God Loves a Good Party...

In my years in the church, I had this sense that to party was a bad thing, or if you did, you had to be tame about it.  I know that is part of a dominantly white church culture, but why are we so reluctant to celebrate?

I look through the Hebrew Scriptures, God commands His people to party, not only that, but He gets serious.  I'll kill you if you don't take time to do this.  I still haven't been to a Jewish wedding (although I saw a re-enactment of a first century Jewish wedding years ago somewhere), but they were one-week, whole village parties.  Jesus seemed to frequent weddings.  His first miracle was done in the midst of a wedding.

I was at a wedding this weekend for one of my former students.  This student was one of my more cherished students, one of those types of kids who "got it."  It was so wonderful to see Him marry a solid follower of Jesus. 

My wife and daughter were with me, and if you've never met my daughter, let's just say she is one spastic party animal.  I mean she loves parties.  She loves celebrating.  I was watching her the dance floor at 4 and half years old showing everybody up.  She would randomly go up to people to try to get them to dance with her.  At first no one would pay attention, so she would wisk and whirl around the dance floor.  After a while her joy was infectious.  She would jump from person to person, not knowing really any of them, smile as wide as the ocean horizon, dancing the night away.

I had a chance to catch up with many people from my last church.  There was a moment in the midst of the reception that I stepped back and looked at my watch, and seeing that 3 hours had already past.  I think about the meaningful conversations, the celebrating, the food, the people, the dancing, the life that was there.  I mean isn't this a glimpse of eternity?  You know what I'm talking about? Those moments where time flies, you look at your watch and you ask, "Where did all the time go?"  If eternity transcends time, maybe this a glimpse of what heaven is like.  What God is like.  My daughter is the embodiment of celebration.  She wants to party and celebrate all of the time.  And she does it with complete strangers.  She wants people to join her.

So I wonder, is this attitude in our hearts? Our churches?  Why don't we do this more often.  Like seriously, just name any excuse to throw a party and do it.  There is life there somehow.

And to top it off, I had one of those moments where a former student read to me what her speech was going to be at her baccalaureate.  I remember the first event she came to...so raw and high maintenance.  I never really knew that on that night as I shared my story she made a decision to be a follower of Jesus.  She then told me of what's happened since, and I was in tears.  You love those moments.  Take a picture.  They don't come often.

What a beautiful day it was.

Tags: weddings, celebration, church, theology

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