Hearts Ablaze Dance Team

Hearts Ablaze was inspired by the message that was preached the very night that I (Lisa Handlin) was called to lead a dance team. The sermon that night was about offering God a living sacrifice. The speaker went on to describe how God consumes the sacrifice completely. When I thought about this, I thought that the sacrifice God desires most is our hearts, and that if we offer our hearts as a living sacrifice, completely given over to Him, He would consume them. Thus the name, Hearts Ablaze, and our scripture, Hebrews 12:29 "For our God is a consuming fire", came to be.

We believe that we, as worship dancers, need to keep our individual hearts and lives pure so that we, as a team, can allow the Holy Spirit to minister through us to edify the church and draw the unsaved to Him.

We believe that we need to be yielded to God first, our Pastor second, and then to the leadership of our church, as well as to one another, in order to be all that God wants us to be. I believe there is a special anointing upon our group due to our willingness to submit to one another and to support the gifts and uniqueness of each individual.

Lisa Handlin was introduced to Christian dance as a new believer in 1995 through a group called Christian Dance Fellowship and received instruction within this group. It was a dance conference for Jewish praise that really ignited her desires to dance and encouraged her to allow what was in her heart to have a physical expression. Having no technical background, she has been trained and led by the Holy Spirit to lead, dance, and choreograph for His glory. Several years later she received her call to lead Hearts Ablaze.

Barbara Sherman was introduced to Christian dance in 1985 when a Messianic Jewish group ministered at The Tabernacle, the non-denominational charismatic church she attended in Laurel, Maryland. She became a member of The Tabernacle dancers in 1986 and danced with that team for over 3 years. In 1998, she began attending Living Waters Church, where Pastor Elizabeth invited her to participate in the formation of a new worship dance ministry-Hearts Ablaze.

Ruth Ann Mayer's books, Step Into His Marvelous and May I Have This Dance have provided biblical teaching and guidance for our dance ministry.

Worship Dance is interpretive dance that glorifies God. The goal of every dance is to glorify God, minister to the lost, and edify believers. It is not the dancers' abilities or the choreography that ministers, it is the powerful presence of the Holy Spirit-apart from Him we can do nothing.

Scriptures that call us to this ministry: Romans 12:1, 10:5; I Peter 4:10-11; I Corinthians 2:4-5; Psalm 35:18, 40:9, 149:3, 150:4

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