God’s Laughter, & Ours

God’s Laughter, & Ours                                                               by Kelly Durant  7-27-14

Psalm 126:2 “Then was our mouth filled with laughter, and our tongue with singing: then said they among the heathen, The Lord hath done great things for them.”

2. A little boy opened the big and old family Bible with fascination, and looked at the old pages as he turned them. Suddenly, something fell out of the Bible, and he picked it up and looked at it closely. It was an old leaf from a tree that had been pressed in between the pages. "Momma, look what I found," the boy called out. "What have you got there, dear?" his mother asked. With astonishment in the young boy's voice, he answered: "I think it's Adam's suit!" 

How many of you like to laugh? We don’t usually think of the Bible as humorous but from all the different stories, we can conclude God often did some humorous things to get our attention! I think God must laugh at our feeble attempts to understand the mechanics of the universe!  

God made us to laugh and to want to enjoy life! What is the Christian conclusion of the purpose of mankind? “To enjoy God and love him forever!”

3. God seems to have made us with an appetite for laughter! Science cannot explain laughter, it is involuntary. Think about it, can you premeditate laughter? Ok, in 10 seconds I am going to laugh! Hum, it didn’t work! Ha! Maybe it is because we need our internal organs massaged a few times a day, right? Little kids and even teenagers laugh a lot more than us as adults. Sometimes the teens in back laugh during the sermons and I have no clue as to why! It is sad, that many stop laughing with age! Laughter is all about connections and the people we love.

Most laughter is not even sparked by a joke. For example, Olga may be telling me about where to buy some shampoo that makes the hair fluffy, and how everyone could all use some of it, and I answer, ‘that’s how it is’, and she tells me more and when I say it another time, ‘that’s how it is’, we both laugh out loud because we both know I say that when I really don’t know what to answer back on that subject, ‘Isn’t that how it is?’ When I am lost for words I also love other sayings in Spanish (English too) like, “Oh, don’t tell me that!” Say that 3 times and that’s funny too, right? Well, you can see how what’s funny relates to the relationship you have with person! With some people, one can never be funny though! That’s scary!

So how funny is the Bible? Some parts have funny expressions; did any of you ever finish reading Song of Solomon?  However, other parts are very sobering with heavy lessons. We might actually conclude God matures us more in the sobering trying times than in the fun times in our lives, but the balance is found in Psalm 127:2 “It is vain for you to rise up early, to sit up late, to eat the bread of sorrows: for so he giveth his beloved sleep.” Laughter, seriousness, and sadness all have their time and place in our lives and we must pray to have discernment.

4. There is a time for everything, and the Bible teaches us to be connected to our family of brothers and sisters as in one collective heart! James 5:13 “Is any among you afflicted? Let him pray. Is any merry? Let him sing psalms.” What we can conclude is we will laugh and sing when the mood is right, but if a brother is down or sick, we will be serious and pray for him or her.

There is nothing more irritating than some kid or adult laughing when everyone is trying to get everyone quiet for a serious message, right? And also when everyone is happy and singing “Happy Birthday” laughing that one of our teens is wishing for a new Porsche, how out of place it would be for someone to be hanging around with a bored ugly angry face, right?

Kids seem to help us laugh the most! This is why the Bible mentions children as a blessing!  Psalm 127:3  “Children are an heritage of the Lord: and the fruit of the womb is his reward”. Our kids do so many funny things! They even make TV shows on the funniest home videos with kids and people in funny situations. My mother told me that when I was little I was putting ice cream from my bowl into my pocket. When they asked me what are you doing I told the babysitter that I liked this stuff and that I wanted to take some home to eat it later, ha!

5. You can read the Bible and even laugh out loud at times. For example, do you recall Balaam’s ass that argued with him? To begin with, an ass or donkey is an ugly, funny, and temperamental creature. Balaam beat him 3 times to make him go straight but angels were in the way. Imagine, instead of Balaam passing out from fear when the ass spoke to complain about being beaten, Balaam argued back! Isn’t that funny? Many things are humorous in the Bible!

And speaking of funny, just think how silly Jesus looked riding on an ass through Jerusalem? The Romans would ride in chariots or on powerful stallions, and yet Jesus, the King of the universe is on this silly little colt! A big guy on a little animal!

Sometimes we laugh after we have been frightened to death, has that ever happened to you? You fall down playing basketball and everyone thinks you broke your back and is quite and serious but then you jump up and laugh to make the pain go away! Can you imagine the disciples laughing after Jesus calms the sea? They probably could have said, “We were like (terrified face) during the storm and then we were like (mellow face) afterwards!”

6. Certain false churches even included long sessions laughter in their services in the 1990s in the Neo-charismatic churches teaching that ‘holy laughter’ was a Third Wave of the Holy Spirit. It was funny for a few sermons but then the fad passed. Laughter is mentioned in the Bible, KJV, seven times and of those 7 most of the time laughter is put in the context as something not of much value. Ecclesiastes 7:3 Sorrow is better than laughter: for by the sadness of the countenance the heart is made better.

James 4:8-10 8 Draw nigh to God, and he will draw nigh to you. Cleanse your hands, ye sinners; and purify your hearts, ye double minded.9 Be afflicted, and mourn, and weep: let your laughter be turned to mourning, and your joy to heaviness.10 Humble yourselves in the sight of the Lord, and he shall lift you up.

The conclusion here is that God is not happy with people that entertain their selves with laughter while they ignore cleansing their selves from their own sins indifferent to recognize the suffering in the world and how each of us need God. Some people pay big money in big cities to go to big comedy clubs to hear some stand-up comedian tell foolish jokes, even offensive and vulgar jokes and why do they laugh? I can only stand to watch one of these over-rated comedians for about 1 minute when on a show on TV! I think most of the audience laughs because they are embarrassed for the stupidness of it. Is this really a good time? People seem to have to be drunk in order to laugh, how sad! Most all of the mocking is not funny but rather degrading. They laugh, then what? Nothing! Ecclesiastes 2:2 I said of laughter, It is mad: and of mirth, What doeth it?

7. There will come a day when we will be able to laugh as much as we want! For the moment, however, laughter helps us forget about how our earth’s basement is on fire and how at any moment of the day an earthquake, a war, or someone’s accident can provoke a sudden life of suffering! As compassionate sympathetic people we always will suffer after some news channel announces another disaster, another plane down with hundreds dead, or another 300 more school kids captured by extremists into slavery! How much evil, and how much more scandal can we take?  Lately most people are not laughing at what is happening in the world, they are angry at the injustice and apathy, at the lack of resistance to the violence and abuse, and at the fact that their privacy and legal rights are being mocked by officials. The Romans rulers had servants to follow them around and repeat in their ears, “You are a man and not a God”, we need hire a few thousand of these types of servants again to speak to our leaders as blatant disrespect for the law and abuse is at an all-time high!

People when in a crisis will cry in despair and that can haunt and depress you! No one with a heart like God’s heart likes to see any other person suffer. Most of us feel the urgency and the need to help those who are in pain! But many times we are on the other side of the world and we are helpless to act, all we can do is pray, and keep on praying, prayer does do great things! Locally you can do something though by investing your time, talent, and treasure.

So if I, or someone, were to laugh all day while living on this earth in this miserable life we would either be considered as vain and shallow, high on drugs, or out of our minds and mentally insane! The truth is laughter is a gift and a commodity that lasts only a few minutes of every day! We should appreciate it more!

8. There will be a day when we will be able to laugh all day in heaven! But until then, let’s try to create more laughter (like our creative brother German)! The world knows enough hell, let’s show them a little more heaven!

And finally I am reminded of what the Lord will laugh at. He will laugh at the evil people and fallen angels when they think they have conquered Him in the final battle. Listen to this prophetic Word and what the Lord answers to those who think they will usurp Him, Psalm 2:3-5 “Let us break their bands asunder, and cast away their cords from us. 4 He that sits in the heavens shall laugh: the Lord shall have them in derision. 5 Then shall he speak unto them in his wrath, and vex them in his sore displeasure.  God, who laughs last, will laugh best!

God will separate the evil ones from the good ones and put us under His protection where we will laugh and the evil doers will be punished!

9. Listen to this prophetic word, Psalm 126:2 “Then was our mouth filled with laughter, and our tongue with singing: then said they among the heathen, The Lord hath done great things for them.”

In order to laugh, you have to have joy and Joy comes from obeying God's Word.  A person at peace with God will have a happy, free, and forgiven spirit and heart right with God as He brings joy, peace, and the conditions to permit laughter" John 13:17 If ye know these things, happy are ye if ye do them

Do you have Jesus in your life? Jesus can help you laugh with real joy because of the purity you will have in your heart by being in God’s will! Every one of us has to pass through a repentance, a breaking process, an uncomfortable unhappy time period, like going through an operation to extract the sickening infection of sin. But then, after the storm comes and goes the sunshine of happiness comes out and you suddenly feel elated, happy, and laughter will fill your voice!