“Give Us This Day Our Daily Breath” 9 March 2008 - Pastor Shelley Cunningham Ezekiel 37:1-14

At the beginning of the Disney movie The Lion King, young cub Simba and his best friend Nala are out looking for adventure. As youngsters can be, they’re bold and fearless and a little bit foolish. They splash through the wadi, prancing and pouncing. As they race and wrestle, they manage to tumble into the spookiest place in the Prideland: the mythical elephant graveyard. It’s a stark contrast to the lush creation they’re used to. Take a look: (Lion King video clip)

Creepy, indeed. The view of all those lifeless bones is creepy – and a little depressing. But no more so than the skeletons we all run into every day. You might not have seen an elephant graveyard, but I bet you have seen a pile of dry bones before. Here’s a couple on the verge of losing their home. Dry bones. There’s a single parent struggling to stay in touch with his kids. Dry bones. There’s a lonely widow in a nursing home, waiting and waiting for a visit that never comes. Dry bones. Here’s a student stressed out by exams and worried about finding a job. Dry bones.

Like Simba, Ezekiel’s gaze comes to rest on a valley of lifeless bones. Skeleton after skeleton is strewn across the arid ground. Each one represents a dream that’s died, hopes left in the dust. But unlike Simba, Ezekiel doesn’t just see bones. He sees the future – the future of God’s people. They’re people who’ve forgotten whose world they live in. They’ve lost sight of what’s really important. They’re been too busy to make time for God. And because they have, they’re dead. They’re as dead and worthless as a pile of old bones.

The people Ezekiel was talking to felt cut off from God, literally. They had been driven out of their homeland and into exile in Babylon. Their city and their temple had been destroyed. And many of them believed that meant their God had been defeated by the Babylonian god, too. What do you do when you lift your eyes to the hills, and help does not come? You just might give up, that’s what. Your soul gives up. You go about your days without much of a sense of purpose and without much hope for the future. You’re nothing but a pile of dry bones.

What’s drying up your soul these days? There’s plenty to point at: News about the economy. Uncertainty about the housing market. An endless election season. Spring training without Johan Santana. A schedule packed overfull with kids’ activities. Winter. The list goes on and on. Some days it barely seems worth it to get out of bed

That’s what God’s people in the text were feeling. They needed something to be hopeful about, something to give them a reason to believe. And that something comes in the form of Ezekiel’s vision. That lifeless valley becomes a source of hope – for them, and for us. Why? Because, for one, the vision of those bones verifies that God sees what’s happening to his people. If one of your questions is, doesn’t God notice that I’m running on empty, the answer is, yes. God sees. But more than that, God cares. God doesn’t just leave the bones to crumble in the dust. No, God is able to bring life to those dry bones, to knit them back together and set them on the right path. How? Not just by reassembling them – putting things in order – but by filling them with his very self: his breath. One, two, three times in this text God tells Ezekiel that he will fill them with his breath. And with God’s breath will come life.

You don’t realize what a gift breath is until you don’t have it. I was playing basketball in college when I had my first and, thankfully, only asthma attack. As I ran down the court, suddenly I couldn’t draw enough oxygen into my lungs. It felt like I was drowning: throat closed, chest tight, heart pounding. There was a wave after wave of panic as I gasped for air. I tried to stay calm, but my heart was racing with fear. It was a terrifying experience. You don’t realize what a gift breath is until you don’t have it.

In our very act of breathing, God gives us the strength and the will to live. Of course, I mean that literally – with every breath we take, life-giving oxygen fills our lungs and poisonous carbon dioxide is expelled. The physical act of controlled breathing can lower the pulse, drop blood pressure, and release endorphins that calm the brain. It’s why focusing on the breath is such an important part of yoga practice and other forms of meditation. I want you to experience that for a moment: breathe in slowly. And out. In. Out. One more: in. Out. Can you feel your body relax? That’s the importance of breath.

But just as important as the life-sustaining act of breathing can be the soul-sustaining act of breath prayer. With breath prayer, you focus on a word or phrase while you slowly breathe in and out. Spirit, fill me. Jesus, use me. Or, Lord, have mercy. Or, simply, Abba, Father. That breath prayer can be directed for a person or need you want to lift up to God. Or it can be for a quality you’re seeking for yourself: patience, stillness, peace. Praying this way trains your mind to stay centered on God. Too often when I try to pray, my mind races in a million different directions. Breath prayer keeps things simple, and it keeps my mind focused. And as you breathe, you draw the spirit into your lungs, inviting God’s presence to invade your very soul. It becomes a way of having life come back to you. Breathing in God’s spirit is more than a simple elemental exchange. It affirms your desire to live as a disciple of Jesus. It makes Christ the focus of your most necessary act.

If you’re thinking this sounds simple, you’re right. It is. And I’m not going to say that taking a few minutes a day to concentrate on your breathing will stave off that dry bones feeling. But think about it: too often we bring that feeling on ourselves. We allow ourselves to be consumed by our wants, our worries, our fears. We think we have to solve our problems on our own. We say we’re too busy, so we let going to worship slide. All of these things cut us off from the very God who can give us life.

This text reminds me that God wants to be as close to us as the air we breathe. “I will put my spirit in you, and you shall live,” God promises. “And then you will know that I am the Lord.”

At the end of the Lion King, an older, wiser Simba discovers there are worse things in life than being surrounded by a graveyard. He’s been in an exile of his own. He’s lost someone he loved dearly. He’s got to figure out just who – and whose – he is. But as he does, he realizes that without the strength of his father, he’ll never be able to overcome the challenges he’ll face.

Without the strength of our father, our bones are nothing but dust. We’re at the end of our power and our hope; we’re as good as dead. But with it – with the strength of the one who weeps when we struggle and who with a word can raise Lazarus from the grave – with that strength, we have everything we need to truly live. This God who breathed new life into the exiled people of Israel can breathe new life into us, too. All we need to do is call his name – Abba, Father – take a breath, and draw it in. Amen.

GUIDED BY THE GOSPEL: GATHERING • GROWING • GIVING