CELEBRATE!
Over my many years as a preacher, I’ve occasionally found myself in hot water, some of which I boiled myself. I cringe as I remember making spontaneous remarks, which meant I hadn’t thought them through, with disastrous results. In illustrating talks, I’ve told stories that didn’t work, made asides that should have been left aside, and have inserted foot in mouth enough to give me indigestion.
But sometimes criticism came simply because I love to use humour in my talks. I’ve always believed Christians should be able to laugh before death, and I’ve found good clean humour can be a great aid to communication – when we laugh at an amusing story, it’s evidence our brain has truly connected to an idea. But not all Christians believe a light touch is appropriate in religious circles.
One poker-faced chap approached me after a sermon, his face grim. ‘Listen here, Jeff’, he began, as if I had a choice. ‘In this church, we don’t have fun. We have joy. The joy of the Lord.’ As I surveyed his sombre features, it occurred that any joy he claimed had to be buried very deep, as there seemed to be little evidence of it.
Some believers feel uncomfortable with anything that remotely looks like fun because they have imbibed an unbiblical view of reverence: the idea that, in order to please God, we are called to tiptoe around Him, with voices permanently lowered. To them, smiles imply flippancy. But to revere someone is to do what they ask of you, and this God of ours calls us to be silent, but also to shout for joy, to clap our hands in praise, to celebrate. If in doubt, consult the feasts and festivals of the Old Testament era, where a lot of partying and merriment was commanded.
There is an ancient Russian Orthodox tradition that devotes the day after Easter to sitting around a table and telling jokes – it’s called hilaritas. After the sombre reflections of Easter week, the pain of the worst Friday that we rightly call Good, and the hopeful waiting of Easter Saturday, then dawns resurrection day.
And then, on Easter Monday, some of our Orthodox friends have a day devoted to the sharing of giggles. Surely they do this because of what we disciples know: even though Satan thought he’d destroyed the bringer of love and life, in Christ, God had and has the last laugh. One writer, William Bausch, even calls the resurrection, ‘the cosmic joke that God pulled on the devil.’
Bausch surmises: ‘Satan thought he had won, and was smug in his victory, smiling to himself, having had the last word. So he thought. Then God raised Jesus from the dead, and life and salvation became the last words. And the whole world laughed at the devil's discomfort.’
This does not mean we are endlessly ecstatic. We acknowledge, we give a nod to the very real difficulties of life. Bodies get old and diseased, relationships crumble, money runs out, and if you’re a believer trying to be faithful in a land where loving Jesus is a crime, you spend every day on a precipice of uncertainty. Those realities are certainly no joke.
But with the nod comes a knowing wink, because faith affirms that one day, tears will be banished, and deep, rich laughter will be ours, when we celebrate the final death of death in the presence of Christ. This is Exodus laughter – the joy of slaves set free.