“And I say also unto thee, That thou art Peter, and upon this rock I will build my church; and the gates of hell shall not prevail against it.” (Matthew 16:18) We usually describe revealed truth in terms of light. Radiant beams stream from heaven above and illuminate the way before us. Light is all well and good, but the Savior also described revelation as a rock. This makes sense. We want the truth to be firm and immovable, solid as a rock, reliable enough upon which to hang all of our hopes and dreams without fear of it collapsing and caving in. If we manage to find ourselves trapped in a prison of all of our sins and regrets, our doubts and our fears, our hopelessness and our despair, then what we need most when staring down the very gates of Hell barring the way before us is not so much the light of truth and the big, solid rock of revelation. Yes, the Rock is an excellent foundation upon which the Church may be built, but it is also an extremely effective battering ram against which the Gates of Hell cannot prevail. The truth is hard and if we are still clinging to our futile attempt to scrape away happiness from wickedness, then we might not much want the truth or its hardness, but if we are ready to rise up and shake off the dust and break free from the shackles of sin that bind us down and to shatter the gate of Hell that have been shut up against us, then what we need more than anything is the pure, unadulterated truth, harder than diamonds, cut out from the mountain without hands and rolling right into the gates of Hell with the force of a thousand angry bulls. If we truly receive the truth, the whole truth, and nothing but the truth, not given to us from flesh and blood but revealed straight from the mind of our Father in Heaven, and send it before us with all of Heaven's might, the gates of Hell cannot prevail against that rock of revelation. Those gates of Hell may appear to be made from fire hardened oak, reinforced with steel, but they're not really real. At least, not really real when compared to the hard rock of truth, falling from heaven and blazing with the heat of re-entry into the atmosphere, and traveling with enough force to leave only a rapidly dissipating mist of darkness where the gates of Hell used to be as it clears for us the way to forgiveness and freedom and a faith-filled future.
