By Dr. John E. Morgan
Pastor–Collinsville Baptist Church
Isa Lake. Yellowstone Park is full of weird stuff.
Geysers (yes, including Old Faithful). Don’t see those around here. Huge pools of bubbling mud. Lots of hot springs. One of the most beautiful waterfalls anywhere. Buffaloes and Wolves. A hot spring that has covered a cliff with calcium making it look like a huge frozen water fall. Weird stuff. Including Isa Lake.
It is not weird because it is large. There is a really large lake in Yellowstone with wonderful trout. Not Isa. It is only about 1,000 feet long.
Isa is not weird because of its temperature. It is 8,000 feet up on the side of a mountain. The water running off the mountain has hollowed out a natural rock bowl that is the lake. It is fed by rainwater running down the mountain. And melting snow. The water playfully finds its way down the mountain rocks. Beautiful little mountain streams. Foaming cascades. Just like lots of other mountain streams and lakes.
It is not Isa’s depth. In the summer the surface is placid enough to be covered with lily pads. And much of the year there is little water flowing into or out of the lake. It becomes more of a pond with just small amounts of water seeping out.
It is that water leaving the lake that makes Isa Lake special. I like to think of the water drops playing with each other all the way down the mountain. Jumping from rock to rock. Each drop trying to jump higher than the next one. Each drop trying to hit a target below. Playing like little children until they are exhausted as they fall into the lake. Whew. Now they can rest. And then each drop bobs along, floating on the surface in the thin mountain air with the sun glinting. Floating on the gentle current with their friends. Before realizing they are moving faster as they near the end of the lake.
Isa Lake sits directly on a ridge of the mountains. The bowl of the lake balances on that ridge. That ridge is the Continental Divide. There are two exits from the lake, one on each side. Leave one exit and the water drop will eventually go to the Pacific Ocean. Leave the other exit and it will go to the Atlantic Ocean. Isa Lake is weird because it sits on the Continental Divide and flows to two different oceans. It is believed to be the only lake that does that. It is sometimes called Two Ocean Lake. My family just called it Divide Lake.
Those water drops may have played well with each other, liked each other. But once they leave the lake, they cannot go back. There is no return.
They are like a lot of people who will walk across a football field or a stage this week and get their diploma. As they leave the stage, they can never go back and be a high school student again. Their choices will lead them to different lives. College. Jobs. Marriage. But never again a high school student. They are leaving Divide Lake.
I would tell them that choices matter. Some choices – which rock to jump on – don’t matter much. Other choices – which exit from the Lake to take – do matter. And cannot be changed.
At the end of your life, you will have been defined by those choices. Joshua once said to the people of God, “Choose for yourselves this day whom you will serve… as for me and my household, we will serve the LORD.” That’s the most important choice you will ever make. Serve the Lord. And follow Him. You will really like where that stream goes. Where it ends. Much better than the other option. Choose. God.
Scripture above is Joshua 24:15.
