"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.¹

There is an ancient and intriguing text in the early Christian tradition that reads, "[Whoever] does not dance does not know what happens."² Most of us would not naturally assume that dance has much to do with faith. Indeed, some of the more Puritanical branches of the church have considered dance a wile of the devil, as much to be shunned as liquor and promiscuity, and dangerously close to both.

There are few references in Scripture to dance, although we are given a daring glimpse of King David dancing naked in the streets after one victory, and we recall Miriam dancing in celebration of God's mighty defeat of the Egyptian army at the Red Sea. The psalms make reference to praising God "with tambourine and dance" (Psalms 149, 150). Then, of course, there is Herodias' daughter whose dance so pleased Herod that he finally conceded the head of John the Baptist (thus proving the seductive dangers of dance).

There are several prominent metaphors of God's relationship with us in the Bible: the true shepherd of the flock (Ezek. 34), the faithful husband of a wayward wife (Hos. 2), the owner of a vineyard gone wild (Isa. 5:1-7). Yet a single overarching theme is woven into these metaphors, succinctly expressed in Jeremiah's prophecy of a new covenant with Israel:

I will put my law within them, and I will write it on their hearts; and I will be their God, and they shall be my people. No longer shall they teach one another, or say to each other, 'Know the Lord,' for they shall all know me, from the least of them to the greatest, says the Lord. (Jer. 31:32-34a, emphasis added)

This passage says a great deal about who God is to us, for us, and with us. One way to plumb the richness of such a familiar passage is to look at its substance through a new lens. The lens I am proposing is to view God as our dominant dance partner. The image is not original to me, but its power is beginning to emerge with freshness in my imagination. I believe it can instruct us in our lives as Christians and in our role as church leaders.

Letting God Lead

At our recent Pathways-Weavings Retreat (October 2001, Nashville, Tennessee), author Wendy M. Wright suggested that contemplative awareness is like being the non-dominant partner in a dance. It is far from a passive role. To be the non-leading dance partner, she noted, requires tremendous alertness, responsiveness, and spontaneity. Reflecting on this image from my limited experience of paired dancing, I remembered that you must learn the feel of your leading partner, anticipating your response to every guiding movement. When dance partners have been together a long time, the non-dominant partner will yield gracefully to the slightest pressure of the leading partner, knowing just what is required to make the movement together smooth, purposeful, and beautiful.

Imagine living this way with God! Of course, most paired dancers learn specific steps to a dance and know them in advance of performance. The great adventure of dancing with God is that we don't know the movements in advance. We can't "learn" this dance before performance. We can only learn how to be a responsive dance partner and let the dance unfold as we perform it. It occurs to me that God does not determine precisely how the dance will unfold because this depends significantly on our free response. God adapts the guiding steps, improvising to accommodate our awkward and erratic partnership.

Like all improvisation, however, depth structures make possible the exercise of fluid creativity. God knows the deep structure — the ultimate purpose, direction, and form of the dance. It is exquisitely beautiful and endlessly varied, because it takes into account the uniqueness of each human being created in the divine image. God delights to dance with each of us in a different way through the days and years of our lives.

We, of course, add our own variations. Sometimes we stop dancing altogether and try to hide from our partner. Sometimes we refuse to dance, even when God is beckoning with marvelous inviting movements all around us. Often our steps are out of rhythm or off-balance as we stumble around like clumsy children. Then there is the "resistant partner" routine where we agree reluctantly to dance, but manage only tiny, tight steps and stiff resistance to the more adventurous, sweeping movements of the choreography.

God is a very patient leading partner and a consummate teacher, if we will be led and taught. The One who made us knows our deep ambivalence and anxiety, our grasping desire for dominance and our despairing passivity. The One who knows and loves us keeps drawing us out of our narrow rooms, our constricting categories. One of these categories says, "Dominance and passivity are polar opposites. If you are not dominant, you are passively dominated." God says, "Learn to be active without being dominant. Reorder your mind and heart so they are at ease with my reign." To be non-dominant and non-passive is an unfamiliar posture, a paradox transcending our norms. Yet living in this paradox allows God to be our God and us to be God's people. (contined on page 2)

The Rev. Marjorie Thompson, M.Div., is an ordained minister in the Presbyterian Church USA and Director of the Pathway Center for Spiritual Leadership, Nashville, Tennessee.