Stone Of Stumbling

“Wherefore also it is contained in the scripture, Behold, I lay in Sion a chief corner stone, elect, precious: and he that believeth on him shall not be confounded. Unto you therefore which believe he is precious: but unto them which be disobedient, the stone which the builders disallowed, the same is made the head of the corner, And a stone of stumbling, and a rock of offence, even to them which stumble at the word, being disobedient: whereunto also they were appointed.” (1 Peter 2: 6-8). Whenever I have heard the term “Stone of Stumbling,” I always imagined a stone that caused one to stumble. But now I am not so sure. Christ is the Stone of Stumbling. He did not come to this Earth to condemn us but to save us. He did not come to cause us to stumble, but to be the solid foundation upon which we could rebuild ourselves. I think we sometimes get it into our heads that we could be sprinting through life with the greatest of ease if it weren’t for all of the tests and trials that God throws at us to trip us up. God is not some treacherous stone that has positioned itself in just the right place for us to twist our ankle and fall. The Stone of Stumbling is not a stone that causes us to stumble, but a stone that is there to help and support us when we have stumbled. The Stone of Stumbling is the place that we can rest and massage our sore muscles and joints and retie our shoes and get back up and try walking in the path again. To reject or disallow the Stone of Stumbling is to stubbornly cling to the idea that we can make it through this life without stumbling and also without needing a Stone of Stumbling to help us get back up on our feet again. But to set the Stone of Stumbling as the chief corner stone, the head of the corner, is to embrace that we are stumblers and we need every help that we can get from our Stone of Stumbling. “Whosoever shall fall upon that stone shall be broken; but on whomsoever it shall fall, it will grind him to powder.” (Luke 20: 18). When we fall upon the Stone of Stumbling, we do so because we are already broken, we are already in need of Christ’s saving grace. We fall upon the Stone of Stumbling broken, and we are healed. But if we refuse to come to the Stone of Stumbling, then we will get no healing and we will fall and break and fall and break until we have been ground down into powder. Let us believe, let us see the Stone of Stumbling as a precious place of peace and healing and salvation, and let us never think for a second that Christ would ever try to trip us up, but will only ever try to build us up.