Recently we took a trip that might have been one of my families last where the four of us share a hotel room (yes, my kids have grown up). This has always been a treasure for me, but my timing does not match the rest of the family. I am an early riser; it’s what I do. I read, pray, study; it is my time of fellowship with God. This time was a little different. I was reading a chapter in Tim Keller’s “The Reason for God” called The Dance of God.
In this chapter, Keller describes the Christian life and in it he beautifully describes what it is to glorify. He tells us to glorify is to praise, enjoy and delight in something. He tells us to glorify is to defer and to sacrifice your own interest to devote yourself making the other happy. Your ultimate joy is their joy. He goes on to say that this process “creates a dynamic, pulsating dance of joy and love.” An amazing rhythm…
I read somewhere that Hebrew tradition tells us that dance functioned as a process of prayer and praise, as an outward expression of rejoicing, and as a way of reconciling God and His people. We can see this image in scripture as we know from Exodus 15:2; The LORD is my strength and my song; he has become my salvation. He is my God, and I will praise him, my father's God, and I will exalt him. In Psalm 149:3 we see; Let them praise his name with dancing and make music to him with tambourine and harp.
As I sat in my hotel room reading about this, thinking about this, with the three people I love most in this world soundly sleeping; I suddenly felt an overwhelming peace, a beauty, a joy that I can’t adequately describe. I sat in silence with only the light for my book. I could hear the joyful rhythm of my three girls breathing as they slept. I felt tears well up in my eyes and I thanked God for allowing me this dance. Simply divine.
Grace and Peace!
1 comment:
Grace alert!
Paul tells us in Romans 1:20; "For since the creation of the world God's invisible qualities—his eternal power and divine nature—have been clearly seen, being understood from what has been made, so that men are without excuse." At the risk of abusing the cliché, on few occasions do we remember to stop and smell the roses. We’re truly in rare form then, when we’re grateful for having flowers in the first place, acknowledging who put them there. In the spirit of that acute awareness, a man’s proximity to the Father is perhaps closest when he silently reflects on his own role as a father and the love for his children; in silent awe of how much he’s been blessed, thanking Him for making such privileged moments possible. The “invisible quality” of pure, powerful, indescribable gratitude is doubtless a gift of grace, clearly “seen” and understood in precious moments as family life plays out its joyful rhythm.
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