"In Him We Live And Move And Have Our Being"

I don’t stop often enough to ponder that I’m able to ponder my own existence.

Isn’t it a wonder that God not only gave us life and movement—but an inner sense of our own being? It’s sort of circular; our God-given sense of being is what makes pondering it possible.

It is no small feat to create something that lives, and moves. But this state of being, this awareness-of-our-awareness-of our existence—the fact that I am musing over it this very moment—is something I can’t get over.

In God, I live. Only God can create life out of nothing. Billions of cells, each one having all the complexities of a small city. Nerve endings sending billions of signals back to the brain, feeding back real-time messages of heat and cold and bitter and sweet. That’s impressive enough. But lilacs live. Labradors live. Stink bugs live. My being alive, though wondrous, is not so peculiar.

In God, I move. God could have made me a stationary soul. But no. Bones, muscles, ligaments and tendons all work in concert to perform macro and micro movements—many of them without me knowing it. But wheat fields undulate in the wind. Dunes shift. Planets spin in strictly-ordered orbits. Tides rise and recede in cadence with lunar phases. Rhythms of movement are happening all around us in predictable patterns. My moving, though wondrous, is not so peculiar.

In God, I have my being. God has graciously given me the mental capacity to ponder a situation, to contemplate a thing—to meditate on the substance of things hoped for, the evidence of things not seen.

I am reminded of it when I sing of His grace, and tears come to my eyes. When I pet a dog, and feel my pulse slow. When I hear a violin concerto, and the hair stands up on the back of my neck. When I smell fresh-baked bread, and my mouth waters. When I see a sunset over the ocean, and feel so small. When I ache with the physical pain that accompanies loss.

As a human being created in God’s image, it would be a gross understatement for me to say that much has been given in the gift of being. My life and my movements are dwarfed by my God-given sense of being, which He has planted in me to ponder Him anew, and respond by “singing and making melody with all my being” (Psalm 108:1).