Held in the Hard

Have you ever felt like things in your life have dried up—like they are no longer living, just existing?

Maybe it’s a relationship, your health, your purpose, or something deep inside you that once felt full of life. It doesn’t always happen suddenly. Sometimes it happens slowly, until one day you realize something that once felt alive now feels… gone.

I’ve been sitting in that reality more than I ever expected. Part of my body has, in a sense, died. My kidneys no longer function, and for all practical purposes, they are not coming back to life on their own.

That has a way of shifting everything.

It brought me to Ezekiel 37—the valley of dry bones. Scripture says the bones were not just dry, but very dry. That means they had been gone a long time. There was no life left. No tendons, no flesh, no sign that life had ever been there.

And yet God asks a question:
“Can these bones live?”

It’s a question that doesn’t make sense in the natural. But Ezekiel answers the only way we really can:
“Lord, You alone know.”

Because if God wills it, what is dead is not beyond Him.

What struck me most is that the restoration didn’t happen all at once. It happened in stages.

First, there was the sound.
Then the rattling.
Then the bones came together.
Then the tendons and the flesh formed.
Then the skin covered them.
And finally, the breath.

It was a process.

So often we pray for healing or restoration and expect it to happen overnight. Sometimes God does move instantly—but often, He works in stages. Quietly. Intentionally. Beneath the surface.

There is movement before there is evidence.

Because we don’t see immediate results, we can begin to believe God has forgotten us. But that is a lie. Ezekiel 37 shows us that God works step by step, long before we ever see the finished result.

The enemy says:
It’s too late.
It’s been too long.
It’s too dry.

But God says:
Speak to it.
Trust Me in it.
I am not finished.

Just because we do not see change immediately does not mean He is not working. The bones came together before the breath came. There was movement before life was visible.

Scripture tells us that those who wait upon the Lord will renew their strength. But waiting is not passive. In Hebrew, it carries the idea of tension—like a cord pulled tight—expectant, leaning forward. Waiting is not doing nothing. It is trusting while the bones are still assembling.

It is believing that God is working, even when we cannot yet see the breath.

When we experience death—whether physical or something in our life—we need the breath of God. The same breath that gave life to Adam is the breath that brings life to what feels lost.

God asked Ezekiel, “Can these bones live?”

And maybe He’s asking us the same thing.

Not because He doesn’t know the answer—but because He wants to know if we trust Him with it.

How often do we give up instead of trusting that, if it is His will, He can restore what seems gone?

God does not desire for us to remain broken. He does not desire hopelessness. He desires restoration, even when the process is slow.

We may feel cut off. We may feel like hope is gone.

But that is not the end of the story.

We are not dry bones.
We are not forgotten.
We are not without hope.

There is hope for healing.
There is hope for restoration.
There is hope for what feels lost.

And it comes when the Sovereign Lord speaks and says:
“Come to life.”