The Dance

"You dance over me while I am unaware,
You sing all around and I never hear a sound,
Lord, I'm amazed by you and how you love me."

The words from this song (Amazed by Jared Anderson) come from a verse in Zephaniah and it always warms my heart.

"For the LORD your God has arrived to live among you. He is a mighty savior. He will rejoice over you with great gladness. With his love, he will calm all your fears. He will exult over you by singing a happy song." Zephaniah 3:17

The reason this song and scripture keep coming back to me is that they paint a picture of a God who is so incredibly excited about me that he is dancing and singing over me all the time - even when I am unaware or in disbelief. It has broadened my view of who I believe God to be. Our view of God determines our relationship or our lack of relationship with our Creator. If we see our God as distant and ready to condemn, then it is likely that our relationship with Him will not be one of love, but of fear.

However, the Bible shows us that God is not distant and that he desires a close, intimate relationship with each one of us. In fact, for those of us who confess him as Lord, he is a God who loves us so greatly and is filled with such joy for us that he sings and dances over us!

I started to ask what brought about this revelation of how God sings over Israel, and in turn how he sings over those who are his? What had Israel experienced that resulted in God lavishing his mercy and love upon his people?

If we back up to the rest of chapter 3, we find that God is addressing this portion of scripture to Israel in light of prophecies by Zephaniah that Babylon would be coming to bring judgment upon Israel. The judgment was that the people were carried away captive into Babylon as punishment for abandoning the Lord and worshipping foreign gods and idols. Keep in mind that this would all occur in the future, nonetheless it would take place, and Israel would yearn for God’s deliverance.

Farther down starting in verse 14, Zephaniah prophecies about the Lord's coming deliverance. Although Israel was being justly punished for their transgressions against God, He was compelled by His great love to rescue his beloved from the hands of Babylon.

What type of song will the Lord sing over us? In Psalm 32:5 & 7 we read, “I acknowledged my sin to You, and my iniquity I have not hidden. I said, ‘I will confess my transgressions to the LORD,’ and You forgave the iniquity of my sin . . . You are my hiding place; you shall preserve me from trouble; you shall surround me with songs of deliverance.”

God wanted to sing songs of deliverance over Israel and to rescue her from her judgment. In the same way, God delights so much in our desire to turn from unrighteousness, that He sings songs of deliverance over us.

The Hebrew word for “rejoice” which we see in verse 17, is giyl or guwl, and is defined in Strong’s Concordance as, “To spin around under the influence of any violent emotion,” and to “be glad, be joyful,” or to “rejoice, cry out, and exalt.” In other words, to dance.

God is pursuing me even in my disobedience. He wants to sweep me off my feet and carry me to a place where he can "dance over me", "calm my fears" and "exalt over me with singing." This is most certainly not a God who is too serious, distant or angry. He is spinning in joy and singing songs of deliverance because I am His.