Some Reflections on God being ‘Almighty’
As I noted this previous Sunday, I intended to say something about God being ‘almighty’ but didn’t have the time. So here are some of my thoughts.
From here we transition to momentarily consider what is means for God to be called ‘Almighty.’ For some this word suggests abuses of authority. Perhaps it has resonances of feudal lordship and unjust assertion of power. But like I said on Sunday, we need to reverse our thinking. Nicholas Lash writes, “Unlike, other judges, God judges justly; unlike other shepherds, God brings back the strayed, binds up the crippled, and strengthens the weak; unlike other fathers,God acts like the father in the misnamed parable of the prodigal son.” This is the case of God being almighty.
It might be best to consider Almighty in the context of what comes next in the baptismal covenant, namely that God is creator. In this word ‘‘Almighty” we are given the sense that God is all powerful without constraint. It is important that we first notice the unimaginable power of God the Father. But by placing this term in the context of God’s creative act we can also see it as a statement of God’s love and freedom, of surrender. Catholic priest and theologian Hans Urs Von Balthazar writes, “this almightiness can be none other than that of a surrender which is limited by nothing.” It is on ‘surrender’ that I would like to focus here. God the Father—and as I have noted Sunday, Mother—represents God’s relationship to God, but it is only in a subordinate sense that God should be called ‘creator’ and in relationship with creation. “Creator” never represents God's relationship to God, but solely God's relationship to creatures. God is Father by nature and creator by choice.” From this incredible power, comes God’s self-surrendering love in creation. This is the essence of freedom, that God, who is bound by absolutely nothing chooses to create. Again, Balthazar notes, it is “the origin of all freedom—once again, not in the sense of doing as one chooses, but in that of superior self-possession of the love which surrenders itself.” A surrender that we also see in the Jesus’ act of humility in the incarnation and crucifixion. The world does not exist because of necessity, but by choice. Existence itself is a gift from an almighty God.