The Witness of Stones

When we read the Old Testament, we find that God often used stone monuments as witnesses.

“Abram traveled through the land to the site of the oak of Moreh at Shechem. At that time the Canaanites were in the land. The Lord appeared to Abram and said, ‘I will give this land to your offspring.’ So he built an altar there to the Lord, who had appeared to him.” (Genesis 12:6-7) “From there he moved on to the hills east of Bethel and pitched his tent, with Bethel on the west and Ai on the east. There he built an altar to the Lord and called on the name of the Lord.” (Genesis 12:8) “So Abram moved his tent and went to live near the great trees of Mamre at Hebron, where he built an altar to the Lord.” (Genesis 13:18) “When they reached the place God had told him about, Abraham built an altar there and arranged the wood on it. He bound his son Isaac and laid him on the altar, on top of the wood.” (Genesis 22:9)

In the book of Joshua, after the Israelites entered Canaan, they set up stones several times as witnesses to remind future generations.

“So Joshua called the twelve men he had appointed from the Israelites, one from each tribe, and said to them, ‘Go over before the ark of the Lord your God into the middle of the Jordan. Each of you is to take up a stone on his shoulder, according to the number of the tribes of the Israelites. They are to be a sign among you.'” (Joshua 4:4-6)

“Joshua set up the twelve stones that had been in the middle of the Jordan at the spot where the priests who carried the ark of the covenant had stood. And they are there to this day.” (Joshua 4:9)

“Over Achan they heaped up a large pile of rocks, which remains to this day. Then the Lord turned from his fierce anger. Therefore that place has been called the Valley of Achor [which means ‘trouble’] ever since.” (Joshua 7:26)

“Then Joshua built on Mount Ebal an altar to the Lord, the God of Israel, just as Moses the servant of the Lord had commanded the Israelites. It was an altar of uncut stones, on which no iron tool had been used. On it they offered to the Lord burnt offerings and fellowship offerings.” (Joshua 8:30-31)

“So we said, ‘Let us get ready and build an altar for ourselves, not for burnt offerings or sacrifices, but as a witness between us and you and the generations that follow, that we will worship the Lord before him with our burnt offerings, with our sacrifices and with our fellowship offerings. Then in the future your descendants will not be able to say to ours, “You have no part in the Lord.”‘ . . . And they named it the Altar of Witness, for they said, ‘It is a witness between us that the Lord is God.'” (Joshua 22:26-27, 34)

“On a large stone under the oak tree beside the sanctuary of the Lord, Joshua then wrote on the scroll of the Law of God. He said to all the people, ‘See! This stone will be a witness against us. For it has heard all the words the Lord has said to us. It will be a witness against you if you are untrue to your God.'” (Joshua 24:26-27)

In the New Testament, we can also see similar examples. In Luke 19:40, when Jesus was last entering the city of Jerusalem, He rebuked the Pharisees by saying, “…the very stones will cry out.” Today, when we are weak, stumble, or fail, the history in the Bible and these stones also stand as a witness to “warn us, on whom the culmination of the ages has come” (1 Corinthians 10:11).