Dry Bones by Willow

This past summer, I got the opportunity to go to Ruston, Louisiana for my fourth mission trip. I went, but I went with a bad attitude. A lot had changed since the last mission trip: we were going through a different organization, our youth pastor had just moved to another church, and a lot was going on in my life at that moment that was painful. I do not like change, so when change does happen, I expect the worst. My cynical outlook grew stronger as the week continued. I went to the kids club we were volunteering at during the day and the conference at night. It was fun but it wasn’t the amazing heart wrenching experience that I had hoped. I just felt a whole lot of nothing for the majority of the time.

 The worship was nothing to complain about, though. It was amazing to be in a room full of youth so unafraid of raising their hands and singing at the top of their lungs. One night during worship, the lead singer of the band, Chuck Hooten, started telling the story of Ezekiel and the dry bones. That is my all-time favorite Bible story. However, a lot of the time I think that I get caught up by the word “story”. When I hear that word, I think of some fantasy with a princess, a dungeon, a tall tower, and a dragon, something entirely fictional. This "story" is not fictional. God literally took a valley of bones and brought them back to life. He gave them breath again. It's hard to wrap my mind around something so miraculous.

It got me thinking about how stupid my mindset had been. I had thought so highly of myself that I thought God- my amazing, all-powerful God- could not fix me when He could kill me and then revive me in less than a second. That revelation allowed me to rethink my entire summer. I am so blessed to have gotten to go on that trip.