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'Passionate For God'
Read : 2 Samuel 6: 1-5, 12b-19; St Mark 6: 14-29; Ephesians 1: 3-14 (NIV)
'David danced before the Lord with all his might.' (2 Samuel 6: 14)
'On the idle hill of summer,
sleepy with the flow of streams,
far I hear the steady drummer
drumming like a noise in dreams.'
'The Shropshire Lad' 35 A E Houseman
As I was thinking of this sermon during these recent glorious summer days, I fancied I heard 'drumming like a noise in dreams' - not the drumming of the steady drummer in Houseman's 'The Shropshire Lad', but the drumming from the celebrations when David brought the Ark of God back to Jerusalem where it belonged. The Ark had been carried off by the Philistines generations earlier, but David had defeated the Philistines and recaptured the Ark, and now he was bringing it home.
The Ark was the most sacred possession of the Hebrews. It was a rectangular wooden box, 45 inches by 27 inches by 27 inches, and with the passage of time it became ever more venerated, symbolising as it did the presence of the living God, for the God who 'dwelt in the high and holy place' was also present at the ark in the midst of his people.
It may have contained the two tablets of the law given by Moses, and possibly also Aaron's rod that budded and a golden urn holding manna. They overlaid it with gold, both inside and outside, and carried it about on two poles, also overlaid with gold. It was carried by the sons of Levi on the forty years' wandering through the wilderness; borne over the Jordan river when the Israelites entered the Promised Land; captured by the Philistines; and now re-homed by David in Jerusalem.
When he held a feast of dedication and carried the Ark into the shrine he had prepared for it, the religious procession was enlivened with tambourines and castanets. The rhythm of these drum-like instruments got under David's skin, and he danced with all his might, to the glory of God and to the scandal of his lady wife, Michal. For he was wearing only a linen ephod, a garment seemingly even scantier than the cutty sark in Burns's 'Tam o' Shanter', and Michal was disgusted and outraged. David, however, was not a bit embarrassed, either by his dancing or by his wife's angry response to it. For he was dancing his religion.
There are two things you can do when you have an overwhelming sense of the presence of God: you can either bow in silence, or you can dance in ecstasy. David was ecstatic in God's presence. He danced for joy, indecently to his wife's eyes, but there was no mistaking that he was thoroughly passionate about God, and the only fitting way to express his passion on that occasion was to dance it.
Now I'm not suggesting you should leap out of your seats and start dancing - chance would be a fine thing, but what an interesting sight that would be! But I am suggesting that we should be passionate about God. There are, of course, many ways to be passionate and joyful. We can encounter God either with a shout or in silence, either with movement or in meditation. But in whatever way, should we not jump for joy, spiritually or physically, in response to God's grace? We heard St Paul telling the Christians in Ephesus that they should 'live for the praise of God's glory'. How can you 'live for the praise of God's glory' without being passionate about God and finding a way to express your passion?
David's dancing way of expressing his passion is not all that surprising. After all, many faiths permit, and indeed require, dancing. You only have to think of the Dancing Dervishes, for example, or of the Indians of America, or of the indigenous people of the West Indies, to see just how natural and instinctive it is for people to dance their religion. And indeed, if the art of the catacombs is anything to go by, the early Christians embraced the idea of dancing their religion.
On the walls of the catacombs they depicted Christ as Orpheus, 'the fabulous musician whose music none could resist, who danced the fawns out of the forest and the firs down from the hills.' ('Said Or Sung' Austin Farrar The Faith Press 1960 p. 185) Did they see themselves as following the irresistible music of Christ, their Orpheus, no matter where it led, even if it led them to the amphitheatre and to martyrdom? Perhaps for them the lyre of Orpheus had become the compelling drum of Christ, and they were happy to be his partners in the dance.
Our situation is not so dramatic as theirs was, but the dance still goes on. Jesus is still dancing, and he is looking for dancing partners. Could it be that we could partner him with something of the spirit suggested in the verse of these hymns?
''Jesus Christ is dancing,
dancing in the streets,
where each sign of hatred
he, with love, defeats',
Listen, Lord Jesus,
I should triumph too:
where good conquers evil
let me dance with you.'
John l Bell and Graham Maule in 'The Church Hymnary: Fourth Edition' 2005 No. 360
'Dance, then, wherever you may be;
I am the Lord of the dance, said he,
and I'll lead you all, wherever you may be,
and I'll lead you all in the dance said he.'
Sydney Bertram Carter in 'The Church Hymnary: Fourth Edition' 2005 No. 404
| Rev Charles Robertson, July 2018 |
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