God's People DANCE!
Hebraic circle dancing is a large part of Hebraic Praise and Worship "But", you might ask, "does God find favor in seeing all these people swinging around, holding hands . . . HAVING FUN during these special times of worship and praise?" We would submit that not only does He find favor, He expects it!
We all know that God expects His people to keep the Feast of Tabernacles, that these Holy Days - these 'moedim' - are 'appointments' or 'dates' we have with The Creator, but with a careful reading of the text, we find that God reveals a little more about our festival observance.
NKJ Leviticus 23:39 Also on the fifteenth day of the seventh month, when you have gathered in the fruit of the land, you shall keep the feast of the LORD for seven days . . .
In the above passage, the phrase "you shall keep the feast of the Lord" reads like this in the Hebrew . . . "ta haggoo et hag YHVH" which means "you feast, feast to The Lord". There are two Hebrew words in this passage that are significant to our understanding of what God wants us to do during the festival. The first is 'chagag' (Strong's 2287) and the other is 'chag' (Strong's 2282 - a derivative of 2287). When you look these words up in a Hebrew dictionary you find that they not only mean 'feast', they also mean 'to swirl around, to dance'. So if we were to rewrite this passage with that understanding, it might read like this, ". . . you shall DANCE, DANCE to (with) The Lord . . ." Certainly, with our understanding that the festival is indeed "a date" and that this festival in particular pictures the Wedding Supper of the Messiah, I believe it would be appropriate to say that we are indeed "dancing with YHVH" at the festival.
Furthur study of the words related to the Hebrew word "chagag" (Strong's 2328 - "chuwg"; Strongs 2329 - "chuwg"; and Strong's 2283 - "chagah") indicate that the dance is done in a circle.
The Bible gives us a number of examples of God's people dancing during times of joy and victory.
- Miriam danced after God defeated the Egyptians at the Red Sea - Exodus 15:20
- David danced when bringing the Ark of the Covenant to Jerusalem - 2 Samuel 6:14
- In the Millennial Kingdom of God, young men and old will dance - Jeremiah 31:13
So, at the festivals . . . WE DANCE! We encourage you to join us on the dance floor as we praise Him during this time of celebration.
We have striven to make the dances easy to pick up. Yes, there will be a few old favorites, such as Roni Roni that are faster paced, but for the most part, the dances are designed to be learned quickly, using basic dance steps.
If you would like to learn more, please join us in one of the evening dance classes where we will teach some of the fun Sabbath Praise Songs that we do often in our local congregation.
Praise God in his sanctuary:
praise him in the firmament of his power. Praise him for his mighty acts: praise
him according to his excellent greatness. Praise him with the sound of the trumpet:
praise him with the psaltery and harp. Praise him with the timbrel and dance: praise
him with stringed instruments and organs. Praise him upon the loud cymbals: praise him
upon the high sounding cymbals. Let every thing that hath breath praise the LORD.
Praise ye the LORD.
KJV Psalm 150:1
Dance Videos!
Participate in the Dance that is a part
of every praise and worship service. See videos of the
praise dances that are common to the festivals. Click
Here