"On This Rock"

Matthew 16: 18

“I tell you, you are Peter and on this rock I will build my church”

It is often assumed, due to this passage, that Peter is the ‘rock” upon which Jesus chose to build his Church. And while Peter had three times denied him, it was his close bond with the Lord that Jesus believed made him best able to guide the Church after his crucifixion.

Many of us have rocks upon which we have built our lives, foundations of beliefs that support us even when everything else around us has collapsed. For some, their rock is indeed the Church, God, or Jesus. For other, like Jesus, it is a close relationship, with a parent, sibling, best friend, or spouse. And for others, sadly, it is in a material object such as money, fame, or popularity.

So what happens when our rocks, our foundations, are damaged, or worse, destroyed?

I have a friend, Moise, who was on the top floor of a building in Port-au-Prince when the earthquake hit that January afternoon two years ago. The foundation and supports for the building were not able to withstand the earth-shaking event, and the building collapsed. And out of a room full of people, Moise was one of only a very few who survived. He suggests divine providence. I suggest a combination of that and his Herculean strength. I feel certain he held the building up with his bare hands he is so strong; his biceps are the size of my thighs.

I’ve recently been reading a book suggested to me by my father entitled, The Brother of Jesus, that examines James, Jesus’ brother, and his importance and significance in the early Church. In it, the author suggests among other things that James, not Peter, was the “rock” upon which Jesus had truly desired to build his Church. This is indeed an earth shaking realization; something, which if proven correct, would obliterate the foundation of the modern Catholic Church which is physically headquartered on Peter’s rock, his tomb in Rome. So destructive it would be that even those scholars who support the theory on James are weary of its ramifications.

While I do not know for certain what I believe about James, I do know what I believe about earth-shattering realities.

We must accept them, for they are gifts from God.

Such acceptance will likely cause a great deal of damage. People will get hurt; some may even die. Beliefs will be crushed and institutions and individuals will be forced to change. But, like all things, God wants us to accept the Truth. If he had wanted us to believe otherwise, he would have never caused the earth-shattering reality to occur in the first place.

Our lives and our history are full of these overwhelming realities: Darwin’s Theory of Evolution, Copernicus’ planetary realignment, the death of a spouse, the loss of a best friend. But all of these events would have never occurred if God did not want us to learn something. It is in these darkest times that we humans are best able to grow.

Down here in Haiti, they are still picking up the rubble from earthquake 27 months ago. There are likely still numerous bodies buried under the piles of bricks and mortar, victims of the harsh reality of the very violent, unstable, and seemingly unfair world we call our home. How could God allow such a tragedy to occur in such a broken and impoverished society? Was he really punishing the posterity of Voodoo whose ancestors had “sold their souls to the devil” in order to free themselves from their oppressive slavery?

No.

Very simply, the Earth just moved. What had been years of tension between two determined pieces of land finally gave way, resulting in a destructive and powerful upheaval of rock. God did not intentionally cause this tension, nor did he deliberately cause the tectonic movement. The ever-changing, evolving planet he designed simply did what it was designed to do: change.

While roughly 300,000 perished, Moise, like millions of others, survived this catastrophe. Many lost their homes, their businesses, their jobs. Hundreds of thousands were forced to relocate to unknown places while many simply relied on their families and friends scattered around the island. But one thing, one foundation, remained through all of this mayhem: their faith. The Haitians, one of God’s most tested people, remained ever faithful in the ever-loving God. If anything, this disaster allowed their faith to grow.

Haiti will rebuild and recover. We all can rebuild and recover, with faith in God, in whom and with whom all things are possible. But right now, Haiti and the rest of the world are facing the incomprehensible question: How?

It will not be easy. And it will be very slow. It will continue to be a test on Haiti and other nations alike for years to come. But the Lord will give us a second chance; he already has when he sacrificed himself on that rocky hillside nearly two millennia ago. He has already given us his greatest gift.

Redemption.

With it, all that we have destroyed can be rebuilt. War-torn countries, polluted rivers, flattened cities, religious conflict, splintered relationships. With the gift of redemption, we can transform the rubble into something more beautiful than we can even imagine. There will be times where we will fail a second time, a third time, a thirty-third time. But God will always remain, our rock, our shelter from the storm, calming the waters for our thirty-fourth try. Upon him we can rebuild the foundations that once supported us. And, like Jesus, we should remember to rely on our brother, our brothers, to hold us up when everything around us seems to have collapsed.