job each morning
consists simply in shoving them all back; in
listening to that other voice, taking that other
point of view, letting that other larger, stronger,
quieter life come flowing in.”
C.S. Lewis, Mere Christianity