Ponder Anew

We sang a song in church this week. A hymn. You know, one of those old tunes like “Amazing Grace” before Chris Tomlin ruined “Amazing Grace.”

One lyric jumped out as we sang it, and I jotted it down in the pew:

Ponder anew what the Almighty can do.

It can be easy for Christians to believe, almost robotically, that God can do anything — well, anything but sin, of course. That’s what makes God God, right?

So, what does it mean to “ponder anew” what God can do?

I like pondering; it’s one of my categories on this blog. To ponder anew — just as I often ponder anold before bed or on long drives — sounds like a grand time.

But how does one ponder anew the already established notion that an all-powerful God can do — does — all-powerful things?

Growing up in a Christian home (and going to a Christian school and always going to church) has generally been a good thing, a blessed thing, even.

But growing up in so many Christian arenas is also a thing that has its cons, a thing that works against me in many ways.

For one, I’ve never known a life without some knowledge and awareness of God. I’ve never had to “find” him, because he’s always been at every turn. I’ve always been taught that God is omnipotent, omniscient, and omnipresent.

God: the triple Omni. I can’t get away from him, even if I tried. Psalm 139, baby (yes, I memorized that entire psalm in second grade).

On the one hand, I’ve held a clear belief in God from an early age. I’ve never doubted that God, in some context, some entity, some way, somehow, beyond any origin story, is out there, somewhere. Nothing else makes sense.

This particular story of Jesus becoming a man, becoming a bridge to God, connects so many personal dots. The chaos of this world and this life finds order with the coming of this God-Man.

And yet on the other hand, by growing up Christian, I’ve never had to fight for my faith. To slug through the swamps without a light to guide me. To find him waiting at the end of a deep and desperate hole.

I’ve never really had to grapple with the Almighty’s existence or what the Almighty can do — until recently, that is.

I’ve been pondering anew how blessed I am. Not only for my first 12 years growing up in a metaphoric “Eden” but also for the last 30+ with my family and my finances and my health and more. Hearing others’ difficult stories over the years confirms this distinct goodness on my life that I can’t explain.

God has just been good to me and my family.

And yet life catches up to all of us eventually. People die. People leave. Famine falls. And Eden feels further and further away.

In recent years, my beliefs have been challenged not by God’s existence but by “God’s plan,” whatever that is, however much we can see it or hear it or know it or prepare for it, whether I like what’s happening around me or not.

My 32-year-old self has had to trust this same God from second grade, the one I’ve always trusted, the one who’s blessed me abundantly, the one who gives and takes away, who supposedly works out all things for his good when this feels anything but good.

Often, I’ve failed in this trust; it’s a grappling like never before grappled.

I suppose I am still learning what it means to ponder anew what the Almighty can do. I know what I want him to do. I believe He is able — at least, I think I do.

But what if he doesn’t do what I know he can do? What if he wants to do something else? Can I somehow rest in this?

Why is it so hard to relinquish control and just rest in God’s plan?

I go to Scripture and read about burning bushes and shining lights on the road and calling voices in the night, and certainly God has the ability to step into a story and change a person’s path forever.

He has the ability to do. I’ve pondered and I’ve pondered, and I believe it with all my heart, heavy though it’s grown.

To ponder anew what the Almighty can do?

I feel like I know it already.

Now how I long for the Almighty to do.