Pondering Is Not a Waste of Time

Last updated on: December 6, 2015 at 12:20 pm by John Mark N. Reynolds

Pondering Is Not a Waste of Time 2015-12-06T12:20:51-04:00 John Mark N. Reynolds

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We ponder Christmas.

Following the historic events of the first Christmas: Mary treasured up all these things, pondering them in her heart.

I would have been tempted to run out and shout everything I had seen and what I thought it meant. Mary, who said “yes” to God, treasured the events and pondered them. Americans cannot even let forty-eight hours pass before we wish to understand and endlessly discuss even the most complex event.

Mary waited until an ancient historian approached her and then was able to put the entire Christmas story into the framework of Jesus life and the life of the early Church. There are events I will not share in social media, things too private for public consumption . . . at least yet. Bad events usually should be shared. . . they encourage prayers and keep me accountable. Failures should be as public as can be and successes as private as possible.

We should post our prayer requests and not so much our prizes.

What happens to the good things we see God doing in our life and the lives of those around us? What if we see Jesus being born in our midst? Mary’s example is to “treasure” this goodness. There are memories I treasure from my childhood and only now begin to understand, because I have called them forth over time. It is true that memory can become distorted, and for historical records this matters. That’s why Luke used many sources. Recollection also can contextualize an event. The tragic break up in seventh grade makes better sense in the context of my life than it would have done even two years later. It loomed too large in my emotional life.

This is even more true of powerful good events. Only now am I understanding what happened to me at my baptism and the standing outside with God after that event. Perhaps it is better to say only now do I feel ready to seriously ponder! Maybe someday I will be able to share what happened that day, but for now I do not yet understand.

I treasure the memory and God slowly polishes the moment, removing the tarnish of this present age.

“Pondering” is even less fashionable, even in academic circles. There is a horrid demand to “publish or perish” at the very earliest stages of one’s career. This might be good for scientists or those in mathematics where a certain kind of genius can decay. Perhaps poets need to write quickly. When it comes to human things, give me the mature theater of Shakespeare’s The Tempest over his fumbling (though brilliant!) Henry VI Part I. Perhaps he should have pondered Blessed Joan of Arc in his heart before turning her into a witch!

To ponder is to place the whole of our reason over time on an idea. We think, we pray, we live out what we think we see and modify our idea. We give this great good idea or experience the best we have. If we are as wise, intellectually brilliant, and virtuous as Mary, the final product of our pondering would create a holiday, a holy merriment, that has spread to every corner of the world.

An old hymn says it best: ponder anew what the Almighty can do. Good God . . . if we think of you for a lifetime, what might you give us to say?

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