Ezekiel 37:15-23: a reflection

15The LORD’s word came again to me, saying, 16“You, son of man, take one stick and write on it, ‘For Judah, and for the children of Israel his companions.’ Then take another stick, and write on it, ‘For Joseph, the stick of Ephraim, and for all the house of Israel his companions.’ 17Then join them for yourself to one another into one stick, that they may become one in your hand. 18“When the children of your people speak to you, saying, ‘Won’t you show us what you mean by these?’ 19tell them, ‘The Lord GOD says: “Behold, I will take the stick of Joseph, which is in the hand of Ephraim, and the tribes of Israel his companions; and I will put them with it, with the stick of Judah, and make them one stick, and they will be one in my hand. 20The sticks on which you write will be in your hand before their eyes.”’ 21Say to them, ‘The Lord GOD says: “Behold, I will take the children of Israel from among the nations where they have gone, and will gather them on every side, and bring them into their own land. 22I will make them one nation in the land, on the mountains of Israel. One king will be king to them all. They will no longer be two nations. They won’t be divided into two kingdoms any more at all. 23They won’t defile themselves any more with their idols, nor with their detestable things, nor with any of their transgressions; but I will save them out of all their dwelling places in which they have sinned, and will cleanse them. So they will be my people, and I will be their God.

God gives Ezekiel a strange little sign to perform. Take two sticks, he says, write Judah on one and Joseph on the other, the names of the two kingdoms that had split apart in bitter division generations before. Then hold them together in your hand so they become one stick. And God explains: I will make them one nation, one people, one king over them; they shall no longer be two.

Notice what God promises to do with the division. The split between the northern and southern kingdoms had been long and deep, a fracture that seemed permanent. And God says he will make the two one again, joined in his hand. He is not resigned to the division of his people; he purposes to heal it, to reunite what had broken apart, and to cleanse them so that they are his people and he is their God.

There is hope in this for every division that seems beyond repair, in a family, a church, a people, a relationship long fractured. God is a reuniter. What has split apart is not automatically split forever; God can join the two sticks into one in his own hand. That does not make reconciliation easy or automatic, but it means it is not hopeless, because the God who promised to reunite his divided people is at work still. Where you long for something broken to be made one again, bring it to the God who joins sticks into one, and do not give up hope of healing.

Lord, you are a God who joins the two sticks into one, who heals division and reunites your fractured people. Where I see a division that seems beyond repair, in my family, my community, my relationships, give me hope in your reuniting power, and make me a peacemaker in your hand.