"Shall we dance?"

It’s been 8 weeks! Eight weeks since my surgery and I got the Dr.’s “OK” to run again! My running shoes were beckoning me to get out there again and get back to my normal daily runs. As I tied up the shoe laces anticipating that great adrenaline rush I had not felt for 8 weeks, I realized I had a new outlook on it all. A new excitement to just enjoy!

As I began the run....I got so excited to be out there again, I just began to do a victory dance as I ran. My arms up in the air, a skip to my step, and a few turns with some groove moves here and there kept me going....:) I heard a voice in the distance say “MOMMY, what’s wrong with that lady?” I knew this little girl’s mother, and heard her mother come out to see, and replied with a chuckle to her daughter “Carly, that’s just Lisa....she does happy dances!” I slowed down to listen to this conversation and heard Carly ask if she could do one too! By this time I was by her mother and said I’d love Carly to join me! So we danced.....and we danced, and we DANCED! And passers by were quite amused....one little old man walking by even waved his cane around with a groove like none I’d seen. By the time it was all done we had a group of neighbors, laughing, and dancing their own jig with us! Some quite hilarious, but that made it all the more wonderful!

On my run home from my wonderful dance with Carly....I felt the smile of Jesus just radiating....He was dancing too! You see....as I look back on that dance in my neighborhood....he brought to my attention....”Lisa, think on all those dancing with you.....” I stopped in my tracks.....I knew all of the neighbors dancing. One lady was a precious care taker of her terminally ill husband; one just said goodbye to her son going to Iraq; one had a prosthesis from an injury from the war, and was dancing away as best he could; one lady just lost her mother; one man had just had a heart attack 2 months earlier and was struggling with depression. I knew every single one of these people....and their stories all filled with such HUGE hurdles.....They made my hurdles look so small.

When I got home I had a message on my phone from the lady taking care of her husband. I speak with her frequently. She thanked me for the dance. She said she got a glimmer of how we need to dance in the dark times, and thank God for the little things in life. It may just be a little dance....but it’s a dance. It’s a light that can spread in a dark situation. She was crying at this point......and so was I. We had a chance to pray together on the phone. I just love her so much! Once again.....God teaches me.

Look at what one dance can do! Do I look for those dances in the dark times? It’s been a summer of many hurdles for our family. From my Mother’s cancer, to my health scare and surgery, to saying some hard goodbyes, and seeing my sister move to Canada. These were hurdles, but the lessons I have learned I would not trade for the world. I have learned to dance! And I am learning how to dance over hurdles. I may not win a track competition for hurdles, but I know I would have more fun than anyone else in the competition! Isn’t that what God would love us all to grasp onto anyway? It’s not about the journey....it’s about how we go through that journey that makes us stronger! Jesus gives us the “dance”! He gives us the grace to hurdle in spite of how high that hurdle is. Loneliness, Pain, Rejection, Disease, Grief, Anger, Broken marriages, A lost loved one, Addiction, Low Self-Esteem, whatever that hurdle is.....God

not only has a way over that hurdle, but one that will even surprise you! I am learning that the biggest hurdle in my life is really not so big when Jesus is right there on the other side ready to catch me. If I don’t eloquently dance, or leap over it....if I fall flat on my face....He catches me and finishes the race with me.....dancing! I finish victoriously!

There are days I have no dance in my step.....days I would love to give up and have a pity party...but I have found that all it takes is putting one step in front of the other, crying out to Jesus for His help, and He takes it from there. Before I know it that one foot in front of the other....has turned to into a dance. The breakthrough has begun.

If it’s a dance from the heart, a dance from the soul, or a physical dance....it’s a dance.

It’s a place of letting go and letting God. It’s such a precious place to be.

Shall we dance?