Those
of you who were here in church last week heard about my problematic experience
taking ballroom dance lessons with Joe under the tutelage of a young Russian
dance instructor named Zergai. This
week, picking up on that same dance theme, I want to tell you about the beginner
tai chi class I once enrolled in. And I
have to admit, that experience was also problematic.
Tai
chi is a Chinese martial art practiced both for self-defense and for its health
benefits. It is reputed to be wonderful
for one’s balance and marvelous in gently reducing stress. In addition, I think it is so like
dancing. Its movements are slow and
controlled and almost balletic.
I
first saw someone doing tai chi decades ago in Golden Gate Park in San
Francisco the summer I worked as a hospital chaplain at the Pacific Medical
Center. Ever since then, a piece of me had
wanted to try moving in that same slow motion, meditative way.
And
so, all these years later, I signed up for a beginners’ class with about thirty
other men and women of various sizes and shapes at the Taoist Tai Chi Society
in Bridgton.
Each week, we stood in four equal lines
with an experienced tai chi student assigned to each of the four corners. In that set pattern, we began to learn the
first form, which is a series of what are supposed to be simple movements, each
one flowing into the next. We learned to
hold our ball of “chi” (which is Chinese for “energy”) and move it carefully
around.
In
a way, it reminded me of the flour babies that, when our children at least were
about to reach puberty, they had to carry around for a week as part of the school-required
sex education curriculum. The flour babies were five-pound bags of enriched
flour that, for seven days every fifth grader - male and female - had to care
for – 24/7.
The
experience was an interactive, hands-on way to help these impressionable
students understand what it would be like to be a teenage mother or
father. You see, you had to carry the
flour baby and know where it was at all times.
You had to take time out to feed it, change it, and comfort it at set
intervals throughout the day and night.
And heaven forbid if you dropped your flour baby, and it broke!
But
I digress! Holding your ball of chi
struck me as being along the same lines.
What would happen if you missed a step and dropped it?
Now,
after a couple of weeks in the class, I realized that the number of people who
continued to come had decreased considerably.
And it was not long afterward that I learned two things. First, similar to my experience with ballroom
dancing, this was not exactly a beginners’ class. In fact, I discovered that I was the only one
of the twelve or fifteen people left who had never held a ball of chi before that
first session. Everyone remaining in the
class had been doing tai chi for a while and had returned to the rank beginner
class to refine their moves.
Second,
I learned that when a group of people is practicing tai chi, the primary goal
is for the whole group to move together.
Everyone’s ball of chi was supposed to be rising and falling amidst the
slow balletic moves at the same time and in the same rhythm. The whole point of the practice was to move
together in complete unity of body and spirit.
The whole point of the practice was to move as one.
And
if you missed a step, or held your ball of chi aloft when everyone else was
holding theirs down low, or you were simply a little slower to pick up on the
next part of the form, you ruined the practice for everyone. In short, you stuck out like a sore thumb –
and quite possibly had gotten tangled up with someone when you went left and
the class went right.
` I
found that tai chi under these circumstances did more to increase my stress
level than to alleviate it.
Needless-to-say, I have left tai chi behind. I do yoga now – which also
helps with balance, is quiet and meditative, is more of a solitary venture, and
is way less stressful.
There
are times, of course (very important, even critical times), when we are called
to move together, to dance as one. Jesus intuitively understood that necessity
when, according to the Gospel writer of John, he prayed a final pastoral prayer
the evening before his execution, shortly before sharing a last supper with his
disciples in that upper room we keep hearing about in the Holy City of
Jerusalem. Since the Gospel writer was not an eyewitness to that scene
(after all, he wrote his narrative many dozens of years later), he records what
he thinks Jesus might have prayed. The result is a lengthy, many verses long
prayer in the typical lofty and sometimes convoluted language and syntax that
characterizes this Gospel.
Lutheran
pastor David Lose described the scene this way.
“It’s Thursday evening, the night on which Jesus will be betrayed,
handed over to his enemies, deserted by his friends, tried, convicted, and
ultimately crucified. And knowing all that is to come, he gathers his closest
friends, offers them parting words of encouragement and hope, and then prays for
them.
He prays that
they may endure the challenges that come their way. He prays that they may
discover strength in their unity. He prays that they will be drawn together as
one as Jesus and the heavenly Father are one. And then he prays not only for them,
but for all for who will believe in Jesus because of their testimony.”
Three times in
the verses that we read Jesus prays for unity.
On the basis of that evidence alone, surely we can say that dancing as
one – all our moves engaging us in a common rhythm and taking us in one
direction - is essential to Jesus, the one we have chosen to follow. Another way to look at it would be that last words of advice
are the ones you need to take to heart. Last prayers are most certainly not to
be taken lightly.
And what is it
that Jesus says? “That they may all be
one”, that they may all dance together in the rhythm that has pulsed through
the universe since the very beginning of time. That being said, I cannot help wondering: What
would Jesus think if he were to walk into our world today after such a
heartfelt prayer that was also a passionate challenge to his disciples – and so
to us as his 21st century disciples as well?
After
all, we live in a world fraught with division and discord. We live in a world
characterized by distrust with nations holding one another at arms’ length – unable
to agree on trade policies and sanctions.
One blogger I read wrote this:
“We live in a day and age that is characterized by division. Division
seems to mark every area of society. Increasing divorce rates, ongoing racial
issues, and widening political gaps are just a few examples that speak to the
divisiveness of our culture.” It is like the observation of a rabbi who
said that a town with
two Jews would need three synagogues: The one I go to; the one you go to; and
the one neither one of us would be caught dead in.
UCC pastor Ron
Buford acknowledges that the same dynamic has always been true for Christians –
in ancient times and now. He writes,
“People in Jesus' day were as divided about Jesus' prophecy as we are
today...mosques or no mosques; synagogues or no synagogues; churches or no
churches; gay marriage or no gay marriage; ways to worship, receive communion,
or baptize. And yet, we act (he observes) as if God, knowledge, or love itself
is something we can own, limit, control, or divide.”
And
yet, as the blogger I read this week observed, “In
the midst of all of this division, the church has a real opportunity to show
the world a better way. In a world that is marked by disunity, the people of
God need to be united. We need to tangibly demonstrate the transforming power
of the gospel by living as one.”
The motto of our denomination, the
United Church of Christ, affirms that need:
“That they may all be one." It is a
phrase, of course, that is drawn directly from our Scripture reading this
morning. As a denomination, we go on to say that we are a united and
uniting church: "In essentials–unity,
in nonessentials–diversity, in all things–charity," These UCC mottos
survive because they touch core values deep within us.
A
second-grade teacher gave an assignment to her class. Students were to bring an
item that represented their religious background. She wanted to teach the children
about diversity in the world and the many ways of worshiping God.
At show and
tell time, they began to share what their particular item meant to their faith.
A Catholic child brought some rosary
beads and shared how they were used in prayer. A Native American child who
brought a dream catcher and told the class how it would capture her dreams at
night, filtering out the bad ones and holding on to the good dreams. A Jewish
child brought a candle and shared how it was used to celebrate Hanukkah. And one
little boy pulled some food out of his bag. He said, "I'm Southern
Baptist, and I brought a chicken casserole."
Those are the
non-essentials (the forms and structures of piety). In the UCC we celebrate those non-essentials
and the diversity they represent.
We are not meant to point fingers and dictate what is right
or wrong, good or bad, proper or improper when it comes to the non-essentials
aspects of religion.
However, the
essentials are different. I believe we are
called – Christian and non-Christian alike – to strive for unity. I believe we are called to dance as one, and
the dance that we are called to dance is the dance of love.
“To fall in love is
to fall in rhythm.” Thank you Mickey
Hart of the Grateful Dead for that brilliant observation. Though the United Church of Christ has neither a rigid formulation of
doctrine nor an attachment to hierarchical structures, its overarching creed is
one word – love. The United Church of Christ is a big umbrella, welcoming all
people on their spiritual journeys.
Why? Because love and unity in
the midst of our diversity is our greatest asset as a UCC Church.
Love and unity
in the midst of our diversity: We will
need to remember those words in the coming months here in our church. Perhaps you remember that you decided at our
Annual Meeting to form a team that would help all of us do some hard thinking
about who we are as a church and where we are going. Its task would be to help us dream together about our future. Who knows where all this visioning will lead
us? However, I foresee two things
occurring.
First, not all
of us will agree on what ought to characterize us as a church - from what
worship might look like to what role we should play in our community. But those
are the non-essentials. When it comes to them, we will undoubtedly have a
variety of perspectives but, remember, that is a good thing. Diversity is something to be cherished and
respected in a denomination – and in a church - like ours.
Second, I trust
that all of us will agree on the essentials – and the most important essential of
all, which is love. “In all things – charity” - as our UCC motto
proclaims. I pray that we will choose
to dance the dance of love as one – like a tai chi class moving in unison with
beautiful and balletic moves, each person cradling their chi, their
energy. I pray that we will fall into
the rhythm of this most important dance – the dance of love - unified. I pray that, even in the mist of our
diversity, we will dance as one.
The dance of
love: That must be the dance of the
church. And what does love look like? A
new UCC Banner announces it: Be the
church (the banner reads). Protect the
environment. Care for the poor. Forgive often. Reject racism. Fight for the powerless. Share earthly and spiritual resources. Embrace diversity. Love God.
Enjoy this life.
Exactly how we
do that, exactly what the dance steps will look like for our particular church
and whether everyone sitting here today will decide to dance with us in unity: Those
are the questions that each one of will in time need to answer.
"In
essentials–unity, in nonessentials–diversity, in all things–charity," Will
we dare to dance again as a church? Will
we dare to dance a dance of love – whatever it may look like and wherever it
may lead? As your pastor, I pray that we
will! Let’s dare to dance again!
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