Biblical Humour

The Bible offers some clues to God's personality - he's alternately been called vindictive and just, bloodthirsty and caring, all-powerful and impotent, capricious and foresighted, and loving and hateful. But no one has ever fully explored why God might be such a figure of contrasts. Nor has anyone ever satisfactorily explained what guides his relationship not just with angels, the devil, and his son, but also with all of creation.

A year past the diagnosis of AML (Acute Myeloid Leukemia), Curt Ghormley has done it again. This time, his book is a set of weekly devotional meditations drawn from childhood, career, and family. Together, they form a richly entertaining tapestry of God’s faithfulness in the life of a cancer survivor. Unashamedly biblical, each brief story tells of a God who shows his faithfulness in the circumstances of everyday life. Some of the circumstances are poignant and heart-wrenching. Some are over-the-top comical. Some are wondrously death-defying.

Humor is a truly human phenomenon - crossing history, culture, and every stage of life. Jokes often touch on the biggest topics of our existence. And although it may seem simple on the surface, humor depends on the use of our highest faculties: language, intelligence, sympathy, sociability. To the philosopher Steve Wilkens, these facts about humor are evidence that God just has to be in there somewhere. Yet many Christians, scholars and laypeople alike, haven't taken humor seriously.

The Nativity: During the reign of King Herod of Judea, an unwed teenage virgin called Mary is impregnated with a magical baby by the Holy Spirit. She and her fiancé, Joseph, travel to Bethlehem for a preposterous census, and Mary has to give birth in a stable. Meanwhile, a group of stargazing magi who have traipsed hundreds of miles after a star inadvertently inform the king of Judaea of the Messiah’s birth. Also included: "Herod’s Christmas Carol" and a bonus, "Parodies of a Visit from St. Nicholas".

Satire is a kind of preaching. Satire pervades Scripture. Satire treats the foibles of sinners with a less than perfect tenderness. But if a Christian employs satire today, he is almost immediately called to account for his "insensitive" and "unloving" behavior. Yet Scripture shows that the central point of some religious controversies is to give offense. When Christ was confronted with ecclesiastical obstinacy and other forms of arrogance, He showed us a godly pattern for giving offense.