The Park Road Pulpit
Sermons from Park Road Baptist Church
Russ and Amy Jacks Dean, Pastors
Good News That’s Hard to Hear
Ezekiel 37:1-14
Amy Jacks Dean, March 17, 2002
As I read the lectionary texts for this Sunday and considered the options, I knew that I had to deal with the valley of dry bones found in Ezekiel. I knew because I was transported back to that makeshift platform that has been built just behind St. Paul’s Episcopal Church in New York City. Only rescue workers are allowed to go into the church, where the only damage was to the clock, which stopped at some point during the chaos of the tumbling of buildings. Because of our Salvation Army badges, we were allowed into the church. I had envisioned that we would walk in to a quiet sanctuary that was available for firefighters and police officers to pray. As we waited to go in, I looked at sign after sign, poster after poster, message after message lining the fence surrounding the church. I began to formulate a prayer that I would lead inside the church for those in our group and anyone else that might want to hear. I am a Pastor. A prayer should be offered, and I needed to be prepared. I would need to pray for those who grieve. I would need to ask God for comfort. I would need to call for peace among all of God’s people. Little did I know that the sanctuary has been converted into a shelter for rescue workers. The church is literally wallpapered with letters and banners from all over the world. They are running a kitchen out of that sanctuary. There are cots available for a nap. Rescue workers sit in the pews eating their food amidst good words from all over the world. It was suddenly apparent that a prayer was neither appropriate nor necessary. This sanctuary is no longer a quiet place for worship for it has been converted into a bustling place of food and rest. It was Good News that was hard to hear.
We left that sanctuary and walked out onto the ramp that led to that makeshift platform that has been built for viewing Ground Zero.
In the time since last week’s text of the selection of young David as King, the people have lived in exile. They had some autonomy – they were allowed to gather and even continue some of their religious practices. They were free to marry, build homes, and plant crops. But we should not fool ourselves into thinking that the Exile was anything but horrible. It was a national disaster and a crisis of faith. They had lost their land of promise, their leaders were imprisoned, and the Temple lay in ruins. They were not where they wanted to be or where they were supposed to be. They lived with a sadness that ran down to their bones. It was a terrible time for the children of Israel. The people were beginning to question if the history of Yahweh with the people had come to an end – for you see we are not the first to wonder where God is in the midst of tragedy. Our text for today is Ezekiel’s prophetic answer to that question. (Preaching Through the Christian Year, Year A, pgs 174-175 and The Christian Century, Feb27-March 6, page 20)
Katheryn Pfisterer Darr in her commentary on this text says that the people’s hope had “perished; and without hope, they might as well be dead. The future, if one can even speak of such, seems as barren as the past years and present experience of exile . . . in light of Judah’s collapse, Jerusalem’s destruction, the exile’s own situation, and Ezekiel’s past denunciations, good news was, for many, hard to hear, well-nigh impossible to envision.” (New Interpreter’s, Vol VI, page 1503)
But this vision that Ezekiel had was one of hope. He saw a broad valley full of dry bones. Bones. A sign of death and despair, grief and misery. And God says to Ezekiel, “Can these bones live?” And Ezekiel says, “God, you know.” (Which can mean one of two things: either as an absolute affirmative or as an uncertain throwing of the ball back into Yahweh’s court.) (New Interpreter’s) Whichever the meaning, the outcome is the same. Ezekiel speaks to these dry bones, and they rattle back together. But these flesh-covered skeletons do not breath until, with God’s help, Ezekiel breaths the breath of life back into these bones, and they live.
What I would give to have performed such a sign standing on that makeshift platform. What would it be like to look over that vast expanse of chaos and call together the bones and watch them rattle back together into people. That would have been powerful. At the Medical Examiner’s office where I worked, one police officer told me that his job was to catalog the body parts that were found at Ground Zero. Sixteen thousand body parts have been cataloged thus far, and in these final weeks of recovery, they expect to find many more – projecting up to 25,000 body parts. Ground Zero is quite literally a Valley of Dry Bones. It must look much like what Ezekiel saw in his vision. Death. Destruction. Grief. Exhaustion.
But the truth of the matter is that Ezekiel did not literally bring dry bones to life any more those of us at Ground Zero in New York City did. All Ezekiel had was a vision. And the vision was one of hope and restoration. It was Good News that was hard to hear.
As we travel this Lenten journey, we need a vision of hope. In the midst of the sadness and tragedy of this life, we need a vision of restoration. I wonder if the vision is this: God is not done. We can live and be revived by the Spirit of God on this side of the grave. But too many people don’t know this. We should be seeking out the places where Good News would be hard to hear. It is precisely in those places, with those people, that we need to be giving a word of Good News. What does this good news sound like?
I received a letter in mail this week from a new friend that I met at the Medical Examiners Office in New York City. Frank and Lou Jean Johnson served food there all day, and Eleanor Helms and I served food there all night. Gary had this to say, “I think it’s time for me to leave here – the bodies and the body fragments are starting to get to me, Amy. I have done this for a long time, and since Vietnam I have seen so much . . . I know for fact what human beings will do to each other. The animal kingdom does not do what we do to each other – they kill to eat – not because of hate or just to torture or mame. I am really sorry to lay my feelings on you – it’s not fun, but I need to get this out or I think I will lose my mind. You did not understand me when I told you, so I am going to say it again. You, and the people who came with you, put light in a very dark area. The love I saw and others saw, that came from your hearts, did more for us than the food you served us.”
Putting light in a very dark area is Good News – that is awfully hard to hear. On our recent trip, that light sounded like a Southern accent and tasted like a grilled cheese sandwich. We made people smile who had seen horror – those who have lived and worked in the valley of dry bones. If only for a brief moment, it was Good News that was hard to hear, but just because it is hard to hear does not mean that it is inaudible.
I ran across a few lines from a poem entitled “A Hard Death” by Amos Wilder.
Accept no mitigation
But be instructed at the null point.
The zero breeds new algebras.
“Ezekiel’s fellow exiles were at the null point, as good as dead and without hope. Facile words of reassurance could not cut through their despair. But Ezekiel invited them to view reality through God’s eyes by means of a divine vision wherein the zero breeds new and unanticipated algebras.” (New Interpreters, Vol. VI, page 1504)
In other words, when we are at zero – the bottom – the place where Good News is the most difficult to hear – that’s when we should be listening most closely. Elie Wiesel “has observed that Ezekiel’s vision of the valley of dried bones bears no date because every generation needs to hear in its own time that these bones can live again.” (New Interpreters, Vol. VI, page 1504)
The way I see it, each one of us in this room lives in one of two predicaments. We are either (1) at the null point ourselves – having hit rock bottom. We know tragedy and grief and despair and exhaustion as a personal friend. Let me say to you - Listen very closely – I have a word of Good News that is hard to hear but it is this: God is not done. Can you hear it? God is not done. There is hope and life on this side of the grave, and God will never be done until you know this.
If you don’t fit into this first category, then you automatically fall into a second category (and there are only two categories). (2) You have the responsibility of making sure that everyone in category number (1) hears this Good News. We have a job to do – it is to tell people there is hope. Some of you will actually need to say it to someone – you will need to look him or her in the eye and say, “God is not done. There is hope and life on this side of the grave.” Some of you will never use words. You will simply embody this message. You will live your life as if you actually believe it yourself: God is not done. There is hope and life on this side of the grave. What would that look like if we all lived our lives as if we believed that to be the truth? It would make Easter a revolution. We would never hear “resurrection” in the same way. If we could stand before people and bring them back to life – it would be good – it would be very good.
In a Salvadoran refugee camp in Honduras – a place obviously filled with despair and tragedy – the people understood something about a need for hope. “Every time the refugees were displaced and had to build a new camp, they immediately formed three committees: a constructions committee, and education committee, and the committee of joy. Celebration was as basic to the life of the refugees as digging latrines and teaching their children to read.” (Clothed With the Sun, Joyce Hollyday, page 225) That committee of joy must have had Good News that was hard to hear; yet it still needed to be said. They were teachers of joy – they pour their love into their children with a hope that the world will be better for them. These refugees stand in the midst of a valley of dry bones of their own and they speak a word of hope and they bring life again to the people. I look out among this group, and I see people that need to be brought back to life, and I see people who have so much life to give. And you’ve got to give it to those who don’t have it – it is our job; it is our calling – we cannot deny it; it is who we are.
The refugees are living reminders that God is not done. There is hope and life on this side of the grave. On this journey we call Lent, we have Good News that is hard to hear. The history of God’s work with God’s people is not finished because we have been given to one another. I suggest we take that responsibility very seriously. May it be so.
O God, on this day of worship, we pause to give thanks. We give thanks for a word of hope in the midst of despair. We give thanks for the life we have, and we pray that we would live it – truly live it – to the full.
Today, we stand in the face of many valleys of dry bones
Ground Zero
The Intensive Care Unit
The Broken Marriage
The Depression
The War on Terror
And we say to these valleys – and all valleys – that you, O God, are not done. You still work your way into this world through us, and we pray that we would not only be able to hear Good News, but that we would be able to tell and live it ourselves. Amen.