Easter 2 - Holy Humor Sunday

Psalm 16

Trust that I am on a path of life leads to a fullness of joy.

Within this trust we have a perspective that lets us see the various boundary lines of life and to affirm them as necessary, that we have no life apart from them.

This backward look from verse 11 to 6 to 2 shapes us to find instruction in the night, whether that be a Jesus night in a tomb, a Nicodemus night of befuddlement, or a Thomas night of desire for an experience of resurrection. All of us look for our hearts to be strangely warmed that we might find our forgiveness before ever we act (even though we are called to act as though forgiveness has already come before our reception of it).

Trust is one of the best sources of humor there is. So often that which is funny relies on tricks, misdirection, put-downs, finding a survival perspective. However, trust begins to see humor where there is none (perhaps it is time to go back to that old-time medicine theory of humors). Trust is a creative act. Trust leads us to a strange formula: T+GT=C. I don't know whether that can work mathematically, but it does here as Tragedy + G*D's Time = Comedy. From a Christian perspective we begin with the tragedy of crucifixion and add to it whatever is meant by "three days". This results in the comedy of resurrection.

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Three tortoises, Mick, Alan and Les, decide to go on a picnic. So Mick packs the picnic basket with beer and sandwiches. The trouble is the picnic site is ten miles away so it takes them ten days to get there.

When they get there Mick unpacks the food and beer. "OK Les, Give me the bottle opener."

"I didn't bring it," says Les. "I thought you packed it."

Mick gets worried, He turns to Alan, "Did you bring the bottle opener??"

Naturally Alan didn't bring it. So they're stuck ten miles from Home without a bottle opener. Mick and Alan beg Les to go back for it, but he refuses as he says they will eat all the sandwiches.

After two hours, and after they have sworn on their tortoise Lives that they will not eat the sandwiches, he finally agrees. So Les sets off down the road at a steady pace.

Twenty days pass and he still isn't back and Mick and Alan are starving, but a promise is a promise.

Another five days and he still isn't back, but a promise is a promise. Finally they can't take it any longer so they take out a Sandwich each, and just as they are about to eat it, Les pops up from behind a rock and shouts........

"I KNEW IT!......I'M NOT GOING!"

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Lack of trust is merely funny. Trust is the humor of joy.

Alternative ending:

Later the day that Les left to get a bottle opener, Mick and Alan see Les returning in as much of a cloud of dust as he can muster.

Panting as he arrives, Les says, "Duh, we've been living so slowly too much of the past has stuck to us. I saw some folks drinking at the picnic site we passed on the way here - the caps are twist-offs! We don't need a bottle-opener. Let's feast!"