Dances of Worship and the Cost of Truth

Jul 12, 2026

Devotional

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38s
#SpeakTruthNotSilence
“``We wouldn't have had this violent ending of the ministry of John if John had just kept quiet. Silence is the easy way out. Jesus Christ was not crucified for his times of silence and solitude. He was crucified in great part because of what he said. Silence can be a great temptation. There is the silence of those who have nothing to say in the face of some grave injustice, the silence of despair and silence after disaster, the muzzling of those who speak truth and power.”
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50s
#TruthBringsRisk
“Isn't it curious that Mark inserts the death of John the Baptist right after the disciples being sent forth? This passage of Mark sort of casts a big shadow over the the vows of Jesus and his disciples, and it kind of insists that we confront the reality of the truth that when the truth of Jesus Christ meets with strong opposition, sometimes it can even turn wild. It's a warning, this passage, probably to me as a preacher and to you as a congregation or as disciples, that sometimes it's hard to follow a crucified savior without the possibility of pain induced by truth.”
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58s
#WorshipRestoresUs
“And I wonder how that story goes for us today. When we praise and we share our meal at the table, what does it mean to you, to us, to gather as a church family to sing great bread and open our hearts in prayer, not just alone as solitary activities, but as David did with the people. Breaking bread with people is part of justice and worship, worship and justice. So this is the time for us to set out with those disciples who started out last week to follow our passion and commitment to justice and healing for a broken world, to dance with joy and exuberance, to revel in the love of God. We work hard on issues, and we need to be able to renew our spirits here in worship with one another and hold each other up because we've been brought together both to work and to pray and also to praise.”
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51s
#GodBeyondLabels
“So who is who is God to us? Is it the scary Old Testament vengeful God? Is it the gentle, compassionate, loving God? Yes. But more than that, is it the powerful, unexplainable Quite honestly, I am comforted that the universe is not spinning wildly out of control, but rather it is in the hands of a God who is so much greater than our imaginations. Our imaginations are pretty powerful engines in their own right, but God God doesn't fit neatly in our little God type box, our little human brain. God doesn't fit there. God is way more than that.”
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64s
#ImagoDeiForEveryone
“Many names, many experiences, many ways for us to understand God. One of the great flaws all throughout the scriptures as we read the stories is that of humans trying to make God in their own image and rather under rather than understanding that we have been made in the image of God, and that the image of God encompasses all of us, not just people like me from European backgrounds, not just people from The Americas, from the Aztec or Mexico or Spain or France, not just people of African American backgrounds, not just Middle East, not just Asia, everybody. All of us. All of us are in the image of God that God created.”
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86s
#ExuberantWorship
“David's dance, it was ecstatic, exuberant, energetic. I told someone I was I was preaching about these dances today, and especially the David dance. And this was a friend who who was a colleague in ministry. And she said, oh, good. Are you gonna dance down the aisle at the beginning? And I said, No. No. And and honestly, my congregation will probably be glad that I did not. but you know, it's it's one of those stories that we all kind of we love to see that excitement and enthusiasm. We aren't gonna sing a song later, and I may ask you to try to do a few things to be exuberant. Very nonprotestant, I know. Anyway but the question really is is how passionate is our worship? How exuberant is our praise? How deep is our awe at what God is doing in our lives and in the life of the world? Do we really know? Do any of us really know what it feels like to rejoice with all our might like David? Because God is present in our lives. Have we ever felt so full of exaltation about who God is that we want to dance without inhibition, right, in front of our family, our friends, our community.”
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56s
#TheCostOfTruth
“But I wanna take a quick look at the other party, the other dance. This one is tough. We're in the middle of relaxing vacations, summertime stuff, and all of a sudden, we get hit right smack in the face by this violent story of the beheading of John the Baptist. Maybe it's about weighing the cost of being a truth teller. Maybe it's about the last great Old Testament prophet and first great New Testament gospel preacher all in one, that's John the Baptist, is senselessly murdered by government order. why would Herod go to all this trouble and participate in this heinous act in order to silence a troublesome preacher? John was executed because he told the truth to a couple of powerful political people who did not want to hear the truth.”
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61s
#ForeshadowingOfSacrifice
“Surely Mark in this is kind of using this story as a foreshadowing of the death of Jesus. Herod's a precursor for Pilate, and John's death looks forward to the death of Jesus. Just like Herod, Pilate is caught up in murderous events that are beyond his power to control and unable to back down after being publicly challenged and potentially embarrassed. He wanted to save face. He was at his birthday party and all his friends were there. He couldn't refuse her. So the whole story is a preview of Jesus' death. Last Sunday, we focused on the story of Jesus sending his disciples out, of how they were empowered to tell the truth, just like John did, of how they were empowered to heal and cast out evil spirits, and how they were to shake the dust off their sandals from places that would not hear them.”
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40s
#RebuildWithTruth
“To us in our time, particularly right now after this pandemic, after decades in in mainline churches having membership declines, we have been given by God daunting transformative work, the work of rebuilding and refurbishing the church. We can't do that without daring to tell the truth and listen to the truth. So I challenge all of us to pray for one another. Pray for me that I may speak as God leads me to speak, and that you may listen as God wants you to hear.”
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56s
#WhenPowerSilencesTruth
“fearless preacher and prophet John the Baptist condemned them both, and Haradius hated that. So Herod, who had once admired him, still was a little confused, but Haradius wanted him dead and got the chance with the Dance of the Daughter. Surely Mark in this is kind of using this story as a foreshadowing of the death of Jesus. Herod's a precursor for Pilate, and John's death looks forward to the death of Jesus. Just like Herod, Pilate is caught up in murderous events that are beyond his power to control and unable to back down after being publicly challenged and potentially embarrassed. He wanted to save face. He was at his birthday party and all his friends were there. He couldn't refuse her.”
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52s
#GraceForTheFlawed
“and was even cruel. He exiled her from the castle for a while, then he brought her back because she found somebody to be with. And he said, oh, no, no, no. You can't have anything nice. You get back here. You're my queen. So there's a bad side to David. And yet and yet, we find that God can even turn that around. This does not excuse David's behavior. I was hoping we get to the place sometime where women are not treated that way. So it's a little bit weird, this dance, when I look at it, but it is glorious and joyful that he is able to worship God. And it makes me grateful that God can keep loving David and keep loving us when we screw up.”
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72s
#LearnFromBoth
“which dance should we attend? Which party should we go to? The exuberant joyful one led by David, who's a flawed but passionate king, or the one that calls for us to place the challenge of discipleship, the challenge of being apostles. If someone were saying, hey, are you gonna go to David's party, or are you gonna go to the go to John's party? Not John's party, but, you know, there's well, actually, we have to learn from both. I probably would say yes to that, not not one or the other. We have to learn from them both. But I'll tell you what party I wanna go to. It's the one that's coming up next in Mark. It's the feeding of the 5,000. That's what comes next. It's a it's almost like it's here on purpose as a real challenge to, okay, so we saw a couple of kind of really flawed parties last week. Now let's go to the one where there's a miraculous provision for everybody out of the generosity of one small boy.”
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79s
#LetJubilationInChurch
“So why why are we tearing ourselves apart? Makes no sense to me. David had lots of flaws, but lack of passion, not one of his flaws. In the joyous procession of the ark towards Jerusalem, the new capital, and now in a sense the city of God, he had lots of reasons to rejoice. Things were coming together. No wonder he danced. Jubilation is a word we rarely use, partly because such a feeling has been limited to sports and political victories. I've seen people go to basketball games and football games. Yeah. But you don't do that in church. I've spoken a few times at at some some of my students' churches, some some my churches or active, and every once in a while, appreciate it. Amen. Yeah. Tell it. And and I see you guys nodding. I love it. But usually, the most I see here is is a little bit of a and I like that. I like that. I wonder what it would feel like to to have that jubilation.”
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88s
#DavidsJoy
“So we think about David. David in the Hebrew scriptures, for the most part, everybody thinks of David as hero and king. And in overall, his memory was a bright, sustaining source of hope for people of Israel. But when we think of his humanness, we tend to concentrate on his flaws, especially his tragic affair with Bathsheba. This week's reading, however, portrays a very human, a very joy filled dancing David, undoubtedly pleasing in God's sight. This reading, it kind of bookends the reading from a couple of weeks ago when David was full of grief and full of lamentations about the death of Jonathan and Saul. The man who tradition says composed the Psalms was obviously a person of deep feeling, And today's passage about his joy gives us a whole another side of his passion, his profound gratitude and praise for God's word in his life and the life of Israel in bringing the people together, uniting the kingdom, strengthening them in a common cause against the enemy Philistines, establishing the people in their land, and the whole Davidic dynasty to the glory of God. God fulfilling his promises right before their eyes in his own lifetime.”
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68s
#GodAtTheCenter
“The expansion of David's family, David had many wives, part of Michal's problem. K? He had many wives, concubines, children. He had, military victories over the Philistines. And and now the final touch, bringing God right into the center of things, and the ark which had traveled with the Hebrew people all throughout their time in the wilderness and promised land. As well as holding the tablets with the 10 commandments on them, the ark was this visible signal symbol of God's presence. Probably a little hard for us to get that in our separated church and state life, which I support, by the way, in case you're wondering. I don't want the state interrupting my my sacred, my religion. And in the time of Israel, it was important that David called the people to God and and have God as the center of their focus.”
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89s
#ArkHomecoming
“As well as holding the tablets with the 10 commandments on them, the ark was this visible signal symbol of God's presence. Probably a little hard for us to get that in our separated church and state life, which I support, by the way, in case you're wondering. I don't want the state interrupting my my sacred, my religion. And in the time of Israel, it was important that David called the people to God and and have God as the center of their focus. It couldn't have hurt his credibility to lead the parade in, right, with all the cast of nets and the tambourines and everything else. So this this this ark, had disappeared for a while after Jericho and was with the Philistines, and and the reason it was scary to them was that they were not authentically seeking God, makes me think of raiders of the lost ark. You know? Then and then then in Obed, it's finally home, and David is bringing it in dancing and singing, the dance of worship and thanksgiving. And it's not just a private dance either. It's everybody in town. It's a whole big hooray accompanying the return of the ark.”
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60s
#ArkOfTheCovenant
“Now the ark. What was the ark? K. In case you're you're new to this. The ark of the covenant was a container that could have the the stone tablets for the 10 commandments. This was, like, the holiest of holies is the the word of God, and the ark was the container. Sacred thing. We see, in every synagogue. We see this in the scrolls. Very, very powerful and holy symbol. So the ark has finally been returned by the Philistines. They had captured it, but it scared them. Because of the awesome power of it, it was frightening them. And then for a while, it rested in the house of Bibloth. And David, in establishing Jerusalem as his seat of power, wanted to restore the ark to the center of the people's shared life.”
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79s
#DavidUnitesIsrael
“Alright. So so here we are with David establishing Jerusalem as his seat of power and wanting to restore the ark to the center of the people's life. Of course, Israel and Judah is a a kingdom. It's a theocracy. Right? It's so no church and state issues there. But there's a little background for this episode in a long and often painfully violent story of David's rise to power. The celebration represented a culmination of this process of consolidation, bringing in all the different tribes together, bringing everybody together in a unified Israel. Lots of building projects, including, of course, a magnificent home for David. The expansion of David's family, David had many wives, part of Michal's problem. K? He had many wives, concubines, children. He had, military victories over the Philistines. And and now the final touch, bringing God right into the center of things, and the ark which had traveled with the Hebrew people all throughout their time in the wilderness and promised land.”
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93s
#JoyAndTheArk
“This week's reading, however, portrays a very human, a very joy filled dancing David, undoubtedly pleasing in God's sight. This reading, it kind of bookends the reading from a couple of weeks ago when David was full of grief and full of lamentations about the death of Jonathan and Saul. The man who tradition says composed the Psalms was obviously a person of deep feeling, And today's passage about his joy gives us a whole another side of his passion, his profound gratitude and praise for God's word in his life and the life of Israel in bringing the people together, uniting the kingdom, strengthening them in a common cause against the enemy Philistines, establishing the people in their land, and the whole Davidic dynasty to the glory of God. God fulfilling his promises right before their eyes in his own lifetime. Now the ark. What was the ark? K. In case you're you're new to this. The ark of the covenant was a container that could have the the stone tablets for the 10 commandments. This was, like, the holiest of holies is the the word of God, and the ark was the container. Sacred thing. We see, in every synagogue. We see this in the scrolls. Very, very powerful and holy symbol.”
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65s
#SayAmen
“And I've been brought up in a very proper high Methodist church. And I think I was about 13 at the time we visited this church, and so I was very rule oriented. child, trying to do all my homework right, just everything proper. So we went into this church, preacher was preaching, and this lady, like, in back of me kept going, yeah, preach it. Amen. Yeah. Go. Alright, preacher. And somebody else was doing the same thing, and I'm like, you're so rude. She said, no. They're just happy. No. They're just they're just giving joy, and they're saying so be it to what that minister is saying. it's all good. And if you wanna just do this, that's fine. But if you want to say amen, that's fine too. Amen.”
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