The older I get, the more I lose things. I leave a file on that ridiculous garbage heap I call my desk, and two minutes later it has buried itself three layers down. I set my keys on the table to free my hands for something else, and when I turn my back, those keys take flight. It’s amazing. I am getting to the age where it is all too easy for me to lose things.
In the immortal words of Dan Quayle, “It’s a terrible thing to have a mind to lose.” Or something like that!
But that’s all right. I am not complaining. Do you know why? Can you guess why I really rather like losing things? Because losing things provides me with an opportunity to find things! When I lose something, eventually I will find it, and I get the joy of finding what was lost. When you find what was lost, there is something to celebrate, and that makes up for the anxiety of loss!
Back in December I went to the Post Office and bought a roll of a hundred stamps. I came home, went about my business, and lost sight of those stamps. Well, it came time to send out Christmas cards, and I couldn’t find them. In fact, I wasn’t actually sure I had bought any stamps. I thought I remembered it, but I couldn’t be sure. So, needing stamps, I trekked over to the Post Office and bought a hundred more. That was that, until, just about two weeks ago I was getting my winter clothes ready for the cleaners, and in the pocket of one of my jackets, a roll of a hundred stamps! I rejoiced! It was like finding $33.00 on the street. It was like a gift I hadn’t expected. It was a reassurance that I was not completely crazy! I rejoiced! Something that was lost was now found, and that’s worth celebrating.
Incidentally, would you like to know how I celebrated? Would you be able to guess my reaction when I found the stamps? I threw up my hands; I said, “All right!”; and, if the truth be told, I danced a little jig. Not much. Not enough to get me a spot with the Irish River Dancers. But my whole body wanted to get in on the act. When you rejoice over what was lost being found, the whole body wants to rejoice. The whole self wants to get involved.
Back in early the 19th Century, in Kentucky, there was a strange sect of Christians called the United Society of Believers in Christ’s Second Appearance. That was their official name, but most people just called them the Shakers. They were called Shakers because they would get so caught up in worship that their bodies would just begin to shake uncontrollably. Those who saw them reported that as they prayed and as they sang, some would tremble from head to toe, some would get down on their hands and knees and cry out, even barking like dogs, and some would break into what they called a “holy dance.” In fact, the Shakers left us a wonderful song called, “Lord of the Dance.” You may have heard it. It represents Jesus Christ as the dancing, celebrating Savior. Some of it goes like this:
I danced in the morning when the world was begun, and I danced in the moon and the stars and the sun, and I came down from heaven and I danced on the earth. At Bethlehem I had my birth. Dance, then, wherever you may be; I am the Lord of the dance, said he. And I’ll lead you all wherever you may be, and I’ll lead you all in the dance, said he.
What might cause you to break out into a holy dance? What might happen that the Lord of the dance would lead you in the music of celebration? Would it have to do with recovering something that was missing? Would you dance over finding something that had been lost?
I
The elder brother in Jesus’ wonderful parable didn’t know he had lost anything. He hadn’t figured out that what his brother did was a loss for him. He thought it was somebody else’s problem, not his, when his younger brother ran off into the far country. The elder brother hadn’t caught up with the fact that he himself was among the bereaved, for he had lost a brother. If you don’t think you have lost anything, then there is no reason to celebrate, even if it is found.
When the younger brother left home, taking his share of the inheritance to waste it in riotous living, it was clear that the father had lost something. The father had lost a son. The father had lost half of his wealth. The father had lost big-time.
And it soon became abundantly clear that the younger brother had lost something. As the stories began to trickle back from the far country, it was clear that the younger brother had lost his integrity, indeed his very soul. The younger brother was a loser from the word, “Go.”
But nobody thought the elder brother had lost anything, least of all the elder brother himself. Nobody recognized that he too had lost a something; and he didn’t see it either. He didn’t feel the connection between his own condition and his brother’s condition.
As Jesus tells the story, the elder brother comes in from working in the fields and hears something he doesn’t understand:
Now his elder son was in the field; and when he came and approached the house, he heard music and dancing. He called one of the slaves and asked what was going on. He replied, ’Your brother has come, and your father has killed the fatted calf, because he has got him back safe and sound.
Isn’t it interesting that the elder brother had to ask what this sound was? Isn’t it fascinating that he didn’t know a joyful noise when he heard one? He didn’t just recognize the sounds of celebration? He didn’t just know the accents of acclaim? I guess not, if he had never thought of himself as someone who had lost anything. If he had never imagined himself to be a person in need, then maybe the sounds of celebration were altogether foreign.
The most serious issue the Christian church faces today is its inability to connect with the lives and heartcries of broken people. We have forgotten how to hear how people hurt. We in the church have become so preoccupied with our own comfort that we have lost sight of our real mission. And what is that mission? Our mission is to reach and to teach, to find and to redeem, the least, the lost, and the lonely. Our brothers and sisters are wandering, distracted, off on the wrong track, and it is our task to reach with the good news of a redeeming Christ. But in our elder-brotherism, we really do not expect anything special to happen. We really do not think that down-deep, conversion happens, the kind of conversion that turns a person totally around, heart and soul, mind and emotions, relationships and affections. We who have been church folks for a hundred years or so have forgotten that out there are brothers and sisters who desperately need what only Christ can give. We have forgotten that they belong to us, so that when they come home, we should be among those rejoicing over what once was lost but now is found, was blind but now can see. Too often that just doesn’t happen.
If we are infected with the spirit of the elder brother, we get anxious when somebody does come home. We get uncomfortable when a heart is deeply touched and tears flow or laughter rings out or bodies shake. The Shakers sang about this in “Lord of the dance.”
I danced on the sabbath when I cured the lame, the holy people said it was a shame; they whipped and they stripped and they hung me high, and they left me there on the cross to die. Dance, then, wherever you may be; I am the Lord of the Dance, said he. And I’ll lead you all wherever you may be, and I’ll lead you all in the dance, said he.
Oh, I hope you have the urge to dance. I hope you have heard the music and the laughter. Have you not felt something when brothers and sisters do come home? I shall always remember the dance in this very room. I shall always remember those who have stumbled down this aisle, their bodies shaking with tears, for they had experienced so great a salvation. The whole body wanted to get involved. I shall not soon forget those who have fairly run from their seats, eager to come home. The whole self wanted to dance and to sing. I shall always cherish the memory of men and women that many of us had given up on, but who eagerly presented themselves before God, coming home. I cannot speak for you, but I know that I have wanted to sing, I have wanted to dance, I have wanted to run up this aisle to meet them. I have wanted to rejoice, because my brother, my sister, has been found and is coming home.
It is too bad if we have to inquire what the fuss is all about; it is sad indeed if our only response is to worry that this is taking too long. Never mind the time! There is a party going on, with music and dancing! Never mind the delay; when your brother or your sister comes home, there are no other priorities. Dance and sing! And even if you didn’t know you had lost anything, you had. You had. Nevertheless, what was lost has been found. So dance and sing!
Too bad that the elder brother was so removed from the cries of others’ hearts that he didn’t even recognize the song and the dance when he heard it. Too bad that he didn’t know that it was as much for him as it was for his brother.
II
In truth, the elder brother hasn’t come to the party because he is out of touch with how much grace he himself receives day by day. The elder brother refuses to sing and doesn’t want to dance, because he has normalized the father’s overflowing love. The elder brother’s life is so predictable, so even keel, that he has forgotten what grace is. The elder brother’s response to the great feast, the music and the dancing, is a little like one of my childhood birthday parties. I’m told that when I turned six years old, my mother said I could have a party and I could have whatever I wanted for refreshments. The story is that I ordered up chocolate cake, with chocolate icing, topped off by chocolate ice cream. Well, they said, all that chocolate was so abundant that I couldn’t eat it, and during the party I pushed my plate aside and asked if there was any vanilla in the kitchen! God gives us such abundance that we forget to celebrate it. We are out of touch with the fact that it’s grace.
But he answered his father, ’Listen! For all these years I have been working like a slave for you, and I have never disobeyed your command; yet you have never given me even a young goat so that I might celebrate with my friends. But when this son of yours came back, who has devoured your property with prostitutes, you killed the fatted calf for him!’ Then the father said to him, ’Son, you are always with me, and all that is mine is yours.
All that the Father has is ours too. We are blessed. We forget it, but we are blessed. And that in and of itself ought to be cause for music and dancing. That in and of itself ought to stir our souls and move our bodies. Grace abounds; but we lose sight of it. We are out of touch with the fact that it is by the goodness of God that we are at home too.
When I was a seminary student, there was a graduate assistant who astounded us all by the way he wrote his seminar papers. Bear in mind that seminar papers had to be shared with everyone else in the class, and in those days, before photocopy machines, you duplicated things with the old mimeograph. You remember mimeographs? You typed a stencil, cutting little indentations through which the ink would flow. What a pain it was when you made a mistake! That repair fluid that you painted on, then you waited half an eternity for it to dry before you could type over it? It was a long, laborious task to type a paper. Now, add to that the fact that the computer had not been invented, so that you could not easily go back and rewrite a sentence when you changed your mind about what you wanted to say. Most people wrote things out in pen or pencil, then revised by scribbling all over the page, and then typed a paper draft, and then, at last retyped it all on a mimeograph stencil. In other words, there were many steps, all of them painful and time-consuming, before you got a finished product.
Well, this graduate assistant, Fred, on the night before a paper was due, would spread out his books on the bed in front of him, and would proceed to type a paper straight out of his head on to the mimeograph stencil, letter perfect, with no mistakes, and no revisions. What people got the next morning looked as though it had been polished for weeks, but it was actually one night’s work.
Well and good; but do you know that Fred became stilted and shriveled? Fred became smug and over-confident. Fred took his A’s for granted; others whooped and hollered over B’s. Fred never got any fun out of his scholarship. He became one of the most serious, down in the mouth, sober people you would ever want to meet. Fred got good grades, yes; but Fred never got to dance. Fred never got to sing a full-throated hallelujah, because Fred had no struggles.
What a shame if we are so good we don’t know how bad we are! What a pity if we have been so busy keeping ourselves under control that we have never had a reason to revel in the workings of grace! “Son, you are always with me, and all that is mine is yours.” Don’t you hear that? We are blessed! Sing! Dance! Let heavenly music fill the air! Let the sounds of joy poke through our deafness! For whether we know it or not, we were among the lost, but now are found; whether we can recall it or not, we too were among the blind who now can see. Even those of us who think we’ve got it all together need to sing and dance, because it is all of grace. It is all a gift.
Brothers and sisters, rejoice. Rejoice with all your hearts. Break forth into song. Lose those inhibitions. Follow that urge to lift your hands in praise. Do not stop your feet from tapping or your bodies from swaying in time with the rhythms of grace, for there’s a party going on. And it will not be denied. Listen to the father:
But we had to celebrate and rejoice, because this brother of yours was dead and has come to life; he was lost and has been found.
We have to celebrate and rejoice. If we do not, the very rocks will cry out. If we do not, something deep within us will die. If we do not, it is because we are unwilling to see what God is doing, right here, in this very room. We have to celebrate because something dead is coming to life, something lost is being found. No small celebrations will do. They must be grand. They must be exuberant. They must be glorious. They must get our whole selves involved. We have to celebrate with music and dancing. The Shakers got it right:
I danced on a Friday and the sky turned black; it’s hard to dance with the devil on your back. They buried my body and they thought I’d gone, but I am the dance and I still go on. Dance, then, wherever you may be; I am the Lord of the Dance, said he. And I’ll lead you all wherever you may be, and I’ll lead you all in the dance, said he.
They cut me down and I leapt up high, I am the life that’ll never, never die; I’ll live in you if you’ll live in me. I am the Lord of the Dance, said he. Dance, then, wherever you may be. I am the Lord of the Dance, said he. And I’ll lead you all wherever you may be, and I’ll lead you all in the dance, said he.
Come on. Come on; put on your dancing shoes. Let’s go to the party. Sing and dance along with me, down to the banquet hall where the feast has been prepared. For the lost has been found and wanderers are coming home. In fact, here even the dead are alive again. Something to celebrate!
