dance

The red-headed lady that raised me is at work once more. Oh, I know she’ll never actually say the words again, but still I hear her voice in my head.

Don’t change horses in the middle of the stream.

The old adage has been passed through several generations since Abraham Lincoln popularized it as a campaign slogan in 1864. He used the word picture to convince a divided nation to keep him as president during the Civil War. It still means basically the same thing today as it did back then.

Don’t make drastic changes in the way you are achieving a goal while in the middle of that activity.

Have you seen the movies where they show the driver and a passenger in a vehicle trading places as it careens down the highway at high speed? The result is usually a little scary, and somewhat humorous, but almost never disastrous.

I wonder if anyone reading this has attempted such a maneuver in real life? No, I don’t mean on an empty stretch of highway. I’m thinking about during rush hour, on the busiest freeway in Los Angeles—or Dallas—or Atlanta.

Anyone? Anyone at all?

I didn’t think so.

No one in their right mind would try that foolish shenanigan under those conditions. No one.

It has been on my mind for a few months, so I mentioned it to a few select friends the other day. Well, it was actually a few friends and acquaintances on Facebook. I realized the Lovely Lady and I have owned and operated our music store for thirty years this week. It’s a long time to do one thing.

I mentioned it and my friends rose to the occasion, sending notes of congratulations and praise.

I may have taken the praise too much to heart.

Today was the first day of my thirty-first year of owning and operating a music store. I don’t know what I expected. From the congratulatory notes I read about the first thirty years, I suppose I wanted to think the hard days were behind me. Everybody loves us and will do what is necessary to insure our lives will be easy from here on out.

There would be no more fussy customers to make happy. No more sticky problems would arise. I’ll never have another unpaid bill to be concerned about.

None of those was true today. It was a day of struggle and of problem-solving. Exactly as nearly every day of the previous thirty years has been. Customers didn’t receive their orders as expected. I had to take back a guitar a customer had changed his mind about. There is a large payment due to a vendor tomorrow, and no surplus of funds in my bank account today.

Nothing has changed. We face the same challenges, the same necessities. It would be easy to despair.

I won’t.

Reality continues on apace. We will deal with that reality in precisely the same way we have always attempted to do so.

I said the words to a young man as I tied strings on his classical guitar today. He is wondering what comes next for him, hoping to achieve dreams and plans for his family. I’ve said the words before to my readers, relating my conversation with a wise man many years past.

This is my place of ministry. These are the people I am called to minister to.

It’s not a church. It’s not a foreign country. It is where God has placed me. For now. The interactions arrive as they will, sometimes at the lazy speed of a country lane, sometimes at the frenzied pace of a crowded freeway at rush hour.

I am resolved that I will not change horses in the middle of this stream.

With that reminder, I hear the voice of the red-headed lady once more.

You got to dance with who brung you.

She wasn’t much for dancing, my Mom. It was frowned upon in my family and church in those days. That said, she grasped fully the concept of being faithful and committed. She wanted her children to do the same.

I understand how I got to the place I am today. As I look back over many years of life, I see many influences. I do.

But, I know beyond any question Who brought me to this point.

I’m planning to keep dancing with Him.

There are numerous other tempting companions here at the Dance. I see many I know who are changing partners, not necessarily suddenly. Little by little, over time, they have been drawn by promises of other rewards—other pleasures.

The end of the Dance is not going to be a happy time for them. Their new partners will never satisfy the expectations they have. The disappointment will be profound.

The dance of life continues. The steps are sometimes intricate and complicated, taking every bit of concentration I can muster. At other times, all I have to do is follow the lead of my Partner.

If I step on His feet and of those around me, patiently the steps are explained again. Never, not once, have I been sent to sit against the wall and wait until I can do it better.

The dance is not over. There’s still time and room for as many more as will come. The invitation is open. The Host still says come. (Revelation 22:17)

The music is starting again.

I know who my Partner is.

Yep.

The same One who brung me…

Nothing shapes your life more than the commitments you choose to make.
(Rick Warren ~ American pastor/author)

The Spirit and the Bride say, “Come.” And let the one who hears say, “Come.” And let the one who is thirsty come; let the one who desires take the water of life without price.
(Revelation 22:17 ~ ESV)

Nevertheless I have this against you, that you have left your first love.
(Revelation 2:4 ~ NKJV)

“God wrote the whole Bible without once using the word fun.”

The old preacher never tired of reminding his congregation of the fact. I was just a young man, newly married, and I didn’t think much of the idea. Back then, anyway.

No fun? None?

Ever?

It wasn’t that the old fellow didn’t like to laugh. It wasn’t even that he didn’t enjoy spending time at a game of skill or two with friends. He just couldn’t find the word in the pages of the Book, so he decided it wasn’t something promised to followers of God.

I’m beginning to think he wasn’t far wrong.

That said, there is more to speak of on the subject. I hope you’ll stick with me here.

If you expect the conclusion of my little essay to be that we all should keep our noses to our grindstones, and wipe those smiles off our faces, you’ll be disappointed.

The pursed lips of the Church Lady—she of Saturday Night Live fame—are nowhere to be found in the words ordained by the Author of the Book we follow.

You see, laughing and dancing, joy and enjoyment, hugs and smiles are all included in the master plan for those of us who aren’t promised fun.

It would seem that, perhaps the problem lies in our definition of fun and not in the acts of enjoyment in the life with which we’ve been blessed.

His mom’s car pulled into the parking spot right next to the music store’s front door one day last week. I recognized the lady immediately—her face, once smiling and friendly, now distressed and cheerless. It took the man longer than usual to make it through the front door. When he did arrive, he was leaning on a cane.

A few years younger than I, the man has been a customer of mine for the last thirty years. I have never known him to hold a job. Until just recently, he was completely able-bodied, but just had better things to do than find employment.

He has fun.

In fact, on that day last week, he needed to find some supplies to get his guitar into shape so he could play at a party. No. Not to earn money, just to have fun. Copious amounts of beer, wine, and hard liquor will be available there. A fair number of the attendees at the party will leave inebriated. He may be one of them.

As the man made his slow, painful way to the cash register, he waved a couple of twenties in the air. Declaring that his mom had come through once again, he paid for his purchases with her hard-earned money and, struggling with the front door, departed to have fun at the party.

Fun? Really?

We might have different understandings of the meaning of that word. The old preacher liked to speak of joy, the joy that came from God Himself. It is an appropriate beginning. But, I think there is more.

Celebration, for instance. At relevant occasions, celebration is the activity in which we should participate. Births, life passages of import, successes in our endeavors, holidays—all these and more result in celebration, the culmination of hard work and partnerships. (Deuteronomy 12:7)

Indeed, we are told to enjoy the fruit of our labor. Food and drink is ours to enjoy. The wise person understands the limitations to such things, though. Many years ago, one wise man suggested that we not become one of those folks who drinks too much wine, nor who is a glutton. (Proverbs 23:20)

Mirth and laughter are also ours to delight in. A merry heart is as good as medicine for our bodies. Yes—words from that same wise man. (Proverbs 17:22)

So, tell those jokes (the appropriate ones).

Plan that birthday party.

Enjoy sitting at the table with family and friends.

Sing. Dance. Shout.

They all belong to us. All of them.

There is just one little thing. We earn them by our faithfulness to keep promises. We earn our food with our labor. Our marriages are kept strong as we work at them, loving our spouses and serving them.

The joy, celebration, food and drink, laughter, and music are the icing on the cake. They are the magnificent blessing of a loving Father who rejoices in our rejoicing.

My old friend? He counts his celebrations by the memories of “being wasted” and his sexual conquests. Someone else earned his ticket to those parties. He can’t even pay for the party favors himself.

Jaded and burned out, he knows nothing else but fun. And, it’s not even fun anymore, just another dark place in which he looks as he searches for fulfillment. In between the occasional rush of emotion, he lives in pain and unhappiness, always searching for more fun.

The old preacher wasn’t wrong.

I like his definition better.

Every day, I like it better.

There is not one blade of grass, there is no color in the world that is not intended to make us rejoice.
(John Calvin ~ French Theologian ~ 1509-1564)

There is nothing better for a person than that he should eat and drink and find enjoyment in his toil. This also, I saw, is from the hand of God.
(Ecclesiastes 2:24 ~ ESV)

He's Taken Leave

Random wanderings with Paul Phillips

Dance With Who Brung You

There’s No Fun in the Bible