The Baby in the Manger #10: Rock

 Rock (heb: selaʿ, ṣûr, grk: petra)

The LORD is my rock, my fortress and my deliverer; my God is my rock, in whom I take refuge, my shield and the horn of my salvation, my stronghold.  (Psalm 18:2)

The word 'Rock' is often used in the Old Testament to describe God.  It denotes a secure stronghold - one that is safe and reliable.  For example:

The LORD is my rock, my fortress and my deliverer; my God is my rock, in whom I take refuge, my shield and the horn of my salvation, my stronghold.  (Psalm 18:2)

(The Old Testament uses two main words for 'rock': selaʿ and ṣûr, both used respectively in the verse above. General consensus seems to be that these have similar meaning and are used for poetic variety).

When we meet the incarnate Jesus in the New Testament, he applies this metaphor to himself - most notably in the parable of the wise and foolish builders: there is probably not a Sunday School child who has not learnt the song!  On comparing the two builders - one whose ill-fated endeavour built on sandy soil was swept away by floodwaters, and the other whose building stood firm on the 'rock' of solid ground, sums up:

“Therefore everyone who hears these words of mine and puts them into practice is like a wise man who built his house on the rock. The rain came down, the streams rose, and the winds blew and beat against that house; yet it did not fall, because it had its foundation on the rock. (Matthew 7:24-25)

When life throws so many things at us, there is one thing that is secure - as secure as a safe and firm rock in the middle of a torrent or raging sea, and that is our God.

But there is another more specific rock to whom Jesus is compared, and that is the Rock of Meribah - linked directly to Jesus in 1 Corinthians 10:4.  In Exodus 17:1-7, the people complain to Moses about having nothing to drink in the desert.  In response, God sends a miracle: He instructs Moses to strike his staff against a rock, and from that Rock flowed water.   The rock is not only security, but provision of life-giving water.

However, the seeing of a miracle did not change the hearts of many of the wandering Israelites. In the New Testament, when Paul writes about the incident of the Rock of Meribah (which means 'grumbling') in his first letter to the Corinthian church, he says this:

For I do not want you to be ignorant of the fact, brothers and sisters, that our ancestors were all under the cloud and that they all passed through the sea. They were all baptised into Moses in the cloud and in the sea. They all ate the same spiritual food and drank the same spiritual drink; for they drank from the spiritual rock that accompanied them, and that rock was Christ. Nevertheless, God was not pleased with most of them; their bodies were scattered in the wilderness. (1 Corinthians 10:1-5)

Paul's exhortation to the Corinthian church is not to fall into temptation.  Like the wise builder of Jesus' story, we need to continue to build our lives on the secure and life-giving rock.  Like the Israelites who witnessed the miracle in the desert, we have the evidence that God has come among us in the life, death and resurrection of Jesus Christ, and the ongoing witness of the Holy Spirit through his Church.  God does not change - he is a strong fortress for those who trust in him, but that fortress stands in judgement against those who refuse to cling to it.

He has come - what's your response?