I went to a wedding and I didn’t want to dance, but I also felt like I was keeping myself from dancing, that somewhere in my self I wanted to dance but I was suppressing that truth in unrighteousness. It made me feel like my heart was trying to be one piece, but it was made up of two incompatible pieces. Like one side was the hook-side of velcro, and the other side was a slab of bacon.

It was like when I went to an event called Sports Weekend with my youth group, and they did “every head bowed, every eye closed” so that you could raise your hand to be prayed for. There were two reasons to raise your hand, but they amounted to the same thing, since no one except you could tell the difference. You could raise your hand to pledge your life to Jesus, and have someone pray for you, or you could raise your hand to re-dedicate your life to Jesus, and have someone pray for you. It didn’t matter which one you chose.

Each and every event my youth group participated in did this, and I never raised my hand. But something in me wanted to every time, and so to not raise my hand took effort. I worried that I’d developed a callous that let me ignore the promptings of the Holy Spirit. So I made a deal with the Spirit.

I prayed:

“I will raise my hand this time, but you have to stop bugging me about this at every youth group event. I’ll do it this time, but you have to leave me alone about these events after this. No more guilt-tripping. I’m not quenching the Spirit.”

I wish I could remember the message at which I raised my hand, because I know that me raising my hand had nothing to do with the message. It was the fact of the corporate event of a call to conversion, or a rededication of your life to Christ, that moved me. It was only the fact of the even that moved me. I was not moved by the message. Later our Youth Leader remarked on the fact that several kids in our group raised their hands. From their perspective it must have looked like “Wow, whatever this stupid message is, it must have really resonated with these kids.” I doubt it. I just wanted to Spirit to leave me alone.

I wanted my desire to dance/not-dance to go away. So I made a deal with my desire. I would indulge it, and then it would have to leave me alone. I began to dance.

I did the Macarena. I did the Macarena not because it is an ironic thing to do. Not because doing the Macarena is a dance that is like not-dancing. But because the Macarena is the only dance I know how to do.

I was in a corner of the dancing area, close to the speakers. The music from the speakers wasn’t the Macarena. The music from the speakers was “Let’s Twist Again,” but I’ve never twisted before, so I was unable to twist again. Also, I was unable to twist at all. But attempting to twist again felt particularly disingenuous. I did the Macarena.

I kept doing the Macarena. The songs changed, but my dance did not. I kept doing the Macarena. Some people thought I was funny for awhile, but then me continuing to do the Macarena became incomprehensible to them. I became very serious about dancing the Macarena. The sweat poured off of me like a margarita flowing down the beard of Aaron. I began to glow. Multiple witnesses can confirm this.

At a certain point, the Macarena moved from my hips to my heart, and I became one with the Macarena. I have learned to do the Macarena without ceasing.