Wednesday, March 10, 2010
...an occasional reminder is needed. Even if it's from myself.
This was an essay of intent I wrote for my ministry minor application a year ago.
Please ignore the abysmal quality of writing (who me, put off writing a paper? never).
About three and half years ago, the beginning of my sophomore year of high school, Bethany, my former middle school cheerleading coach and a graduate of my small private Christian school returned from Florida where she had been serving in full time ministry as a professional dancer in the Way of Life Acrodramance company. She began teaching dance classes at a local church. Soon, she took me under her wing and became my mentor, which was something I was in need of at that point. First it was her just being a listening ear and an encourager. Then she started giving advice and urging me onward. She invited me to go with her to worship conferences and dance camps were I felt as though my eyes were opened to all new possibilities--possibilities that cannot be described by word of mouth but must be experienced. Finally I was getting so see where Bethany’s deep passion for dancing for the Lord was coming from just as little seeds took root in me.
The following year, my junior year, Bethany continued the Lord’s vision when she began a Youth Dance Ministry at my church. Being a student leader and a part of the Youth Ministry changed and affected me in so many ways. Aside from confidence and leadership skills through leading, teaching, assisting, and choreographing, by far my favorite aspect of the ministry is the people, the community which has grown out of it. As Bethany mentored me, I now had the wonderful opportunity before me to be a mentor to these younger girls. It is one of the most incredible privileges to watch these girls grow--as one coherent being--dancing, spiritual, mental, and emotional. Each person is a valuable part of the community, but I believe it is through Bethany’s leadership that we have learned to share our vulnerabilities, which has bond us together as a community. We found the common purpose of growing and sharing our faith together through dance. I have found that Bethany’s naturally nurturing personality often transforms her dance classes into a form of dance therapy. Most of the girls involved in the ministry have somewhat of a shy, demure nature, but Bethany has provided an environment where they feel free to open up. These girls who would have never dreamed of even reading the announcements in Sunday School were now up in front of a congregation of one-thousand, two-hundred people leading improvisational dance worship. The confidence we all gained together never ceases to amaze me.
Upon meditating on one’s particular call of ministry or one’s vocation it is hard to not get wrapped up in “What do I want to do? But, wait, what does God want me to do?” The two are not distinct, instead often those places we have most zeal are perhaps those places where we most share the heart of God. A favorite quotes of mine is by Frederick Buechner, paraphrased it is: Vocation is “the place where God calls you to is the place where your deep passion and the world’s deep hunger meet.” In these past years I have felt deep passions shaping within in me (for even writing and thinking on them has made me feel more alive). Dance is my medium and reaching out to others, both with dance and through dance, is my passion.
I have experienced and watched the transformative power of dance. I feel a deep passion to work with young girls. Teenage girls who are trying to form but often instead tend to loose their identities and sense of self during adolescents. I want to help them to search out and find these things. Dance is a wonderful tool for discoveries and explorations, for as dancer Martha Graham once said, “Movement never lies, it is the barometer to the state of the soul’s weather.” The body is the soul’s story teller; with its movements you can read that which words cannot articulate or fully express; As it should be in worship as well.
As I have become more deeply involved in dance ministry I find more and more that I have strong ideas and deep passions to see a reformation of liturgical dance, worship arts, and “Christian culture”. I believe the church, as a whole, is in desperate need of the arts. Not only corporately do we need change, but individually we need our thoughts, our ideals, reformed. Artists who are Christian (who fear being called “Christian artists” because the term is deemed degrading) should no longer strive for excellence, as I formerly thought, for whose standards of excellence are they striving? The world’s. We are called to craft our gifts, skills, and talents faithfully--to God’s standards. We Christians are called to live in a new way, to reference a Switchfoot song, we are called to “a new way to be human”. Therefore this translates over to our calling as artists. We should not be mediocre copies of culture, but instead, we should be creating and forging a new way in the arts; Showing the world a new way to be artists.
As a Christian and an artist I care very deeply about how my identity and gift relate and intertwine. I want to know how they can best serve God and others. However, I sense that often the biggest hinderance for Christian artists to fully develop and cultivate both culture and the arts in the way that God has intended is: Christians and their preconceived “Christian culture”. They follow their own ideas of what is right and good instead of God’s truth. Ignorance both binds and limits, for it creates an uncertainty and hesitancy where there should be boldness.
Dance is an extremely powerful art form because the medium is the artist’s body. The artist’s entire being is involved. I think that it is because of its very potency that dance is so controversial. Just because it is so controversial does not mean it should be forgotten. This gift of dance must be taken as a whole; No tearing it to pieces into “sacred” and “profane” categories. It is up to us to get to know the One who gave us the gifts--to know His plans, intentions, and visions, so that we may begin using these gifts in a way that is pleasing to Him.
The intensive study for the theology of ministry minor opens our eyes and gives us a clearer vision of where we are and who we are in God. If theology is like our fence and guidelines for Christian thought it does not bind, but rather keeps us safe and allows us a freedom to explore. If we know where we may venture out to (with full discernment) then we will not be left perpetually standing still in the status quo. As artists in the church we should be exploring every bit, every square millimeter, within those boundaries that God has given us. He has revealed to us that which is good, let us share that vision with the church in a new way and with the world that they might taste and see that He is good.
I wish to be a cultivator of culture. I believe that this is what young girls, the arts, worship in the Church, and the world need. I know I must learn to be discerning and have an alert eye. The ministry minor will teach me the theology, the guidelines, and the history of from whence we came. Learning these things will allow me to develop my relationship with God and others, my own gifts and skills, and passions so that I may approach my calling prepared and discerning.
