Ezekiel 37-

1) since this is for a group, this is a natural place ot speak of a spirit-inspired, enlivened church.

2)With Star trek we could talk about being transported

3)It is hard to knwo if ruah is breath or spirit here.

4)Here the process of decay is reversed. fro churches, this is good news when people try to chart a church's life cycle.

5) These are just jigsaw puzzles of corpses unless breath/spirit is within them.

6)the breath of life recall Gen. 2 or Elijah and the widow's child.

7) One could speak of a living death as in vv.11-14.

8)To be without hope can be as good as dead.

9)this could be an example of hitting bottom before restoration can occur.

 

Ps. 104:24-35

1) This is an example of wisdom pervading creation. This gets turned into the logos that Jesus incarnates in John 1, God's vision, logic, plan. See Prov. 8:22-31 for a personified wisdom.Here, i think of the spirit of life, or the spirit/breath/wind hovering over the primordial waters of creation.

2) Like lady Wisdom, an emphasis on rejoicing is here.

3) NIB p.1098 McCann calls God architect and artisam here.

4) the fearsomne sea harbors the fearsome leviathan, but as in job, it has lost its edge. Maybe only in god's perspective is it  for sport, but still God revels in it.

5) this is an ecological pslam where everthing fits together.

6)this si a great description of God's providence governance, sustaing, of the world from entropy.

7_God is a god life life:breath or spirit.the resulting resposne is praise. Pentecost too proclaim l'chaim: to life.

 

Rom. 8:22-7

1) Here instead of apocalyptic destruction, we have the labor pains of new life.

2) Still, transformation is painful

3)The church is a priovisional demonstration; its full adoption papers are not yet fully binding.This is an already?not yet tension

4) We are saved in hope for this completed redemption

5)So, we can wait with good grace but still with excitement, again think pregnancy

6) I love this passage of a Spirit who can  sympathize with troubles that words cannot express.this is side by side help,t he kind Martha wanted Mary for (NIB-598)

7)What odes it mean to you that te Sprit prays for us right now?

8) Wright cites god's Grandeur (Hopkins0 at 606

4)