Run Forth Dancing!
(Rutgers, April 4, 1999; Easter Sunday, Year A; Holy Communion)
Jeremiah 31:1–6 (OT, p. 816); Matthew 28:1–10 (NT, p. 34)
Christ is risen!
[Christ is risen indeed!]
Christ is risen!
[Christ is risen indeed!]
Easter is the day of our utmost joy,
the day for our most exuberant celebrations!
For in raising Jesus, God has both vanquished death
and offered us all eternal love!
A psalmist of ancient Israel anticipated
the Easter joy that follows Good-Friday despair by saying:
"O Lord my God, I will give thanks to you forever.
You have turned my [lamentation] into dancing;
you have taken off my sackcloth + clothed me with joy…"
(Psalm 30:12b, 11)
Other psalmists—and the prophet Jeremiah, as well—
called upon Israel to offer all-out celebrations of thanksgiving
for God's steadfast love and for God's victory over forces of death.
Said Jeremiah, in this morning's First Lesson, "O virgin Israel!
Again you shall take your tambourines [rattle 1 / slap],
and go forth in the dance of the merrymakers." (Jer. 31:4b)
[rattle 4 / slap]
Said the psalmists, "Sing aloud to God[, who is] our strength;
shout for joy to the God of Jacob.
Raise a song, sound the tambourine…" (Psalm 81:1–2a)
[rattle/slap; rattle/slap; rattle/slap, slap, slap]
[rattle throughout] "…praise [God's] name with dancing,
mak[e] melody … with tambourine [slap] and lyre."
[slap/slap] (Psalm 149:3)
We've all seen children who were just so happy and filled with joy
that the only way they could express it was to hop and twirl
and skip around, singing and clapping.
It happened here last night, right after the Easter vigil
when one of our children went hop, hop, hopping
up and down the center aisle, she was so happy!
Well, the grown-ups of ancient Israel,
like the grown-ups in many parts of the world,
chose to continue their childlike ways and to never stop
dancing and singing and playing the tambourine [rattle 1]
when they felt a joy too big to just talk about.
King David danced with childlike abandon [rattle 2]
and beat his tambourine [f pp f pp f pp ffff]
when he recovered the lost ark of the covenant
and carried it up to Jerusalem (2 Sam. 6:5)—
feeling a joy too big for him to just talk about!
And centuries before that, following God's miraculous
Passover deliverance of Israel from slavery in Egypt,
the prophet Miriam + many other women with her (Exodus 15:20–21)
had danced with their tambourines, [rattle thru] and sung:
[chant] "Sing to the Lord, who's triumphed gloriously…"
[slap]—singing out of a joy too big for them to just talk about!
Well, if God's victory over the Egyptians at the Red Sea was
worthy of dancing and celebration by one Miriam,
then God's victory over death in the raising of Jesus was
certainly worthy of dancing and celebration by two Miriams,
for, you see, "Miriam" was the name in the Hebrew language
of the women we call Mary Magdalene and the other Mary,
the two women who, according to the Gospel of Matthew,
were the first persons to experience the Risen Christ!
What those two "Miriams" had expected to see when they went to
Jesus's tomb that Sunday morning was [Thomas G. Long, Matthew (1997), 322]
"a monument to the sadness they felt in the[ir] soul,
a confirmation of the cruel truth that the world
[will inevitably put] mercy[, tenderness, goodness,] and
righteousness to death."
But what they saw instead was an empty tomb and a messenger
from God, who conveyed to them this message of unexpected hope:
(Matthew 28:5–7) "'Do not be afraid;
I know that you are looking for Jesus who was crucified.
He is not here; for he has been raised, as he said.…
[G]o quickly and tell his disciples,
'He has been raised from the dead,
and indeed he is going ahead of you to Galilee;
there you will see him.'"
In this moment, the two Marys came to understand that (Roberta
Bondi, "Memories of God," in Living Pulpit,, January-March, 1998, p. 36):
"The foundation of the universe for which God made us, to which God draws us,
and in which God keeps us is not death, but joy."
And by the time the women left the tomb
to carry their message of good news to the other disciples,
their fear had been overcome by this "great joy" (28:8).
& I like to imagine that as they ran from the tomb they were skipping
+ hopping + leaping, renewed in a childlike exuberance for life.
As they were running forth dancing, suddenly
Jesus himself, the Risen Christ, was right there with them.
All Christ's goodness and beauty were once again alive
and with the women as an undying presence and as
an unceasing source of joy for his followers—to this day.
Our media have been filled of late
with monstrously tragic news of Good-Friday-like events,
news of unremitting violence + terror, both at home and abroad.
And so it is easy for us, as it was for the two Marys of old,
to approach Easter believing that the principalities and powers
of this world will inevitably put tenderness, goodness,
and righteousness to death.
We, like the Marys, need to hear words of Easter hope;
we, like the Marys, need to have reaffirmed for us the truth that:
"The foundation of the universe for which God made us,
to which God draws us, and in which God keeps us
is not death, but joy."
My own experience of rekindled Easter hope began, oddly enough, Friday evening,
when, amidst Good Friday's mood of mourning and lamentation,
and amidst the ongoing news of fresh crucifixions in Kosovo, I
came across two joy-filled photographs in the New York Times.
They were pictures of contemporary Christian joy,
photographs of a Maundy Thursday Passover service
held by the United Spiritual Church of God,
a Guyanese Christian congregation in Brooklyn.
The members were shown dancing ecstatically
to Caribbean and African rhythms,
beating them out on their tambourines and drums,
like modern-day Miriams,
in celebration of God's victory over Pharaoh.
And if they were dancing like that Thursday night, can you imagine
what [rattle 4] joyful dancing and playing of the tambourines
is going on in that church today[slap] in celebration
of God's victory over death at Jesus's tomb [slap] and
of God's offer to all the world of eternal love! Yes! [slap]
And immediately after seeing those photographs, Margaret and I
happened to watch a video recording of one of last year's PBS Great
Performances broadcasts, about African-American gospel music.
For me, the emotional highpoint of the program came right after
the Reverend Rance Allen of the Pleasant Grove Baptist Church
in Brooklyn extended to the congregation this invitation:
[rattle t]"If you're happy about what the Lord has done for
you, then everybody dance![slap]"—and dance they did,
expressing a joy too big for them to just talk about,
a joy rooted in the hope
that's born of Christ's resurrection,
the one hope that has the power—
as African-Americans know well—
the power to overcome every sorrow in life.
Alas, it is unlikely that dancing will break out here at Rutgers,
for we are, after all, a Presbyterian Church,
a spiritual home and refuge for those of us who belong
to God's frozen people, us grown-ups who've decided
that we'll confine all our childlike expressions of joy
to athletic stadiums and secular dance floors,
and that we'll not bring them to church with us
those childlike expressions of joy.
And, of course, we Presbyterians are not the only Christians
who're suspicious of dancing in church!
Last week I received from a Methodist congregation
a newsletter containing this humorous notice:
"Members of the choir will perform liturgical dance every
Sunday until they raise enough money for new choir robes.
PLEASE give generously."
So I'd never expect the likes of us or of that Methodist congregation
to break out dancing right here in church—
even on Easter Sunday, even on our day of maximum joy.
But I do have this secret hope, that I'm willing to make public—
I hope that when we get home today,
and we're thinking, "Nobody's really watching me"—
I hope we'll let the little kid inside of us,
the little kid that just can't contain her joy—
I hope we'll let that little kid inside of us just bust out.
I hope we'll let ourselves exclaim, at least out loud if not in a shout,
"Christ is risen!" "Christ is risen!" "Christ is risen!"
and then I hope that as we say those words
we'll get up and do a little skip [h–rattle]
and take a little twirl [holding—rattle], and
express the joy of this day that's too big to just talk about,
the joy that this Easter we've heard again
the good news that truly has the power to overcome
all the bad news that we've been hearing.
For "Christ is risen" is a call for us to be
Christ risen in the world and for the world.
My dear family in faith,
Easter is a joy that's much too big to just talk about,
for the good news that Christ is risen is a source of hope
that has the power to overcome all of life's sorrows and tragedies.
As the ancient psalmist said (Psalm 30:12b, 11):
"O Lord my God, I will give thanks [slap] to you forever.
You have turned my [lamentation] into dancing [twirl + tamb];
you have taken off my sackcloth and clothed me with joy…"
[rattle 4]
On this Easter Day, Christ's goodness and beauty are once again alive
and with us as an undying presence + an unceasing source of joy.
This is a day to feel exuberant about what God has done for us—
raising Jesus from the dead and offering us all eternal love.
So let's let ourselves go.
And as we leave this morning,
let's run forth into the world dancing!
For—Christ is risen!
[Christ is risen indeed!}
Alleluia! rattles and a final thump Yes!
Let us pray:
Faithful God, take away from us all doubt, and renew our faith in the resurrection of Jesus Christ. And grant us such joy and hope in Christ's resurrection that we shall run forth dancing—to share the good news and to be God's love in the world. Amen.
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