There’s something about water that makes me either sigh or cry. And sometimes it is both. I looked up water in the Blue Letter Bible app and it says that “water’ occurs in 409 verses. That is a good number of times.
With the recent events in our country, water seems to have a power about it that I would never have thought possible. I have seen floods before, hurricanes come like clockwork during the season, and the heavy rains that seem to hide tornados. But what happened in the mountains, I have never seen. Yes, Asheville floods and I have seen the videos before; however, not like it did a few months ago.
And then there’s my own personal flood. Processing the mountain floods was difficult for me because I LOVE the area that was devastated. It is my heart home. Coming home to a flooded house was hard. Processing what has been lost, is beyond anything, short of my parents deaths, I have experienced. It is as if I lost them all over again.
The power of water should be well known to me since I have heard about the Red Sea, the flood of Noah’s time, and yet, here I stand in awe and in misery at the power of water. As much as I want to make it an evil thing, I cannot. Water cleans. Water restores. And water refreshes.
Psalm 23 1-2 “The Lord is my shepherd; I shall not want. He makes me lie down in green pastures. He leads me beside the still waters.”
“He makes me lie down” is an act of rest. Lush green pastures beside still waters. Why still waters? The cooling effect of still waters is refreshing. Easier to swim in still waters, much easier to drink from still waters. But I think it is the stillness of the waters that calls to our souls that restores them. A lake without boats and too many people around is such a peaceful, restorative place. There’s something about looking out at a lake that immediately calms you. I think of this place when I read Psalm 23. It is a place God can give us rest, peace, and calmness. It is a place that reminds us of the Garden where He walked with Adam and Eve in the coolness of the day.
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