Question #228

What about dancing?

I am the mother of four boys. One is now a teenager and is being asked to attend boy/girl type parties where dancing is being encouraged. I feel that this is not appropriate for a Christian, especially the type of close dancing and couple dancing that is popular these days. What scriptures can I use with him to explain why dancing is not appropriate for him…can lead to lust, is not “modest”, etc.?

The Answer:

There may be other influences that are as bad, but there is no influence that is worse on the morals or people and the stability of the home than dancing. There is nothing in it that elevates the spirituality of the soul or purifies the heart. No Christian has ever been led to be more spiritual-minded or more devoted to Christ by participation in this worldly activity. Dancing has never brought a Christian closer to God, nearer to Christ, or more Christ-like in life. Dancing has never led a Christian to love Christ more or to do more for His Kingdom. The most that has ever been said by any one in defense of dancing is that they don’t see any harm in it. One reason that they don’t see any harm in it is that they are not looking for any harm. They are looking to justify that in which they wish to engage and in which they are going to engage because they desire to “run with the crowd.” Any activity that has no better justification than “everybody is doing it” is something that is better left alone for the Christian. Moreover, instead of asking “What is wrong with it,” the Christian should ask, “What is the good in it?” What would they think of the same bodily movements and closeness of bodily parts occurred in the darkness of the bedroom instead of the dim light of the ballroom? Given the obvious answer, is it any wonder that such movements and closeness in the ballroom often lead to either the bedroom or that back seat of an automobile? Most likely, most of those who wound up in the bedroom or automobile said “It will never happen to me.” The remainder includes those who were too naive to realize what could happen and those who set about to make it happen as their aim in life.

The truth is that dancing is a work of the flesh and not a fruit of the Spirit. Read the list of the fruit of the Spirit in Galatians 5 and see how impossible to fit dancing into that list. Read the list of the works of the flesh and you will see that dancing fits quite easily; it concludes with “envyings, drunkenness, reveling, and such like.” Paul then adds: “of which I forewarn you, even as I did forewarn you, that they who practice such things shall not inherit the kingdom of God.” To say that dancing does not fall into the works of the flesh is to deny the obvious. Any conduct that brings such a decree from the Lord should be rejected and avoided by the Christian. The decree of the Lord cannot be changed.

Every passage of Scripture that commands us to avoid temptation and the excitement and gratification of the lust of the flesh prohibits dancing because it always does this.

The white robe of the Christian has been washed in the blood of the Lamb. Rev. 7:13-14. Conduct such as dancing can only spot and the white robe with the filth of the world and blemish the work of the blood of the Lamb.