Stormdancer, thank you for answering my questions! That helps me have a better understanding of what you mean. I think this kind of dancing is a little bit different from the improv I described, but maybe not by much. It just depends on the situation.
stormdancer said:
If you are consciously controlling your movements, it is worship if you are doing it from a humble and worshiping spirit.
I agree. Worship depends on the heart, not on form.
stormdancer said:
It is more similar to worship through singing, because both are music-oriented.
This was the question I was most curious about. Singers and musicians train to sing and play instruments. When musicians play a song in church, chances are the worship pastor chose that song in advance, and the musicians have rehearsed it together at least once. Even in churches that do not use musical instruments, such as Church of Christ and Primitive Baptist, I'm pretty sure there is still congregational singing. The only way to do congregational singing is to use lyrics that have already been determined, whether they are put up on a projector so everybody can read them, or everybody has them memorized. It would be a double-standard to say this is okay for music but not okay for dance. They are very similar art forms, except that one is auditory and the other is visual.
Nothing is mentioned of dancing in the New Testament church, whereas, instruction is given to encourage one another: "Be filled with the Spirit; speaking to yourselves in psalms and hymns and spiritual songs, singing and making melody in your heart to the Lord; giving thanks always for all things unto God and the Father in the name of our Lord Jesus Christ..." Ephesians 5:18b-20.
If there were such activity in the early church, it would undoubtedly be mentioned it here or in Colossians 3:16.
Okay, now I am really lost. Are you now saying that any kind of dance in church is not okay at all?
I can see that there is a determined will to dance/worship in the carnal flesh. I can't imagine any person who loves the Lord not wanting the power of the Spirit in all things whether in church or not. It just makes spiritual sense.
This is what I am talking about. You are making an assumption about every single Christian whose ideas about worship do not line up to yours. I don't know about you, but the only person whose heart I know is mine. For you to state categorically that everybody who doesn't do things in the way you described is motivated by the flesh and not the Spirit, is a
very serious accusation. If you are comfortable casting judgment on a huge number of people you've never met, that's between you and God, but as your sister in Christ I have to caution you against that. I believe that worship comes from the heart, and can appear in
many different forms. Brother Lawrence, a monk who lived several hundred years ago, considered his duty of washing dishes in the monastery is an act of worship. Any activity through which we communicate with God, glorify Him, and enter into His presence, is an act of worship, whatever it looks like.
Under the guise of spiritual worship, Jewish cultural folk dances are brought in the church and called worship. They are not. They are just Jewish folk dances (or an attempt to recreate them). The same goes for other choreographed dances, Jewish or not. Some seem to think that just because it is Jewish, it is spiritual. Certainly, that cannot be true.
Your last statement is correct, but the reverse is also true: just because it is Jewish (or choreographed) doesn't mean it
can't be spiritual either. I've danced to more choreography than I can remember, and the truth is, when I am dancing to something I've already learned, I personally feel
more free to worship God than when my dance is unstructured or unplanned. When my body memorizes the steps, my mind and my spirit are open. I wish you understood this. I think you are missing out on a big blessing by rejecting it so emphatically.