We received a bit of a blow this past week. It kind of makes sense when you consider that we were feeling so good at the progress being made. Satan wants to come in and mess things up. Our neighbour came by with an envelope that had been put in his mailbox that was actually for us. It was a bill that indicated we were past due for an incredibly large amount of money. The first thoughts that go through your head when something like this happens is that there must be some mistake, so that's what we prayed. But, unfortunately, when Renaissance Man went through all his records, rechecking every single email and letter, bank statements, etc., he realized, much to his extreme disappointment, that no, there was no error. The money is due and it is due now.
It would be funny if it weren't so serious as we had a lot of plans for where that money was going to go and it wasn't to this bill. So, all weekend long, Easter weekend of all weekends, it's been a battle once again for us - where does our hope lie? Jesus came to defeat death and all hopelessness.
Our pastor did not pick your typical Easter passage from the New Testament story of the Resurrection. He went to Ezekiel 37. The story of the dry bones coming to life. God asks Ezekiel if the dry bones can live. His answer is so classic and is exactly how I feel. "O Lord God, you know." Some translations include the word "only" which makes me smile as it almost makes his response sound sarcastic. Ezekiel's response doesn't seem to show a lot of faith. He doesn't say, "Oh yes, absolutely Lord, you can do this!" I almost picture more of an eye rolling, "I suppose, can't say for sure. I've seen you do great things before, but don't know if you'll do it now. You seem to pick and choose when you'll do great things." Why would Ezekiel be so vague in his answer? Perhaps it is because the situation appeared so bleak. When God showed him the valley of dry bones, He was showing him bones that had been there for years and years. It must have been truly an awful thing to see - death. I probably would have responded the same way as once someone is dead and gone, it's not that likely they'll come around again, especially without skin!
Ezekiel was told to prophesy to the dry bones, in other words to speak life into the death that was in front of him. Interesting order, isn't it? He's told to speak life first and then the miracle happened after. We usually want the miracle to happen first so that we believe God's abilities. The passage said he prophesied "as he was commanded." He was strictly doing it out of obedience, not necessarily because he thought it would do anything.
The dry bones then get skin on them, but they remained lifeless until God breathed the breath of life into them. What is the challenge for ourselves? We must speak life into our bleak situations which is ultimately expressing our faith out loud to ourselves and others around us. I must choose to believe that this bill was not a surprise to God. He kept Renaissance Man's eye's closed to it for some reason. Its timing, though odd, is actually good! If we had received this bill even a few months ago, we would not have been able to pay it. We will be able to pay it now, it just means we make quite a few steps backwards. I don't think we could have handled a blow like this any earlier! So even the timing makes us see God knew when we could handle it. Step one of faith.
Step two. Trust God for his provision. We certainly were hoping to make steps in the forward direction, not backwards! We trust in his provision for our needs. I believe this is the speaking life into what appears hopeless. We prophesy to our bank account! Our bank account is like the valley of dry bones! It's been dead for awhile! It has no skin on it and just when it appears that skin was coming, it got hot and dry again in our little desert! It's interesting that Ezekiel was shown an army of dry bones, not just one skeleton. Our huge bill is like that army in that it wasn't a little thing we could have easily handled on our own. No, no, no - this is a rather large bill, very army-like in it's amount that we cannot handle on our own, unlike a little skeleton that we could have dealt with by ourselves. Yet, we have hope in what we know about God and we keep our eyes on Him, the Author and Perfecter of our faith. He is very busily trying to perfect our faith. So we don't lose hope, not even facing the death of our bank account. We do this out of obedience, not unlike Ezekiel. God asks us, "Do you think I can bring your bank account bank to life?" "You know," we answer back. We can't say for certain what He will do, but we know He has the ability. We try not to be defeated.
Step three. We wait, but we don't sit around hoping money will pop into place. We actively wait. We started brainstorming all sorts of ways we could make some extra income. We went on the MLS and started looking for building lots again. We are back in the house building mode, not for us to live, but to build and sell again. Someone asked me about that crazy thought at church as everyone who knew us when we built our last place also saw that it was a hard time for us. But I quickly responded that it would be different this time. We would do many things differently which is actually one of the reasons we want to do it so badly. We learned so many lessons through the last house build that it seems a huge waste to not do it again. My poor three year old doesn't quite grasp what we are doing and thinks that we are getting out of the farmhouse and into a new place. This makes him quite happy as he thinks this place is a dump anyway and can't wait to move! Truth is, it is an old dumpy farmhouse in parts, so I get it! He's just speaking what I'm thinking! But I digress.....
I started thinking of all the things I could sew for big bucks. There isn't much, but I've got a few ideas. We started thinking about all sorts of things, so we aren't going to sit around and just hope that money will fall from the sky. My prayer is that God will give us supernatural abilities to make up this sum of money and that He'll bless the work of our hands.
Step four. God has to work. God is the only one with the true breath of life. Ezekiel prophesied out of obedience, and the skin did appear on the bones, but they were still dead. In the same way, we looked for properties on the weekend and we did find one we liked, but only God can make the sale. Back to Ezekiel, try and keep up! Then God breathed on the bones and shazam! The bones came to life! So we have our part to do in any miracle that might take place. But ultimately, God is the one that resurrects life out of hopeless situations.
We were listening to a cd in the van as we drove yesterday and of all things it was on the Renaissance. That period of time followed the Middle Ages when no one had access to books. They were all put away on shelves in churches, kept safely away. The Middle Ages was a time when no one ever read, hard to imagine! One of the reasons the Renaissance gets the name "Renaissance" is because the books came out again and civilization was "reborn" - the actual meaning of "Renaissance". I have given that name to my husband as I write in this blog as at the time I thought it best described him for his abilities as that is now what the term "Renaissance Man" usually means - someone who is pretty much good at everything. But now I see, it suits him even more - he is reborn as well. The breath of God lives in him. The breath of God lives in me. God took our dead lives and gave us new life through Christ. We are walking testimonies to how God brings life. Knowing this, we can look at our "dry bones" situation and see life. We have the benefit of Scripture and know nothing is hopeless.
A great Easter song that we sang yesterday had the verse, "Death, where is thy victory? Where is thy sting?" It's been defeated! It's not just a nice line in a song. It's God's Word to me. God is victorious over this bill and He can even take away the sting of it, if He so chooses.
At the end of this image of dry bones, the Lord says to Ezekiel that it is a picture of Israel. By bringing the bones back to life he says, "Then you shall know that I am the Lord...." It always comes down to the Lord wanting the glory from our lives. May He get the glory in this situation as we leave it in His capable hands.
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