Thoughts on Joy and Laughter

Imagine what a dull and dismal place the world would be without any joy or laughter. We need something to bring a smile to our faces and to help us see the funny side of life, otherwise it would all be doom and gloom. Even bad jokes can be tolerable when times are hard, such as,

'Doctor, I keep thinking I'm a pair of curtains!'
'Just pull yourself together now.'
And what do you call a girl standing between two posts? Annette!

Of course, laughter is not always a good thing, not when it is scornful, mocking or critical, but when laughter is natural and spontaneous it is not only a good thing, but one of the truly special gifts of God - able to lift broken spirits, defuse arguments, bring people together, and spread happiness all around. As the Reader's Digest says and research has proved, laughter is the best medicine. I remember reading a news article about a man with cancer who spent seven weeks watching videos that made him laugh, and the laughter seemed to have made his treatment so effective that he was cured in a much shorter time than doctors had predicted or expected.

Helen, unlike most of her friends, absolutely adored her mother-in-law, who was always laughing and had a great store of wonderfully funny stories. She told of three sisters who were getting on in years, and whose minds were beginning to slip a bit.

One evening, one of the sisters called down from the bathroom, 'Emily, I've got one leg in the bath and the other one on the floor - am I getting in or getting out?'

'Oh, for heaven's sake!' exclaimed Emily, who began to struggle up the stairs. When she reached the landing, she paused to get her breath and wondered out loud, 'Am I going up or going down?'

The third sister, having witnessed this, said to herself, 'Thank goodness I'm not like those two, knock on wood....Well, who do you think is at the door at this time of night?'

Anyway, Helen and her husband were invited out to dinner with friends a few months after his mother had died. One of them told a story that was typical of her sense of humour, and Helen burst into laughter and told everyone, 'I haven't laughed so much since Bill's mother passed away!' The atmosphere cooled rather after that, as the friends had not understood Helen's meaning!

Understanding meaning is a major problem in life. In the book of Job, the story of a man who suffered grief, loss and a breakdown of his physical health until he was brought to the brink of utter despair, we find God's promise of healing and renewing laughter. Job's friends could not understand why Job believed it, as he had precious little to laugh about, yet Job was confident that

God had not forgotten him, and would keep his promise to fill his mouth with laughter and his lips with shouts of joy. It was an amazing promise, which few of us in Job's position would have believed, and yet it did come true: laughter did follow tears and joy replaced sorrow.

Jesus was also often misunderstood, and you would be forgiven for thinking he had no sense of humour by the way the gospel writers portray him - and yet nobody who is both teacher and storyteller is lacking in that department, and he would not have attracted such a huge following if he had not been fun to hang around with.

Just as Jesus chose his friends and disciples, so he has chosen us. He has approached us with a call and an offer made from love, and has chosen us for joy and for love. However hard the Christian way might be, it is, both in the travelling and in the goal, a way of joy and laughter. As William Barclay put it, a Christian has to be 'the laughing cavalier of Christ', for a gloomy Christian is a contradiction in terms. How can anyone whose sins have been forgiven, and who has Jesus for their friend, not have a smile on their face?

In today's readings, both Jesus and Paul remind us that we are loved and must share love with others. Sometimes Christians live as though they were being sent out into the world to compete with one another or to set themselves apart from others, but Jesus calls us and sends us out to love everyone, even those who say they hate us or whom we have learned to regard as enemies. And if we love well, then we will laugh a lot, because love is always a source of joy, which bubbles up and overflows in smiles. When we love well and respond to God's goodness with joy and laughter, there is a smile on God's face, too!