20 Bible Verses About the Beach

Genesis 1:9-10

“And God said, ‘Let the waters under the heavens be gathered together into one place, and let the dry land appear.’ And it was so. God called the dry land Earth, and the waters that were gathered together he called Seas. And God saw that it was good.”

Reflection: The creation account gives the separation of sea and dry land its own command: the waters are gathered “into one place” so that dry land can appear. God names both, Earth and Seas, and calls the arrangement good. The chapter counts this as the third day (Genesis 1:13), and plants grow on the new land in the verses that follow.

Job 38:8, 11

“Or who shut in the sea with doors when it burst out from the womb… and said, ‘Thus far shall you come, and no farther, and here shall your proud waves be stayed’?”

Reflection: God answers Job “out of the whirlwind” (Job 38:1) with a string of questions Job cannot answer. In verses 8 to 11 the sea is pictured as a newborn bursting from the womb, with clouds for its garment and thick darkness for its swaddling band, and God as the one who set its limits. The line spoken to the waves, “Thus far shall you come, and no farther,” describes the shoreline as a command.

Jeremiah 5:22

“‘Do you not fear me?’ declares the LORD. ‘Do you not tremble before me? I placed the sand as the boundary for the sea, a perpetual barrier that it cannot pass.’”

Reflection: The Lord is speaking to a people he calls “foolish and senseless” (Jeremiah 5:21). The sand holds the sea back: “though the waves toss, they cannot prevail; though they roar, they cannot pass over it.” The next verse makes the contrast: “But this people has a stubborn and rebellious heart; they have turned aside and gone away.”

Psalm 95:5

“The sea is his, for he made it, and his hands formed the dry land.”

Reflection: Psalm 95 lists what belongs to God from one extreme to the other: the depths of the earth and the heights of the mountains (verse 4), then the sea and the dry land. Ownership rests on making: “The sea is his, for he made it.” The psalm then turns to worship, “let us kneel before the LORD, our Maker!” (Psalm 95:6).

Psalm 89:9

“You rule the raging of the sea; when its waves rise, you still them.”

Reflection: The line is addressed to God, in a psalm that asks “who is mighty as you are, O LORD?” (Psalm 89:8). Ruling the sea is set beside victory over enemies: the next verse says, “You crushed Rahab like a carcass; you scattered your enemies with your mighty arm.” Rising waves are named as one of the things that answer to him.

Mark 4:39

“And he awoke and rebuked the wind and said to the sea, ‘Peace! Be still!’ And the wind ceased, and there was a great calm.”

Reflection: The day began with Jesus teaching from a boat while “the whole crowd was beside the sea on the land” (Mark 4:1). That evening he crossed the lake, slept through a windstorm with the boat filling, and was woken by disciples asking, “do you not care that we are perishing?” After the calm, they ask one another, “Who then is this, that even the wind and the sea obey him?” (Mark 4:41).

Genesis 22:17

“I will surely bless you, and I will surely multiply your offspring as the stars of heaven and as the sand that is on the seashore.”

Reflection: The angel of the Lord speaks to Abraham a second time, after Abraham has not withheld Isaac (Genesis 22:16). God swears “by myself” and uses two pictures of what cannot be counted, the stars of heaven and the sand on the seashore. The promise goes on to say that in Abraham’s offspring “shall all the nations of the earth be blessed” (Genesis 22:18).

Hebrews 11:12

“Therefore from one man, and him as good as dead, were born descendants as many as the stars of heaven and as many as the innumerable grains of sand by the seashore.”

Reflection: Hebrews retells the promise to Abraham in its list of people who acted by faith, using the same stars and sand. The preceding verse credits Sarah, who “received power to conceive, even when she was past the age, since she considered him faithful who had promised” (Hebrews 11:11). The “one man, and him as good as dead” is Abraham.

Isaiah 10:22

“For though your people Israel be as the sand of the sea, only a remnant of them will return.”

Reflection: Isaiah turns the sand promise around. Israel may be “as the sand of the sea,” yet only a remnant will return, and the verse before names where they return: “A remnant will return, the remnant of Jacob, to the mighty God” (Isaiah 10:21). Paul quotes this verse in Romans 9:27: “Though the number of the sons of Israel be as the sand of the sea, only a remnant of them will be saved.”

1 Kings 4:29

“And God gave Solomon wisdom and understanding beyond measure, and breadth of mind like the sand on the seashore.”

Reflection: Here the sand measures breadth of mind, not people. The verses that follow say Solomon’s wisdom surpassed “all the people of the east and all the wisdom of Egypt,” and name wise men he outdid, among them Ethan the Ezrahite and Heman (1 Kings 4:30-31). The wisdom is described as God’s gift, “beyond measure.”

Psalm 139:17-18

“How precious to me are your thoughts, O God! How vast is the sum of them! If I would count them, they are more than the sand. I awake, and I am still with you.”

Reflection: Addressed to God, these lines come from a psalm about being known and unable to get away. Earlier the psalmist says that even “the uttermost parts of the sea” would not put him out of God’s reach (Psalm 139:9-10). Here he tries to count God’s thoughts, finds them “more than the sand,” and closes with “I awake, and I am still with you.”

Matthew 7:26-27

“And everyone who hears these words of mine and does not do them will be like a foolish man who built his house on the sand. And the rain fell, and the floods came, and the winds blew and beat against that house, and it fell, and great was the fall of it.”

Reflection: The two builders close a long block of Jesus’ teaching in Matthew 5 to 7. The storm is the same for both builders: rain, floods and wind strike the house on the rock (Matthew 7:25) and the house on the sand alike. Jesus likens the one who hears “these words of mine” and does them to the builder on the rock, and the one who hears and does not do them to the builder on the sand.

Matthew 4:18-19

“While walking by the Sea of Galilee, he saw two brothers, Simon (who is called Peter) and Andrew his brother, casting a net into the sea, for they were fishermen. And he said to them, ‘Follow me, and I will make you fishers of men.’”

Reflection: Simon and Andrew are working when Jesus finds them, casting a net into the sea. The call borrows their trade: “I will make you fishers of men.” They leave their nets “immediately” (Matthew 4:20), and going on from there Jesus calls James and John, who leave their boat and their father Zebedee in the same way (Matthew 4:21-22).

Matthew 13:2

“And great crowds gathered about him, so that he got into a boat and sat down. And the whole crowd stood on the beach.”

Reflection: So many people came that Jesus got into a boat and sat down in it to teach, while the crowd stood on the beach. Mark 4:1 describes the same arrangement. What he taught from there were parables, starting with “A sower went out to sow” (Matthew 13:3). Later in the same chapter the kingdom of heaven is compared to a net full of fish that men “drew ashore” and sorted, keeping the good and throwing away the bad (Matthew 13:47-48).

John 21:4

“Just as day was breaking, Jesus stood on the shore; yet the disciples did not know that it was Jesus.”

Reflection: Seven disciples, Peter among them, have fished all night by the Sea of Tiberias and caught nothing (John 21:2-3). At daybreak an unrecognized man on the shore tells them where to cast the net, and the catch is too heavy to haul in. The disciple whom Jesus loved says, “It is the Lord!” and Peter throws himself into the sea (John 21:7).

John 21:11

“So Simon Peter went aboard and hauled the net ashore, full of large fish, 153 of them. And although there were so many, the net was not torn.”

Reflection: When the disciples land, they find “a charcoal fire in place, with fish laid out on it, and bread” (John 21:9). Jesus still asks for some of the fish they caught, and Peter drags the net ashore with its 153 large fish, the net unbroken. Then comes the invitation, “Come and have breakfast” (John 21:12). John counts this as the third time Jesus was revealed to the disciples after he was raised (John 21:14).

Acts 21:5

“When our days there were ended, we departed and went on our journey, and they all, with wives and children, accompanied us until we were outside the city. And kneeling down on the beach, we prayed”

Reflection: Paul’s ship had put in at Tyre to unload cargo, and he stayed seven days with the disciples there, who “through the Spirit” were telling him not to go on to Jerusalem (Acts 21:3-4). When he left anyway, all the disciples, wives and children included, walked him out of the city. They knelt on the beach, prayed and said farewell before he boarded (Acts 21:6).

Acts 27:43-44

“…the centurion, wishing to save Paul, kept them from carrying out their plan. He ordered those who could swim to jump overboard first and make for the land, and the rest on planks or on pieces of the ship. And so it was that all were brought safely to land.”

Reflection: At daybreak the crew of Paul’s ship saw “a bay with a beach” and tried to run the ship onto it, but struck a reef, and the surf began breaking up the stern (Acts 27:39-41). The soldiers planned to kill the prisoners so that none could swim away, and the centurion stopped them to save Paul. Swimmers and non-swimmers on planks all reached land, which turned out to be the island of Malta (Acts 28:1).

Micah 7:19

“He will again have compassion on us; he will tread our iniquities underfoot. You will cast all our sins into the depths of the sea.”

Reflection: The last three verses of Micah begin with the question “Who is a God like you, pardoning iniquity and passing over transgression?” (Micah 7:18). Verse 19 looks ahead: God will tread sins underfoot and will cast them into the depths of the sea. The book then ends on the promise of “steadfast love to Abraham, as you have sworn to our fathers from the days of old” (Micah 7:20), the same Abraham promised offspring like the sand.

Revelation 21:1

“Then I saw a new heaven and a new earth, for the first heaven and the first earth had passed away, and the sea was no more.”

Reflection: In John’s vision the sea is listed with the first heaven and the first earth as something that has passed away. Earlier in Revelation the sea is where a beast rises (Revelation 13:1) and where the dead are given up for judgment (Revelation 20:13). Three verses on, the same words “no more” are used of death, mourning, crying and pain (Revelation 21:4).