By Elizabeth Prata
The Ocean State is aptly named.
Growing up in Rhode Island in the 1960s was a fun experience. The nation’s smallest state is beautiful and the ocean and Narragansett Bay is never far from anyone who lives there. We happened to live just a few miles from the ocean and most Sundays we took a drive south to Saunderstown, crossed the Jamestown bridge, and then took the ferry to Newport. The ferry was a blast.
Newport is home to all those Jacob Astor mansions from The Gilded Age. Dad would drive the kids and mom around the island on Ocean Drive past all the mansions, past the smaller mansions on the water’s edge with their lovely lawns and rocky outcrops reaching for the sea, and then we’d have a picnic by the park and watch the boats
There was no Newport Bridge at that time. You had to take the ferry. On the ferry, we passed boats, the islands with lighthouses, and other sights. One sight always captured my attention.
“Clingstone”.
Clingstone is a house built in 1905, perched atop a small, rocky island in an island group called “The Dumplings” in Narragansett Bay, near Jamestown, Rhode Island. It withstood the devastating 1938 Hurricane, (though was damaged) faced other hurricanes, storms, decay, renovation, and more. The house is known by locals as “The House on a Rock”.
Even to my young eyes the house looked strong. I mean, it’s built on a rock! I often wondered what it was like to live there.
I don’t have to wonder any more what it is like to build my house on the rock. In His grace, He saved me and taught me to cling to the rock. I have my own Clingstone now. Isn’t it funny how life goes. Jesus, who was so far from my mind for over 40 years, is my All in All now. The little girl with big eyes looking at the House on a Rock, the Rock all for her own now and a house that will never fall.
The verses below are familiar but please slow yourself and read them carefully. Then really think about it for a minute, before you go on to other things. The verses are soul-soothing. Be encouraged.
Everyone then who hears these words of mine and does them will be like a wise man who built his house on the rock. 25And the rain fell, and the floods came, and the winds blew and beat on that house, but it did not fall, because it had been founded on the rock. (Matthew 7:24-25).
Republished with permission from Blogs.crossmap.com, featuring inspiring Bible verses about The House on the Rock.
