Barbie Loflin

Many years ago I went to my daughters school to have lunch with her. As I sat in the hallway waiting for her class to appear, I watched the children make their way through the cavernous hallways.

Single file…

Mouths tightly shut…

The familiar clip, clip of the teacher’s heels pounding on the tiled floors. As they filed past I began to absently hum… all in all it’s just another brick in the wall. (Oops. Flashback. Pink Floyd… where did that come from?)

When the next class came up the hallway, I watched as they marched silently, single file, close enough to the wall the keep the corridor clear. Hands clutching little metal lunch boxes, I began to sing… O EEE oh, O EEE Oh… (Think Wizard of Oz )

The third class started around the corner, hands by their sides, stepping in unison, silence and order reigned… until I saw him.

Yes, you could not miss him.

As he rounded the corner the single file line took on new life. Arms flailing, hips moving to some unknown beat, the little boy danced his way down the corridor; everyone around him acting as if he did not exist. As he danced, I sang , “Celebrate good times. Come on… it’s a celebration…” (Yes, still a child of the 70’s) I made it to the second “celebrate” before our mental music came to a screeching halt (add sound effects). Then came the voice. You know the voice. It is the voice that has told you all of your life that you must conform. Grating like fingernails on a chalkboard it scrapes through the spirit, leaving painful divits in the soul (wow – that was intense).

From somewhere down the hall, just around the corner, I hear its weight shifting from burdened grown up, to carefree boy… the voice bellows… “That will be just about enough out of you! You will now have a SILENT LUNCH!(now picture the special effect echo…)… silent lunch… silent lunch…. And in the recesses of my mind I clearly saw a spindly green hand extend, bony finger pointing as the words “I’ll get you my pretty, and your little dog too!” echoed through the corridor.

A hush fell, accusing eyes darted toward the child who had dared break the rule. Dancing! He was dancing in the middle of a school! How dare he?!

The dancing stopped. The little boy moved obediently into line, following the same ordinary and expected path as everyone else, and head bowed, went into the cafeteria, where he would now partake of his SILENT LUNCH. Order was restored once again to the halls, joy and individuality had been dealt with… all was well.

I mean, I felt the little dude’s pain. I thought about the many (and I do mean many) times Mrs. Margaret Bunch would sneak up behind me during nap time and swat my backside with that paddle just because I had something very urgent to tell the person asleep on the mat next to mine. I mean, had it not been for this strong gifting of superfluous conversation that God has given me, I might have been truly scarred!

What’s my point? Oh, I don’t know. Why does everything have to have a point? Sometimes you just want to talk about things… get them off your chest.

Oh, well, the point is this:
There will be many times in your life – if you love God with all of your heart – that you will absolutely dance to the beat of a different drum. You will hear music that no one else hears; feel a lightness in your step that propels you to dance instead of march. And when you feel His music… MOVE.

What about the opposite side of the coin?

Have you ever been the person to condemn someone to a silent lunch? I have. I used to mentally scream silent lunch! every time a guy at church got on my nerves with his outbursts. When the dancers filled the isle to the point that I could not see the platform, I was screaming silent lunch!

When the worship pastor would start teaching definitions of praise terms…please silent lunch! You get the picture. But what I was effectively doing is this…

2 Sam 6:20-23 When David returned home to bless his household, Michal daughter of Saul came out to meet him and said, “How the king of Israel has distinguished himself today, disrobing in the sight of the slave girls of his servants as any vulgar fellow would!”

Let me tell you something, what I had effectively done when I chose to hold others to my standard of worship… to say that it must be done this way and no other… was to render myself spiritually barren… 23 And Michal daughter of Saul had no children to the day of her death.

David’s response to Michal should challenge us to go further in our worship, and rebuke us for judging the worship of others.

21 I will become even more undignified than this, and I will be humiliated in my own eyes.

I wish we could all get that into our spirit. When someone close to you demands your silent lunch, I would love to see those eyebrows raise, and hear you say…

Oh really?

Just before you start your snoopy dance.