Holy humor

Tomorrow is Holy Humor Sunday in my husband's church. The Sunday after Easter is the day to laugh and let mirth take wing.

Remember Abraham and Sarah? When God told Abraham that he and childless Sarah would have a son, Abraham fell down and laughed, and said to himself, "Can a child be born to a man who is a hundred years old? Can Sarah, who is ninety years old, bear a child?" Sarah, hearing the news, also laughed.

God was not offended by their laughter; in fact God named their son Isaac, which means laughter.

I think God rejoices to see us laughing and happy, the way we are when we're good to each other and others are good to us. Proverbs 17:22 tells us that a cheerful heart is good medicine. Laughter cures the blues, and helps to heal mind, spirit and body. Ever tried to stay angry or feel down when laughing? I can vouch: it doesn't work.

Leonard Sweet, author and professor, gives us the Jesus Code for Healthful Living. A few examples: laugh a lot; fullness of joy is the infallible sign of the presence of God. Also, hang out with friends, because God redeems us through relationships. Good friends teach us who we are and help us become whole. And don't forget to play out the child in you; we can only grow spiritually when we're curious, vulnerable and loving.

Once I read a study that said small children laugh dozens of times a day, adults not much more than ten. That tells us something -- maybe that we're often too serious. Adult life sobers us right up; last Monday we filed our tax return and I was Mrs. Grumpy by the time I was done with it. Most days heart disease isn't a huge chuckle either.

Ecclesiastes says, "For everything there is a season, and a time for every matter under heaven," including a time to weep and a time to laugh. Evidently knowing I needed to find more time to laugh, friends not long ago gave me a book called How to Keep Laughing -- Even Though You've Considered All the Facts. I chortled my way through it.

G.K Chesterton once observed, "Life is serious all the time, but living cannot be. You may have all the solemnity you wish in your neckties, but in anything important (such as sex, death and religion), you must have mirth or you will have madness."

I loved that H.L. Mencken, one of America's great iconoclastic newspapermen, once defined Puritanism as "the lurking fear that somewhere someone may be having fun." I am no Puritan. On the other hand, I am a Methodist, of whom he wrote that if you're in a cold room, sit next to a Methodist, because they give off plenty of heat.

Christ has risen, spring is in the air, so let's enjoy all the good laughs we can.

And the heavenly choir sang: Amen to that.

Joan Uda is a retired United Methodist minister who lives in Helena.