Sermon Illustrations For Lent 5 (2017)
Illustration
Ezekiel 37:1-14
Dry bones. This is the passage about dry bones, or is it? Is the prophet talking about actual bones in a valley? Is this a poetic metaphor for human life? How do you encounter this passage at this moment of your life?
There have been some dry-bone moments in my life. These were moments of pain and anguish when I could not feel the presence of God, when I was lonely and afraid, when I was in the darkness of desolation. I felt dry. My spirit was dry. My life was dry. My hope had dried up. Those are the moments when I need the breath of God, when I need God to breathe life back into my soul and my spirit. Those are the moments when I sing, “Breathe on me, breath of God.” Those are the moments of miracle when God restores my soul.
Bonnie B.
Ezekiel 37:1-14
History is not as neat as we would like it to be. Sometimes it just gets a little messy. Decades ago, students were taught that Columbus discovered America. Now it is more likely that teachers will point out there were people already here when the Italian explorer arrived. History is the story of Great Men, said more than one historian. Now it’s recognized that ordinary people lived extraordinary lives, and archaeologists focus much more on the lives of regular folks. A trip to Monticello once focused strictly on the genius of Thomas Jefferson, not only scientifically and politically but also in the way he planned and laid out his gardens. Now a visit to that national historic site will show that African-Americans were there too, not as employees or servants, but as slaves living a brutally harsh life with none of the freedoms proclaimed in the Declaration of Independence and guaranteed in the constitution.
The story of the exile is told much more neatly than it actually occurred. The traditional version has it that the people ignored the warnings of the prophets and sinned. Babylon was allowed to conquer them and take them away in exile. Then Babylon was conquered and the people all came home and rebuilt the temple that had been destroyed.
Except there was more than one exile. Many voluntarily went to Egypt and to other lands. Not all of them came back from Babylon. And not all of them were exiled. The poorest remained behind, to reviled when the descendants of the rich and powerful returned.
Ezekiel is a product of the Egyptian exile. When God speaks to him about restoring life and hope, it is to an Egyptian audience who had made the faith come to life in a foreign land and who would remain in Egypt. Can these bones live? Yes! Not just in the shadow of the temple, but around the world.
Frank R.
Ezekiel 37:1-14
Our world is full of the dead bones of those who have not found the Lord. The most important job of the church is to send prophets (missionaries) to all the nations so that they may come to life. Are there dead bones even in our country and even in some churches? We can see some who don’t have the Lord in them! We can tell by the way they act. Are they hopeless and depressed? Are they even suicidal? Do we have times when we lose hope and the Lord’s love seems far away? We may all have those ups and downs. That is why we come to our church -- to bring us back to life and to keep us alive. We must hear our God calling to us from the grave. It is like being awakened from a sound sleep.
When I was on the mission field I saw the faces of many converts. When they finally realized the truth of the gospel and found the Lord, their faces lit up with joy! It was such a blessed change from the hateful gods they had been worshiping.
When my son’s wife died, he was so depressed he got into alcohol for two or three years. He even ended in jail a couple of times when his mother -- my former wife -- sent him there because she didn’t want him around her house any more. He lived in Chicago, and I had just returned from the mission field and was living in New Mexico. He came down to visit when I got back, and after showing him some scripture passages he turned back to the Lord. I could see the difference in him. The dry bones were coming back to life! When I went to Chicago to visit him a couple years later, he was a counselor for alcoholics. He drove me down to the place where he was practicing, and when he introduced me to one of his clients she said, “He knows what it’s like.” Maybe the Lord had given him that bad experience in drinking so he could help the Lord put flesh on other bones.
Each one of us Christians shares in the prophet’s work when we reach out to others who seem to be dead and give them the hope that only comes from the Lord.
When I was a chaplain for a prison, I saw a building full of dead bones. The prisoners did not know that there was anything else for them. When many of them got out they were still dead and committed crimes again, so they went back to the prison “cemetery.” But there were some whose bones came to life when they accepted the hope that our Lord was giving them.
If you are alive in the Lord, then share your light with those who are living in darkness. You can help the Lord put flesh on those dry bones!
Bob O.
Romans 8:6-11
Not long ago I made a trip to the west coast. After landing at LAX, I had to use public transportation to get where I intended to go. I don’t get out to Los Angeles often, and I don’t know the highways or how to get around on them. I boarded the cab and trusted that the driver knew what he was doing and where he was going. I trusted that he would take me to the place where I was to go. My driver did a good job and I arrived safely. However, had he wanted to do so he could have taken a long, winding route and charged me more. He could have gone to a totally different place, far from where I wanted to be. The driver was in control of where I ended up.
I thought about that again as I read through this scripture. If our minds are led by the flesh, our old sinful nature, then we end up in a place that doesn’t please God and is hostile to him. If, though, we allow the Spirit to lead our minds, then we end up in a place that is life and peace. It all depends upon who is driving as to where we end up. So today I ask you, who is at the wheel of your life? Who’s driving?
Bill T.
Romans 8:6-11
Actress Hayden Panettiere, who starred on the television program Heroes, had a tattoo that ran down the left side of her back. The inscription was in Italian and read Vivere senza rimipianti. This means “to live without regrets.” But Panettiere encountered her first regret when she realized that rimipianti was spelled wrong -- it should have been rimpianti.
Application: If we live with the spirit within us, then we will have no regrets.
Ron L.
Romans 8:6-11
This lesson elaborates on what William Shakespeare wrote about life in Macbeth: “Life [he says]... is a tale told by an idiot, full of sound and fury signifying nothing.” It is all just making its way to death, as Leonardo da Vinci once put it: “While I thought that I was learning how to live, I have been learning how to die.” John Calvin echoed similar sentiments, noting that “we, while following the course of nature, rush headlong into death; for we, of ourselves, contrive nothing but what ends in ruin” (Calvin’s Commentaries, Vol. XIX/2, p. 286).
Famed modern Reformed theologian Karl Barth notes that the Spirit and the gospel shatter this hopeless way of life. In their presence “our present existence is discredited and rendered questionable” (The Epistle to the Romans, p. 248) -- for the good news, he says, is that the Spirit dwells in me in the midst of death, “beyond the catastrophe in which ‘I,’ in the totality of my concreteness, is helplessly engulfed” (The Epistle to the Romans, p. 290). The catastrophe of a life headed towards death has been discredited.
Mark E.
John 11:1-45
The most profound moments of my pastoral life have been the moments of transition: being present at birth, at baptism, at marriage, at death, at graveside. These are the moments when I encounter God, God’s spirit, God’s wisdom, and God’s strength. At the beginning of my vocation I was hesitant to officiate at a funeral. In fact, I prayed that God not provide that opportunity. That was a foolish prayer. I conducted five funerals in four weeks in my first pastorate. I soon learned that God would give me the words, the strength, and the courage to be wholly present, to be a conduit of love and grace.
Jesus is not present at the death of his friend, but he is present at his resurrection. Jesus will be present at our resurrections too -- opening his arms and his heart to us and welcoming us home. There is a moment at death, which I have seen and felt, when the human body remains but one can feel that the spirit, the soul, the life essence has gone. That is resurrection of the spirit into the company of God through Christ. That is hope and peace and love experienced in this place before we can travel to another.
Bonnie B.
John 11:1-45
This is not only a long passage, it’s also a very familiar one. Jesus stalls and Lazarus dies. Well, it was all to show that Lazarus was really dead, not just sick. Jesus raises Lazarus from the dead. Happy Ending.
But because of its familiarity we might miss a few things. First of all, Jesus had friends: Mary and Martha and their brother Lazarus. Friends are different than apostles or disciples. There will always be a boundary between Jesus and his followers. There is no such boundary when it comes to those who are personally dear to him. For all of us there are those who are friends who dwell in our hearts, but others who are good people, good companions, good folks who fill other niches in our lives.
Also, in this passage the tables are turned. In another gospel Jesus chides Martha for not recognizing what’s important and what isn’t. But in this passage Martha scolds Jesus because he didn’t get it. His friend was more than just an object lesson to strengthen the faith of others across millennia. And Jesus weeps. In this passage the divine Son of God finally “gets” what it means to be fully human, to experience the grief of loss that cannot be fully cured.
Frank R.
John 11:1-45
I read of one man who went back to Germany during World War II to help get out a Jewish friend. He did not seem to care if there was danger; he cared more for his friend. He got his friend out, but when he went back to help others he was caught and arrested. Our Lord kept coming back to help his friends until one day he also was captured and died on a cross. Life may have dangers, but we move ahead anyway -- knowing that even if we are executed, God has a place for us far better than one we left!
Some have trouble with miracles, and I heard one fellow say that Lazarus was not really dead -- he must have been only sleeping, because when they opened his tomb they didn’t smell anything! If he had been there back then, he probably would have been with the group that wondered why Jesus didn’t come back earlier and heal Lazarus.
Jesus did that healing partly to win converts. Some will only believe if they see a miracle.
We read of many miracles in the Bible, but do we think that they all stopped after the scripture was written? Do we have the faith to believe that God can still do things that seem totally impossible? No matter how much we may love a dear one, we don’t believe that God can raise them. But he is still raising the dead, but not sending them back to earth. They are at home with him.
When my folks were killed in an auto accident, I saw them in a dream my first night in the funeral parlor; they were standing before me hand in hand, smiling and telling me not to worry about them. It was so real that I can still remember it.
Church can help us believe what God can still do down here on earth for those who believe! As this text says, there will always be doubters!
Bob O.
Dry bones. This is the passage about dry bones, or is it? Is the prophet talking about actual bones in a valley? Is this a poetic metaphor for human life? How do you encounter this passage at this moment of your life?
There have been some dry-bone moments in my life. These were moments of pain and anguish when I could not feel the presence of God, when I was lonely and afraid, when I was in the darkness of desolation. I felt dry. My spirit was dry. My life was dry. My hope had dried up. Those are the moments when I need the breath of God, when I need God to breathe life back into my soul and my spirit. Those are the moments when I sing, “Breathe on me, breath of God.” Those are the moments of miracle when God restores my soul.
Bonnie B.
Ezekiel 37:1-14
History is not as neat as we would like it to be. Sometimes it just gets a little messy. Decades ago, students were taught that Columbus discovered America. Now it is more likely that teachers will point out there were people already here when the Italian explorer arrived. History is the story of Great Men, said more than one historian. Now it’s recognized that ordinary people lived extraordinary lives, and archaeologists focus much more on the lives of regular folks. A trip to Monticello once focused strictly on the genius of Thomas Jefferson, not only scientifically and politically but also in the way he planned and laid out his gardens. Now a visit to that national historic site will show that African-Americans were there too, not as employees or servants, but as slaves living a brutally harsh life with none of the freedoms proclaimed in the Declaration of Independence and guaranteed in the constitution.
The story of the exile is told much more neatly than it actually occurred. The traditional version has it that the people ignored the warnings of the prophets and sinned. Babylon was allowed to conquer them and take them away in exile. Then Babylon was conquered and the people all came home and rebuilt the temple that had been destroyed.
Except there was more than one exile. Many voluntarily went to Egypt and to other lands. Not all of them came back from Babylon. And not all of them were exiled. The poorest remained behind, to reviled when the descendants of the rich and powerful returned.
Ezekiel is a product of the Egyptian exile. When God speaks to him about restoring life and hope, it is to an Egyptian audience who had made the faith come to life in a foreign land and who would remain in Egypt. Can these bones live? Yes! Not just in the shadow of the temple, but around the world.
Frank R.
Ezekiel 37:1-14
Our world is full of the dead bones of those who have not found the Lord. The most important job of the church is to send prophets (missionaries) to all the nations so that they may come to life. Are there dead bones even in our country and even in some churches? We can see some who don’t have the Lord in them! We can tell by the way they act. Are they hopeless and depressed? Are they even suicidal? Do we have times when we lose hope and the Lord’s love seems far away? We may all have those ups and downs. That is why we come to our church -- to bring us back to life and to keep us alive. We must hear our God calling to us from the grave. It is like being awakened from a sound sleep.
When I was on the mission field I saw the faces of many converts. When they finally realized the truth of the gospel and found the Lord, their faces lit up with joy! It was such a blessed change from the hateful gods they had been worshiping.
When my son’s wife died, he was so depressed he got into alcohol for two or three years. He even ended in jail a couple of times when his mother -- my former wife -- sent him there because she didn’t want him around her house any more. He lived in Chicago, and I had just returned from the mission field and was living in New Mexico. He came down to visit when I got back, and after showing him some scripture passages he turned back to the Lord. I could see the difference in him. The dry bones were coming back to life! When I went to Chicago to visit him a couple years later, he was a counselor for alcoholics. He drove me down to the place where he was practicing, and when he introduced me to one of his clients she said, “He knows what it’s like.” Maybe the Lord had given him that bad experience in drinking so he could help the Lord put flesh on other bones.
Each one of us Christians shares in the prophet’s work when we reach out to others who seem to be dead and give them the hope that only comes from the Lord.
When I was a chaplain for a prison, I saw a building full of dead bones. The prisoners did not know that there was anything else for them. When many of them got out they were still dead and committed crimes again, so they went back to the prison “cemetery.” But there were some whose bones came to life when they accepted the hope that our Lord was giving them.
If you are alive in the Lord, then share your light with those who are living in darkness. You can help the Lord put flesh on those dry bones!
Bob O.
Romans 8:6-11
Not long ago I made a trip to the west coast. After landing at LAX, I had to use public transportation to get where I intended to go. I don’t get out to Los Angeles often, and I don’t know the highways or how to get around on them. I boarded the cab and trusted that the driver knew what he was doing and where he was going. I trusted that he would take me to the place where I was to go. My driver did a good job and I arrived safely. However, had he wanted to do so he could have taken a long, winding route and charged me more. He could have gone to a totally different place, far from where I wanted to be. The driver was in control of where I ended up.
I thought about that again as I read through this scripture. If our minds are led by the flesh, our old sinful nature, then we end up in a place that doesn’t please God and is hostile to him. If, though, we allow the Spirit to lead our minds, then we end up in a place that is life and peace. It all depends upon who is driving as to where we end up. So today I ask you, who is at the wheel of your life? Who’s driving?
Bill T.
Romans 8:6-11
Actress Hayden Panettiere, who starred on the television program Heroes, had a tattoo that ran down the left side of her back. The inscription was in Italian and read Vivere senza rimipianti. This means “to live without regrets.” But Panettiere encountered her first regret when she realized that rimipianti was spelled wrong -- it should have been rimpianti.
Application: If we live with the spirit within us, then we will have no regrets.
Ron L.
Romans 8:6-11
This lesson elaborates on what William Shakespeare wrote about life in Macbeth: “Life [he says]... is a tale told by an idiot, full of sound and fury signifying nothing.” It is all just making its way to death, as Leonardo da Vinci once put it: “While I thought that I was learning how to live, I have been learning how to die.” John Calvin echoed similar sentiments, noting that “we, while following the course of nature, rush headlong into death; for we, of ourselves, contrive nothing but what ends in ruin” (Calvin’s Commentaries, Vol. XIX/2, p. 286).
Famed modern Reformed theologian Karl Barth notes that the Spirit and the gospel shatter this hopeless way of life. In their presence “our present existence is discredited and rendered questionable” (The Epistle to the Romans, p. 248) -- for the good news, he says, is that the Spirit dwells in me in the midst of death, “beyond the catastrophe in which ‘I,’ in the totality of my concreteness, is helplessly engulfed” (The Epistle to the Romans, p. 290). The catastrophe of a life headed towards death has been discredited.
Mark E.
John 11:1-45
The most profound moments of my pastoral life have been the moments of transition: being present at birth, at baptism, at marriage, at death, at graveside. These are the moments when I encounter God, God’s spirit, God’s wisdom, and God’s strength. At the beginning of my vocation I was hesitant to officiate at a funeral. In fact, I prayed that God not provide that opportunity. That was a foolish prayer. I conducted five funerals in four weeks in my first pastorate. I soon learned that God would give me the words, the strength, and the courage to be wholly present, to be a conduit of love and grace.
Jesus is not present at the death of his friend, but he is present at his resurrection. Jesus will be present at our resurrections too -- opening his arms and his heart to us and welcoming us home. There is a moment at death, which I have seen and felt, when the human body remains but one can feel that the spirit, the soul, the life essence has gone. That is resurrection of the spirit into the company of God through Christ. That is hope and peace and love experienced in this place before we can travel to another.
Bonnie B.
John 11:1-45
This is not only a long passage, it’s also a very familiar one. Jesus stalls and Lazarus dies. Well, it was all to show that Lazarus was really dead, not just sick. Jesus raises Lazarus from the dead. Happy Ending.
But because of its familiarity we might miss a few things. First of all, Jesus had friends: Mary and Martha and their brother Lazarus. Friends are different than apostles or disciples. There will always be a boundary between Jesus and his followers. There is no such boundary when it comes to those who are personally dear to him. For all of us there are those who are friends who dwell in our hearts, but others who are good people, good companions, good folks who fill other niches in our lives.
Also, in this passage the tables are turned. In another gospel Jesus chides Martha for not recognizing what’s important and what isn’t. But in this passage Martha scolds Jesus because he didn’t get it. His friend was more than just an object lesson to strengthen the faith of others across millennia. And Jesus weeps. In this passage the divine Son of God finally “gets” what it means to be fully human, to experience the grief of loss that cannot be fully cured.
Frank R.
John 11:1-45
I read of one man who went back to Germany during World War II to help get out a Jewish friend. He did not seem to care if there was danger; he cared more for his friend. He got his friend out, but when he went back to help others he was caught and arrested. Our Lord kept coming back to help his friends until one day he also was captured and died on a cross. Life may have dangers, but we move ahead anyway -- knowing that even if we are executed, God has a place for us far better than one we left!
Some have trouble with miracles, and I heard one fellow say that Lazarus was not really dead -- he must have been only sleeping, because when they opened his tomb they didn’t smell anything! If he had been there back then, he probably would have been with the group that wondered why Jesus didn’t come back earlier and heal Lazarus.
Jesus did that healing partly to win converts. Some will only believe if they see a miracle.
We read of many miracles in the Bible, but do we think that they all stopped after the scripture was written? Do we have the faith to believe that God can still do things that seem totally impossible? No matter how much we may love a dear one, we don’t believe that God can raise them. But he is still raising the dead, but not sending them back to earth. They are at home with him.
When my folks were killed in an auto accident, I saw them in a dream my first night in the funeral parlor; they were standing before me hand in hand, smiling and telling me not to worry about them. It was so real that I can still remember it.
Church can help us believe what God can still do down here on earth for those who believe! As this text says, there will always be doubters!
Bob O.
