Shouting Stones

Even the stones will cry out

Luke 19:37-40 “Then, as He was now drawing near the descent of the Mount of Olives, the whole multitude of the disciples began to rejoice and praise God with a loud voice for all the mighty works they had seen,  saying:” ‘Blessed is the King who comes in the name of the Lord!
Peace in heaven and glory in the highest!” And some of the Pharisees called to Him from the crowd, “Teacher, rebuke Your disciples.” But He answered and said to them, “I tell you that if these should keep silent, the stones would immediately cry out.”

Science is wonderful. More and more stories from the Bible are being verified by forensic science and by archaeological evidence. Whilst we cannot ‘prove’ this statement, we do have evidence, very serious evidence, that nature shouts God’s Glory. A few years ago, an earnest scientific magazine did a recording of a whole year in the life of a mountain – you know – one of those huge piles of rock and stones. They played the resulting recording back speeded up a few thousand times and apparently it sounded like a symphony orchestra. If that’s not rocks crying out then I don’t know quite what is.

The point is this, as Jesus Himself said, if we don’t praise God then the world, and all that is created in it, will do so. Mountains sing. Forests make music. Rocks praise God. Birds sing; crickets chirrup (it is sometimes called stridulating); butterflies carry wonderful colours;  flowers scent the air; wolves sing; fish fly  – the list goes on. All these things we accept as part of nature are also cries of praise to their creator.

They all do these things with total abandonment – no embarrassment, no shyness, totally abandoned in their worship of their creator. So why can we not be like them? Some call it civilisation. We are too civilised to be totally abandoned. I call that disobedience. We knowingly disobey God when we decline the opportunity to worship Him because if we don’t then the stones and rocks will do so. They do already. Sometimes we are the only created beings in the whole of creation who do not worship Him.

Yes He has given us choice. Yes He knew that by doing so some would disobey. Yes, many more than we all realise have chosen not to praise Him, not to thank Him, not to worship Him. We call them ‘the lost’. I nowadays call them ‘the not yet Christians’ because the day is coming when that will change.

The fact remains that if we will not cry out, if we should remain silent, then even the stones will cry out their praise and worship to their creator God.