Introduction
One of my favourite rocks is found in Eastern Ontario within Bon Echo Provincial Park. It is Mazinaw Rock, rising 100 m above the lake below. The name Mazinaw comes from an Algonquin word meaning “painted-image lake,” for along its rock face there are 260 Algonquin pictographs–figures of animals, humans and geometric shapes. They tell the story of who has been there before.
The rock is mostly granite with dark streaks of other rocks folded in. It was formed a billion years ago, by a mountain building event, when continental plates collided, crumpled, lifted and folded. It was shaped with force that pushed up mountains that have since been shaped by glaciers, and worn down over time by wind, rain, ice and snow.
By any set of descriptions, Mazinaw Rock is majestic. A feature of the landscape that is so immense, and impressive that people have been drawn to it for centuries, including the Algonquin people, painters and artists like the Group of Seven, vacationers, campers, hikers, climbers and geologists.
Viewed from a distance, or seen up close from the seat of a canoe, or climbing over it on the 1 ½ km hike up the trail to its top for amazing views of the lake and surrounding forests, you are overwhelmed by its massive size, the forces that shaped it, its solidness and its endurance. This rock has borne witness to so much of Earth’s history. The span of my life will only be a blip in the scope of this rock’s longevity.
Mazinaw Rock also sits within the Canadian Shield, that horseshoe shaped region of exposed ancient bedrock, once a massive mountain range, that covers roughly half of Canada’s landmass, and is the geological core of North America, with some of the oldest rocks on Earth. This rocky shield is covered with forests of spruce, pine, maple, ash, and silver birch forests and dotted with lakes. Many of us seek the Canadian Shield in all seasons–the rocks, water and trees of our northern geography. It is a place where we find peace, rest and recreation. It helps us to get in touch with the Creator and the creation.
There is something about rocks that draw us–many of us collect stones from along beaches and hiking trails. We add them to our landscapes. Early Scottish and Irish settlers in this area used stones to build homes. We take photographs of rock formations (we used 2 of Doreen Janzen’s in our prelude and postlude slides), and enjoy hiking over and around them. Driving north and east into the Muskoka’s or the Kiwartha’s through the rock cuts for the roads–you just feel the weight and pace of life in Southern Ontario melt away, and breathe a little lighter as you enter the Canadian Shield. It’s like the solidness of the rocks can hold the weight of our stresses and worries for a while.
Rocks in the Bible
Wherever you go in the land of the bible, you encounter rocks and stones. The rugged hills and wilderness areas are rocky. Caves form hiding places in the rocks. Homes, temples, synagogues, watchtowers and fortresses were built from stones. Excavated sites reveal remains of first century Roman roads, and aqueducts made of stones.
Rocks are solid, sturdy, stable and strong. They make good foundations. They are metaphors for security, dependability, certainty and safety. They have a timeless, enduring quality to them, at least when compared to our human lifespan.
It is not surprising then that rocks show up a lot in biblical stories. All the scripture texts in our summer worship series will have to do with rocks or stones. With the writer of the book of Joshua we ask the question, what do these stones mean?
Sometimes these rocks remind us of God’s majesty, or God’s protection and faithfulness. Sometimes they are used as markers to show the way. Sometimes they get in the way and cause us to stumble. Sometimes a pile of stones serves as an altar, or a memorial for a significant event, to mark a special place or encounter. Sometimes they work as metaphors for human stubbornness or hardheartedness. Often they remind us of the value of building our lives well, beginning with strong foundations, sturdy walls, and important cornerstones. The writer of the epistle of 1 Peter, plays even more creatively with the metaphor of stones, calling us to be living stones! What a strange image of something that appears to be so solid, still, plain and inanimate!
More than anything, the stones of the bible tell stories. They give us clues to who and what has been here before. They remind us of the enduring, faithful qualities of God. They mark places on our human journeys. They bear witness to our human struggles. From the most majestic mountains, and rugged cliffs to the smallest of pebbles, and even grains of sand, stones speak of our lives and our relationships to God and to each other. They provide stepping stones for our faith journeys–the people, places, and events along the way that have invited us to encounter God, and form an enduring relationship with God. May our exploration of the stones in the bible bless our summer worship and bring us closer to God, who is our rock.
Scripture Context
Our Scripture this morning from Psalm 18. It is also found in 2 Samuel 22, reflecting a time when David was hiding from King Saul, who threatened to kill him. I suspect it also reflects other seasons of David’s life as well. This Psalm of David portrays God as a rock, and uses many other related words to fill out that descriptive picture, depending on the translation. In this first part of the Psalm, God is described as my strength. My fortress. The stronghold in which I hide. My strong shield. My place of safety. The power that saves me. My tall walled tower. Bedrock under my feet. The castle in which I live. The high crag where I run for dear life, hiding behind the boulders, safe in the granite hideout. The writer begins with the image of being safe and secure, finding refuge in God the rock, saved and protected from his enemies.
These images are reassuring, comforting, and calming. They give us a sense of safety and security. They describe God as One who is sturdy and reliable. As One who can be trusted to be there for us.
But immediately after that reassuring image of God as a rock, there is a flashback–a look back in the Psalmist’s life describing an experience of being surrounded by enemies. The Psalmist writes, The ropes of death entangled me; floods of destruction swept over me. The grave wrapped its ropes around me; death laid a trap in my path” (New Living, v. 4-5). Or in another translation: “The bonds of death encircled me; the currents of destruction tugged at me; the sorrows of the grave wrap around me; the traps of death lay in wait for me” (the Voice, v. 4-5).
In both translations there is the image of being caught in currents or floods of destruction. It is the image of drowning. Of being overwhelmed by water. And then in desperation praying, crying out to God, begging for God’s help.
What is David, the Psalmist remembering? Being a shepherd boy, alone in the hills, needing protection from wild animals? Being a young man, anointed to be the next king, but in grave danger, hiding out in the hills from the mad delusions and threats of the current king Saul? Facing a formidable enemy soldier, Goliath, with just a sling shot and five stones? Being the head of the army leading his troops into battle?
I suspect he prayed this Psalm often, and I think it could relate to many of the seasons of his life. Perhaps he is feeling overwhelming shame at the sin he committed against Bathsheeba and her husband Uriah. Maybe the devastation of losing a child floods him with grief. Or perhaps having another child turn against him, seeing his sins repeated in the next generation. Maybe it is remorse and regret for all the lives lost in battle, and the way he treated those he took as the spoils of war. Do the ghosts of those he killed in battle haunt him? If he is near the end of his life, perhaps it is all of that and more.
The next part of the psalm is central. God hears my cry and responds. God reaches down and rescues me, drawing me out of deep water, lifting me from the raging waters. Or as The Message describes it, “But me he caught–reached all the way from sky to sea; he pulled me out of that ocean of hate, that enemy chaos, the void in which I was drowning” (v. 16-18).
This psalm of praise to God is the testimony of king David who experienced God’s salvation. Who experienced being rescued by God, lifted out of raging waters, and set on a solid, sheltering rock. It is a deliverance story, which is a major theme in the bible. These deliverance stories are not only spiritual, but also physical, tangible. Not only personal, but often also communal.
Seeking Refuge in God the Rock
Taking refuge in God is a central theme in the Psalms. As Derek Suderman writes in his Introduction to psalms in the Anabaptist Community Bible, “taking refuge in the Lord (2:12; 91:4) becomes a powerful metaphor for coming to God in prayer” (Derek Suderman, Introduction to Psalms, Anabaptist Community Bible). And I would like to explore that a bit more this morning. What does it mean to seek refuge in God the rock–to come to God in prayer?
First, seeking refuge in God the rock is an act of trust in something beyond ourselves. So much is shifting and changing. So much seems unsteady and fleeting. Institutions and structures that we once thought were invincible, solid, reliable and enduring now seem flimsy and shaky. How shockingly quickly the security we think we know can dissolve, disintegrate. We find it hard to know what and who we can trust when it comes to information and communication. We can feel overwhelmed by the sheer flood of data and how to make sense of it all. It seems we can’t even trust our own eyes, for pictures and images can be manipulated.
More than ever, we need to be grounded, we need strong foundations. Seeking shelter in God the rock means finding a solid foundation. A foundation made of what is most enduring–love; which is at the heart of the character of God. It means trusting that there is a force of goodness, and love and mercy active in the world. That the nature of God is good. It means, as Derek Suderman writes, an “understanding of the Lord as fundamentally ‘a God of compassion and mercy;…very patient and full of faithful love…a God committed to standing against evildoers and the wicked who attack and victimize” (Suderman, Introduction to Psalms, Anabaptist Community Bible). What looks like love reflects the nature of God. Wherever there is justice at work, there is God. Where we see mercy and compassion we see the face of God. Where the hungry are fed, where the strangers are welcomed, where the cries of the grieving are comforted, there we see God. There is the rock of our salvation, the God of our deliverance. Where there is new life and hope, there is God. Where cultures meet and reconciliation begins to build new communities of trust and cooperation, there is God. To seek shelter in God the rock, is to find solid ground in the character and nature of God, and allow the noise and distractions of the rest fall away.
Second, when we seek shelter in God the rock, we find our security in God rather than the empire. To express our allegiance to God’s kingdom and sovereignty “rejects the ultimate authority of Babylonian, Roman or today’s contemporary powers” (Suderman, Introduction to Psalms, Anabaptist Community Bible). To trust in God rather than empire is a rejection of what empire stands for and how empire operates. Empires would like us to be lulled into thinking that their reach is necessary for our security, that military might will protect us, that isolating and insulating ourselves from those who are different will make us safer.
Long ago, before king David, God warned the people what the rule of a king inevitably looks like–crushing taxes, brutal battles, exploitation of the weak. Seeking shelter in God the rock means we recognize the fleeting nature of modern empires. That in the big picture their time of domination is short-lived. And their ways will not endure. In contrast to the false and fragile security offered by power and empire, the power of love endures.
Finally to seek refuge in God the rock means that we come as we are. Seeking refuge in God, the rock acknowledges our vulnerability–that we can’t control everything, anticipate everything, think or plan our way through everything. Sometimes we are blindsided by what we didn’t see coming, and all we have left, all we can do is cry out to God, to throw ourselves on the mercy of God.
Seeking refuge in God, the rock acknowledges that we come to God empty, scared, angry, grieving, lonely, broken and lost. It is hard for most of us to fully express or be fully present to our feelings. We fear that it makes us seem weak and needy if we give space to our feelings and allow them to have expression. We don’t want to fall apart in front of others so we keep it all under wraps.
Seeking refuge in God the rock means we come to God humble–ready to be honest about who we really are, what we long for, what we have done and neglected to do.
But don’t let the rock image suggest that God is cold, hard, unyielding, static. Biblical stories of God reflect a character, a force, a presence that is personal, dynamic, active, and responsive. The God of the bible sees and hears and responds. The God of the bible shows up– intervenes and delivers and sustains and yes, even punishes and takes sides. The God of the bible whispers, speaks and roars, if you read the rest of this Psalm. And this is not only a spiritual reality but a physical one, in the presence and power of acts of love, mercy, compassion and justice.
Who of us can relate to feelings of being overwhelmed, to being in over our heads, or caught in currents that seem to pull us off course, or trapped in something fearing that there is no clear way out? Who of us can relate to gasping and drowning in the overload of data, information, vindictiveness and hatefulness that floods our newsfeeds and social media? Or the overwhelm of negative stories, of power run amok, human suffering and the Earth groaning?
One of the beautiful things about the psalms is that they “express the full range of human emotions and experiences” (Suderman, Introduction to Psalms, Anabaptist Community Bible). They give us permission to be raw and real before God whether we are the speaker or the listener. They are places where we can see and hear and express our own joy and our own experiences of anguish. And where we can learn to listen well, bear witness to and speak out for others in their experiences of anguish.
There is not a correct formula for how to approach God in prayer. There is not a certain, or only way to pray to God or relate to God. Seeking refuge in God the rock means coming to God as we are–human, real, honest, humble, vulnerable. That is our invitation today and every day, whatever season of life we are in.