As a Christian I recognize that humor is a gift from God, a God who Himself laughs (Ps 2:4). Humor is meant to be enjoyed and to build others up: it can be used to bring a person into the truth and bring joy and delight and healing. But there is something desperately, wrong with how we as human use humor. We don’t naturally use it in love for God and others, but use it puff ourselves up and beat others down. We use to hinder others from the truth instead of helping other experience the truth. This is not way things OUGHT to be.
And that is why Jesus is so wonderful: he never used humor in a self righteous way to destroy others. In the recorded instances where we see Jesus use humorous imagery, we see him utilize it to expose the evil of religious hypocrisy (Matt 7:5; 23:24). Jesus helps us see how bad things have gotten and he came to rescue us from the darkness of sin and spiritual death by going to the cross and dying for our sins. From an outward appearance, what he did looked comically bad and foolish—going to die on a Roman cross. People mocked him and made sarcastic jokes about him as he was dying on the cross. But in reality, through his death and resurrection he saved a people from sin and spiritual death and hell. He transforms the lives of those who follow and know him, and he gets the last laugh over sin and darkness and spiritual death. And he invites all to come to him and experience a joy and right use of humor that not lasts in this life but will also be experienced in the life to come.
God Laughs:
ESV Psalm 2:4 He who sits in the heavens laughs; the Lord holds them in derision.
ESV Psalm 37:13 but the Lord laughs at the wicked, for he sees that his day is coming.
ESV Psalm 59:8 But you, O LORD, laugh at them; you hold all the nations in derision.
Laughter can be a gift from God:
ESV Psalm 126:2 Then our mouth was filled with laughter, and our tongue with shouts of joy; then they said among the nations, “The LORD has done great things for them.”
ESV Luke 6:21 “Blessed are you who are hungry now, for you shall be satisfied. “Blessed are you who weep now, for you shall laugh.
Laughter as a Hindrance:
ESV Proverbs 29:9 If a wise man has an argument with a fool, the fool only rages and laughs, and there is no quiet.
ESV Luke 6:25 “Woe to you who are full now, for you shall be hungry. “Woe to you who laugh now, for you shall mourn and weep.
ESV James 4:9 Be wretched and mourn and weep. Let your laughter be turned to mourning and your joy to gloom.
