37 The hand of the Lord was upon me, and he brought me out in the Spirit of the Lord and set me down in the middle of the valley; it was full of bones.2 And he led me around among them, and behold, there were very many on the surface of the valley, and behold, they were very dry. 3 And he said to me, “Son of man, can these bones live?” And I answered, “O Lord God, you know.” 4 Then he said to me, “Prophesy over these bones, and say to them, O dry bones, hear the word of the Lord. 5 Thus says the Lord God to these bones: Behold, I will cause breath to enter you, and you shall live. 6 And I will lay sinews upon 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.”
7 So I prophesied as I was commanded. And as I prophesied, there was a sound, and behold, a rattling, and the bones came together, bone to its bone. 8 And I looked, and behold, there were sinews on them, and flesh had come upon them, and skin had 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 the breath, Thus says the Lord God: Come from the four winds, O breath, and breathe on these slain, that they may live.” 10 So I prophesied as he commanded me, and the breath came into them, and they lived and stood on their feet, an exceedingly great army.
11 Then he said to me, “Son of man, these bones are the whole house of Israel. Behold, they say, ‘Our bones are dried up, and our hope is lost; we are indeed cut off.’ 12 Therefore prophesy, and say to them, Thus says the Lord God: Behold, I will open your graves and raise you from your graves, O my people. And I will bring you into the land of Israel. 13 And you shall know that I am the Lord, when I open your graves, and raise you from your graves, O my people. 14 And I will put my Spirit within you, and you shall live, and I will place you in your own land. Then you shall know that I am the Lord; I have spoken, and I will do it, declares the Lord.”
We should note two further at points at this juncture. The first is that Ezekiel's words here seem to owe a good deal to the account of the creation of man in Genesis 2:7, where it is said that God made man of the dust of the ground, and breathed into his nostrils the breath of Life. If so, then the point that is being made is that this is an act of new creation, a creative act in which men are made new - as, in fact, 36:26 had promised. The second thing is that the two parts of the miracle indicate the differences of direction in Ezekiel's task: one was to prophesy to the bones telling them to hear the word of the Lord; the other was to prophesy to the wind, to the 'ruach', the Spirit of God, to breathe on those slain - that is, both a manward and a Godward reference. The indication is, therefore, as has been said, not so much two separate actions, as two aspects of the same action. But the implications of this are considerable. This double emphasis by which the miracle was to take place is surely preaching (hear the word of the Lord) and prayer (for the quickening Spirit). The word of God and the intercession of man! It was for this that Ezekiel stood: and his presence among the exiles of Chebar was the symbol and token that God was going to work, in this way, through his instrumentality. Is not this a word for our time? Men are saying, 'Our bones are dry, our hope is lost. You are speaking of a covenant, of a new day dawning, it is impossible.' But God says, 'Nothing is impossible. Preach and pray.'