Advent 16

The prophet Ezekiel is shown a vision of a valley of dry bones—the wake of devastation from war and famine and disease that his people knew too well. God (rather surprisingly) asks him, “Can these bones live?” Ezekiel sees only death and devastation before him. Utter hopelessness. But, at the breath of God, sinew and muscle and movement appear before Ezekiel’s eyes as the people are made whole. Life is restored to them. God says, “Then you, my people, will know that I am the Lord, when I open your graves and bring you up from them” (Ezekiel 37:13, NIV). This is a vision of what God is in the business of doing. Restoration. It’s what Jesus came to begin at Christmas, and see through to the end at Easter and beyond. 

Advent sees this restoration as a long and slanting light. It meets our eyes, and suddenly we can see hope where there was none. We start to see life where there was only decay. That is the work of this kind of hope. Like shoots of green in a crack in the concrete. Like a song calling through the dark. We see it all the time: life where there should be none. May we see these small miracles everywhere