Who saw the UK Blessing video yesterday? It was great to see the unity in the church.
Myself (UC Grace) and Prinith (Movement in Worship Birmingham Base) have felt led to organise a UK Dance/ Movement blessing. We want people across different dance ministries, and individuals that simply have a passion for demonstrating their faith through movement, to join us in creating this blessing.
Dear Dancer
We’d love to invite you to take part in a UK project to draw Christian dancers together and create a blessing to people across the UK.
The Vision
To dance to the song The Blessing by The UK Blessing (original Kari Jobe) using this version – https://youtu.be/PUtll3mNj5U
Gathering the videos together we will compile it into video for everyone to share across social media and their networks. We want it to be an opportunity to display the vast ability of dancers, their heart to worship Jesus and share their faith through dance and movement. During covid 19 lockdown, dance places, workshops and performances may have been shut down, but a dancing army have continued to move in their homes and outdoor spaces as they feel led. Dance impacts more than we know and this presents a fantastic opportunity for many to gather and move for our God. Would you like to join us?
The details –
We plan to air the video on Sunday 17th May.
All video submissions need to be received by Sunday 10th May.
Videos must be recorded in landscape
Please do not wear any branded clothes.
Feel free to use banners, flags or other props
Please dance to as much of the song as you feel led to.
Many of you have heard me speak about raising up a #dancingarmy and encouraging people to #dancealittlelouder. The reality of this happening has snowballed, and it is awesome to see how God is using such a simple concept to gather people, to gather movers and dancers whose whole heart is simply to worship, praise, prayer, live life and more through Jesus. If you’ve not joined us yet for a Prayer Dance Bite can I encourage you to do so. Let’s step out and live our journey of faith through movement, however big or small that might be.
During this crazy time that we are living in at the moment. It can send many of us into a spin with an unclear way out. In another one of my late night/ early morning awake times with my son, my head was in a spin about the latest news of the more intentional lockdown we were about to enter. So many people would be feeling so many different things. What was God saying in amongst it all?? PEACE. PEACE, BE STILL.
I knew that I had to dance to that. That myself, and many others needed to know that God says, Peace Be Still… Let your Faith arise. Jesus is the one that calms the storms with 3 strong words, He is the one that will bring us comfort, strength, peace and protection over the coming months. We need to choose to let our faith arise and lean into all that He has available for us.
As I shared with others my passion for moving to this song, they wanted to also dance, before I knew it, there was indeed a dancing army, proclaiming God’s word, safety, protection and peace. That’s what this video is. A culmination of 8 dancers stepping out to move in prayer for all. God moves mountains, he changes water into wine, he raises people from the dead, he heals the sick. He stands by us no matter what, walks with us during our darkest hours, and carries when it gets too much.
Remember this ripple I keep talking about? How a ripple can change the atmosphere. For just by one starting, others will follow. Let’s make this ripple shake and move the heavens. Let’s be bold in our conversations, our prayers, our movements. Let’s shake the heavens and show people how great our God is.
Join me, #dancealittlelouder. Be a #dancingarmy.
We’d love to connect with you further, so why not sign up to our newsletter where you can hear more about what we are doing and how you can get involved. Head here.
Wow. What a period of unknown we are entering into. I’m sure each of us have many different feelings at the moment. One thing for sure, is that we need to stand firm on our foundation – God’s word and Jesus. It has struck me that we need to be active with our dance ministry in this period of change moving forward, God has been speaking to me about raising a worship dance army.
That my heart cannot be held by circumstance. For my eyes are locked on the God who sees the end. So when this world around me cries out, “Who can stand?” I know That I will not be moved for my feet are planted in You.
Lyrics from Firm Foundation, Selah
I want to share with you four ways that you can choose develop your dance ministry during this time of change. Ways that you as an individual can grow and develop your dance ministry, or ways you can do it for your group.
1. We are called for such a time as this.
During some of the many hours I am up with my son, I had quite an intense time of searching with God. There are many things on my mind at the moment, but the biggest one is that God is calling us dancers and movers to step up. Step up and move, dance, declare God’s glory, peace, power and love across all that is going on.
The words from the song Firm Foundation have washed over me during the past week, speaking affirmation, encouragement and joy into a situation that looks quite bleak! We share our faith through dance and movement, demonstrating our faith, deeds and action.
Part of my response to this conversation with God involved embracing the lovely March weather. Heading to the beach, because that was where God said I should dance, and putting movement to this song.
So the first way to develop your dance ministry is by being willing to respond to Gods call.
Moving forward as a dancing army
Last year I shared about the golden whirlwind picture I was given, where essentially there were little tornadoes above each person’s head. As dancers and movers moved the little tornadoes gathered together into a big one.
All those little ripples merged together to create a change in the atmosphere that was unprecedented (you can read more about it here). I had already begun to see this picture start to come to fruition at the beginning of the year. But going forward our ability to move and dance as one will be even more important.
God is leading me to encourage a Dancing Army. By this I mean, making the choice to use our dance and movement to cause an even greater shift in the atmosphere. We have this magnificent opportunity to demonstrate worship and faith in different way going forward. Your dance ministry can help this grow by being bold and stepping out, building a dancing army. Choosing to simply be Jesus with your movement and encouraging others.
Dance a little Louder
The song Raise a Hallelujah has a line in it ‘sing a little louder’ where every bit of me wants to do more than the words give. God is calling us to move more, to dance strong, dance it loud and dance it from the heart. Now is our time as dancers to step out into all God has made us to be. To pray, to move, to go deeper with God.
Part of this requires gathering with other dancers and as we become more of a dancing army – our dance, our song – is getting louder.
Dance ministry is hard work, it requires dedication and always choosing to put Gods pathway first. It also requires stepping out to encourage others and be in the gap when others can’t. Dancing louder with more vibrancy, declaring Gods heart and putting his word front and centre.
Create an online dance ministry community
Community brings cohesion, the opportunity to join together and move as one consistently. You cannot beat face to face dance ministry. However, you must adapt to the circumstances around you, which is why at UC Grace we are launching Prayer Dance Bites. Short 20 minute gatherings online 2-3 times a week, to read and respond to scripture. All ages welcome.
How could you create community online to encourage others with your dance ministry. Choose to get people moving and dancing their prayer. Creating fellowship, catch up and time together.
Want to join us online?
There are several different ways that you can join UC Grace online.
Prayer Dance Bitesprovide the opportunity to connect scripture and pray through weekly sessions via zoom. Further information is available here.
Scripture Promptsbring you scripture right into your inbox once a week. They offer 3 ways to engage with scripture in a way that you might not normally. For more information head here.
As more and more people have asked me this over the last year I
found myself having to think really hard about what the ‘UC’ was for. I knew I had
written a sentence that encapsulated it, but what that was I couldn’t remember.
Not because there wasn’t ever a reason to not remember, but because in the
beginning it was front and centre in my mind, as I set my name and started my
business. But as time has gone on the ability to recall those details has been
harder, there’s been shifts in my aims, my logo design and branding, as well as
the ‘info’ that I display about UC Grace. Plus, the reality of life and just
being busy!
How UC Grace began in 2010
Let’s open the door…
But, there always comes a point when you need a spring clean, a
bit of a shake through to remove bits of info that have served it’s time and
that’s what happened with the ‘UC’. The logo changed to the letters and wording
beneath it changed, I revamped the website, once, twice, many times, I
rebranded, I acknowledged by values for the business and the way I wanted to
push forward. But the reasoning behind the name was always there, it’s just
been hidden behind different layers.
The logo in 2011
So, let’s revisit our roots and share in more depth how the ‘UC’ came about, the biggest thing to recognise first, was that it was a 2 fold development (see Golden Whirlwind for info about why I teach).
So what was the starting point?
In the early days as I sat with my notebook writing down lots of
different names, I settled quite quickly on the word Grace, acknowledging that
as part of our Christian walk, grace was so important. I realised that I wanted
people to ‘see’ grace in dance, in our movements, actions, connections and
relationships. So initially all I had was ‘you’ ‘see’ and ‘grace’. Deciding how
to coax that into a name was super hard. The development of single letters
happened quite quickly ‘uC’. Notice the little ‘u’ and the big ‘C’. That was pivotal
as I felt it showed where the emphasis needed to be. The idea of opening up our
eyes, seeing things that we wouldn’t have seen before, releasing something,
and, so began the next stage.
We we entered 2012 there was a slight change, feeling that I needed to put ‘dance’ within the name and encase the tagline to a more succinct one with just my key words.
Defining what the ‘uC’ was about, working out what would create the foundation. I settled on it encompassing these words – uncapped unceasing unchanging uncover uncontrolled
The addition of dance didn’t last long. By the end of 2012 I’d reverted back to just ‘UC Grace’
This became the saying that best described what the ‘uC’ was
about, and it sat beneath the name uC Grace.
You can see the progression of the logo in these pictures.
As I moved forward with the company, another 3 words were pivotal
in under pinning our tagline
– encouraging | growing | releasing –
these enable us to put Gods word front and centre in the
company.
Encouraging – each person to grow into who they are
meant to be
Growing – each person in their skills, knowledge and
confidence God has given them
Releasing – each person into their dreams, ministries
and journeys God has for them
The last change before the major rebrand was this. The debate about whether I didn’t dance in my title had trundled on, so I wanted to add an image that would explain a bit more about the company was rather than putting dance.
But what does it all mean?
Let’s go back to the ‘uC’, where I had the little u and the big C. You might notice that now the little u is a big U. At the beginning of 2018 I undertook a rebrand of UC Grace. Initially it was just going to be an update of my logo, but after a few months of thinking and praying I realised that UC Grace had changed so much that it deserved a logo that would reflect it’s true heart. Big and bold YOU SEE GRACE, grace in our everyday, the way we think, move and act. Colour displaying individuality, fun and integrity to Gods promise. The dancer with a ribbon displaying the ability worship in different ways (You can read more about ribbons here). A yellow ribbon, to demonstrate JOY. JOY of movement and remembering someone who danced with such joy for Jesus throughout her whole life, Lyn.
Lyn Cave. The joyful dancer.
What ‘UC’ is going to be important for you going forward?
We all see
different things in life, that means we see the importance of things on a
different level. Take a moment to think about your present life, what areas
might you need to see things differently? What areas might you need grace?
This is what the UC is all about!!
Going forward UC Grace is committed to demonstrating and sharing Gods word through dance and movement. The saying below is what developed in 2010 when I started UC Grace. It encapsulates so well what it means to generate a deeper conversation with God through dance and movement. We hope it connects with you and encourages you in your journey.
We’d love to connect with you further, so why not sign up to our newsletter where you can hear more about what we are doing and how you can get involved. Head here.
It’s been an awesome start to our events this year, with our
first Living Colour morning of 2019. Such a privilege to meet with all the
dancers and spend time catching up.
Our focus during the workshop session was exploring Proverbs
3.1-8, by looking at 3 main sections, Gods teaching and foundation, his
faithfulness and understanding when we are struggling and having help come
around us.
There was a great conversation about verse 1, and the
different interpretations in different Bible versions. One version talked about
‘storing’ commands not keeping them, which is an image of treasuring the things
that God gives you.
In verses 3 and 4 we chatted about how we can forget the small things that God is faithful in, and that it’s important to remember them daily. Participants worked in pairs to pick 3 or 4 areas that they felt God was faithful in. They wrote these down on separate pieces of paper and placed them at staggered points across the space. Working with their partner they put those faithful things into a journey, what they realised as they danced and shared with others, was the importance of fellowship and being with someone as you share in your faithful journey.
Below is short film of Servina and Jane’s, and Caroline and Helen’s Faithful Journey.
Our next Living Colour is planned for Saturday 22nd June, you can check out the info here. But why not join us before that at one of our dance days.
Last night I had the privilege of being invited to be part
of the Candlemas service at St Micahel’s, Aldershot, it was such a lovely
evening, I left buzzing and I want to share some of what God spoke to me during
the service.
I had been asked if I could find some dancers who could
respond as the felt led to a piece of live piano music based on Psalm 121: I Life
my eyes up, to the Mountain. The lovely Helen Warren joined me as a second
dancer, and our prayer before we danced was that we would reflect some of Jesus’
heart, that people would be drawn in with a desire to explore God more through
our movement.
Recently I recognised that I spend a lot of time teaching
and delivering, and not so much time dancing for myself. Last night gave me the
opportunity to come before God and thank him that I have the ability to move,
but also reinforced that for UC Grace to grow, and share Gods heart, I need to
make sure I am giving God mine, and that in turn requires time set aside for me
to dance, and be lost in his love through movement.
As the service progressed, Alwyn, the Vicar asked if we
would dance again later in the service. By this point me and Helen felt we had ‘warmed
up’, laid the foundations of showing Jesus through movement. So, as Jesus
Christ, I think upon your sacrifice played, our hearts were stirred more by the
spirit and we loved sharing more of that through dance and movement.
Much of the journey I have been on over the past week has
encompassed the desire to draw back to the centre of what and why I do what I
do with UC Grace. There were several things that God drew my attention to last
night, it made me chuckle as the theme seemed to be everywhere I went at the
moment.
In my previous post I mentioned about the interaction between creativity and the heart, and that my desire when I started had always been that it was about the hearts impacted not the numbers. You can read more about it here. It is this theme of people’s hearts and prayer that keep cropping up.
This prayer below reminded me that God places me where I
need to be and with who I need to be, and I need to be willing to serve Him in
what ever way that looks like.
It’s really hard in reality isn’t it to keep that sense of doing what God wants and following his will. This chorus of ‘I the Lord of sea and sky’ (brilliant song, you can listen to here), sums it up very well.
I will hold your
people in my heart. The people that God puts in front of me at events, in
conversations and through dancing. Each one is important.
We did manage to video some of what we did last night. Not
everything is in full view. But it will give you a flavour from our first
dance.
What special services have you danced in? Let me know.
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