Waterfall: Overwhelmed

Waterfall: An area where water flows over a vertical drop or series of steep drops in the course of a stream or river.

Sounds pretty tepid, right?

A description beside a “small” waterfall in Washington State seemed closer.

This waterfall “ could shove you with a 7 ton force. Yet, cup the same water in your hands, and it runs softly through your fingers. The falls plummet 60ft into a thundering mass of colliding water.”

The name of the fall? Deception Falls. How appropriate.

The Northwest is crazy beautiful this time of year. One of the things that marked the trip were waterfalls. Waterfalls on a postcard are one thing. Standing before them is another. You can the feel the bass. They invite all consuming attention especially ones like Snoqualmie Falls or even Deception Falls. Power on display. An image that doesn’t leave you quickly. 

I think Deception Falls has the best name. So I’ve been thinking about waterfalls ever since. Small ones like fountains in a soft stream are peaceful. But powerful ones cutting over granite plummeting hundreds of feet below overwhelm. If they are strong enough, the mist is blinding.

Psalm 42 mentions a waterfall in context of being overwhelmed. So while the actual Hebrew word for “waterfall” may only appear one other place, the Bible has a ton to say of rivers, currents, and being overwhelmed. I took note of 4 things that overwhelm. But I spent the most time on two by looking at one passage. Psalm 42 is like a ripped out page of many of our journals.

Overwhelmed: By trouble. 

He is overwhelmed by fear, exhaustion, longing, thirst & taunts. What hurts the most is the chasm he feels between where he is and where God seems to be. You hear no mention of anyone near him but his enemies and they are loud.

All thirst. No provision. All longing. No relief. All taunts. No company. All lies swirling. No grip. All pain. No empathy. 

Yet he raises his voice above the deafening torrents around him. He calls to his plummeting soul, “Hope in God.” He remembers days of old, the joy of being in the multitude praising God...the best of days. And now, as a waterfall strips everything around him boring a deeper hole inside his chest, deeper still is fixed 3 things the breakers can’t take: God’s steadfast love, God’s song, God his Rock...His redeemer. Deep calls to deep. The aching room in his heart is not empty. So he pours out.

Note he says God COMMANDS His steadfast love. What a thought. God commands His faithful love to be present with the one in the falls. Second, God’s song in the night is there. A song of truth that beckons his heart to pour out honestly to the only true Refuge....the Rock...our salvation. The man cries out wholehearted, not just unfiltered. A soul in turmoil lacks perspective. Pain is disorienting. Note that faith implores the soul. In a sense, it cries out even when the soul can not. Faith leads the soul to hope in God for who He is. 

An old friend of mine once said “Remember the trite answer has already been thought of.” Whether it’s to help ourselves or others, we got to dig deeper to know how to communicate what’s timeless and leads a soul to hope...not just a well worn unstickable bandaid.

The psalmist is honest. He remembers. He hopes. He praises. He is not lost at sea. But he is in the current. Overwhelmed. He looks to God to save. It’s not “why God?” It’s more of a “why not now?” And until He comes, he praises Him who hears and is present but on the other side of his blindness. He appeals to the One who can see. 

Deception will not take him. Trouble will not plummet him forever. He rests on the Rock who holds him up in the night. The God who reminds him of the truth. Until the Sunrise from on High visits him, he waits.

Overwhelmed: By Grace

Somewhere in it, he becomes overwhelmed by the grace, the steadfast love, the deep life, and glory of God our salvation. He thirsts for the stream. But in the end, he gets the waterfall.

An interesting thing can happen with waterfalls in the plummeting pools. The sheer power can erode the soft rock around them cutting back into the cliff, making the waterfall ledge ultimately fall as well. So whether we stand on the ledge or are already in the falls, the truth of Psalm 42 remains.

Even if the mountains fall, He can cause us to hope and stand...even on mountains.