I hope you dance

 

Read 1 Corinthians 12

As is often the case, we need to go back one chapter to find the antecedent of what Paul discusses here. Differences are part of who we are—in fact essential to seeing who has what gift or ability or need—but those differences need not lead to divisions (11:17-19). They should bring us together.

One God

One Spirit

One Body

One Accord

One God manifested in every iota of creation.

One Spirit manifested inside of us, all around us, hovering over a formless earth.

One Body and many parts all essential to the full functioning of the body.

One Accord from all of our differences we push forward without division.

The One God has given us One Spirit from whom we receive many gifts that are to be used to produce fruit for the body and bring glory to God.

We are all gifted differently but all made to live in one accord.

 None of us are the whole. We really can’t even be an island unto ourselves. We are all connected, but we are not always in one accord.

I will take a little license with Paul’s explanation.

Foot: What’s going on in the control center? Why am I slamming on the brakes? I was just feeling the road.

Eye: There are flashing lights behind us.

Foot:  You didn’t see them?

Eye: Obviously not, did you?

Foot:  Nice. Why do we keep you around?

Eye: We all put it to a vote.

Foot:  And?

Eye: The Ayes (Eyes) have it!

Foot: Don’t give up your day job.

Eye: The guy with the flashing lights is still there. There’s a spot. I’m pulling over.

Bladder: Good. I will always take a stop.

Sometimes, it seems that one part of our body does not know what others are doing, but those other parts are not dispensable. One part is not to be idolized. No matter what taxonomy we place on the parts of the body, all have a valuable part in the overall design and functioning.

I can live without an arm but not without a heart, but still, the heart can’t say to the arm, I don’t need you. We can live without you.

We need to quit triaging our bodies and think about it working at full capacity.  That’s the essence of the analogy.

How can one part not know what the others are doing?

I just finished the Evasive Dring Course at Bill Scott Raceway near Winchester, Virginia and was headed towards Washington, D.C. The last thing our instructors told us before we left that Friday afternoon was watch your speed.

Yeah, sure, ok.

Somewhere on the outskirts of the capital city, I think near Dulles Airport, I glanced at my speedometer in my Volkswagen Golf and it was over 120 ad maybe 140.My eyes came of the dash and scanned for any extra pretty lights.

Whew! Dodged a bullet there.

Yes, I backed off the accelerator a few seconds later. Why wait a few seconds?

C’mon. I was already right at 140. Why not see what this finely tuned German lawnmower engine will do? Should I go on sinning so that grace could abound even more?

I didn’t. It wasn’t really the discretion over valor thing. It was Mr. Practical showed up unannounced im my mind and reminded me:

·       It’s not like I carried a backup motor with me for long trips in case I blow up one along the way.

·       I was certain that a speeding ticket for doing twice the speed limit wasn’t going to be my budget.

The rest of that drive at only 10 or 15 miles over the speed limit—still driving by grace—was boring. OK, I might have tried 120 again in an open stretch.

What does any of this have to do with the body?  I was driving along as if the week before had been like the past dozen, but it wasn’t. I had grown accustomed to driving at very high speeds. This drive on the interstate seemed like any other drive, other than the unusually high number of people putzing along.

My mind, my thoughts, my awareness had no idea that my foot was having the time of its life.

When I need to pass a car on a state road and need to make it happen quickly, I know exactly what my foot is doing.  On that entry ramp to the interstate, I want to feel the accelerator. My eye can’t do that.

The ramp sign may say 55 but I know I need to do 35 and let the traffic pass or 95 and I need to feel the response now.

But on that summer day a few weeks before I was headed to big sandbox, life was normal for most of me, and really good for my foot closing in on warp speed.

Our bodies are designed to work as a unit. That doesn’t always happen.

Our diversity when used for the common good can give us uncommon results.

Our diversity, when used for its own purposes, debilitates the body.

Let’s do this again.

One God

One Spirit

One Body

One Accord

It is not our differences that matter as much as that we use them for the common good—for the body if you will. To do that, we need to be in one accord.

How can we ever do this with so many body parts or gifts?

By the same Spirt that manifested those gifts in you.

It’s more connection.

It’s more koinonia.

You all get extra points this month for enduring another Greek word. This one is perichoresis. You can find some fancy definitions to go with that one, but I took them all and am going with Divine Dance.

The Father, Son, and Spirit are God manifested to us in three entities—three persons. They are different but never divided. They dance in harmony.

The One Spirit has manifested in us many different gifts but they are to be used in harmony. Paul’s example was the human body, but we have this divine example of Father, Son, and Spirit. In a similar vein, we can also look at the divine Jesus and human Jesus existing in harmony. We don’t dig into that much, and today, I think the divine dance of the trinity will suffice.

Differences do not require division among us. Diversity can take us farther than uniformity if the cause is common to and good for all, or in our case brings glory to God.

 The message of this chapter is not the hierarchy of apostles and teachers or nursery workers.

It’s harmony.

It’s accord.

It’s oneness in our differences.

Our model is a divine dance.  We have been asked to dance by God himself. To join this holy Trio of Father, Son, and Spirit as they do things God’s way and never look back.

It’s sounds great, and I’m sure we will get there some day, but did anyone remember that we are still living in these human bodies with sinful tendencies and would surely muck up any dance we were invited to attend.

I used the Movie Scent of a Woman as an analogy to frame our struggles in life. It was in a First Light service not too long ago. I will use it again to call us to embrace the divine dance to which we are invited.

The movie had Al Pacino and Chris O’Donnell as the lead characters.

Pacino played retired U.S. Army Lt. Col Frank Slade. He was blind. He had seen combat, but his blindness came at the hands of his stupidity, not the NVA. Slade also has no filter. You see why I liked the movie.

But Frank kept pressing on. He was living his life with the occasional depressed mood and even suicidal tendencies, but he didn’t quit.

Chris O’Donnell was to accompany Al Pacino during a school break. O’Donnell’s family lived on the West Coast and the school was a prestigious East Coast Academy.

So, we have a temporary mentor who is struggling and a kid with a problem. The school dean is trying to manipulate O’Donnell. I won’t ruin it for you if you haven’t seen it.

Pacino takes O’Donnell to a fancy club with a dance floor. He asks him to describe the dimensions and layout of the floor. Then Pacino asks a lady to dance, and he is an exceptional dancer. The dance was the tango.

She never realized Pacino was blind until O’Donnell helped him find his seat at their table after the dance.

O’Donnell is amazed but has to ask. What happens if you get tangled up? I love the response.

If you get Tangled up, Tango on.

Tangled up, Tango on!

You keep going, trusting, believing, and living. If you get tangled up, just tango on. Our miscues, mismanaged motivations, melodrama, melancholy moods, and other states of our being that don’t align with my alliteration have already been accounted for by God when he asked us to dance.

The Father, Son, and Spirit hold a divine dance daily—each different and unique but completely in sync with one another.

We as many parts of one body, as people with various gifts, as creatures all made in the image and likeness of the one true God but different in many ways are invited to this divine dance.

It starts—whatever our gifts, talents, and roles we have been given--by us getting in step with the Spirit that lives within us.

We can know harmony.

We can live in accord with one another.

We can embrace our various differences in a common purpose.

And God has already factored in how many left feet we have,

One God

One Spirit

One Body

One Accord

That’s the dance card. Don’t sit this one out.

 

Amen.