Lord of the Dance

These last four or five decades have been a perplexing and trying time for our nation. We saw floods, droughts. We’ve even had a plague of locusts or two! We survived divisive wars, and more wars, unprecedented national scandals, social unrest, widespread disillusionment with our governmental institutions, legislative gridlock, multiple diplomatic and military crises, more scandals, inflation, recession, stagflation, the two worst stock-market crashes since 1929; then, more recession, more scandals, more unemployment. We saw floods, tsunamis, earthquakes, tornados, hurricanes and more hurricanes.

And although the Cold War has ended, terrorism and the ecological crises have balanced that one plus out. But now, things are different.  In this last decade, we’re enjoying a period of unprecedented prosperity-- for any family with two and a half incomes.

In the light of all that, it might seem preposterous for me to preach about joy before the Lord. But I continue to believe that what this world of ours needs most desperately to hear is the capital "G" Good News-- the Gospel of Jesus Christ.

Not because the Good News in and of itself has some sort of magical, mystical power to heal a hurting world.  But because people infused with hope and joy and the love of Christ that comes from hearing and encountering the Good News, do have within themselves the power to set about redeeming this blood-soaked, tear- stained planet--this broken Creation.

This of course was what was so unique and so wonderful about the earliest church-- that they were filled to overflowing with transforming love from God's Holy Spirit. They lived in the world-- not with the stance of fighters, or missionaries, or reformers-- but rather as dancers.  They danced to a new tune-- a tune of freedom, a tune of joy, of new life, of community, of Shalom. Luke tells us in Acts 2 that:

"They met constantly to hear the apostles teach, to share the common life, to break bread, and to pray. A sense of awe was everywhere, and many marvels and signs were brought about through the apostles. All those faith had brought together held everything in common: they would sell their property and possessions and make a general distribution as the need of each required."

It was wishful thinking.  It was an impractical, irresponsible way to live. It was crazy. It was in a word, foolish-- folly. Paul wrote to the Church at Corinth,

"Divine folly is wiser than the wisdom of men and women, and Divine weakness is stronger than any human strength."

It was precisely that sort of folly that enabled the earliest church to turn over the world of their time. It was the same sort of foolishness that conquered and transformed the mightiest empire ever known.  Even after Christianity grew respectable and "practical", even after the church herself became a power to be reckoned with in the world, even after church leaders ceased to be merely pastors and began to be bureaucrats and princes, that sort of foolishness never totally died.

We contemporary Christians somehow seem to have lost that radical spirit of divine foolishness.  Some churches try to capture it with lights and mood and music, but it’s kind of like drinking powdered milk—it’s not too bad—unless you’ve had the real thing.  We main-line Protestants seem to feel that the only appropriate way of living in the world is with sober-sided moderation, never letting our feelings show, never giving our emotions an outlet, never enjoying a spontaneous moment.

(Joke: “I’ve got the Spirit!)

When it comes to expressing joy or delight in a service of Worship-- we seem to think it blasphemous! We act more like children of those straight-laced puritans who drove John Wesley and his enthusiastic followers out of the churches and into the fields, than we act like children of Wesley!  At a previous church, I can recall a serious debate on whether applause was an appropriate congregational response to a children's anthem! Have we forgotten the words of Psalm 100?

"Clap your hands all ye people"

That's what we so often seem to be missing-- both in our lives and in our worship. We are missing a spirit of spontaneous gladness before our God.  We are missing that experience of deep and sometimes surprising joy that comes from within in authentic response to the experience of Divine, to one another, to life itself. It is a spirit that celebrates our very existence on this planet as a holy gift. It is the spirit of King David in this morning's Old Testament Reading.

After conquering the supposedly unconquerable stronghold of Jerusalem, David made it his capital. He renamed it the city of David. Then he decided to give his victory the final stamp of Divine approval by moving the Ark of the Covenant there. The Ark, as we all know, (courtesy of Steven Spielberg), was considered by the Hebrew people to contain the actual, living presence of Yahweh, the Sovereign God of Hosts.

David had the Ark loaded into a custom-made cart and made a regular circus parade out of the trip. According to Scripture, they had horns, harps, cymbals, psalm-singing and sacrifices along the route.  Not to mention David himself, high-stepping it, right out in front like Mayor Daley parading down State Street on St. Paddy's Day.

When he finally got the Ark to Jerusalem, David had a big tent set up to keep out the weather, had refreshments passed around, and just so no one would forget who was picking up the tab, did the lion's share of the praying,  probably sang a couple of solos and personally took up the collection afterwards. So far, a cynic might say that David hadn't done anything a good public relations expert wouldn't advise.

But David's next move was something else again. The King shucked his royal robes and stripped down to a brief linen apron like the priests wore over their vestments for sacrifices.  Then, with his army and the whole town looking on, including his high-toned wife Princess Michal-- David did a dance.

Who knows? Maybe it began as a political  ploy.  If it did, it sure didn't end that way. David surrendered himself to his deepest emotions-- to feelings he may well have never known were within him. With drums beating and trumpets blaring, David danced the tango of God and Humanity.  The young King cut loose.

Just him and his God, dancing and spinning, whirling around the Ark in passion together. David and Yahweh, catching fire in the dance-- a fire so bright, a Dance so passionate that even his snooty wife's attempt to bawl him out later could not dim the fire of it.

"Some King! Out there in the street dancing practically naked in front of every low class maid and street girl in town. You really gave them an eyeful, mister! Some king! Some royal dignity! Don't you have any sense of propriety? Any sense of shame? I'll tell you one thing! You wouldn't have caught my father doing something like that! And he was twice the king you are, pal.....yadda, yadda, yadda.."

But David was nonplused.

 

"In GOD's presence I'll dance all I want! God chose me over your father and the rest of our family and made me ruler  over GOD's people, over Israel. Oh yes, I'll dance to GOD's glory -more recklessly even than this. And as far as I'm concerned . . . I'll gladly look like a fool . .”

The point of the story is more than the spiritual insensitivity of Michal to true worship of God. Michal was not a bad woman. She stood by David during his feud with her father, King Saul. Once, she even saved David from being murdered by some of her father's bully boys.  But judging from this story, she wouldn't have recognized a genuine spiritual experience if it came up and bit her on the nose.

How sad she was. More to the point, how sad we are, who are too often in the same boat with Michal. To her, David had just been exposing the royal derriere as a cheap publicity stunt.  Michal didn't get the point. But somehow or other, the inhabitants of Jerusalem did. 

David had feet of clay-- just like the rest of us. He could be self-serving, deceitful, vain, and lustful-- even more so than the rest of us.  But on the basis of that dance and that dance alone, we can see why Israel lost her heart to David.  And we can see why Jerusalem never forgot David. A thousand years later, when a carpenter came riding into Jerusalem on a flea-bitten donkey, they hailed him as the son of David.

David understood. Yahweh our God is not only Lord of Work, but also Lord of the Dance, of Celebration, of Joy.  David no doubt knew that he could not have danced before the Ark without the efforts of his army in winning the victory, without the whole history of the Prophets and Patriarchs and Judges who had kept the faith of Israel alive before his time.  However-- and this is the other half of the equation-- once the victory was won, it was right and proper, indeed it was necessary for him to strip down and dance for joy before the Ark of his God.

There is much for all of us to do in this world.  Not only do we have families to support and a church to maintain, but also a Gospel to spread and a broken world to heal. What is important about our work is not simply that it gets done, but which work we choose to do, why we do it, who we touch as we do it, what it means to us, and how we fit it into the context of the rest of our lives. To put it simply, it is important to know how the work that you and I do in this world  contributes to the coming of Christ's New Jerusalem.

It is painfully apparent that as a people, we are over-worked and under-celebrated.  The pollsters tell us that we are working more hours on average then the generations before us.  The scale of the substance abuse problem in our nation says clearly that we have lost the capacity for genuine, spontaneous enjoyment-- without the crutch of chemicals.  Truly we have forgotten how to dance. Jimmy Buffett writes in one of his songs,

Overkill, Overkill

Such a megla modern problematic ill

Climb too fast and shove too hard

You'll be pushin' up the daisies in the old bone yard.

About  fifteen years ago, I saw a pastor walk to his seat for the afternoon session of the last day of Annual Conference, and drop stone cold dead from a heart attack-- less than a hundred feet from the Bishop-- literally just a few minutes after he had retired.  Truly we have forgotten how to dance.

There is a passion we have lost. There is a genuine passion buried in the deepest recesses of our being-- a joy found in true faith in God, encountered in honest effort for the heavenly Realm that we seem to have misplaced. There is a compelling sense of the sacredness of life that calls us to celebrate. That’s what genuine worship is really all about. There is a gladness experienced in true gratitude for all of the gifts that God has given us that cannot be experienced in any other context.

It's the passion David felt as he danced. It's the spiritual ecstasy that the saints knew. It's the happiness, the deep-down satisfaction that comes from having worked hard and well for God, and then in knowing God's pleasure in our efforts. There is a joy in being truly known and accepted and loved by our Maker

that cannot be expressed in words alone. It's a feeling that calls us to strive, that calls us to dance.  It is the genuine encounter between God and humanity. It is the experience of the holy.

That experience, that joy, that dance, is compelling in its power. It is unmistakable when we behold it in others. For those who experience it, it is disturbing, unsettling, uncomfortable and awesome.  It calls us out of the comfortable ruts of who we are and throws us up onto the heights of who we might yet become-- for God. It drags us out into the world-- daring us to remake the world-- for Christ's sake.  It thrusts us out of the house and into the church, and then out of the church and into the street-- dancing with and in the Spirit, all of the time.

With David and with the early church, with the apostles and martyrs, with the ancient Israelites, with Francis and Luther, with the Wesleys and George Fox, with Dorothy Day and Dr. King and Archbishop Tutu-- with all the saints-- ancient and modern-- Protestant and Catholic and Orthodox-- you and I are called to dance. It is a dance of love, a dance of joy, a dance of community. Above all it is a dance of transformation.

For this dance can transform us, and transform our world.  It may well be the only thing that can truly change our world and ourselves for the better.  The Lord of the Dance beckons-- inviting us—yearning for us to join in.  The orchestra has been playing for thousands of years, waiting for us-- for you and for me in particular-- to begin.  Shall we dance?

Let us pray.

Lord Christ, you call us to the Dance of Faith. Help us to hear the music, and not be afraid to follow where you lead us.        Amen.