"Rock of Ages" and Isaiah 26:3-4
Of the many Bible verses I have memorized over the years, and review regularly, these words in Isaiah have always been near and dear to my heart:
“You keep him in perfect peace whose mind is stayed on you,
because he trusts in you.
Trust in the LORD forever,
for the LORD GOD is an everlasting rock” (Isaiah 26:3-4).
While I draw this fleeting breath,
When mine eyelids close in death,
When I soar to worlds unknown,
See Thee on Thy judgment throne,
Rock of Ages, cleft for me,
Let me hide myself in Thee.
But how does God keep his people in perfect peace when they are facing chronic pain? Or terrible troubles in their family? Or loss of a job and livelihood? Or dark news reports? It’s by our trust in him. And in our trust of him, our minds are stayed, settled, lodged on him (26:3).
This is what lies behind an assertion John Calvin made when commenting on James 1:2, “Count it all joy, my brothers, when you meet trials of various kinds”. Calvin focuses on the statement, “count it all joy” when he writes:
He means, in short, that there is nothing in afflictions which ought to disturb our joy. And thus, he not only commands us to bear adversities calmly, and with an even mind, but shews us that this is a reason why the faithful should rejoice when pressed down by them. It is, indeed, certain, that all the senses of our nature are so formed, that every trial produces in us grief and sorrow; and no one of us can so far divest himself of his nature as not to grieve and be sorrowful whenever he feels any evil. But this does not prevent the children of God to rise, by the guidance of the Spirit, above the sorrow of the flesh. Hence it is, that in the midst of trouble they cease not to rejoice.
Now, that all sounds fine. But then you add to Calvin’s comments his own ailments, losses, and grief, and you realize that he knew of what he spoke. He had excruciating, chronic pain from frequent kidney stones, struggled with gout (he had other serious ailments I won’t mention here), was a refugee, lost all of his children in infancy, was hated and slandered by many, faced wars and plague, and lost his wife – whom he loved dearly – after she went through a lengthy illness.
So, when Calvin wrote “there is nothing in afflictions which ought to disturb our joy” you know he had skin in the game, as they say. Here was a man whose mind was stayed on the LORD, who trusted in the Rock of Ages and rejoiced. Here was a man (not sinless by any stretch of the imagination) who was frail and friable, and yet a man who lived to “bear adversities calmly, and with an even mind” because he trusted in the LORD.
Brothers and sisters let us trust “in the LORD forever, for the LORD GOD is an everlasting rock”.
Pastor Mike
(From my letter to the congregation, 25 February 2021)
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