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UNCLE JOHN'S Study Bible
Ezekiel: Lesson 7
The Book of Ezekiel is one of the most difficult books in the Bible to understand. Ezekiel communicated messages from God many he received through visions while he lived in Babylon among the captive exiles. Like St. Francis of Assisi, Ezekiel met with God among nature. He is thirty years old, by the river when he sees the heavens open, and he experiences great visions of spiritual astronomy and a call to be a prophet with a commission to be a watchman on a mission. He is in exile among 10,000 captives in a time when Daniel is in the court of the king, Nebuchadnezzar.
10 lesson study in the Book of Ezekiel Lesson 7
EZEKIEL Chapter 37:1-14
VII
MAY THE FOUR WINDS BLOW YOU SAFELY HOME
What was once the great nation was now in exile, creation in captivity, bondage to corruption. The hand of the Lord touches Ezekiel and he's drawn out by the Spirit of the Lord who "set me in the middle of a valley full of bones". The Lord leads him back and forth among these many dry bones on the floor of this valley and asks Ezekiel “Son of man, can these bones live?” “You alone know, O Sovereign Lord” he replies and listens to the Lord who instructs him “Prophesy to these bones and say to them, ‘Dry bones, hear the word of the Lord! I will make breath (in the Hebrew translation also meaning air, wind or spirit) enter you and you will come to life. I will attach tendons and make flesh come upon you and cover you with skin: I will put breath in you and you will come to life.’” So he prophesies as commanded and he hears a noise, a rattling sound like an earthquake shaking as the skeletons are formed into a body as the bones come together bone to bone. He watches as flesh covers the bones with skin but there is no breath in them. The Lord says to Ezekiel: “Prophesy to the breath; prophesy, son of man, and say to it, ‘This is what the Sovereign Lord says: Come from the four winds, O breath, and breathe into these slain, that they may live,’ He prophesies as commanded, to the north wind and its convincing power, to the south wind bringing the Comforter. “Awake, north wind, and come, south wind! Blow on my garden that its fragrance may spread abroad,” Solomon’s lover sings to him. He prophesies to the east wind, its trials and tests, and to the west wind and its blessings which brings understanding in the present time. Zeke prophesies to the bones a creative word and prophesies to the winds of the Spirit for God to supernaturally move on these bones and for the winds to breathe life and restoration into these bones, and breath enters them and they come to life and stand up on their feet as a vast invincible army.
“Son of man, these bones are the whole house of Israel. They say, ‘Our bones are dried up, our hope is gone, we are cut off.’ Therefore prophesy and say to them ‘O my people, I an going to open your graves and bring you up from them. I will put my Spirit in you and you will live, and I will settle you in your own land.’”
The fulfillment of Ezekiel’s vision some 2500 years later are the bones of six million Jews killed in the Holocaust in 1945 and Israel scattered without a homeland is given new life when they are recognized as a sovereign nation in 1948 and the four winds of Earth carry the exiled home.
In God’s supernatural ability is the power for the dead to be raised and revived. Lost hope will find new faith. What is written as inspiration in the Bible brings vision to the spiritual dead to find new purpose in the manifestation of life. We come to the four winds that enable breath in air to blow on the Spirit of the mind that entitle and transform us and will carry us in song safely home. The same Lord who formed human flesh and bones from dust and breathe air into our nostrils to make us living beings shall open our graves and bring us up from them and put his Spirit in us that we may live again. Then we will know the Lord has spoken and done this and we will know God.
SOLOMON'S POEMS, SONGS & PLAY
Pleasant words are a honeycomb
Sweet to the soul and health to the bones
A bit of kindness, a pleasant phrase, soothing comfort, a soft word, costs little yet means so much. The comparison with honey speaks across all cultures through every generation. As the story goes, his father watches a swarm of bees covering the infant head of Ambrose in his cradle, and when the bees lifted they left a drop of honey on his lips, foreshadowing his future persuasive eloquence.
The honeybee is a symbol for work, industrious, pleasant, busy, cooperative, creative, orderly, and diligent. The honey produces a symbol of wisdom, sweetness, wealth, eloquence, and positive changes pleasing to the soul, and the senses, with healing characteristics. The Hebrew name for bees is connected to the word "speech". The true and righteous words of our Lord are said in the Bible to be "sweeter than honey" and the pleasant words of humans compares to the health-giving honeycomb. A sweet-talking person's lips "drip as the honeycomb" with honeyed tongues. The Bible refers to the Promised Land as a land of abundance "flowing with milk and honey."
Ambrose, the Bishop of Milan, as I know of him, is the patron of beekeepers and candle-makers. He taught that church is a beehive, and the bees faithful, diligently storing up treasure or honey in heaven. The beehives represent a peaceful, cooperative community wisely ruled by one head, the Queen bee. It is like the sweetness produced by eloquence. Words can create a buzz and can sting too.
Bees represent vigilance. And because they store up honey, they are examples of thrift, banking and forethought.
Ambrose is known as the honey tongued Doctor, bestowed upon him because of his speaking and preaching abilities. He is also a teacher, and a Bible student who is a great influence on others. Born to Roman nobility, he was a wealthy man who gave it away to the poor, serving up as an example. He was part of a chanting choir and wrote many hymns. Ambrose is a great orator, and a Christian universalist, who believes that all people shall eventually achieve salvation.
When Jesus Christ, resurrected from the dead, appearing behind locked doors to his disciples, they thought they were seeing a ghost, even after Jesus spoke to them and showed them his punctured hands and feet, they still did not believe it was him, until he ate a piece of fish and honeycomb, convincing them this was not a ghost, but the same man they saw die, now return in the flesh to life, fully alive.
Love is magnanimous, and its eloquence sweet as honey. Solomon understood nature and drew wisdom from his surroundings. He wrote: "Eat honey, my son, for it is good; honey from the comb is sweet to your taste. Know also that wisdom is sweet to your soul; if you find it, there is a future hope for you, and your hope will not be cut off."
A positive attitude, pleasing, kind, watchful words can transform and heal us through the inner workings and power of the Spirit true.
Solomon wrote a powerful book of sweet romantic poetry in a play called the Song of Songs located in the Old Testament of the Bible. It's a song of love in a heart of hearts.
Throughout Scripture we see many poems and songs, and many different styles of writing, all inspired from the same source, the Spirit of God. The angels speak in exalted poetic language and inspire great poetry, Mary's magnificent canticle, and Zechariah's song, filled with the Holy Spirit, praising God in a prophetic poem. From the Book of Job, to the song of Moses and songs of his sister Miriam, Deborah's song in Judges, the Song of Ruth, songs of David, Solomon, Isaiah, Jeremiah and many of the prophets, the Bible is brimming with poetry, and sometimes spoken by the Lord, or through others written for special occasions, flowing with its own rhythm and unique message, and sometimes the poems are united together in a collection. The book of Psalms is a book of praises, many written by David, but also by other members of his choir such as Asaph. Some are designated as songs, very specific in being set to music, with stringed instruments, the lyre, or with flute, cymbals, drums, or to the tune of "another song"; and some psalms are designated as prayers. David turns his heart to God through his talent, poems and lyrics, with praises and worship, to honor God and to sustain him and encourage others through all the trials of life. His son Solomon, also King of Israel, has a left us a testament of some of the greatest poetry of mankind, the love poetry of Song of Songs, the wisdom of the Book of Proverbs and the book of Ecclesiastes or The Preacher, or one who gathers the congregation. The poetry in the Old Testament did not rhyme but the characteristics of its language is poetry. When you hark to the words of the psalms it moves in a river of sound within the musician. Hallelujah! Come read out loud and hear what the Spirit is saying and hum .
excerpt from SONG OF SONGS:
Friends "How is your beloved better than others,
most beautiful of women?
How is your beloved better than others,
that you charge us so?
Beloved My lover is radiant and ruddy,
outstanding among ten thousand.
His head is purest gold;
his hair is wavy
and black as a raven.
His eyes are like doves
by the water streams,
washed in milk,
mounted like jewels.
His cheeks are like beds of spice
yielding perfume.
His lips are like lilies
dripping with myrrh.
His arms are rods of gold
set with chrysolite.
His body is like polished ivory
decorated with sapphires.
His legs are pillars of marble
set on bases of pure gold.
His appearance is like Lebanon
choice as its cedars.
His mouth is sweetness itself;
he is altogether lovely.
This is my lover, this is my friend,
O daughters of Jerusalem.
Friends Where has your lover gone
most beautiful of women?
Which way did your lover turn,
that we may look for him with you?
Beloved My lover has gone down to his garden,
to the bed of spices,
to browse in the gardens
and to gather lilies.
I am my lover's and my lover is mine;
he browses among the lilies.
Lover You are beautiful, my darling, as Tizrah,
lovely as Jerusalem,
majestic as troops with banners.
Turn your eyes from me;
they overwhelm me.
Your hair is like a flock of goats
descending from Gilead.
Your teeth are like a flock of sheep
coming up from the washing.
Each has its twin,
not one of them alone.
Your temples behind your veil
are like the halves of a pomegranate.
Sixty queens there may be,
and eighty concubines,
and virgins beyond number;
but my dove, my perfect one, is unique,
the only daughter of her mother,
the favorite of the one who bore her.
The maidens saw her and called her blessed;
the queens and concubines praised her.
Friends Who is this that appears like the dawn,
fair as the moon,
bright as the sun,
majestic as the stars in procession?
Lover How beautiful your sandaled feet
O prince's daughter!
Your graceful legs are like jewels,
the work of a craftsman's hands.
Your navel is a rounded goblet
that never lacks blended wine.
Your waist is a mound of wheat
encircled by lilies.
Your breasts are like two fawns,
twins of a gazelle.
Your neck is like an ivory tower,
Your eyes are the pools of Heshbon
by the gate of Bath Rabbim.
Your nose is like the tower of Lebanon
looking toward Damascus.
Your head crowns you like Mt. Carmel.
Your hair is like royal tapestry;
the king is held captive by its tresses.
How beautiful you are and how pleasing,
O love, with your delights!
Your stature is like that of the palm,
and your breasts like clusters of fruit.
I said, "I will climb the palm tree;
I will take hold of its fruit."
May your breasts be like clusters of the vine,
the fragrance of your breath like apples,
and your mouth like the best wine.
Beloved May the wine go straight to my lover,
flowing gently over lips and teeth.
I belong to my lover,
and his desire is for me.
Come, my lover, let us go to the countryside,
let us spend the night in the villages.
Let us go early to the vineyards
to see if the vines have budded,
if their blossoms have opened,
and if the pomegranates are in bloom-
there I will give you my love."
