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BY BONNIE SCOTT
UMCONNECTION CONTRIBUTOR

My roommate was making converts, and I was a prime target. Three nights a week she would come home inspired and on a mission. "You've got to come with me next time!"

I successfully dodged her invitations for weeks at a time, but she was relentless. There was good news to be had, and I had to have it. So out of love for my friend, I did it. One courageous day in January, I packed a bag, filled a water-bottle, suppressed the self-deprecating conga line in my head, and set foot inside of Transformations.

Transformations would be a great name for a church, but it's actually a gym. And it was rocking with the upbeat music of the Zumba class at the back of the room, where I spotted my roommate, already jiving. Zumba is a Latin-based dance-aerobics class that has recently revolutionized the fitness world for women (and a few brave men). Forget boring step classes, Zumba is sensational and high-energy, great cardio and honest-to-goodness fun. It's as if Zumba's creators knew that our bodies were made for dancing.

Of course, I wasn't thinking all this as I made my way through the gym, feeling 25 sets of eyes on me, eyes belonging to buff, iron-pumping, bodies. I was thinking all gyms ought to be called, "Judgment Zone for the Uncoordinated and Unfit." I was thinking I had approximately 30 seconds to cut and run before making an absolute fool of myself. (Is this what first-time visitors feel at church?)

If I did make a fool of myself, nobody seemed to care. The instructor called out the moves, showed us how to spin this way and shake that way, kept an eye on our progress, and offered a well-timed "C'mon!" whenever we wearied. The women followed suit, skillfully dancing, squatting, stretching, and even smiling through their sweat. The workout was intense. I fumbled and panted through the routines, taking a "water-break" every six minutes.

But all I could think about was worship. Here in the Zumba class, I was experiencing something more akin to my vision for Christian worship than most of the Christian worship services I've attended.

Here were women from all walks of life, races and ages (yes, even the elusive young adult), moving together to the same beat. I admired the strong leadership of the instructor and felt genuinely encouraged by the other women. There was a distinct element of ritual: the warm up, the cool down, the synchronized dancing, the way everybody cheered when "Boom Boom Boom" came over the loud speakers. When's the last time "And Can it Be That I Should Gain" elicited a scream from worshippers? When's the last time you left worship absolutely compelled to share the good news – relentless in your pursuit to bring along a friend?

Above all, as the gym's name implies, these women brought with them the expectation of being transformed. Do we attend worship with the same expectation?

N.T. Wright says we become like that which we worship. In a culture that idolizes physical fitness and a certain beauty-ideal, women are willing to pull out all the stops to be transformed into the image endorsed by the magazines. Will we leave behind our inhibitions and come to worship expecting to be transformed in the image of Jesus Christ?

Paul used athletic metaphors to describe Christian life as a race, and our word "asceticism" comes from the Greek which literally means "training," as in the disciplined training of our bodies. So I think there is much that can be learned from the Zumba craze about discipleship and corporate worship. Here are just three thoughts:

Ritual is not dead – especially not for young folks. We long for familiar patterns and symbolic gestures that identify us as part of a distinct community. Consider Zumba or watch the Cameron Crazies during a Maryland/Duke basketball game – something is being worshipped here, and worship is carried out through ritual.

Seeker-sensitivity does not mean watering things down. My first Zumba class was intense and challenging – but that intensity made it meaningful enough to return. Worship must challenge us if it intends to transform us, and a good leader can intentionally bring newcomers up to speed without watering things down.

Our bodies cannot be forgotten. Zumba engages a person's body, mind and soul because it seeks to transform body, mind and soul.

Corporate worship ought to do the same. If you're not the dancing type, there are other ways to put your body into it: Communion and baptism, to name a couple.

Over the past several months, not only have I taken up Zumba, I've also been working with very gifted clergy colleagues to plan worship for Annual Conference in May. It's just so wonderful to be in a room with hundreds of other Methodist clergy and lay-people worshipping the same God. This year, as you pack for annual conference, come with your singing voice and dancing shoes. Come hoping to make a holy fool out of yourself in worship. Come expecting to be transformed.