Breathe

My daughters have recently become ballet fans. Or rather, fanatics. Since they acquired “Barbie and the Twelve Dancing Princesses” (the DVD) there's been no living with them. You call them to the table and they glide lightly in, feet pointed gracefully. They do dainty little traveling turns from room to room, moving around the house like a corps de ballet. What can one say?

So I was surprised recently when I found the Bolshoi Nutcracker on TV and got loud, instant complaints from the little ladies. “BOR-ing!” “When can WE watch something?” “What's on Noggin?” I kept saying, “Just wait. It gets better,” but it never seemed to. I could have just made them watch it, or at least made them do something else while I watched it, but instinct told me if I forced the issue I could accelerate the inevitable time (it's coming) when they'll tire of ballet. So instead I said, “Let's not watch this. I've got something better.” And I pulled out an old “Ballet Magnificat” video cassette, ready to pull that one too if they got bored. To my surprise, they loved it! They couldn't get enough of the premier Christian ballet company going through their 1994 repertoire.

Of course, I was enjoying it too. I haven't seen this one in years. It's so old I'm lucky I didn't damage the heads on my VCR. On this video you can enjoy several really nice suites. The first one is set to some of Integrity's Hosannah music, all classically styled. I was enjoying one of the first few songs, “I Will Sing of the Mercies of the Lord” with the girls. The song starts with a couple of ladies coming out with tambourines. They do some middle eastern folk style moves, in the way that ballerinas often do folk steps—with almost superhuman grace. But then when they got to one particular part of the song, I did a double take. Hey! I recognized that set of moves! I knew it really well, in fact. It was mine! And I was transported back to 1993, a year before the video came out.

That was the year I went to a Jerusalem Worship Dance seminar. My dance company had told me numerous times I should go to one of those things. Rich gatherings of worshipers who also happened to be dancers. It was designed for church dancers like me. The bigwigs in the world of worship dance were brought in to teach us, and they would pool their creativity, and teacher and student alike would come away with ideas to enrich the next year of choreography. This particular year I went for the first time. I did not know what to expect, so when the brochure said there would be a chance to bring a piece you were working on and they would help you with it, I didn't know enough to be self-conscious about it. I picked out a song I was indeed working on and brought along a cassette.

I flew into Washington DC full of excitement, dance shoes packed away carefully. I was swept into a world of visual extravagance, where there were so many beautiful things to see that one was almost overwhelmed. Sondance was there, a duo I had admired since the beginning of my dance experience. That alone would have been enough to draw me. And there was Ballet Magnificat, Liz Dimmel, and many others with far more experience than I had. We sweated through rigorous master classes, and I felt like I held my own, not the best dancer by any means, but a respectable student at this level.

When the evening came for us to get help with our pieces, I was good and scared. I felt a little like a kindergarten crayon artist showing fridge art to Rembrandt. But, I'd signed up, and I really wanted some input on this piece. So I danced it. I forget the singer, but the song was called “Clap Your Hands.” It was done in that neoclassical style that used to be popular, combining synth with classical chord structures. The lyrics went something like this:

Clap your hand, all ye people.
Shout to God for joy.
For He is King over all the earth.
His throne is established in righteousness.
And now He comes, His people to bless.
Clap your hands! Clap your hands!
Shout to God for joy!

I didn't want to go clapping through the whole song. The sound of my palms smacking together jangled one's nerves and fought with the sound of the music, so I devised this nifty Semitic-looking move where your hands didn't actually meet, but you mimed a clap. And in that second-to-the-last line you did a little traveling turn in one direction, did your mime clap, traveled back the other way, and clapped again. When I got to that part and did my little move, I heard this voice, “I LIKE that!” and my worship dancer's heart rejoiced, because you were always were looking for ways to praise God and you derived your ministry from encouraging people to worship with you. And I had high hopes that what I was doing was translating into praise for them, so I redoubled my efforts and put everything into it. Probably way too much into it, and when the song ended, I sat down, puffing and sweating, to get my critique.

The dance was well received, especially the one move. There was room for improvement, of course. Although I honestly can't remember what they said (probably to straighten out my arabesques or something), I appreciated that the one move got communicated to them. If they GOT it, then it must be clear, and it would hopefully minister at my own church, too.

But while I sat there with my mouth hanging open, panting, my lungs filled with the cold, dry air from the hotel and my bronchial tubes started to swell. Never having experienced that before, I wasn't concerned about the fact that it was getting harder to breathe. I mean, who hasn't been out of breath before? And I'd danced pretty hard.

Then it was time for the next dancer, and I got up and went back to my seat. Breathing got harder and I got up to go to the ladies' room so I wouldn't disturb anybody. Things went from bad to worse. I couldn't exhale. I coughed hard, got the air out, then I couldn't inhale. I kept trying, getting more and more desperate. This lady came in there, not with the conference, but somebody staying in the hotel. I tried not to disturb her, but at this point I was absolutely fighting to breathe. She asked if she could help, so I pointed to the double doors behind which the conference was still going on and choked out something about getting somebody from in there. A moment later in rushed the Sondance duo, as well as Liz Dimmel. So much for not wanting to be a bother.

Somebody handed me a paper bag, thinking maybe I was hyperventilating. I wasn't, but the bag was helpful in that the warm, moist air from inside my lungs was sent back down, relaxing the bronchials. I sucked greedily on that paper bag, then looked up in relief. They stayed for a minute or two, talking nicely, and then went back to the workshop. Embarrassed, I got in my sister's car and drove back to her house, where I was staying there in DC. I felt much better the next day and enjoyed the rest of the conference.

Over the next few years I would go to a conference when I needed refreshing, and I might meet up with Liz or Yvonne or somebody, and we always laughed over the paper bag incident. I had a few more incidences like that, and eventually was diagnosed with exercise-induced asthma. It's pretty manageable these days. In fact, I haven't had an episode since I got too old to dance; but I'll probably always remember and hate the feeling of desperation you get when you can't seem to get that all-important next breath.

You know what's kind of cool? I didn't realize it at the time, but my little clapping move found its way into the pool of creativity that seemed to follow those conferences. I used to pick up Christian dance videos from here and there, and for a year or so I saw that move done over and over. The JWD dancers did it. Sondance did it at the next Jerusalem Worship Dance conference. And although I missed it at the time, Ballet Magnificat adapted it to tambourines and put it on their video. So that's my little contribution to the Christian dance world.


This week I went to ask our pastor what his Sunday sermon was going to be about (I was picking out music), and he mentioned something about being desperate for God. Immediately my mind went to the song, “Breathe.” I can resonate to that song.

“This is the air I breathe, Your Holy presence living in me. And I—I'm desperate for you.”

You see, I know what it is to be desperate for the next breath, to fight and scratch and long to breathe one more time. I sit here clicking away on a sunny day, enjoying the warmth of the evening sun, drinking in deep, calm breaths. But I happen to know that, calm as I am, I have a desperate need for that next breath.

Did you know that in the Greek language the words “Spirit” and “breath” are the same? Pneuma means “Spirit,” “breath,” and also “wind.” Are you comfortable in the place God has you? Good. Are you in a hungry time? Good, too. Whether you realize it or not, you and I share one thing in common: a desperate need. I'm desperate for the next thing God's Holy Spirit is going to do in my life. He's my Breath. He keeps me alive.


Refiner's Fire, recorded Friday night (3-28-08)
Breathe_3-28-08.mp3