Stone is the oldest and most enduring thing on the earth, and it is the foundation of everything else. In Daniel, where Christ is spoken of as a stone cut out without hands, He is called the Ancient of Days, and there is no doubt that those are the chief features of stone — age and stability. They also have passive strength and weight, while some have value, such as quartz or diamond. But the type is presented in various ways; not only is He proclaimed as the Rock of Ages for a security for those in the tempests which Isaiah predicts (Isa. 32:2), but also the Rock on which the church shall be built (Matt. 16:18), a rock of habitation (Psa. 71:3 JND), the rock of my heart (Psa. 73:26 JND), “the rock that followed them” (1 Cor. 10:4), and other such names of dignity, but also in the humblest aspects of a stone rejected by men, yet chosen of God and made by Him a foundation stone (everything beginning in and resting on Christ), and the head stone of the corner (everything ending and culminating in Him), and also a living stone, a tried stone (tried by death), and an elect stone (elect in resurrection) — a precious stone. He is also a stone of stumbling on which whosoever shall fall shall be broken, and a rock of offense which will grind him to powder (Matt. 21:44).
J. C. Bayley (adapted)