Scripture Reflection — Ecclesiastes 1:9 & Isaiah 40:8

“What has been will be again, what has been done will be done again; there is nothing new under the sun.” — Ecclesiastes 1:9

Everybody’s Chasing Waves

Beneath the Wake came from a quiet moment standing on the back of a cruise ship watching the ocean late at night.

At first, all I could focus on was the turbulence behind the propellers. Massive white water exploded upward behind the ship, violent and chaotic for a moment before slowly fading back into the deep blue of the ocean.

But the longer I stood there watching it, the more it started feeling like a picture of humanity itself.

The water directly behind the ship was loud, aggressive, and impossible to ignore. Yet farther away from the wake, the ocean remained calm and unmoved. The turbulence eventually disappeared completely, swallowed back into something deeper and far more permanent.

That image became the foundation for this song.

The chorus says:

“Everybody’s chasin’ waves
Watch ’em rise, watch ’em break”

And honestly, that feels like life sometimes.

Human beings constantly rush toward whatever feels important, exciting, emotional, or culturally powerful in the moment. Entire groups of people get swept into movements, trends, outrage, fear, entertainment, politics, opinions, leaders, or ideas almost overnight.

Some people jump in immediately.
Others hesitate along the edges.
But eventually most people feel the pressure to move with the current.

The older I get, the more I realize this pattern repeats itself constantly throughout history.

People chase what shines in the moment:
success,
status,
movements,
leaders,
money,
attention,
approval,
fear,
identity,
belonging.

For a while, it looks massive and permanent.

But eventually the tide rolls back out.

That is why the line:

“Every promise sounds brand new
Till the tide rolls out and shows the truth”

became important to me.

Because history has shown over and over again how quickly people build certainty around temporary things. Society often treats the newest wave as though it will define everything forever, but time has a way of humbling human confidence.

The waves rise.
The waves crash.
And eventually they fade back into the sea.

One of the deepest realizations I had while writing this song was that the ocean itself never changed. Only the turbulence did.

That became deeply spiritual for me.

Because beneath all the noise of humanity, beneath every cultural moment, every trend, every argument, every movement, every fear, every obsession, there is still something eternal underneath it all.

For me, that points back to God.

The bridge says:

“Watched the world be what it’s always been”

That line captures the feeling I had standing there on the ship. Human beings continue repeating many of the same patterns generation after generation. The names change. The technology changes. The language changes. But people still wrestle with fear, pride, identity, power, belonging, greed, love, faith, and purpose just as they always have.

And yet God remains steady underneath all of it.

Isaiah 40:8 says:

“The grass withers and the flowers fall, but the word of our God endures forever.”

That verse feels deeply connected to this song because everything temporary eventually fades. Trends fade. Crowds fade. Leaders fade. Arguments fade. Even entire civilizations eventually fade.

But truth does not need to chase attention to remain true.

That is why one of my favorite lines in the song became:

“Funny how the calm don’t move
Doesn’t beg or have to prove”

Real truth often does not scream the loudest. It simply remains.

The farther I looked beyond the turbulence behind the ship, the calmer the ocean became. Eventually the white water disappeared completely back into the deep blue beneath it.

And maybe life works similarly.

Maybe beneath all the noise, pressure, fear, trends, and chaos people chase every day, there is still something eternal waiting underneath the surface — something steady that does not rise and fall with every passing wave.

Something that remains… beneath the wake.