This is a very personal piece for me. I am a Christian. I enjoy helping and encouraging people whenever I can. My website and blog are designed to bring joy and to share a little light on positive things happening in our lives. In today’s blog, I want to share with you all something I received from reading Ezekiel 37 from the Bible. I hope it will encourage someone.
1 The hand of the LORD was upon 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 back and forth 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, "O Sovereign LORD, you alone know."
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 [1] 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.'"
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 from the four winds, O breath, and breathe into these slain, that they may live.'"
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 whole house of Israel. They say, `Our bones are dried up and our hope is gone; we are cut off.'
12 Therefore prophesy and say to them: `This is what the Sovereign LORD says: O 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.'"
I showed the video because I am a visual learner and I know for me, it was extremely powerful to see the scripture played out before my eyes. It underscores the awesomeness of God.
Now let us focus and talk about bones, flesh and breath from this popular story.
The skeleton is the inner framework of bones that supports and gives shape to the human body. It also protects some of the soft organs of the body. The adult human body has 206 of them. The largest bone is the femur or thighbone, and the smallest bones are in our inner ear, called the tiny ossicle bones. More than half an adult's bones are in the hands and feet, and the skeleton makes up only one-sixth of an adult's weight. Amazingly, bone is five times stronger than steel.
Dead bones are dry and fragile, but living bones feel wet and a little soft. Bones are flexible can absorb pressure. They have a network of blood vessels and nerves running through them and bleed when broken. Up to one-third of the weight of a living bone is water.
Skin (or flesh in this story) is the soft outer tissue covering of vertebrates with three main functions: protection, regulation, and sensation. The average person's skin covers an area of 2 square meters. Skin accounts for about 15% of your body weight. The average adult has about 21 square feet of skin, weighing 9 pounds, and contains more than 11 miles of blood vessels. The average person has about 300 million skin cells.
Breathing is respiration, during which air is inhaled into the lungs through the mouth or nose due to muscle contraction and then exhaled due to muscle relaxation. Breathing is something the body does automatically. We cannot live without breath as it brings us oxygen. We breathe on average 1,700 to 2,100 times a day. The human body can survive three weeks without food, three days without water, but only three minutes without air.
The way we breathe changes depending on our state of mind and how we feel. If you are stressed or fearful, you may take quick and shallow breaths, whereas when you are relaxed and at ease, you breathe smoothly and more regularly. If we hold our breath or change the rate at which we breathe in and out, we can change how we feel. The way we breathe can be actively controlled by merely focusing on our breathing. Medical studies confirm how we breathe impacts our nervous system, hormone production, fight-flight response, stress levels, heartbeat and rate, blood pressure, and digestion.
Back to the story of the valley of dry bones, God put the all the bodies back together again first bone by bone, then flesh and finally breathing life back into those bodies.
Ezekiel said O Sovereign LORD, you alone know. Only you alone know how to create this miracle. To me, that is the statement within this story. God, You created me and you know this situation. Only you can help me with this. We need your Spirit! Only you of God can make the impossible possible. God breathed life back again into the lifeless children of Israel and He will do the same with us. We have witnessed him create miracles throughout our lives and He’s never failed us. Put us back together again and Breathe on us.
So when we are feeling down, depressed, anxious, tired, exhausted, hopeless, etc. Please remember to breathe again. God is our breath of Life and we are built to handle anything. Focus on breathing - God. He has made us all spiritually, physically, emotionally, mentally, etc. to deal with all situations knowing O Sovereign Lord, you alone know.
So how do we breathe again?
1. Recognize and admit where you are to God and to yourself. Be honest. Cry and yell for help if necessary!
2. Get back to prayer and praising God
3. Read His Word
4. Trust the Lord
This music video is to encourage your heart and know that we need God’s Spirit to breathe on us.
In closing, earlier this month, I had a procedure to remove a 1.1-centimeter size lesion, which doctors called complex or cancerous, from my right kidney. While I was under anesthesia, the medical team placed a breathing tube down my throat, to stop my lung from breathing and to control how I breathed. My Intervention radiology doctor used a long thin probe to puncture my back to get to my kidney. She then began to freeze, thaw, and refreeze the lesion in order to destroy it. Moving forward, I will have to see the doctor every three months to check on the progress of any additional growth, but the good news is…96% of people who undergo this type of procedure encounter no new growth. Following the procedure, my doctor told me everything went well and not to worry about any cancer. Praise God!
You are built to handle anything that comes your way!
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