I share an office with two people. Well, John works from home, but the other man is there often enough for us to chat. I enjoy hearing about the games he uses to help his students learn about the Old Testament. 

 

Last week I was surprised to come in and find a skeleton sitting by our closet. I introduced myself, but he or she did not respond. I asked my office mate. It turns out that the story in chapel was about the Dry Bones that Ezekiel saw. Some kids wore costumes with printed bones on them, and lay sprawled across the stage as if dead. Then the Lord asked Ezekiel a question. 
 

"Can these bones live?"

 

There was a rattling noise as the skeletons clambered up. 

 

Bones have an association with being scary. Mostly we don't think about them, much less thank them for their service. Then one snaps on the soccer field, and we rush to the expertise of an orthopedic surgeon. Still, the doctor is not technically responsible for healing, but rather aligns the pieces and keeps things steady while regrowth mysteriously arrives under the skin. Maybe doctors understand it. Maybe not.

 

Still the reality is, life would be unmanageable without femurs and ulnas. They support us in all manner of movement, with remarkable compliance. Our bag without bones would be unruly in a world that requires us to stand erect, run, climb ladders, and stir soup. Octopi manage without bones, which is fascinating, but they have water working for them, as well as thousands of tiny suckers. Yet for those of us on dry land, such scaffolding comes in handy. 

 

Not the epitome of color or responsiveness in themselves, bones play a part. When God breathed life on them, and attached them together with sinews, they arose. 

 

Bones represent the true ideas that we depend on. The ligaments that connect them are like when we bring those principles together. I like that the word religion is related to ligaments. 

 

 

But if we only recite those things, without actually breathing life into them through our actions, we are as inanimate as a skeleton. Maybe I understand this. Maybe not. But I would rather be dancing in a field than sitting by my closet with nothing to say.