Strata: The Bible In the News: Hope and Help for Today’s Dry Bones

There are few Biblical images bleaker than the Valley of Dry Bones found in Ezekiel 37. It is this very bleakness that highlights the sense of exaltation when God declares that he will, through his breath (or spirit or wind), cause these bones to live again. It is left to the popular press to apply this imagery in a wide variety of contexts.

More than once the present condition of religious organizations is compared to Ezekiel’s valley. From Africa (as reported in Africa News) comes one account, in which a Nigerian bishop “compared the Ugandan Church to the valley of dry bones which God commanded the Prophet Ezekiel to bring back to life ... The Church has lost her sense of stewardship and the role of transforming society. It has started disintegrating.”