Flood Waters

Inks Lake and the Frio River are probably my two favorite places in Texas. Inks, a small lake in the shadow of larger Lake Buchanan, is just about an hour northwest of Austin. It has clear, cool water, great fishing and a spot called "The Devil's Watering Hole." The Devil's Watering Hole is a quiet cove where you can swim, float and jump off a 20-foot-high rock into the water. There are hiking trails, a small river to float, and natural rock slides that send you splashing into the water below. The views on the water rival anywhere in the world.

The Frio in Concan is about an hour and a half west of San Antonio. The Frio is an amazing, cool river to float down. You pack up drinks, snacks and a waterproof speaker into innertubes and just let the water take you downriver. If you'd like, you could choose to swim all day long, too. There are swimming holes, rocks to jump off of, and a giant slide that may or may not toss you a little too quickly into the crisp river water.

Over the years, I've taken my girls to both of these places numerous times to spend hot summer Texas days in the cool refreshing water. When you go to the river or the lake in Texas, everyone is friendly. You strike up conversations with people all the time. You find out where they are from, what they do, and which football team they root for come August. There's a camaraderie when you are in Texas near a body of water that is unlike anywhere else in the world. You are sharing this next-to-God experience with these people, and you always leave with a smile on your sunburned face. 

But water doesn't always behave the way we expect. This summer, the Hill Country in Texas was ravaged by deadly floods. The same rivers that people float in the summer heat rose quickly and violently, swallowing roads, homes, and entire campsites in a matter of hours. Places that had once been filled with laughter and families were suddenly filled with sirens, rescue helicopters, and unimaginable loss.

Water is one of the most powerful forces on earth. Most of the time, we experience it in its gentler forms—a cool river on a hot day, a calm lake reflecting the sky, a refreshing swim after hours in the Texas sun. But when water rises beyond its boundaries, it reminds us very quickly that it cannot be controlled.

That tension between life and destruction is something the Bible understands well.

Throughout Scripture, water appears again and again, sometimes as a source of life and blessing, and other times as an instrument of judgment. God uses water to cleanse, to destroy, to rescue, and to restore. Water has always carried this tension. The same force that can sweep away homes and roads can also cleanse, refresh, and sustain life. In the hands of God, water becomes a powerful symbol of both judgment and renewal. It destroys what is corrupt, yet it also prepares the way for something new to begin.

The first and most obvious example appears early in Scripture with the flood in Genesis 6–9. The waters of the flood covered the earth, wiping away a world that had become filled with violence and corruption. At first glance, the flood appears to be purely destructive. Yet when the waters receded, something remarkable happened—life began again. The flood did not only destroy; it also cleansed the earth and marked the beginning of a new covenant between God and humanity.

We see this pattern again and again throughout the Bible. When the Israelites stood trapped between Pharaoh’s army and the Red Sea, God parted the waters so His people could walk safely across. The same waters that delivered the Israelites then collapsed over the Egyptian army behind them. What became salvation for one group became judgment for another.

Even in the New Testament, water continues to carry this meaning. Baptism, for example, symbolizes both death and new life. In Romans 6:4, Paul writes that we were “buried therefore with him by baptism into death, in order that, just as Christ was raised from the dead… we too might walk in newness of life.” Going under the water represents death to the old life; rising out of it represents the beginning of a new one.

Water destroys.
Water cleanses.
Water gives life.

And throughout Scripture, God uses all three.

The same water I have floated in with my girls, laughing under the Texas sun, is the same water that can rise without warning and take everything in its path. That’s what makes it so powerful—it is both beautiful and dangerous, life-giving and life-taking, refreshing and overwhelming. And that is exactly how Scripture presents it. Water reminds us that God is not small, predictable, or easily contained. He is both just and merciful, both holy and life-giving. He destroys what is corrupt, but He also makes all things new. So the next time I step into the cool, clear water at Inks or drift down the Frio, I’ll still enjoy it the same way—but I’ll also remember what it represents. Beneath the surface of something so familiar is a power that points back to the nature of God Himself.