Today I will dig the history behind a song that we have sung often in our worship services and college fellowship. I hope and pray that you will be encouraged as I have been from learning about this hymn.
The Song
My hope is built on nothing less
Than Jesus’ blood and righteousness.
I dare not trust the sweetest frame,
But wholly trust in Jesus’ Name.
‘On Christ the solid Rock I stand,
All other ground is sinking sand;
All other ground is sinking sand.’
When darkness seems to hide His face,
I rest on His unchanging grace.
In every high and stormy gale,
My anchor holds within the veil.
His oath, His covenant, His blood,
Support me in the whelming flood.
When all around my soul gives way,
He then is all my Hope and Stay.
When He shall come with trumpet sound,
Oh may I then in Him be found.
Dressed in His righteousness alone,
Faultless to stand before the throne.
The History Behind the Song
Edward Mote is the man who penned this song. He grew up as part of a poor family and did not come to know Christ until the age of 16. He recognized his very sinful past self:
“My Sundays were spent in the streets. So ignorant was I that I did not know that there was a God.”
-Edward Mote
From then on forward, Edward lived a life devoted to the LORD working as a cabinet maker and eventually became a preacher of a baptist church in Hosham, England. At one point during his service to the church, the congregation had offered him the deed to the church building as gratitude for his service. He responded saying:
“I do not want the chapel; I only want the pulpit, and when I cease to preach Christ, then turn me out of that.”
-Edward Mote
What a true man of God! To value the preaching of God’s word over the physical values of the church building. He was a man who lived with eyes set on Christ as opposed to the gains of this world. In fact when he was on his death bed, unable to preach anymore, he said:
“The truths I have been preaching, I am now living upon, and they do very well to die upon.”
-Edward Mote
The church, in his honor, engraved in the cornerstone:
“In loving memory of Mr. Edward Mote, who fell asleep in Jesus November 13th, 1874, aged 77 years. For 26 years the beloved pastor of this church, preaching Christ and Him crucified, as all the sinner can need, and all the saint desire.”
The hymn “The Solid Rock” was penned in 1834, but originally had the title of “The Gracious Experience of a Christian”. Edward Mote intended to write out the life of a Christian based on the truths he stood upon. His intention was to emphasize the anchor, the rock, and the stronghold of Christ in the believer’s life. Everything else will fail as a foundation. Interestingly about this hymn are the missing stanzas that were found in the original poem, emphasizing the redemption from the fires of hell:
“My hope is built on nothing less than Jesus’ blood and righteousness;
‘Midst all the hell I feel within, on His completed work I lean.
I trust His righteous character, His council, promise, and His power;
His honor and His name’s at stake, to save me from the burning lake.”
-Edward Mote
Edward Mote understood the truth of God and what it meant for his life. To trust these truths was to stand upon the promises of God and death, resurrection, and glory of Christ. Praise God for raising up such a man to encourage many generations.
“Everyone then who hears these words of mine and does them will be like a wise man who built his house on the rock. And 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. And everyone who hears these words of mine and does not do them will be like a foolish man who built his house on the sand. And the rain fell, and the floods came, and the winds blew and beat against that house, and it fell, and great was the fall of it.”
-Matthew 7:24-27
May you be encouraged, as I am, to continue to hold fast to the rock that is Jesus Christ.
A modern rendition from Charlie Hall
Charlie Hall - The Solid Rock (On Christ The Solid Rock)
Sources
http://articles.christiansunite.com/article6027.shtml
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Edward_Mote