Dry Bones
One
The Death of Joseph
Many people know how the book of Genesis begins. It’s pretty easy to remember since it begins with “In the beginning.” But fewer people know how the book of Genesis ends.
It’s kind of a strange ending, and it has to do with the death of Joseph, the boy with the fancy coat, whose brothers sold him into slavery, and who ended up being the second-most important man in all Egypt. Now he’s dying in Egypt, and his family is all around him. He makes a prophecy: He tells them that they are not destined to stay in Egypt, but that God will come and bring them out of Egypt and back to the promised land.
“And when God does that for you,” says Joseph, “you have to bring my bones back to where they belong.”
And after that, Joseph dies, and the book of Genesis ends with Joseph’s bones in a place they do not belong and will not stay.
Two
The Exodus
Four hundred years after Joseph’s death, after Moses has confronted Pharaoh, after the ten plagues have wreaked havoc on the Egyptians, and after the first Passover meal has been celebrated, four hundred years later, Joseph’s prophecy was fulfilled.
In the time of the Exodus, when the chosen people finally begin their journey towards the promised land, we read, “Nor did Moses forget to take with him the bones of Joseph, who had bound the sons of Israel by an oath to carry his bones away with them when God showed His mercy to them.” (Exodus 13:19).
Joseph’s bones had been left where they did not belong and were finally relocated to their appropriate resting place. But actually, isn’t that the human condition? We, human beings, images of God, the fusion of matter and spirit, body and soul, flesh and blood and bones and a living spirit, we are torn apart by death. Our bones are left in this world to rot, while our spirit is taken away.
Ever since Adam’s sin, we are born to be broken. Who will raise us up to heal us? Who will do for us, what Moses did for Joseph? Who will remember our bones, and bring them to their final resting place?
Three
The Place of the Skull
Adam was made for glory, to be immortal. But he sinned, he chose death over life, and his bones fell to the ground, and the flesh wore away, and he became like all his descendants would be, a horrible, grinning skeleton, abandoned and forgotten.
We don’t know for sure where Adam was buried. But some think his bones rest underneath the rock hill of Calvary, otherwise known as Golgotha, “The place of the skull.”
That’s why in many icons of the Crucifixion, you will see beneath the cross, a skeleton, and maybe a few other bone fragments. Because Adam was not forgotten. Just as someone came to retrieve Joseph’s bones and retrieve Joseph’s people, so too someone came to deliver Adam, and to deliver all Adam’s people. Someone came to deliver us from the grisly finality of death.
Four
“I Can Count All My Bones”
Jesus, while hanging on the cross, cited only one psalm: Psalm 22. He spoke the first verse of that Psalm, that we might know that the whole Psalm is about Him. The first verse is, “My God, my God, why have you forsaken me?”
And about halfway through the Psalm, we read, “They have pierced my hands and my feet – I can count all my bones” (v. 17 and 18).
Of course, we know what it means that they pierced his hands and his feet, they did it when they nailed Him to the cross. But what does it mean, “I can count all my bones”?
It means that Christ was on the way to death. That He was following Adam’s path towards disintegration, that his flesh was falling from him, that He had begun the trajectory towards becoming just a skeleton. Because Christ had come to raise up Adam’s bones. And that meant His body would be placed in the earth, like ours. And His soul would plunge down, down, into the ground, into the depths where the soul of Adam and all his descendants waited.
Joseph’s bones waited to be brought to the promised land but the souls of the patriarchs, the souls of all the just, waited to be brought to the real Promised Land of Heaven. God had not forgotten them. God had sent a Savior to raise them up and lead them out of death.
It cost Him death to do it, but He did it. He has come and reversed the horrible course of death, reversed the course of death both for the soul and for the body. He has come to raise our bones and our spirits. But we have to be willing to follow Him, as the Israelites followed Moses. We have to accept His life, and His leadership, if we would enter the promised land.
Five
Bringing the Dry Bones to Life
In Ezekiel, chapter 37, the prophet relates this vision, “I was carried away and set down in the midst of the plain, which was covered with bones. Round the whole extent of them he took me, where they lay thick on the plain, all of them parched quite dry. Son of man, he said, can life return to these bones? Lord God, said I, you are the one who knows. Then he told me to prophecy over the bones: Listen dry bones, to the Word of the Lord: I mean to send my spirit into you, and restore you to life. Sinews shall be given you, flesh shall grow on you, and skin cover you…And I will put my Spirit within you, and you shall live, and I will place you in your own land.”
That’s the human race, that field of dry bones. We are Adam’s heirs, heirs to his sin and heirs to his death.
This must be the beginning of Lent. To really face death squarely, to literally confront the face of death, to feel your face with your fingers and imagine the dead, grinning skull the lies underneath. Remember, you are dust, and to dust you will return.
And death is terrible. And its permanence would be even more terrible. The death of the body is just a faint expression of that even more hideous death of the soul, the extermination of spiritual life, the corruption of goodness. So look at death. Look at sin. See how badly we need to be saved.
And then think of Ezekiel’s prophecy. A prophecy like Joseph’s, not just that our bones will be relocated like his, but that we’ll be given new life, divine life, and we shall live forever!
Suggested Resolutions:
Choose one resolution for today to help you grow closer to God, or create your own. Here are some ideas to inspire you.
This week, reflect on the phrase, “Momento Mori,” or, “Remember you will die,” as a way to ground yourself in your mortality and God’s gift of eternal life.