Dancing in the Heart of Love

Psalm 24
7th Sunday in Pentecost
Plymouth Congregational Church, UCC
The Rev. Jane Anne Ferguson
 
If you noticed that the hymn we just sang is one we sing in Advent you are very perceptive! And have a great memory! It is also an adaptation of our scripture for today, Psalm 24. Listen now to the psalm from the Common English translation of the Bible. I have made a few tweaks for inclusive language.
 
Psalm 24
The earth is the LORD's and everything in it, the world and its inhabitants too.
2 Because God is the one who established it on the seas; God set it firmly on the waters.
3 Who can ascend the [Holy One's] mountain? Who can stand in [God’s] holy sanctuary?
4 Only the one with clean hands and a pure heart;
the one who hasn't made false promises, the one who hasn't sworn dishonestly.
5 That kind of person receives blessings from the [Holy One] and righteousness from the God who saves.
6 And that's how things are with the generation that seeks the [Holy One] --
that seeks the face of Jacob's God.
7 Mighty gates: lift up your heads! Ancient doors: rise up high!
So the glorious [ruler] can enter!
8 Who is this glorious [ruler]? The LORD--strong and powerful!
The LORD--powerful in battle!
9 Mighty gates: lift up your heads! Ancient doors: rise up high!
So the glorious [ruler] can enter!
10 Who is this glorious [ruler]?
The [Holy One] of heavenly forces—this One is the glorious ruler! [Forever!] (Selah)
- Common English Bible with Apocrypha - eBook [ePub] (Kindle Locations 20131-20139).
 
The earth belongs to the God the Creator! The triumphant beginning of this ancient song was most likely sung antiphonally in festival worship. You can hear all the call and response lines…..Who can ascend the Holy One’s sacred mountain?....The one with clean hands and a pure heart….Lift up your heads, mighty gates! ….Ancient doors, rise up! Who is the king/ruler of glory? …. It is God, strong and mighty! This was – is ­– a majestic hymn parts of which were handed down from pre-exilic days in Israel when there was a temple with mighty gates to approach. And parts of which came from post-exilic days when the people had heard so much from the prophets about how clean and humble hearts, integrity in action following God’s ways of justice, were much more important than burnt offerings in a temple that has been destroyed by conquerors.

The psalm also reminds me of the story in 2 Samuel of King David bringing the Ark of the Covenant back to Jerusalem from Judah after he and the forces of Israel soundly defeated the Philistines through the power and instruction of God. If you remember the Ark was the portable residence of God which also held the Torah given to Moses. It traveled with the people of Israel wherever they went. The story goes that the Ark was put with great ceremony and care in an ox cart and taken from town to town before it was given permanent residence in Jerusalem, the City of David the King.  Along the way, David led the procession, literally dancing in great abandon, before the Ark of the Covenant, accompanied by a great crowd of musicians on zithers and harps and tambourines and cymbals. Not a stately, kingly thing to do, perhaps. But a joyous, devoted, “wear your heart on your sleeve” celebration of your faith kind of thing to do. A celebration of the God who has appointed you the ruler and brought you victoriously through great battles kind of thing. When the procession reaches Jerusalem, it seems that David’s wife, Saul’s daughter, Michal, looks out the palace window and sees her husband dancing with abandon before the ark and she is scandalized! Not the way a king should behave! One translation says, “she lost all respect for him.” Another say, “she despised him in her heart.” Too much, too showy! Too religious?

Have you ever felt like Michal? Something was too showy or too “religious” for you? Kind of embarrassing? Or perhaps, you find yourself not quite owning up to being a Christian as the source of your social justice passion when you are with other progressives because Christianity has such a bad reputation from extreme far right Christians. Perhaps you are afraid someone will say, “You’re not a Christian, are you?” Or perhaps you confess, “yes, I am, but not THAT kind of Christian.” “Well, what kind? And why?” Then you feel tongue-tied. You are not alone….Pulitzer Prize winning columnist, Connie Schultz, who writes for USA TODAY, is married to Ohio Senator Sherrod Brown, and is part of our UCC family, wrote in a recent column, “My faith continues to be a source of challenge and comfort, but I find myself defending it more these days when in the company of fellow progressives. This is an understandable development in our country, perhaps, but sometimes it puts me in a mood.”[i]

I have experienced this mood. Have you? Part anger, part embarrassment, frustration! My faith is a comfort and a challenge. I want to wear it on my sleeve and experience its deepest mysteries, its high and lows, and be ready to speak about it in any situation, to even express my joy and relief in its comfort to the point of dancing if the situation calls for it. Bodily expression of faith such as King David expressed was never really part of the faith tradition I was grew up in, though we were constantly challenged to verbally share our faith, “to witness.” This always felt a bit awkward because I thought it was about sharing something intellectually doctrinal that I didn’t think I could articulate. I usually just chose to be nice to my friends and invite them to church if it seemed right. But inviting someone to church in the 60’s and early 70’s in the Bible belt was not particularly scandalous. Now we are being called, as Schultz comments, to speak our faith in interfaith settings, in our families that hold views of Christianity across the spectrum from left to right and to use our bodies and our words to demonstrate for justice. If you are ever uncomfortable, you are in good company.

When I read Psalm 24 over and over again this week, I was struck by the psalmist’s pure bodily joy in the goodness of God and creation, by the deep bodily longing to get right with God in heart and action in order to stand in ultimate trust before the Divine, by the giant, humongous amount of joy in welcoming God, the glorious ruler and maker of all the earth and the cosmos into the presence of the people in worship. And I longed to have my faith renewed to experience these things. It is easy to be beaten down by life to the point that worship is lackluster and just kind of washes over us as we go through the motions. Or to feel constrained in sharing our faith because of the ways Christianity has been falsely used to oppress others. Thank goodness that in times like these, when we do not have the energy to muster up a dance, even in our hearts, when we feel our silenced by our fears of being misunderstood, God receives us with open arms, anyway! Thank goodness…because it is only though continuing to intentionally show up time and again in God’s presence in good seasons and tough seasons, that we have the opportunity to be surprised once again by faith that encompasses our whole beings, body, mind, heart and soul.

This is the invitation of Psalm 24. To show up with our whole being, not just our heads, but our hearts, our arms, our legs, our voices, our eyes and ears, our gut instincts in the presence of the Holy. We show up for the sheer joy of being alive, of just being. Of “oneing” with God as the 13th century mystic, Julian of Norwich wrote. Julian was a prophet before her time testifying to “a true oneing between the divine and the human. She writes that when human nature was created, it was “rightfully one-ed with the creator, who is Essential Nature …that is, God. This is why there is absolutely nothing separating the Divine soul from the Human soul…in endless love we are held and made whole. In endless love we are led and protected and will never be lost.”[ii]

Julian’s entire life from childhood until her death was encompassed by the Black Death pandemic of the Middle Ages. She lost her family to the plague. She knew suffering and “saw a great oneing between Christ and us” because of he knew pain as we do.[iii] We are one-ed with God in joy and in suffering, held in love. I agree with her. And her insights illuminate the invitation of Psalm 24 to invite God so deeply into our beings that we are transformed, made clean, forgiven and can dance -  in body or soul or both – for joy. Psalm 24 invites us to show up again and again to wear our faith scandalously on our sleeves for the world to see just as King David before us, just as our contemporary UCC sister, Connie Schultz.

I want to end with another hearing the psalm again from the book, Psalms for Praying, by Nan Merrill, whose interpretation of the psalms helps us to hear beyond the ancient language of kings and winning battles to how the Spirit works in our interior lives.

Psalm 24
The earth is yours, O Giver of Life,
            in all its fulness and glory,
            the world and all those who
                        dwell therein;
For You have founded it upon
                        the seas,
            and established it upon the rivers.
 
Who shall ascend your hill,
                        O Gracious One?
            and who shall stand in your
                        holy place?
All who have clean hands and
                        pure hearts,
            who do not lift up their souls
                        to what is false,
            nor make vows deceitfully.
All those will be blessed by the
                        Heart of Love,
            and renewed through forgiveness.
Such is the promise to those
            who seek Love’s face.
 
Lift up your heads, O gates!
            and be lifted up,
                        O ancient doors!
that the Compassionate One
                        may come in.
Who is the Compassionate One?
            The Beloved, strong and steadfast,
            the Beloved, firm and sure!
Lift up your heads, O gates!
            and be lifted up,
                        O ancient doors!
            that the Compassionate One
                        may come in!
Who is this compassionate One?
            The Beloved Heart of your heart,
                        Life of your life,
            this is the Compassionate One.[iv]

Truly, it is God’s intention that we are “one-ed” in Love. That we share the joy and justice of this “one-ing” with all whom we encounter, from those most intimate with us to those we may only brush by in acquaintance.  Are you ready to share your faith, even in the tough situations? Are you ready to sing it? Are you ready to dance for joy? Amen.

©The Reverend Jane Anne Ferguson, 2021 and beyond. May be reprinted with permission only.

[i] Tweet from @Connie Schultz; her full article can be found at usatoday.com.
[ii] Julian of Norwich, Wisdom in a Time of Pandemic and Beyond, Matthew Fox, (iUniverse:  Bloomington, IN, 2020, 62).
[iii] Ibid.
[iv] “Psalm 24,” Psalms for Praying; An Invitation to Wholeness, Nan Merrill, (Continuum:  NY, NY, 1998, 41-42).

Author

Associate Minister Jane Anne Ferguson is a writer, storyteller, and contributor to Feasting on the Word, a popular biblical commentary. Learn more about Jane Anne here.