Hey guys, sorry I havent posted much lately, I've been really busy with school and whatnot, but I thought I'd give a bite-sized update to a previous post based on something I read. While I was working on my chapel message on Ezekiel 37 last week, something finally clicked into place that had always concerned me about my argument for the harrowing of hell. I think its weakest link is its reliance on saying that Christ "preaching the gospel" to the dead actually gave them life, so that Christ's preaching of the gospel was Him telling them about the freedom He was giving them.
On its face, this isn't too far-fetched, since the passage itself does seem to say that the preaching of the Gospel gives the dead life. What's more, we do see plenty of places that also point to this, such as our Lord's words that "the Truth [i.e. Jesus] will set you free" (John 8:32) and we do see example's like St. Paul's words to the Corinthians that "where the Spirit of the Lord is, there is freedom," and based on the Spirit's close connection with divine revelation, it isn't absurd to say that the preaching of the Gospel is able to free the dead.
Then came Ezekiel 17, which hit me like a brick. In the scene, we see the prophet, led by the Hand of God (obviously Jesus, as He's at the right hand of the Father) to a dark valley of dry bones. We know that the desert is the place of the wild and evil spirits, see Leviticus 16's references to Azazel dwelling in the wilderness as well as our Lord's words about demons going to "waterless places." With that context, we see a prophet, typologically connected to Christ, who is the fulfillment of all the prophets, descending into the dark valley of sorrow, Sheol. From there, we see the prophet being told to prophesy life to the bones, and in doing so, the Word of God snaps the bones back together, new flesh grows around the skeletons, and then they are filled with the breath of life as the Lord makes them into an exceedingly great army. The most important part to note, for our purposes, is that of Christ bringing life to man again by His word. Even if all the rest of my typological musings on this passage are bunk, this alone proves my point because it shows a concrete example of one giving life by preaching the gospel to those that are "judged in the flesh," as St. Peter says. But even more than that, we also much recognize this army as Israel, or in the case of the New Testament, the Church, the body of Christ Himself. In this way, we are able to see Ezekiel 37 as Christ bringing Himself to life in His resurrection, and in doing so, taking us as His body with Him.
Like I said earlier, this is a pretty small post, but I wanted to put it out there because I thought it was really neat and wonderful to meditate on this Lenten season.
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