In the Cleft of the Rock
The Rev. Augustus M. Toplady, when Vicar of Blagcon, in Somersetshire, was walking through Burrington Combe, a beautiful spot some two or three miles from his home, when he was caught in a sudden storm. The particular place is very exposed, affording no shelter, but Toplady espied a cleft running down a mass of rock beside the road, in which he was able to take refuge until the storm abated.
A man of saintly character, his thoughts were turned by the incident to spiritual things, and picking up a playing card which he found lying on the ground at his feet, he wrote upon the back of it the hymn of which it has been said that "no other English hymn can be named which has laid so broad and firm a grasp upon the English-speaking world", beginning,
Rock of Ages! cleft for me!
Let me hide myself in Thee!
The playing card upon which the hymn was first written is still preserved in America.
It was this hymn which afforded such comfort, among multitudes of others, to the Prince Consort and which he repeated constantly upon his death-bed. "For," said he, "if in this hour I had only my worldly honours and dignities to depend upon, i should be poor indeed!" -Great Hymns and Their Stories.
If our hopes are not fixed upon the mercies of God when we pass from this life into the next then all is hopeless, all is lost. Those endowed with the most livid imaginations can't even begin to fathom the bleakness of eternity without God!
Mark, how long will you continue to reject the truth of the gospel?
Chris |
