Humor and Faith

Pastor Bill Zacharda
August 3, 2008
Genesis 21:1-7

Introduction: How I like to have fun as most of you know! Sometimes it gets me in trouble. Most times it’s medicine for my soul because our God has a sense of humor. Martin Luther said: “If there is no laughter in heaven, I don’t want to go there.” Me too! At the same time I have a vital faith that means so much to me. Is there a connection between humor and faith?

There’s a terrible misconception that religion has everything to do with formality, long-faced sobriety and prohibitions. Long ago, John Wesley said: “A sour godliness is the devil’s religion.” Can you picture Jesus laughing? (Put Jesus picture in front of the pulpit) This is the way he looked when he put a small child on his lap and the child with his hair going in all directions gave him a funny grin?

Do you find any humor in the Bible? In the Bible, there are 500 word plays and puns in the Old Testa and nearly 200 in the New Testament. The best known one is old Abraham and barren Sarah naming their child Isaac which means laughter. I just chuckle when I think of these two old people sitting in their rocking chairs with the biggest smiles. Sarah connected humor and faith when she said: “God has brought laughter for me; everyone who hears will laugh with me.” It got a lot funnier when Sarah’s tummy starting popping out and what the neighbors were saying! When you get to be a hundred years old like Abraham or 91 years old like Sarah, then put yourself in their situation and see if you don’t laugh out loud!

1. Let’s consider first what good humor can do. Good humor is a way we stand outside ourselves and see ourselves in a new light. Can you laugh at yourself? Good humor teaches us not to take ourselves too seriously. Good humor exposes our weaknesses and foibles. It helps us regain balance and perspective. Our moodiness, our conceits, our limited imaginations, our inconsistencies are all something to laugh about.

The famous London preacher, Charles Haddon Spurgeon was visited by the well-known New York preacher Dr. Cuyler. They took a walk and acted like two boys just out of school. They were exchanging humorous stories from their ministry. They often broke into uncontrollable laughter. After calming down from an uproariously funny incident, Spurgeon wiped the tears from his eyes and said, “Cuyler, let’s kneel down right here and praise God for laughter.” These two great men known for the souls they had won for Christ knelt together thanking God for the gift of laughter.

Laughter is a joy to the soul, a release of tensions. •Someone said that humor is like the springs on your car. It helps us over the rough places. The famous magazine editor, Norman Cousins, overcame a crippling illness by watching the old Marx brothers movies and past episodes of Candid Camera. He wrote in, Anatomy of Illness, “10 minutes of laughter was an anesthetic that would give me at least two hours of pain-free sleep.” Humor lets us get a better grip on life when we are drowning in misery so that we can regain our composure and perspective. There are times when laughter is out of context, but when we are miserable, we don’t eliminate gloom by adding to it. After a while, even our sorrows need laughter.

Many years ago when there were circuit riding ministers, a pastor was asked to ride many miles out of his way to hold services for a notoriously tightfisted parish. The minister decided to go. He preached a great sermon on gratitude. At the end of the service the pastor passed his wide-brimmed hat for the usual collection. The hat came back empty. Turning his hat upside down he pounded on it to release any coin that might have been stuck. Nothing came out. So he raised his hands for the thanksgiving prayer while the people listened wondering what he was going to pray. “Father in Heaven,” he prayed, “I thank you for getting my hat back.” Sometimes when things don’t go your way, remember the minister’s hat and instead of being disappointed, smile. A sense of humor is often the best antidote for disappointment.

2. Secondly, what humor can’t do, faith can do. Job’s friend reminded him that if he were blameless that God would fill his mouth with laughter and his lips would shout for joy. Job acknowledged that that was true, laughter is a gift from God, but then Job asked a deeper question, How can a person be blameless before God? Laughter can’t answer that question.

“Sarg,” said a big brute of a soldier, “don’t let this little fellow go into battle before me. He ain’t big enough to stop a bullet.” They all laughed to relieve the tension in the foxhole. An hour later when the little fellow died in battle, there was no laughter. Humor may relieve the problem. Only faith settles the problem. • Rheinhold Niehbur, in an essay entitled The Signs of the Times, wrote: “There is laughter in the vestibule of the Temple, the echo of laughter in the Temple itself, but no laughter in the holy of holies.” We laugh at the inconsistencies of life and we laugh to relieve the tension, but faith is knowing that meaning and purpose is found in the power, wisdom and love of God. •Only faith can answer the deeper questions of life which I will be preaching on next week when I talk about “mystery and the hidden treasure.” By the way I have been thinking about next week’s message for the past month. It’s a message that addresses the deep things of life that are mysterious and how the Bible uncovers the mystery and reveals God’s truth. For now what humor can not do, faith can do. Sickness, suffering, death and all the mysterious things in life can not ultimately be relieved by humor. Only faith answers the deep things in life.

3. Finally are you beginning to see a connection between faith and humor. Humor may lead to a deeper faith. For Abraham and Sarah in their old age when God told them that they would conceive a son their laughter was just a prelude to a deeper faith. God has given us a funny bone to help us over our troubles, but the funny bone is connected to the backbone of faith. I’ve seen a person’s spirit lifted out of his misery in an instant by humor so that a firmer faith to overcome could begin.

There’s a story about a Cardinal who was known for his great intellect and dire seriousness. He lay in bed with his lungs congested saying that he was about to die. His fellow priests gathered at his bedside as he choked out his last farewell. When he closed his eyes, they thought he was dead and they began grabbing his possessions. With all this noise the Bishop opened his eyes and saw everyone taking his things and his pet monkey perched on the dresser in front of a mirror. The monkey had grabbed the distinguished hat of the Cardinal and was admiring himself in the mirror. The old Bishop began to laugh and cough, and as the story goes he laughed himself right back to health.

Some people could use a little laughter. Some people linger too long on mistakes or failures, they dwell too long on sorrows or tragedies, or they wallow too much in frustrations or self-pity. There comes a time when they need to laugh themselves back to health. Churchill, with his dry wit, said about one of his friends, “He could see a joke only by appointment.” The British laugh 3 times at a joke. First when they hear it to be polite. Secondly when the joke is explained to them. And thirdly a week later when they finally get it. Do you know anyone like that? They need to stand off from themselves and see themselves as God sees them. The funny bone should be connected to the backbone of faith.

Jesus always connected the funny bone to the backbone of faith. As the saying goes, there’s a lot of truth to humor. Will Rogers said: “I don’t make up jokes, I just watch the government and report the facts.” All of the humor of Jesus is of this kind. He just observed people and reported the facts in a humorous way. Jesus pictured rich and prideful people entering God’s Kingdom like a camel thru the eye of a needle. That’s funny but it’s also true. How hard for a rich man to enter the kingdom of God. Sometimes his humor was satirical like calling the Pharisees whitewashed tombs, but it was always to help people see themselves as God sees them so that they might mend their ways. Whether it was the arrogance of the rich, the vanity of the Pharisees or the intellectual snobbery of the Scribes, Jesus’ humor unmasked them and let them see themselves as God sees them. Hopefully his humor was a seed from which faith could grow.

Hopefully humor can do the same for us. Like Sarah and Abraham may you give birth often to laughter and may your faith in God deepen. May you take yourself less seriously in order to take God more seriously.

Scripture Text:
Genesis 21:1 ¶ The LORD dealt with Sarah as he had said, and the LORD did for Sarah as he had promised.
2 Sarah conceived and bore Abraham a son in his old age, at the time of which God had spoken to him.
3 Abraham gave the name Isaac to his son whom Sarah bore him.
4 And Abraham circumcised his son Isaac when he was eight days old, as God had commanded him.
5 Abraham was a hundred years old when his son Isaac was born to him.
6 Now Sarah said, “God has brought laughter for me; everyone who hears will laugh with me.”
7 And she said, “Who would ever have said to Abraham that Sarah would nurse children? Yet I have borne him a son in his old age.”