Then he said to me: “Son of man, these bones are the people of Israel. They say, ‘Our bones are dried up and our hope is gone; we are cut off.’ Therefore prophesy and say to them: ‘This is what the Sovereign LORD says: My people, I am going to open your graves and bring you up from them; I will bring you back to the land of Israel. Then you, my people, will know that I am the LORD, when I open your graves and bring you up from them. I will put my Spirit in you and you will live, and I will settle you in your own land. Then you will know that I the LORD have spoken, and I have done it, declares the LORD.'” Ezekiel 37:11-14
When the doorbell rang after moving into our new house, I got excited! Oooh, we had a visitor. Two things made me happy about this turn of events. First, someone rang our doorbell. Doesn’t sound too thrilling, right? For me, it was! At our old house the doorbell was located at our front door which NOBODY used, so it was something new for us. I felt quite fancy and made me want to ask the person in for tea. Second, this was a surprise, and who doesn’t like a nice surprise every now and again? Anticipation built as we went to see who was on the other side.
There was a sweet lady standing there holding a gift bag. She was our new neighbor! I did a quick introduction when I saw her outside on the first day we arrived, but that was a bit of a blur, for her and for me. However, there she stood welcoming us into the neighborhood. I have a neighbor! I have a neighbor who isn’t a mile away, and she’s nice! We exchanged greetings, names, and phone numbers while she handed me over an incredibly kind gift.
The boys wanted to dig in something fierce to see what was inside, but they contained themselves until she went back to her house. They looked at me as if it were already Christmas. Please note, these are teenagers. I nodded my head, and they dug in so quickly that I started to think they were deprived of gifts. When I saw one of the first things they pulled out, it all made sense. There they stood with light shining all around them and the Halleluiah Chorus playing while they held out warm, freshly baked banana bread. I’m telling you they can sniff out food a mile away!
I felt so incredibly blessed for having such a thoughtful neighbor. You just never know what you’re going to get when you move into a new house! I was amazed at what all they kept pulling out. There was a perfect gift for every person in our family. There was even fresh thyme and rosemary. Well, if you’ve read any of my previous blogs, you know Julia Child I am not, but how I appreciated their wondrous smell. I was determined to use these fresh herbs.
It was on Thanksgiving when the opportunity came to put that wonderfully smelling gift to good use. I put the rosemary on the turkey and thyme in the stuffing (or dressing). I usually use the dried stuff, but this time it felt so good to use fresh. It tasted delicious too!
This got me thinking about the word dried-up. It often has a negative connotation to it. I had to look it up in the dictionary. I found out it means old and dull, suffering from lack of water, or empty of water. I don’t know about you, but once in a great while I might feel a little dried-up. How depressing is that! Do you ever feel you aren’t as fresh as you once were? You think that your wisdom was at its greatest previously? Well, I think that’s a bunch of bull.
Let me give you another way of looking at things. In that dictionary it also talked about being shriveled with age or wizened. There ya go! Wizened sounds like wisened to me. Wisened would be the past tense of wisen. Wisen means to become wiser. Look at that! Dried-up doesn’t mean a shell of what has been; it means something preserved so it won’t go bad.
My dried herbs are a wonderful seasoning, and they don’t “expire” as quickly as the fresh do. They don’t need thrown away because as soon as you mix them into your food, I realize the aroma and deliciousness was waiting there the whole time. The way I look at life is simple. Use that freshness when it comes to you because it’s an amazing thing, but don’t get depressed when you feel dried-up. Mix yourself right into the excitement of something new and see yourself be transformed into a necessary ingredient.
If you feel dried-up, remember the wisdom. Get out there and become relevant again. It’s up to you if you sit on the shelf or ask for God’s breath to enter you and allow you to live again. Check out Ezekiel 37 today!
