But we had to go to church somewhere, so each Sunday Cora and Julielynne and I sat in a pew at Trinity-St. Paul’s United Church, near Bloor and Spadina. At least, Cora and I sat in a pew. More often than not, Julielynne was on her feet, dancing! She and another little girl – they were both about six at the time – they would go the front of the Sanctuary while the rest of us were singing the hymns, and they’d jump and wriggle and do a little two-step and otherwise move mostly in time with the music. Now I didn’t know what to think about this. And on one level it didn’t matter what I thought about it because this was one of the areas in which I was clearly Stepdad and not Dad, and it was best to keep my mouth shut. But as I look back on it now, I guess I had mixed feelings: on the one hand admiring her freedom and her joy and her foot-loose and fancy-free way of praising God; and on the other hand being embarrassed as heck!
It didn’t occur to me that what Julielynne was doing was very biblical. The Psalms were the hymns of the Hebrews, and Psalm 149 invites us to
Sing a new song…
let the children…exult in their Sovereign!
Let them praise God’s name with dancing;
let them sing God’s praise with tambourine and harp!
Dancing while singing hymns? Well, yes! I mean, her Salvation Army mother had often played a tambourine in worship, her stepdad was making his first (of many!) attempt to learn to play the guitar (that’s kind of like a harp) with an eye toward playing it in church, so were did I get off begrudging Julielynne’s desire to praise God by dancing?!
We serious adult types, with our sense of decorum and manners, we have a lot to learn from children. In their free-spirited, unselfconscious way, children demonstrate something of the freedom which God has offered the world in Jesus. “For freedom, Christ has set us free,” Paul says (Galatians 5:1). But sometimes we sure don’t act like it. I mean, when was the last time that you danced in church? Vic Thomson, bless his heart, did a little jig in here one January after announcing that we’d ended the year with a surplus, but other than that, when was the last time that you saw someone dance in church? When was the last time that you let yourself go with a loud, “Amen!?” Or, for that matter, when was the last time that you even spoke freely in a meeting? You know, just kind of let loose with what you really thought about the matter that’s being discussed? Not worrying about whom you might offend or whether or not you’re breaking some unwritten rule about what is or isn’t appropriate in this church; just freely speaking your mind and heart?
For freedom Christ has set us free! For me, dancing is a metaphor for such freedom. The Gospel is an invitation to the dance. You may or may not choose to literally dance in worship, but part of following Jesus is letting your heart dance. The things that are happening around you may be less than ideal, but your heart is dancing; in your heart you’re singing a new song to the Lord.
There weren’t a whole lot of people singing a new song at the base of the Mount of Transfiguration. There wasn’t a whole lot of dancing in that crowd. They were too concerned about the boy who had epilepsy. They were too concerned about the boy’s family, and the burdens they were bearing. The boy hadn’t been healed. It sounds like the disciples had tried to heal him and had failed. You get the impression that while Peter, John and James were up on that mountain watching Jesus get transfigured, the rest of the disciples were in that crowd trying to heal the poor boy. They couldn’t do it. And when they ask Jesus why they couldn’t do it, Jesus says, “It’s because you don’t have enough faith.” Okay. Nothing diplomatic about this dude. But what I hear Jesus saying more explicitly is, “You couldn’t heal him because you couldn’t see the possibility of healing. You were going through the motions of healing, but all you could see was the disease.”
“You couldn’t heal the kid because of your little faith,” Jesus says. It’s like what the Letter to the Hebrews says about faith: It’s “the evidence of things not seen” (Hebrews 11:1). Part of faith is imagining the possibilities that aren’t yet there. If all that you can see is the disease; if you can’t imagine the possibility of healing, then guess what? You’re going to be stuck with the disease. We have to imagine the new possibility and have faith that it really is possible in order to move out of the mess in which you find ourselves.
It’s like when John McDonald came up to bat in the 11th inning on Wednesday night, when the Jays were playing the Twins. Johnny Mac; defensive wizard; lousy hitter. When you’re into extra innings, the score is tied and you’ve got a man on third, Johnny Mac is the last man that you want at the plate. But John McDonald wasn’t thinking about making an out. John MacDonald was imagining the possibility of hitting that ball into the outfield. Which is exactly what he did. The man’s only hitting .211, but he’s got the gall to imagine that he’s going to put that ball in play and win the game.
We’re never going to get anywhere if we’re imprisoned by what is. But when we imagine what might be, then the blind can see and the demon-possessed are set free and the lame can dance into the future.
I love to square dance. I’m not very good at it, but with a patient caller, it’s a lot of fun. You just follow what the caller tells you to do. To follow Jesus is to dance to a tune that hasn’t yet been called. You have to be able to hear not only what is, but what is yet to be. You have to be able to see not only the present reality, but also the future possibility. If all that you can see is the disease, than you’re not likely to step into a healing dance.
Jesus invites us to dance like a little child. Jesus invites us to dance like no one is watching. Jesus invites us to sing a new song, and dance into the future. Amen.
Text: Psalm 149:3
Preached by Bruce D. Ervin
7 September 2008
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