Episode 1307: Who Could Stand

[00:00:00] Scott Maderer: Thanks for joining me on episode 1,307 of the Inspired Stewardship Podcast.

[00:00:09] Eric Brotman: I'm Eric Brotman from the Don't Retire Graduate podcast. I challenge you to invest in yourself, invest in others, develop your influence and impact the world by using your time, your talent, and your treasuries to live out your calling. Having the ability to plan for the future is, One way to be inspired to do that is to listen to this, the Inspired Stewardship Podcast with my friends Scott Maderer.

[00:00:40] Scott Maderer: Whether it's saying, because I don't agree with you, I can't speak with you, I can't be around you. I have to. Abandon you instead of coming together and loving on each other. That's the broken bones. But God can heal. Even that God's [00:01:00] grace is big enough to bring us together even beyond that. Welcome and thank you for joining us on the Inspired Stewardship Podcast.

[00:01:12] If you truly desire to become the person who God wants you to be, then you must learn to use your time, your talent, and your treasures for your true calling. In the Inspired Stewardship Podcast, you will learn to invest in yourself, invest in others, and develop your influence so that you can impact the world.

[00:01:35] In today's spiritual foundation episode, I talked about Psalm one 30 and Ezekiel chapter 37 verses one through 14. I share how we can be revived no matter how dry we are by God's grace, and I also share how this is true for communities as well. Psalm one 30 says, out of the depths, I cry to you, oh Lord.

[00:01:57] Lord, hear my voice. Let your [00:02:00] ears be attentive to the voice of my supplications. If you owe, Lord should mark inequities, Lord, who could stand, but there is forgiveness with you, so that you may be revered. I wait for the Lord, my soul weights and in his word. I hope my soul waits for the Lord more than those who watch for the morning more than those who watch for the morning.

[00:02:20] Oh, Israel Hope in the Lord. For with the Lord there are steadfast love, and with him is great power to redeem. It is he who will redeem Israel from all its inequities. And Ezekiel chapter 37, verse one through 14 says, the hand of the Lord came upon me and he brought me out by the spirit of the Lord and set me down in the middle of the valley and it was full of bones.

[00:02:43] He led me all around them. There were very many lying in the valley and they were very, He said to me, mortal, can these bones live? And I answered, oh Lord God, then he said to me, prophecy to these bones and say to them, oh, dry bones, hear the word of the Lord, [00:03:00] thus says the Lord God, to these bones, I will cause breath to enter you and you shall live.

[00:03:05] I will a sin 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. So I prophesied as I had been commanded, and as I prophesied, suddenly there was a noise, a rattling, and the bones came together, bone to its bone.

[00:03:25] I looked and there were sins on them, and flesh had come upon them, and skin had covered them, but there was no breath in them. Then he said to me, prophesy to the breath, prophesy, mortal, and say to the breath, thus says the Lord God come from the four winds of breath and breathe upon these slain that they may.

[00:03:43] And I prophesied as he had commanded me, and the breath came into them and they lived and stood on their feet a vast multitude. Then he said to me, mortal, these bones are the whole house of Israel. They say our bones are dried up and our hope is lost, and we are cut off completely. [00:04:00] Therefore, prophesy and say to them, thus says the Lord God, I'm going to open your graves and bring you up from your graves.

[00:04:06] Owe my people and I will bring you back to the land of. And you shall know I am the Lord when I open your graves and bring you up from your graves, oh my people. I will put my spirit within you and you shall live, and I will place on you your own soil. And then you shall know that I, the Lord have spoken and will act, says the Lord.

[00:04:30] One of the passages from Psalm says, if you should mark inequities, Lord, who could stand? It seems to be a important and profound question and assertion in there. Who could stand and the answer is obvious. It's meant to be. No one can stand if God held everything against us. If God kept an account on the books of our wrongs and weight are worth what hope would any of us have?

[00:04:59] And [00:05:00] the answer though not stated, is no one would have hope. No one could stand up to the, that kind of scrutiny because we've all failed. We've all sinned, we've all fallen short, except that's not where the Psalm ends. In fact, that then is a springboard to possibility. There is a forgiveness within you is the next part.

[00:05:24] There's hope. There's. And the Psalm practically trots and runs and trips through to the end where that is where I'll put my life. That's where I'll lean, that's what I'm going to wait on that forgiveness thing, that grace thing, that's the thing I'm gonna be on the lookout for. That's the thing that I'm eager for.

[00:05:45] I, I'm watching for those things more than I would watch for enemies coming over the hill. And then that, that hope turns into an invitation. That this isn't just for me. This is for everyone. It's for [00:06:00] all. Let's put all of our eggs in this one basket. Let's place all of our bets on this one possibility.

[00:06:07] Let's live our full lives into this truth, that this grace is an open-ended, all inclusive invitation. This is where we want to go. This is who we want to be. and then we hear the passage from Ezekiel about the bones, and this is probably a somewhat familiar story to you, and we sometimes kind of forget as we read it, that it's about community in a way that here, although though the prophet is telling his own story, his own memory, his own vision, the hand of the Lord came.

[00:06:47] Me. It's not really a story of individuals at all. In fact, it ends with this vast multitude brought back up to life, out of death, out of dry [00:07:00] bones, and yet we often hear it as if we're made up of a multitude. Of individuals. This is about being built up. This is about getting what you need to keep going.

[00:07:12] This is about how no matter how dry you are, how hopeless you are, how horrible it might seem. God can still revive you. God can breathe life into you and that's often how it's preached. God can revive you as an individual. . And that's not wrong. And that's not bad. And that's not a, an incorrect interpretation or hearing of this because as individuals we do need reviving.

[00:07:41] We do need our dry bones and our dry souls to have breath come in to reanimate us. And there is a hearing in a reading in here for individuals about the need to revitalize yourself from time to. , but if that's [00:08:00] all you read into it that it limits the power of this passage because the passage actually also begins versus and has versus 11 through 14, which is an explanation of this vision and 11 says, these bones are the whole house of Israel, the whole house, not just individuals, but the community together, not just one-on-one, but all.

[00:08:25] and if it go back to the beginning it says, can these bones live bones, plural, not specific individuals. Can this one live? Can that one live? No. Can these individuals as a community, live as a family of God is a body of Christ. Today we live in a an era where there's con tremendous change.

[00:08:50] There's political conflict. There's disagreements on all side that's happening within the church. That's happening between the church. I'm Methodist. That's happening in the Methodist [00:09:00] church right now. You might have seen that in the news that the church is splitting over issue. And that happens in political arena, whether you're a Republican or a Democrat, whether you're from the United States or another country, we often seem to have this rhetoric of division.

[00:09:17] That is all that we hear about, and it happens throughout our lives in all sorts of areas. And yet here we're hearing that this world in which we live is important. and it's good. Not because we messed up, not because we broke it, not because we lost something, but it's a gift. It's a gift from God. It's a blessing.

[00:09:44] It's a place that we're supposed to take care of and that helps take care of us, which might sound ridiculous to put that on the community, to put that on the church, to say that these things are a place where we can come together. [00:10:00] And live out the kingdom of God. But that's the way it's supposed to be.

[00:10:06] And I'm not saying the church is perfect, and I'm not saying that we haven't made mistakes, and I'm not saying that as individuals, we are perfect and we haven't made mistakes. And I'm not saying as a community we're perfect and we haven't made mistakes. What I'm saying is even there, God can breathe life into these bones again and bring us.

[00:10:28] whether it's the uncertain future of politics, whether it's going to the next family meal, and knowing that you're going to end up disagreeing with one member of your family or another about some hot button issue of the day, whether it's the way that we scream at each other at the top of our longs you are wrong.

[00:10:47] And we don't even know exactly what the other person really believes or. Whether it's saying because I don't agree with you, I can't speak with you, I can't be around you. I have to [00:11:00] abandon you instead of coming together and loving on each other. That's the broken bones. But God can heal. Even that God's grace is big enough to bring us together even beyond.

[00:11:19] because the Lord is able to bring life to death, and whether that's death of the body or whether that's death of the soul, it doesn't matter. God can breathe life into us, not just as individuals, but into our communities again, and can bring them together again. I truly believe that. Thanks for listen.

[00:11:51] Thanks so much for listening to the Inspired Stewardship Podcast. As a subscriber and listener, we challenge you to not just sit [00:12:00] back and passively listen, but act on what you've heard and find a way to live your calling. If you enjoyed this episode, do me a favor. Go over to facebook.com/inspir.

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