Jesus and Parties
“The whorehouse”, the locals used to call it. The large, imposing church building had become an object of scorn in the town. Two previous ministers had seduced members of their flock, and word of it had spread throughout the community. Scandal lives long: for years the members of that church hung their heads in shame, clinging together, but turning inward. Reacting to the promiscuity of the past, they descended into another, more respectable immorality: legalism. Theirs was a negative Christianity defined by what they didn’t do. Stifling rules regulated their behaviour. Fun was starched out of them. Their faith was as rigid as ice, and just as cold. They thought that those who drank wine would one day be sent to hell by the Jesus who launched his ministry at Cana. Dancing, bowling, television – and anything fun – were outlawed. They were fanatically zealous in their Pentecostal prohibitions.
And then, ever so slowly, a springtime thaw began. A little nervously at first, they began to laugh more during their gatherings. Worship became more up-tempo, and they discovered that clapping hands and dancing feet are close cousins. The lifeblood that is new Christians began to appear; legalism was sent packing, and exchanged for a hearty, hopeful faith. The locals forgot that the whorehouse had ever been so called.
It all came to a head last week. The weekly prayer and bible study meeting had been cancelled in favour of a Valentines Supper. A witty sermonette was delivered. They played some silly games. And then a band took the stage – which included two deacons in its’ lineup. People sat respectfully around tables as the musicians moved into some catchy dance numbers. Fingers were tapped on tables; feet moved in time beneath the white cloths. And then suddenly, James stood up. He is a giant of a man who could break your back with his hug, and three years ago he was in prison, and might have felt inclined to do so. He had since gotten to know Jesus. He asked his minister if it was okay – and then invited his wife to dance. Arm in arm, the two swept around what had become a dance floor, while the rest of then church applauded and laughed at the sheer unbridled joy of it all. Ian, another deacon, asked his wife to dance, and she complied gladly. And then John, an elderly man who had lived too many angry years in the shroud of scowling religiosity, and had never danced in his forty years of married life, asked his wife if she would do him the honour. She couldn’t, because she didn’t know how – but was thrilled by his invitation.
Soon the floor was jammed with people, a celebration of fun and fidelity. And among them, a couple who had been separated for a while, and for whom divorce had looked very likely; in each other’s arms now, a new beginning, a miracle at a party, a surprise indeed.
But then again, Jesus enjoys party miracles. He seemed more at home with the full blooded laughter of long meals with friends and the so called silly giggling of fidgety children than with the austere, cardboard “goodness” of the religious crowd. He seemed to find their moratorium on fun as restrictive as a fishbone corset, try as they did to pull it tight around Him. Party-poopers can sneer in derision; and the sworn, stiff enemies of so called frivolity can wait outside in the cold of their making; but that as the band played and the people danced that Valentines night away, there was a light in their eyes, a borrowed, reflected light from Him.