A Shadow of a Mighty Rock within a Weary Land

Rebecca Sheridan
Wednesday, March 8, 2023
Matthew 7:24-27

    You hopefully have picked up at this point in our worship service tonight that we are focusing on the metaphor of Jesus our Rock – Jesus is the Mighty Rock within a Weary Land as we sing in the hymn Beneath the Cross of Jesus, our theme for these midweek Lenten services.  What words or images come to mind when you think of Jesus as a rock?  Admittedly, I immediately hear the song to the old Chevy commercial, “Like a rock! OH, like a rock.” I come from a loyal Ford family so those are negative connotations.  Jesus is way better than a Chevy.  But more seriously, relying on Jesus as our rock brings to mind stability, strength, steadfastness, support.  Unfailing presence and love.  A wise man who builds his house upon this rock of Christ, the foundation of our faith, will not fall regardless of the winds blowing and floods coming, we hear in our gospel for tonight.
    Peter takes it one step further and calls US living stones like Jesus!  This is actually one of my favorite metaphors for the church – that we, too, through our faith in Christ become living stones to be built upon Jesus the cornerstone into a stable, solid spiritual house.  At its best, the church is a reliable refuge and supporting spiritual house for all to experience Christ’s love, and people definitely do experience Christ’s love through us as the church of living stones.
But notice in this passage and in our hymn, too, there is a shadow side to the image of Jesus as our rock and we being living stones.  Jesus in fact is the stone that the builder rejected, Peter says.  Beneath the cross of Jesus, we see the shadow of a mighty rock within a weary land.  Every Lent, we journey along with the disciples to Jerusalem and to the cross, and we, too, even though we know the good news resurrection ending of the story probably also wonder why death has to be a part of Jesus’ story and ours.  Before the empty tomb, we must journey with Jesus to the cross and remember that he died for us.  Christ the solid rock dies on the cross.  At his death, there is an earthquake and the temple curtain is torn in two.  Most of the disciples out of fear and confusion run away from the cross.  Their faith is shaken.  Some stumble and fall.  We can relate to the disciples’ confusion, fear, and doubt.
    You know, sand is the same as rock in that sand is just made up of tiny worn-down bigger rocks.  At times, we may feel like little pebbles on the sand than living stones fit to be built on Christ the cornerstone.  We might come tonight feeling weary and worn down.  We want to build our lives upon the solid rock of Jesus but sometimes the sand of the wilderness of life is so vast it is hard to trust that there is a big enough rock to stand on, especially if it’s a rock the builders rejected.  The rock of Christ may look only like a shadow as he hangs on the cross, but Peter encourages us to trust in that rock as our salvation. We gather tonight to encourage one another that at in Christ’s death, what looks like defeat to the world is in fact God’s great victory over sin, death, and the devil – all the forces that seek to defy God, which we’ll denounce once again in just a few minutes tonight. We have confidence that Jesus our rock has conquered all things on the cross! On that cross Jesus our Rock promises to take all our burdens and sins that wear us down and build us up once again into living stones so that we might proclaim the mighty acts of him who called us out of darkness into his marvelous light.  May our faith in the cross of Christ lead us to rest more confidently on the strength of our Rock and our Redeemer.  Amen.