A
Vision of The Resurrection of the Just
Elder O. Kris Widmer
Based on Ezekiel 37 1-14
Foundational beginning: The
Message Bible
With modifications into the context of Second Coming by the Author
July 15, 2016
Inspired while
working on a card with my mother’s parents wedding picture on it as well as
preparing to preach from the above passage.
God
grabbed this Pastor the other day, on a Friday (as I was reading Ezekiel 37),
and whisked me away. The Divine One –
the One with the unspeakable name, the One who was and is and is to come - set
me down in the middle of a cemetery. It
was no particular cemetery, for if you’ve seen one field of bones and ashes,
you’ve seen them all. And believe me,
this preacher has stood in his share of cemeteries by open and closed graves. The
Evergreen Cemeteries of Riverside, California and Vancouver, Washington (each
containing my four grandparents) or Ukiah, Hayfork, Lakeport, Upper Lake, St.
Helena. Or Redding. Or Antioch.
Or Igo - or the ones near you…or far from you.
God
led me in and around the graves. I knew
what was six feet under my feet. Bones. Many, many bones. The
bones of my father, my grandparents, your mother, your uncle, your brother or
sister, the baby you buried or didn’t bury, but released to the morgue. They are all somewhere “’a listening for
their name.”
He
said to me, “Preacher, do you think these bones can live?” I said, “Holy God, Creator and Resurrector,
only You know if that can happen. You said
they would in the 66 books I consider to be Your revelation. But…”
He
said to me, “When the Son of Man comes again, approaching the earth…this is
what it will happen! I’ll show
you. Speak over these tombs – these
graves, these crypts, these niches, these ashes – in urns or scattered on land,
sea or air. Speak to these bones.
Say:
‘Dead
Dust and Dry bones – listen to the voice of God. I will bring the breath of life to you and
you WILL come to life. I will take the
dust and make of it new bones. I will
take the bones – new and old - and create new sinews and tendons and cartilage. I will put new meat, new muscles on your
bones, and cover you with skin. I will
reform your organs, fill up your tubes with vital fluids, (5.5 liters of blood)
and set your heart beating once again.
I will fill your new lungs with new breath - my breath of life. I will cause your thoughts and memories to
resume in a new brain, with billions of new neurons and I will cause your eyes
to open.”
I paused…not knowing if I should. “Go on…say it!” God urged. So I did.
Word for Word.
As I started speaking…I heard a rattling and a rumbling underneath
my feet and within the mausoleum over yonder.
Scattered cremains and common dirt flew into the shape of
skeletons. Niche covers flew off and
crypts were broken open. Sod was peeled
back. Dirt flew out into neat cubic
piles, liner lids and coffin tops flew into the sky, disappearing. Bones flew out of graves and joined together
that had been disconnected. Skulls with
holes were now whole. And above ponds,
lakes, rivers and streams appeared bones too, hovering, as it were, just above
the waters. The seas also had thousands
and thousands of skeletal remains, levitated just above the surface of the
deep.
Then, tendons and tongues and tonsils appeared. Muscles materialized! Skin stretched over these bodies. Hair erupted
from their scalps and faces. Hey…nice
goatee!
They lay there, each one naked as the day they were born and
yet clothed in the brightest heaven-sent light. But as yet…there was no breath in them. So no life in them. Just like Adam and Eve at creation. Body perfectly formed…but lifeless without
God’s breath.
Then God spoke to me again.
“Preacher, now I will show you what will happen when the Son of Man
shall come even closer to the earth…when He speak from the clouds. He shall say ‘Awake, Awake. You who have returned to the dust from which
you came…ARISE! David, Arise! Johanne, Arise! Reinhold, Arise! Josephine, Arise! (My grandparents) Elmer, Arise! (My father). Elaine, Maureen, Ron, Greg, Barry, Thad,
Waldo, Stu, Cindi, Derek, Danica, Lilia, Jose, Shamus, Benjamin, Adeline,
Nadine, Neville, Harry, Harley, Tabitha, Olympia, Fritz, Modell, Thelah and
Lowell – ARISE![1]
“Preacher…so now... speak to the air. All the air shall be My breath of life. Inhale.
Exhale. Speak to the air. ‘Come air!
Come from the four directions: Up, Down and Side to Side. North, South, East, West. Come breath!
Come Oxygen. Fill these
bodies. Breath life!’”
I knew not to question Him this time. “Come air!”
I continued.
And it was amazing. Wind blew around me. It came from all the directions at once…and I
saw chests rise and fall. Breath entered
them. Like a divine C-PAP machine! They all took one collective gasp – the gasp
heard ‘round the world. They came alive!
They stood to their feet! A
numberless multitude of humanity…long dead, now alive! The mortal had at last put on
immortality. And then I saw them rise
off the earth…higher and higher…into the air…into the clouds.
Then God said to me, “ Preacher, the bones your saw here in
this place are but a small fraction of those persons who have lived on the
earth – from Adam and Eve…to today.
Humanity sighs - “We are dried
up. Our bodies are dead. Our corpses have rotted. Our bones are crumbled. Our ashes are scattered. There is nothing left of us. There is no hope!”
So, Preacher, be sure to speak over every body you stand
beside. “The God of Heaven, the Lord of
Creation and Resurrection …. The
Resurrection and the Life says….. “I WILL
dig up your grave and bring you out alive.
You are my people. When you live
again, I will take you straight to the holy city – the New Jerusalem. When I have dug up your grave and put you
back together and given you life….then you will know that I am God. I will give you a new body. I will give you new breath. My breath, my life – back into you…and you
will live. I have said it. I will do it. This is the decree and promise of the most
high God.”
And then I found myself sitting once again at my computer
keyboard.
[1]
This is but a small portion of the list of names of dead family or friends, as
well as funerals I have done in Gospel ministry.
