103-year-old faithfully plays her part in ministry

Catherine Ponder sits a table at her home in Walnut Ridge. (Mary Alford/ABN)

WALNUT RIDGE, Ark. – “Loving God! Loving People!”  

Those words can be found on the worn, wooden hanging sign of the Old Walnut Ridge Baptist Church. And they are words that well describe Catherine Ponder, 103, a longtime member and piano player of the church.   

Ponder accepted the Lord into her heart when she was 12 years old. It was also around that time she began learning to play piano. She and some of the other girls at the church would take turns playing hymns and singing them during Sunday school and worship.   

A couple of the first hymns she learned to play were “Jesus Loves Me” and “Victory in Jesus.”   

Over the years, Ponder has continued to play the piano regularly at Old Walnut Ridge Baptist Church, spanning a period of 90 years except for a few gaps for illness and during World War II.   

Ponder moved to Honolulu with her husband, Willis Miles Ponder Jr., who served in the U.S. Navy, in May 1941.  

Ponder and her then two-month-old son were at home in Honolulu, about six miles away from the naval base in Pearl Harbor, when the bombing took place on Dec. 7, 1941.   

At first, she thought what she was hearing that morning was practice firing. A few minutes after it started, however, the radio announced Pearl Harbor was being attacked by the Japanese.   

“I saw the planes fly over, I guess it was the second wind of the bombing, and we decided they were the enemy planes,” she said. “We knew there were ships in the harbor that were sinking and all that explosion in Pearl Harbor was just deafening.”   

Following the attack, Ponder said they could not have any lights on at night, and she worried over how she would take care of her baby in the dark.   

“But you learn a lot when you have to,” she said.   

Her husband was not on base during the attack. In late November of 1941, he had boarded the USS Pensacola and was bound for the Philippines. Japan launched an attack on the Philippines on Dec. 8, 1941, just 10 hours after their attack on Pearl Harbor.   

“A week he’d been out at sea. They had time to get to the Philippines,” she said. Ponder thought the Japanese had captured his ship until she received his first letter. His ship had been warned and diverted course from the Philippines to Australia.   

“God took care of them,” she said.   

Ponder spent a year in Hawaii before returning home to Walnut Ridge in May 1942.   

Once she made it back home, her professional and personal life was dedicated to playing and teaching others the art of playing the piano. She taught piano for 35 years and often used hymns for learning material. Several of her students went on to play in their churches.   

“I think it was a mission that I had all along from the Lord to do this,” Ponder said. “I feel happy about the outcome of my work, teaching piano.”   

Ponder and her husband were married 74 years. He passed away in April 2015. They had five children, four boys and one girl.   

Ponder celebrated her 103^rd birthday in November. When asked how her faith has impacted her over the years, she said, “It’s been there with me.”   

Old Walnut Ridge Baptist Church was organized in 1882. Ponder’s family has been involved with the church since its inception. The land it currently sits on at 18 Lawrence 405 in Walnut Ridge was donated by her great grandmother, Nancy Cathryn Austin. A few of the original wooden pews still sit in the back of the sanctuary. The current pastor is Dennis Truxler.