Sermon: David's Dance (2 Samuel 6), Jul 15, 2018

David’s Dance

2 Samuel 6:15, 12-19

Last Wednesday morning, I was driving down Main Street, while listening to an album I bought from iTunes – it’s called Dirty Computer. Janelle Monae is a queer, black, female musician. I like her music, because she has a message, empowering black women and the black queer community. Driving with the new album can be an experience. I stopped at a red light. Then, song number seven started playing: Jane’s Dream. Interestingly, that audio cue made me remember the dream I woke up from that morning. The scene I remembered: I was on top of the walls of a beautiful, deep canyon. Lorraine Kakegamic, a member of Immanuel, (Keewaywin First Nations member as well) greeted me, introducing a young person. I asked, “Your daughter?” She said, “No, my son.” That moment, an understanding was formed in my heart which I already knew in my head. I remembered: before colonization, First Peoples’ lives were congruent with their creation story in which Two Spirit people were a respected and affirmed peaceful part of the community. The binary gender system in which each individual should be either a boy or a girl, without the option of a third way was one of the things which the colonizers brought in to the First Peoples. However, before colonization, the Creator was deeply embodied in all relations, in all of the creative world, Third ways. As soon as this part of the dream was retrieved, it quickly led me to another dream I dreamed four years ago when my family still lived on Vancouver Island, a few weeks before my family moved to Winnipeg to start our new ministry. In that dream, I was in a big indoor place like a school gymnasium. I saw several groups of four to six people gathered like a family, sitting on the floor, in a circle, here and there. I went to one group of women and men and children. All had long black hair. They said to me they were Confederation, but they were defeated, lost and scattered. One person said that his name is Louis (Pronounced Loo) Riel. (I didn’t know about who he was at that time. After I woke up, I Googled and searched up information about Louis Riel.) What impact did this vivid, strange dream have on me? Since then, even though at first I barely knew about Reconciliation, I felt I was called to do that work. I knew the Spirit of God would connect me to do the work, and I will do something.

In my car, while Jane’s Dream was still playing, the work of the Spirit or the Mystery took place. I felt the presence. That moment, the Creator or the Creator God imparted an understanding (a kind of “embodied” knowledge. It has no content, but like absorption, I absorbed the teaching of no content, but of substantial integration. That kind of knowledge calmed me. My mind and spirit vibrated. I felt I was connected to the presence of the Creator God. For a month, I had been feeling weak and tired, so susceptible to heat. When the new knowledge was imparted, I became whole again; I sensed my body being restored and my spirit rejuvenated. I felt the Creator calling me. I have and will have my part in the work of reconciliation. That is my dream, which makes my spirit dance.

In today’s reading, David had a dream too. That was bringing the Ark of the covenant to Jerusalem. The Ark was an oblong box, overlaid with gold, a thick slab of gold that rested on the top. This was called the “Seat of Mercy,” and YHWH was thought to sit on that gold slab and rule Israel from that position. Over the Ark, attached at either end, were beaten gold figures of combined human-eagle-lion figures, called cherubim.

The Ark had been held in dusty storage in Israel’s western borderlands, almost forgotten for forty years. Then, David brought it out from Abinadab’s household. Our scripture passage this morning didn’t tell us the full story, so here’s the interesting story in the missing verses: 

The Ark was heavy, very heavy. Two sons of Abinadab, Uzzah and Ahio, marched in front, beside the Ark which was loaded onto an oxcart and pulled by two oxen. Then something happened. Perhaps the cart hit a rock and was jolted. The Ark became unsteady and began to fall. So Uzzah reached out and steadied the Ark. Then what happened was YHWH “burst out” against Uzzah, killing him. The violence was a shock to everyone in the crowd, including David. What does it mean for YHWH to burst out against someone? It was a real, horrible scene! The story closes with David’s horrified reaction. He expressed both anger and fear. He halted the procession immediately, named the place, reporting what happened in that name. Is YHWH an aggressive demon? Ready to strike out against anyone? Where’s humanity? Everyone continued the journey home, fearful. 

There is another surprise in store, however. Just when you think you have YHWH figured out, and you warn people “Stay away! Dangerous!” David hears the news that Obed-edom, in whose house the Ark had now been placed, had been “blessed” by YHWH. How did YHWH bless him? (Perhaps with children, a bountiful harvest, or some life events worked out positively.)

I find this interesting: The same object — the Ark — which represents danger to those who had contact with it would also bring blessings to those who stayed with it. It wounds as it heals. 

So David tried again to bring the box into Jerusalem.  The people with David took even greater care this time, and everything went smoothly. 

Now the highlight: The highlight of this story is David dancing. After the initial fear and shock, then the eye-opening surprise of the unexpected blessing of the Ark, he rejoiced. He danced. The Bible says that David was wearing a linen ephod, and he danced with abandon before God — leaping and whirling. It was wild dancing. He danced only in a linen ephod, (removing his royal garment) and what this means is that it was a sensual dance, a display of his body, before even the lowliest women in Israel (v. 20). It was also ecstatic dancing, David falling into a powerful trance in which he experienced directly the presence of God — and later as he aged he often reminisced that it was his greatest moment: on the road, dancing in front of the Ark, among the commoners. 

Verse 5: “David and all the house of Israel were dancing before the LORD with all their might, with songs and lyres and harps and tambourines and castanets and cymbals.” 

Is that all? No, Verse 19 concludes with the Feast. (Like Powwows and the Feast of friends in the First People’s culture.)

“And distributed food among all the people, the whole multitude of Israel, both men and women, to each a cake of bread, a portion of meat, and a cake of raisins. Then all the people went back to their homes.” 

I find that this incredible story and journey of bringing the Ark to Jerusalem can be an analogy of “On the Road to Reconciliation.” Our reactions and responses to the work of reconciliation may be diverse, with various levels of commitment and understanding. And some of us embrace and commit ourselves to Reconciliation, while still feeling the complexity of tension, fear or conflict. Now, in 2018, the 151st anniversary of the birth of Canada, our society in general and we, as United Church people, dream of reconciliation and press ourselves to move towards it, but we don’t dance yet. 

Our body tells us the truth: When we are in a fearful state, we don’t dance. We can’t dance. Only when we move from fear to joy, can we dance. Then, feasting with friends and journeying home together. 

David’s dancing means that the fuel for the journey home and carrying the Ark of the covenant — in my analogy, Reconciliation — is joy, not fear. And this change from fear to joy begins when our heart responds. It is also analogical to going “trans” into the state of love: When we love it, we want it, we desire it, we hope for it. Nothing really happens without love, and true spirituality and true humility deepen us within the realm of love. It is the work of the Spirit and Mystery which changes us and changes the world. It is my hope for the people of the United Church - we should “desire” the work of the Spirit, healing and justice in the world. We should be more concerned about the world, God’s world, than about ourselves, the church and its structure and survival. If we feel that we are losing the United Church we knew in the sixties or seventies, it is not because we are old, but perhaps because we don’t really “desire”, we don’t really dream, dance, risk faith, dare hope for the world as it is now. Dream, fervour, love and anger as the work of love — these dangerous actions as the seeds of blessing — will help us continue our journey home, where we will rejoice and dance before God and the community of the covenant.