March 27, 2026
It is no secret that every now and then we are in situations where we are quite powerless to do anything about the powers that be and what they are inflicting on us. We may trust in God’s eternal promises, we may know heaven awaits, but that doesn’t make the present suffering all that much better. One of the great ways that we have to defy the powers that be is humor. Humor is an act of defiance. Humor is one of the ways we look at the powers that be and say You will not beat us. During the Great Depression the farmers of the Midwest had a saying: If we had some ham then we could have some ham and eggs if we had some eggs. The Norwegian immigrants told Norwegian jokes about themselves and their struggles to adapt to America as compared to the old country. Jesus himself used puns and humor in addressing the Pharisees and Sadducees, the Sanhedrin, Pilate and Herod. The translators have tried to soften that over the years because somehow we don’t want Jesus to be a smartaleck. But it is a great thing, an empowering thing, to look at an overwhelming problem and make a joke about it. It is a statement of faith, saying to that thing, you will not win. Oscar Wilde, on his deathbed, opened his eyes and said: Either that wallpaper goes or I do. I love that.
Let us pray: Father in Heaven, stir it up stir up in us an attitude that when life presents us problems we will not let our spirit be sapped but we will face these problems with faith, resilience, defiance, and humor, just like Your Son did. In Jesus’s Name, Amen.