The Holy Dance

I know Christmas is over, but I can’t stop thinking about it. What I love most of all about Christmas is the anticipation of celebration, rest, good food, and generosity (to friends, family and even strangers, esp. in lines at the mall). Yet for me this year, Christmas was a return to something I think I had forgotten (or at the very least, something I have ignored for a while).

This Christmas was a big Christmas because it was the first time our two year old daughter, Lydia would be cognizant of all the spectacle that is Christmas for kids. I must say, that I was anxious about how Lydia would react to all of the gifts Santa, and her extended family, would give her this year. Would she be demanding? Would she be overwhelmed? In the end, I was surprised about how the gifts really weren’t the main thing that caught her attention. It was her cousins that she most delighted in, and it was her cousins that most delighted in her!

My brother has 4 kids (believe me I am going somewhere with this) ages 12, 10, 8, and 6. -- three girls and one boy. For some strange reason, they have decided to love her with all their kid might. Each one of them vying with each other to play with her and her toys on Christmas day, not their own. They all wanted to get in on the action of playing with my daughter. I don’t really know why exactly. They just did, and they were giddy about it.

When they turned on the music and began to dance around together, I saw a glimpse of joy in my daughter’s face that I have never seen before. As they danced in a circle holding hands, my daughter’s face came into view. It was full, a smile from ear to ear leaving no tooth hidden, and her throat projected her childlike giggles across the room. As she looked up at the other kids’ faces all delighting in her, it hit me. This is Christmas joy! God coming to earth to dance and delight with his creation!

The shear joy and delight of Christ’s eyes meeting my own has been something hidden from my view of late. I guess I have been too preoccupied and worried about other things that seemed important at the time. However, this new year, I find myself praying to have the courage to join hands with the Father, Son, and Holy Spirit – to join their dance - so that the core of my relationship with God is not book knowledge, but one of mutual delight and joy.

My mind’s eye imagines that it was with this kind of joy that Zechariah sung his song after John was born. He sang:

“Praise be to the Lord, the God of Israel,
because he has come and has redeemed his people.

He has raised up a horn of salvation for us
in the house of his servant David

(as he said through his holy prophets of long ago),
salvation from our enemies
and from the hand of all who hate us—
to show mercy to our fathers
and to remember his holy covenant,
the oath he swore to our father Abraham:
to rescue us from the hand of our enemies,
and to enable us to serve him without fear
in holiness and righteousness before him all our days.

(Luke 1:68-75, NIV)

Pray with me that we as a young adult community will join this holy dance in ’07.