May 26, Easter 6C (John 5:1-9)
Like a girl jumping double dutch, Jesus has perfect timing.
My preteen years in a black working-class neighborhood of Philadelphia taught me a lot of things. It was the art of double Dutch that taught me that timing is everything.
Watching and participating in this game, I learned how to know when it was just the right moment to enter into the jump ropes and to keep in step with movement, agility, and syncopated rhythm. I was never good at actually jumping into the ropes, but I could always be counted on to turn them. As I held the ends, I was able to create the magic moment of one rope going up while the other was coming down, two ropes crossing each other and allowing someone to enter and jump in the center only if they could make sense of the perfect moment.
I would watch girls count out loud or in their heads as they entered the ropes and tried to keep in step with fancy footwork. As I turned the ends, the expert jumpers seemed to know, intuitively, how to slide in between the two ropes like a dancer and stay on beat. It was as much about rhythm as it was about timing.
