Can These Bones Live?

As you may know, in recent years, I have been sporadically updating the MIBS - which is a non-scholarly, highly idiosyncratic ranking of certain questions from the Bible.  “MIBS,” you may recall, stands for the “Mullen Interrogative Biblical Scale.”  It’s a short list, seldom updated.  The number one spot on the MIBS belongs to Pontius Pilate, who asked, “What is truth?”  Coming in at number two is God himself (which seems wrong, but, what can I say?): God asked Adam and Eve, “Who told you that you were naked?”  I’ve lost track of any other entries on the MIBS - I’m somewhat disorganized.  But I think we have a new entry today.

But first, some statistics!  If it’s statistics you’re looking for, about the decline of the Christian faith and religion in America, you will have no difficulty finding them.

In 2020 - that’s before the pandemic - church attendance had dropped 36 percent in America from levels in 1993. (Barna)

In that same time period the number of people who said they had prayed in the last seven days dropped from 83% to 69%. (Barna)

Church membership dropped below 50% overall in this country around 2020. (Gallup)

You’ll be glad to know that conservatives and liberals have something in common: the percentage of both red and blue Americans who say they never attend church went up noticeably during the pandemic (American Enterprise Institute).

The Pew Charitable Trusts predicts that in fifty years, the percentage of Americans who identify as Christians will drop to something between 54% to as low as 35%.  They put the most likely scenario at 39% of Americans calling themselves Christian in 2070.  That figure was about 64% in 2020.  In 1972 it was 92%.

Only 31% of Americans have confidence in the institutional church or organized religion in general (Gallup).

39% of Americans rate as “high” their trust in the honesty and ethical standards of the clergy.  That’s below nurses, doctors, school teachers, and cops.  But it’s a little bit better than ratings for bankers and lawyers; and significantly better than car salesmen and members of Congress.  (Gallup)

Only 20% of Americans consider the Bible to be the literal word of God (which is kind of a relief).  49% of adults are more comfortable calling the scriptures the “inspired word of God.”  But 29% are happy to call the Good Book an “ancient book of fables.”  Among adults with no religious affiliation (a number that is growing rapidly), that figure is, perhaps unsurprisingly, 65%.  (Gallup)

Europe is not doing much better than we are.  Only 60.2% of Spaniards - Spaniards! - said they were Roman Catholic in 2020. (Spanish Center for Sociological Research)

In Italy in 2014 that figure was still 83.3% (Pew Charitable Research).  But, you know, it’s Italy.

That same year, 2014, only 4.2% of the population of England attended a Christmas service in a church of the Church of England, even though 60% of Britons had identified as Christians in the census three years previously. (Wikipedia)  So you can see that just because people say they’re Christian doesn’t mean they go to church.  But we already knew that.

There are places in the world that the church is growing and faith is vibrant.  But by and large, you and I don’t live in those places or visit them often.  We certainly can’t really see them from here, so to speak.

I have been hearing for a long time that the church is dying, that faith is dying.  And there is plenty of evidence to suggest these possibilities.  Decline is all around.  From where I stand it is not hard to picture the church, or indeed much of the institutional construct of the Christian faith, as a valley of dry bones.  Talk about an ancient fable!  The prophet Ezekiel was active in the 6th century BCE, at the time that Jerusalem had fallen to the Babylonian king Nebuchadnezzar and the Israelites were deported into exile.  Try convincing someone in that growing number of people with no religious conviction at all that anything Ezekiel has to say might be of importance to them!

If I was to try to take on that task, I think I’d want to point out that Ezekiel was trying to be brutally honest with the people.  It was important that in his vision, Ezekiel was led by the hand of the Lord to go around the valley so he could see the dry bones up close; he could account for how great was the number of the dry bones; he could see for himself that they were very dry.  This specificity was deliberate: he must know that the substantial demise of Israel was real.  The people had suffered, and much had been lost.  I suppose there were no statistics then, but if there were, I am sure that Ezekiel would have been given the numbers to contemplate.  And those numbers would have looked very bad.

And here is where the MIBS comes in.  For, once the Lord has set Ezekiel down in the midst of this valley of dry bones, and once he has made sure that Ezekiel can see how great is the number of dry bones, and that the bones are very dry, the Lord asks Ezekiel the question, which I now believe must rank among the top few questions of the MIBS.  Considering the statistics I have quoted you this morning, and their dire implications for the life and faith of the church - and I do mean dire - the question with which Ezekiel is confronted must be considered one of the most important questions in the Bible, especially if these words have anything to say to us today.

Here is the question Ezekiel is asked in the midst of that expansive valley of very dry bones: “Mortal, can these bones live?”

Mortal, can these bones live?

Uncharacteristically for a question on the MIBS, this one has an answer of sorts, that is provided by Ezekiel, who seems to understand the spirit in which it is being asked.  “Mortal, can these bones live?” asks the Lord.  And Ezekiel replies, “O Lord God, you know.”  Yes, Ezekiel understands the spirit in which the question is asked.  For the answer is about to be shown to him, when the Lord tells him what to do next.

“Prophesy to these bones, and say to them: O dry bones, hear the word of the Lord. Thus says the Lord God to these bones: I will cause breath to enter you, and you shall live. I will lay sinews on 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 Ezekiel does as he was commanded.  He prophesies, and there is the rattling and the commotion as the knee bone’s connected to the leg bone, etc, and the bones are covered with sinews and flesh and skin, but alas, the prophet can see that “there was no breath in them.”  And what good are the reconfigured dry bones, and the bodies they have formed without breath?

So the Lord tells Ezekiel what to do next: “Prophesy to the breath, prophesy, mortal, and say to the breath: Thus says the Lord God: Come from the four winds, O breath, and breathe upon these slain, that they may live.”

Doing as he is told, Ezekiel prophesies to the breath.  “and the breath came into them, and they lived, and stood on their feet, a vast multitude.”

But God has one last prophecy for Ezekiel to make.  And he leaves no doubt as to the meaning this vision is meant to convey.  “‘Mortal,’ God says, ‘these bones are the whole house of Israel. They say, ‘Our bones are dried up, and our hope is lost; we are cut off completely.’”  It’s like they had been reading up on statistics!  It’s like those old bones had been drying out in the sun for a moment such as the very moment we are living through today, when nothing but demise is all around, and no sensible person could believe that those dry, old bones would ever have life in them again.  Our bones are dried up!  Our hope is lost!  We are cut off completely!  These are the conclusions that the statistics I quoted you are meant to convey - near enough to completely!

It’s important to know that we can see a valley of dry bones before us.  It’s important that we can see the dry bones up close; that we can account for how great is the number of those bones; that we can see for ourselves that the bones are very dry.  This specificity is deliberate: we must know that our substantial demise is real.  The church has suffered, and much has been lost!  And it’s important to hear the question: Mortal, can these bones live?

But it’s also important to hear the answer that comes in the final prophecy that Ezekiel is told by the Lord to declare:

“Prophesy, and say to them, Thus says the Lord God: I am going to open your graves, and bring you up from your graves, O my people; and I will bring you back….  And you shall know that I am the Lord, when I open your graves, and bring you up from your graves, O my people. I will put my spirit within you, and you shall live, and I will place you on your own soil; then you shall know that I, the Lord, have spoken and will act,” says the Lord.

No one needs a preacher to explain to them what the meaning of Ezekiel’s vision of the valley of the dry bones means.  Anyone can see and hear the promise of hope that it is meant to convey: a hope that springs from the driest wilderness.  No one really even needs a preacher to identify the importance of this great question: Mortal, can these bones live?  No one really needs the MIBS.

But what the church needs right now, is to know that the question is being asked of us today.  Possessed of the long memory of the valley of dry bones, and the flesh and the sinews and the skin, and the breath that came from the four winds, and the promise from the Lord God himself that “I will put my spirit within you and you shall live!”  …what we need to know is that the question is meant for us today - mortal, can these bones live? - and that God’s promise to his people in their desolation has not expired, even when we think perhaps we have!

If it’s statistics you’re looking for about the decline of the Christian faith and religion in America, you will have no difficulty finding them.  If it’s dry bones you are looking for, I know a valley full of them that I can show you!  But there’s a question that echoes through that vast, dry valley: Mortal, can these bones live?

And it was not the prophet’s power that gave answer to that question; it was the power of the Lord God; it was the power of the Spirit; it was the power of the breath of God: “I will put my spirit within you and you shall live!”

Oh, we know the question: Can these bones live?  And we know how dire a question it is.  But do we not already know the answer to this question, my brothers and sisters in the Lord?  Have we not already heard the promise?  And do we not already know that God is faithful, and that he keeps his promises?  Did not the house of Israel find out that God would keep his promises and restore them to Jerusalem?

There is a valley of dry bones before us.  I see it in the statistics that are everywhere.  And the bones are very dry.  And I hear the question, don’t you?  Mortal, can these bones live?

And thanks be to God, we already know the answer, after some flesh has been put on those bones, and after the breath of God has come into them by the four winds; we know the promise God made, and still makes to his people:

“‘O my people, I will put my spirit within you and you shall live! …then you shall know that I, the Lord, have spoken and will act,’ says the Lord.”

Pile up all the statistics you want, leave them out in the sun to become very dry and then ask yourself, or if you don’t feel ready to answer for yourself, ask me:  Mortal, can these bones live?

“Oh my people, I will put my spirit within you and you shall live!”

Preached by Fr. Sean Mullen
26 March 2023
Saint Mark’s, Locust Street, Philadelphia

Gustave Doré: the Vision of the Valley of the Dry Bones

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