There is no Rock Like our God

“There is no holy God like the Lord. There is no God but you. There is no Rock like our God.” 1 Samuel 2:2

The human heart is either too stubborn or too variable to be trusted completely. We stubbornly cling to opinions, even in the face of convicting evidence that we are wrong. We will even cling to our personal convictions to the point of causing harm to others. If our preconceived notions are threatened we may attack, make insinuating remarks and shut down relationships that may have actually helped us mature along the way.

Yet, sometimes the same person will be completely unreliable in their beliefs. We need few examples to illustrate the how quickly our convictions can change when they affect our own lives. One man once told me that a certain man was “the devil himself”, could never be trusted and should be avoided. Yet, within a matter of a few months he joined the “devil” and a group of a few others to cause deep hurt. Another person is certainly the devil when they threaten us, but, if we both have the same enemy, he becomes a saint.

I am so glad the Lord is not like our human hearts. In the best sense, He is unchanging. This is one of the assurances we receive when we think of Him as “our Rock”. We may think of Haystack Rock on the northern Oregon coast. The monolithic rock is adjacent to the beach and accessible at low tide. It hosts a myriad of intertidal animals in its tide pools. It is also a nesting place for many seabirds.

Though the weather has beaten upon it for centuries, the waves lapping upon its craggy structure, it remains fixed and steady. Even when tsunamis cause local residents to move inland to escape flooding, this sea stack stands unmoved surrounded by frothing waters and battering winds.

God does not change His mind, treating one class of people with mercy, and another with stern judgment. He is not swayed by so many things that cause humans to be unreliable. We will give a “friend” a free pass on certain behavior while berating it in the life of someone we hardly know. God can be trusted to always be fair, no matter our status or situation.

She was a beloved wife with a husband who doted on her like a young man wooing his prospective bride. Hannah’s husband was a devoted as any wife could desire. But Hannah lived when men would sometimes take more than one wife, and so it was with her husband Elkanah. Peninnah, his second wife, had children and Hannah had none.

To make matters worse, Peninnah threw it in Hannah’s face every opportunity she had. She provoked her mercilessly because the Lord had provided her no children. Imagine the irritability of a wife, wanting children and having none, constantly harassed by a rival who has her toddlers playing at her feet. Hannah was so annoyed she could not even eat.

So Hannah went to the Lord’s temple in Shiloh, praying and crying bitterly from her sorrowful soul. She promised the Lord that if He would look on her trouble and give her a son, that she would give the same son back to the Lord for his entire life.” She apparently prayed for quite a while, sometimes without words.

Eli, the priest, noticed her strange prayer; mouth moving and no sounds, since she was praying straight from her heart. Expecting he had to deal with one more drunken parishioner, he approached her, “Woman, get rid of your wine!” Hannah said her prayer was spoken under great stress, provocation and distress.

Eli promised Hannah that God had heard her, and that he would grant what she prayed for. In short order (only three verses separate the promise of the son to his birth), her son is born and she names him Samuel, which sounds like the Hebrew for “name of God”.

It is Hannah who sang these marvelous words about God our Rock. Her husband was reliable, but not powerful to meet the need of her heart. Her rival was mean-spirited, and no source of comfort at all. Even the priest at first thought the worst of this dear woman.

But the Lord, He is a Rock like none else! Those who love us the most and who would never do anything to fail us sometimes have not power or ability to actually meet our need. But the Lord does. And, as important as her gentle and kind husband was, only the Lord could, in Bible language, “open her womb”.

We should never, ever, even hint that someone is weak or without faith when they cry out in anguish. I’ve even heard people tell pastors who talked about being lonely and sometimes misunderstood that if they can’t do the job, maybe they need to pray more. Believe me, those pastors are pouring their hearts out to God, in the same way our dear Hannah did.

Are you feeling something is missing? Even though your loved ones are constant and faithful, do you still find yourself crying out for more? The Lord, the holy One, He is your Rock. He is the faithful one. He is the place to cling when the storms pound upon your life. He is immovable, unchanging, and our constant deliverer.

Do you know someone who needs encouragement? Cry out to the Lord on their behalf. Let your heart feel their heart’s cry. Not only that, act like Elkanah did; do the good thing that you can. He did not tell her, “Stop your whining about a child. If you have enough faith, God will give you one. Apparently you don’t have what it takes.” No, he took her pain seriously and gave her the comfort and help hid did possess. I am sure these were deeply encouraging as she waited upon the Lord, her Rock, to answer.