Active Joyfulness!

For some reason, I’ve been thinking quite a bit about one of my favorite top-of-the-morning scriptures found in Psalms 118:24 where the Psalmist excitedly declares: “This is the day which the Lord has made; Let us rejoice and be glad in it.” (NASB)  You may have noticed that I wrote that the Psalmist “EXCITEDLY declares,” and when you study out the original meanings of some of the words, it is easy to see why I am pretty sure of the choice of my words.

I was talking to my cousin once again the other day, and we were discussing how we felt that many of the society approved, so-called “empowering” ways in which some gal’s dress themselves today (with little left to the imagination) are in actuality, very demeaning to women.  I recalled that while I personally believe that my wife had a dynamite figure for most of her days on this earth, that the first thing that I just about always pictured and remembered about her was her smile, her encouraging words and the sweet spirit that she possessed… not necessarily her physical attributes… to me, those were the icing on the cake in our relationship. 

I awoke before dawn this morning thinking about those three quality characteristics that I just mentioned and in line with our scripture verse above, realized that Piper’s life in the early days of our relationship, was the channel that drew me into a personal relationship with Jesus Christ.  Her actions spoke so much louder than her words… not that she didn’t speak the right things as well!  But like I’ve stated on many occasions, she lived her faith on her shirt-sleeve, sort-of-speak!  What you saw on the outside was who she was on the inside.  And in her final years that phenomenon is what I choose to focus my attention on, and not on the effects of Alzheimer’s upon her physical body and mind.

So, now let’s see if I can connect this back to the excitement of Psalms 118:24.  It didn’t take much to get Piper excited about the things of God.  As I read through her personal notebooks from 2006 to 2008, it is easy to see that even though she was mentally dealing with lots of uncertainties and changes, that she was still deeply in tune to, studying and demonstrating her excitement about God and His Word.  I can recall times at church out here when there was a move of the spirit across the auditorium and she would jump up and down, spin around and loudly laugh in unabashed joy and thankfulness.  (Just like she’d… or rather we’d do at our home church in California)

And that’s the EXACT kind of joyfulness and gladness of heart that the Palmist is writing about in Psalm 118:24.  I’ve heard it taught, and then confirmed it through personal research, that the word “rejoice” in this verse literally means “to spin around.”  But what was not said is that the definition of the original Hebrew goes on to say, “under the influence of any violent emotion!”  The Greek translation is: “to jump for joy.”  While the word “glad” in Hebrew is defined as “to be gleesome.”  Dictionary.com describes “Gleeful” as being “full of exultant joy, to be highly elated, jubilant or triumphant.” 

In other words, it describes a very physical, active, and with total abandonment response to the joy that’s filling your heart.  I once read that the great Pentecostal Evangelist Smith Wigglesworth, would spin and dance in the spirit for at least ten minutes… EVERY morning when he first stepped out of bed, until the day he moved onto heaven when he was in his eighties! 

Is that the way that you rejoice and are glad before the Lord?  Maybe as you read this, you’re thinking, “well, that’s not the way my church worships” or “that’s just not the tradition that I am comfortable with.”  But from what I read in my Bible… this action is not something that is to be governed or directed by a physical institution as it is something that is specifically directed in the Word of God.  I would bet that this was exactly the way that David danced before the Lord when he brought the Ark back to Jerusalem.  It wasn’t some choregraphed dance, but was a free-form directed by the spirit.  That’s most likely why his wife was upset… because it wasn’t socially dignified! (See, 2 Samuel 6:12-17)  

I gotta say… there is something about dancing before the Lord with total abandonment… as the Spirit leads you.  I’ve done it many a time in the privacy of our home as well as publicly at church when the Spirit of God was moving during a service.  I can’t necessarily explain it, but it definitely makes you feel one with God and at peace and full of joy… when done as the Spirit directs, at the right time, in the right place.

Just think about it…

Have a wonderful week and as you do say with me… “I am expecting to rejoice and be glad before the Lord with joyful abandonment unto Him… today!”