I want to preach to you this morning,
as the Spirit of God would help me,
upon this 37th chapter of Ezekiel's prophecy.
If you have your Bible, I trust that
you will follow me.
I might say that this passage has a
prophetic content, as you shall see in its
application, verses 11 to 14.
But I want to deal with it in
its spiritual content this morning.
This is a most interesting, a most intriguing,
and a most instructive passage of the Word
of God.
No preacher was ever sent to a more
unlikely congregation than Old Ezekiel.
I always think of my good friend, Mr.
Bone, when I come to preach on this
subject, because this was a congregation of bones.
I've been in dead churches and dry churches,
but there weren't bones.
There was still some flesh and some sinew
on the congregation.
But here was poor Old Ezekiel sent to
preach to a congregation of dry bones.
Don't you see that valley?
There were leg bones and thigh bones and
finger bones and arm bones and back bones
and toe bones and all the other bones.
And here was Old Ezekiel called upon to
have a revival in a humanly impossible situation.
I want to tell you, friend, there's nothing
impossible with our God.
Let's get this into our heart this morning.
Let's get this into our soul this morning,
that there's nothing impossible with God.
And when you face the obstacles of this
week, and when you see those rivers that
seemingly are uncrossable, and those mountains you can't
tunnel through on your own, remember, God is
a specialist, and God can do just what
no other can do.
Let us encourage ourselves this morning in the
Lord.
I want you to have a look at
the preacher, because God uses preachers.
God's methods are men, and women set apart
to His glory.
The trouble today, that men make much of
the methods, but God makes much of the
men.
And God is looking for you and looking
for me to be a fitted and blessedly
consecrated instrument, what to do to solve impossibilities
in the name of the Lord.
God wants to use you this morning.
He wants to take you.
He wants to make you an instrument of
revival.
He wants to make you a channel of
His blessing.
Now, the first thing that's essential for blessing
and the servant of God is to have
God's hand upon you.
It's a great thing when the Lord's hand
is upon you.
Do you remember the day when, as a
poor lost sinner, you felt upon you the
kneel-pierced hand of Jesus?
What a thrill it was!
With a heart broken and stained with sin!
With a burden upon your soul unbearable!
With trouble and distress of heart!
Like the psalmist with the pains of hell's
conviction upon you!
God laid His kneel-pierced hand upon you!
And you heard His words, Son, daughter, thy
sins be forgiven thee.
But the Lord wants to put His hand
not only on us for salvation, but He
wants to put His hand upon us for
service.
The Lord wants to use you today!
You know, the trouble with God's people is
they're inclined to leave everything to the preacher
and to say that's his job, let him
get on with it.
No, sir, every believer is a servant of
Jesus Christ.
God wants to put His hand on you
this morning.
You say to me, what can I do?
I just do my daily round, my common
task.
My friend, in that daily round and common
task, there is a sphere of service unlimited!
And there are souls to reach and souls
to be won for Jesus Christ.
I pray this morning that the Lord will
put His hand upon us.
May the Lord's hand be upon us as
a people.
Then look at secondly, the Lord led them
in the Spirit.
Great thing to be in the Spirit.
My, I think you're in the Spirit, you'll
not be miserable.
Some people, when it's Sunday morning, they turn
over and they give a great big yaw.
And they say, it's Sunday, I'd better go
to church or Pearsley will be after me.
I'd better get out.
But that's not the Spirit.
My, I'm glad when the Lord's day morning
comes.
I'm glad to get up and go all
the way up to the prison and meet
my fellow jailbirds and preach the Word to
them.
My, there's something happy about being in the
Spirit on the Lord's day.
This morning after jail I went to visit
the hospitals to see Mrs. Armstrong.
She's near the end of the journey.
But I don't go to comfort her, she
comforts me.
She was repeating over that little verse this
morning, leaning on the everlasting arms.
What have I to fear?
What have I to dread?
Leaning on the everlasting arms.
I have perfect peace with my Lord so
near.
Leaning on the everlasting arms.
My, thank God for the Lord's day.
When we can come into His house and
fellowship the one with the other.
He was carried in the Spirit of the
Lord.
Where did the Lord carry him?
He carried him to a valley.
If you want a good subject, young Christian,
for Bible study, read about the valleys of
the Word of God.
My, there are great places.
You know, David fought a great battle in
the valley.
You know, there was a valley, and God
said, fill it full of ditches.
And when they dug into the valley and
prepared the ditches, God sent rivers of blessing.
God never takes you into a tunnel.
God takes you into a valley.
And it's always an open valley.
There's always a way out.
You look with me at verse 2, and
it says there were very many in the
open valley.
Thank God there's a light in the valley
for every Christian.
And He set them down among the valley
which was full of bones.
You'll never reach man for Jesus Christ until
you come.
We have to be separated from the world.
We have to be like the Lord.
But yet, we have not to be isolated.
There's a great difference between separation and isolation.
Isolation is monasticism.
Build your convent walls and hide yourself from
the world.
But the world climbs over the walls, and
the sins of monasticism are as great as
the sins of the worldling.
But I have to be separated from the
world, and yet I have to be in
the world and not off it.
And I have to go and contact man
for Christ.
And the preacher was sent down in the
valley of bones.
And there was one preacher and a valley
full of bones.
Poor old Ezekiel.
I want you to have a look at
this congregation now.
First of all, you'll notice it was a
very large congregation.
There were very many.
Oh, the largeness of the field of service
for Jesus Christ that baffled you.
One hundred thousand souls a day are passing
one by one away in Christless guilt and
gloom.
Oh, that God would give us a vision
of the multitudes, multitudes in the valley of
decision.
We're only scratching the surface.
We're only seeing a trickle of blessing.
Our vision is so limited.
Our vision is so parochial.
Our vision is so barricaded up with barriers
that are self-erected.
Old John Wesley had the vision of the
world, hadn't he?
And he sat down and he said, Oh,
that the world might taste and see the
wonders of His grace.
The arms of love that compass me would
all mankind embrace.
What we need is a vision of the
very many in the valley.
There are souls that need Jesus Christ.
Souls that you never thought of.
I walked into the upper Abercorn Ward this
morning to see another man, a member of
this church.
He came to Christ some weeks ago here.
And there in the bed was a man
I knew.
He was down in the valley with a
very severe heart attack.
Thank God I was able to witness to
him.
Thank God I was able to point him
the way to Jesus Christ.
And to hold his hand and commend him
to the great Savior who alone can give
peace and comfort.
There are souls all around us that just
need the helping hand to come to Jesus.
May God give us a vision this morning.
May this church have a vision for souls.
There are very many.
Have another look at them.
They are very dry.
Oh, there is a deadness, isn't there, in
the church?
There is a dryness abroad today.
The enemy has come in like a flood.
The world is full of deadness.
And the church is full of dryness.
The deadness and dryness of the church.
There is not that sweet, refreshing dew of
heaven.
There is not the wilderness blossoming as a
rose.
Instead, the wilderness with all its blight and
deadness and dryness is all around us.
Here we have the congregation.
Can God do anything?
You know what God did the first thing
He did?
He challenged the prophet.
You know what we need this morning?
We need a challenge from heaven.
That is what we need.
We need God to speak to us.
We need the Lord to challenge every one
of us as believers and to say to
us, Can these bones live?
I want to ask you, can God save
your family?
Can God save your neighbors?
Can God save your workmates?
Can God reach out across the world and
send a mighty, almighty Revival?
Hallelujah, He can.
Oh, we need to be challenged.
God's people go to sleep today.
God's people become lazy.
God's people get captivated with the ear of
the world and get taken up with materialism.
God, help us to see that we need
to be challenged.
God's saying to us this morning, Can I
send Revival to the Ravenhill Road?
Can I reach down into the Short Strand
with its luminous and to Rosetta with its
convents and move with mighty Revival?
Praise God, He can.
The trouble with God's people is we have
no vision.
We are a visionless people.
We don't realize that God can do the
impossible.
My, what would you think of all those
nuns we're queuing up tonight to get in
here to come to Christ?
It would shake the living daylights out of
you, wouldn't it?
You would nearly say Paisley had backslidden.
You wouldn't, do you?
That's right.
You know the trouble with us this morning
is we have no vision.
I was reading the life story of William
Farrell.
He was a great preacher of Switzerland.
My, what a man of power William Farrell
was.
You know what he did?
He went into the chapel and when the
priest was offering the Mass, he went up
and interrupted him.
And he preached with such power that the
priest stripped off his Mass vestments and fell
down and received Christ as the Savior.
And the whole congregation turned in sobs of
repentance to Jesus.
Has God lost His power?
I want to ask you today, how much
power do you believe the Lord can exercise
today?
You know we live in a day when
people say, well, things are going to get
worse and worse.
That's true.
But that doesn't mean that God's going to
get weaker and weaker.
Things will get worse.
This whole world's headed for destruction.
It has always been headed for destruction.
But God has a plan and a purpose
and a miracle to do it every generation.
And God can do it in this generation.
And if ever there was a generation who
needed to see the power of God, we
need to see the power of God today.
And he said to old Ezekiel, he said,
prophecy.
I want you to preach this earth.
If Ezekiel had been an old compromising unbeliever,
he would have said, what's the good of
preaching to those people?
They're only bones.
What good would a sermon do?
You know, this is the trouble with the
twentieth century, isn't it?
We have lost faith in the preaching of
the Word.
God has ordained means to the salvation of
souls.
And it is not the great machinery, well
-financed and made respectable by leading men.
It's not this machinery that's going to bring
revival.
It's the preaching of God's Word and the
power of the Holy Ghost that's going to
do it.
Preach.
And this is what he said, Thus saith
the Lord, Behold, I will cause breath to
enter into you, and ye shall live.
And I will lay sinews upon you, and
will bring up flesh upon you, and cover
you with skin, and put breath in you,
and ye shall live.
And ye shall know that Ezekiel's a good
preacher.
He never read that in the book.
And ye shall know that Ezekiel did a
great job.
He never read that in the book.
Ye shall know.
What will you know?
Ye shall know that I am the Lord.
Revival comes when God's people are only interested
in the glory of the Lord.
That's when revival comes.
If you're praying for revival to fill your
church, God will never send you revival.
If you're praying for revival so that people
will say, He's a revival preacher, you'll never
have it.
But when I'm only interested in the glory
of the Lord, and I'm saying, Lord, your
name's blasphemed, your word is reviled, Lord, people
have turned their back on your truth, and
they've done death's fight to your spirit, O
God, for your great name's sake, do something.
My, then, God will do something.
Do we believe the promise?
Do I believe this morning that by the
simple, faithful preaching of the gospel, manners, I
was down, as you know, in Kells and
Connor, and I was looking at the Presbyterian
church.
Of course, it has been rebuilt since those
days.
But I was thinking of those great days
of revival.
And I was thinking of Dr. John Moore
and what he said.
He said, I never preached more simple sermons
than in the days of revival.
It was flee from the wrath to come
and redemption in the bleeding land.
And he says, as I preached, the congregation
swayed as under the wind of heaven, and
hundreds and hundreds of souls pressed into the
kingdom.
And as he preached, the sobs could be
heard from the pews.
Men and women fell upon their knees in
the aisles of the old Connor meeting house
and said, God, be merciful to me, the
sinner.
Oh, for revival days like that again.
God can do it.
He'll do it for the honor and for
the glory of His great name.
Let's look a little bit farther.
You notice when this man preached, something happened.
I do like this, you know.
There was a noise.
Some people are scared of the noise, aren't
they?
They say we like a nice, quiet service.
You've come to the wrong church, brother.
We want nice, solemn meetings.
We want to sit down and close our
eyes and think that there's great stillness.
Well, brother, you've come to the wrong place,
if that's what you want.
I want to tell you when revival comes,
there'll be a noise.
There will.
There'll be a noise from heaven.
You'll not sit like lumps of putty in
the pew when God comes a-breathing among
the people of God.
No, sir.
There'll be a stirring in the souls of
men.
There'll be a noise.
God send us a noise of revival in
our churches that shouts of newborn thieves and
the sobs of sinners seeking Christ.
There was a noise.
I like this second part.
Look at it.
There was a shaking.
Hallelujah.
My, when God shakes.
I was standing outside Stormont on Tuesday and
a woman said to me, she says, you
know, they're all Quakers in there now.
Well, may the Lord give us a quaking
and a shaking for His glory.
This is what we need, don't we?
We need to be shaken to the very
depths of our souls.
Why, the church is so proper, isn't it?
And orthodox.
And we go through the motions.
And we just carry on as we have
always carried on.
God, blast into the church with blessing.
I was reading that great prayer of Mr.
Nicholson the other day.
And he said, Lord, I'm ready for revival.
He says, if it blows the ostrich feathers
from the woman's hat into the eyes, Lord,
I'm ready.
Lord, if it disturbs every old Pharisee in
the pew, Lord, I'm ready for it.
Lord, if it causes the greatest religious hubbub
of our day, Lord, I'm ready for revival.
And I would say, bless God, I'm ready
for it too.
My, we need a real shaking, don't we?
We come to the prayer meetings.
We don't expect God to do anything.
We come to the morning service, and we
expect to have the hymns and the singing
and the reading and the preaching.
But all God wants to do, far above
what we can ask or think.
And then I want you to notice there
was a joining.
The bones came together.
I want to tell you, when God starts
working, one of the proofs of God's working
is spiritual unity.
People will come together.
You'll not need to go and ask them
to shake hands.
They'll be happy in the love of Jesus.
There's a unity when God starts breathing.
And when I beheld, lo, the sinews and
flesh came up upon them, and the skin
covered them.
But there was no breath in there.
You know, he started off with bones, and
now he had corpses.
The bones had come together all right.
The skin and the flesh and the sinews
were there.
But, but my friend, there were only corpses.
There was no life in them.
And then he said, Prophesy unto the wind.
Prophesy and say to the wind, Come from
the four winds, O breath and breathe upon
these slain, that they might live.
My friend, you can have the shaking.
You can have the coming together.
But there's only one thing that can make
a corpse live.
And that's the blessed breath of heaven, the
Spirit of God.
Oh, that we could prophecy unto the winds
this morning and say, Come, mighty Holy Spirit
of God.
Come in all thy mighty power.
Thou who didst come at tempest cost with
tongues of fire and as of a rushing
mighty wind.
Thou that didst breathe in the days of
the reformers, in the days of Wesley and
Whitfield and the great evangelists.
Thou that didst breathe in 1859.
Thou that didst breathe in days that are
past.
Oh, breathe again.
Oh, that he might come this morning.
Mighty Spirit of God.
Oh, that he might come.
And you know what happened?
And as I prophesied, as he commanded me,
the breath came into them.
And they lived.
How do you know that the Spirit of
God is at work when people start living?
How do you know?
I'm sure the people that did that television
program, they never intended anybody to be seen.
I'm sure they thought when they had finished
it, it would be a good smear in
the empire's lips.
But there was a woman sitting in England.
I would never have reached her.
She would never have heard my voice.
She would never have heard.
And there she was sitting in her television,
and she was watching that program.
And as I preached, the Spirit of God
came down upon her.
And at the end of the program, she
was on her knees receiving Christ and then
getting down to write to the preacher and
to say, Thank God I've come to Jesus.
That's the work of the Spirit of God.
And what we have seen in ones and
twos, God shows it in thousands and tens
of thousands.
That does not limit the power of God.
They lived.
And I want you to notice something else
that didn't keep still, that didn't sit down
in a rocking chair.
They got on their feet.
When God really works, He puts the young
converts on their feet.
Great to hear these young converts pray in
the prayer meetings, isn't it?
The sweetest thing in a prayer meeting is
to hear a young man or a young
woman just see Him talking to the Lord.
I want you to notice something else.
They all joined the army, every one of
them.
There wasn't a noncombatant among them.
A whole lot of people that can't fight,
you know, don't believe in fighting.
They believe in looping and sleeping.
But look at it.
And they stood upon their feet an exceeding
great army.
I want to tell you when God really
does a work in a man's heart, He
becomes a soldier of Christ.
He becomes a follower of the Lamb.
May the Lord bless us this morning.
And as a people may we get vision.
May we go in for revival.
May this church go in for the fire
and power of God.
And may we never get far more dead
or dry.
May the Lord give us the blessing of
heaven for Jesus' sake.
Amen.