Atom“No Laughing Matter?” (Holy Humor Sunday) John 20:19-31
“For everything there is a season…
a time to weep and a time to laugh…
a time to mourn and a time to dance.”
Ecclesiastes 3
Thomas’ Instant Faith Message (Holy Hilarity)
By Rick Kratzke and David Johnston © 4/25/11
Monologue with tech assistance. Phone messages are displayed overhead and Thomas reads aloud his messages as well as the messages from Jesus.
(At Lights Up – Thomas walks center stage, he is busy with his cell phone, texting.)
(Sound cue #1) Message tone
Thomas: I’ve got a message. (at this point the messages all come up on the overhead screen, Thomas reads all of the messages.)
Jesus: Hello, Thomas.
Thomas: This is an old number. Someone else must have gotten it…delete. (the message disappears)
(Sound cue #2) Message tone.
Jesus: Thomas, get back to me.
Thomas: Who is this?
Jesus: This is your Lord.
Thomas: Right. How did you get my #.
Jesus: I’ve always had your #, since B 4 U were born.
Thomas: Who is this, really?
Jesus: Jesus. Don’t you believe your eyes?
Thomas: OMG, don’t you give up?
Jesus: Never.
Thomas: Haven’t you heard? God is dead.
Jesus: I must have missed the memo, lol.
Thomas: Very funny. God doesn’t have a sense of humor.
Jesus: I made you
Thomas: Why are you doing this?
Jesus: Because I love you.
Thomas: Oh yeah? If you are who you say you are, show me a sign!
Jesus: Have it your way. TTYL.
(Sound cue #3) Blip and power down. (overhead screen goes to black)
Thomas: Hey! What happened. (trying to get his phone working again) The battery was at full charge. Come on! Argh!!! (throws phone in the trash and begins to walk off stage muttering) Show me a sign… (exit)
(lights out)
Thanks Rick Kratzke and David Johnston for that new look at an old familiar story. That image of Thomas texting with Jesus makes me smile…as worship should make us smile…particularly in this season of Easter when we celebrate the best news of all – the resurrection of Jesus from the dead. There should be smiles and even relieved laughter at such good news…which is why the early church made Easter Monday a celebration with parties and feasting and joke-telling. Later the feasting was extended to the whole of the week following Easter and the second Sunday was named “Bright Sunday” on the ancient calendar. It is a season of bright smiles and laughter and celebration in the Church. We have the very best news to celebrate and share.
At the same time…we’re not always sure we’re ready for a whole lot of silly carrying on in church. There were more than a few of you who expressed your nervous about coming to a Sunday labeled “Holy Hilarity.” Smiling is one thing, but “hilarity” – whatever that means – sounds a bit over the top. And not just because we’re Lutherans known for our “careful” exuberance. Our caution is also because…we come to worship with a lot of serious stuff on our plate…and some of us more than others and some of us come to worship – come to life - wondering if we have anything to laugh about…
Which, if we could see into the heart of Thomas in the gospel, is what we might also see. As he made his way back to the “meeting place,” Thomas certainly did not feel like laughing. The events of these past weeks had been anything but a laughing matter. Jesus…the one they had believed sent from God…their teacher and friend…so loving, so caring, so wise, so…compelling, had been brutally beaten and crucified. He was dead. And they had been left stunned and heartsick, and floundering for direction. What now? Where should they go? What should they do? They had left family and livelihood and community to follow him. And he was gone. That was enough to make every day a dark day. But there was also the matter of being hunted…as in leaders of the community hunting for Thomas and the rest and wanting to also do them harm because they were followers of Jesus.
For that reason, they had been laying low, trying to figure things out and only going out after sundown to find food and drink. It was a dreary, depressing time…and in Thomas’ experience there was very little to laugh about, or even to smile at. Even worse now, there were some of the group – most, in fact – that seemed to be losing their grip on reality. Last week when Thomas was taking his turn at finding food, the others had been in the hide-out and – according to them – Jesus had suddenly appeared…in the flesh apparently – although when Thomas had asked them how flesh and blood could have entered a locked room they just looked blank. According to them it was Jesus…wounds healed, but clearly visible…and he had talked to them, encouraged them, blessed them. Which was why, when Thomas slipped back into the room, they were giddy and laughing and dancing, and – in Thomas’ mind – putting the whole lot of them in danger by drawing attention to their hideout. Why, Thomas had had heard the commotion from a block away! He had quickly put a stop to the nonsense, reminding them of what was real: death and danger and refused to believe their mass hallucination. Unless he actually touched the wounds – the flesh and blood of Jesus – for himself he just wasn’t buying their lack of sanity. This was not time for laughing and carrying on.
I had a similar feeling the weekend after my Mother died. There was a get-together here in the community and I went. It was a banquet for a good cause and people were having a good time, laughing and eating and celebrating…but I didn’t feel it. Every little thing we reminded me of the ever present ache in my heart. This was not a time for laughter.
Most of you know what that’s like…for some, it happened this week and you have trouble being very cheery this morning. You had a report from the doctor – for you, or maybe for a loved one – that reminded you that disease is always lurking and even though the doctors are optimistic about the treatment plan, you aren’t sure that you have much to smile about. Or you got the final word on your foreclosure last week, or you didn’t get the job you had been praying for, or the relationship you had been working on so hard blew up in your face…or…you have a friend living in Tuscaloosa whose home is now kindling…and you come today with anything but a laughing heart.
You and Thomas would have been kindred spirits as he made his way once more to the little hideout in the upper room. After his explosion at their lunacy last week, he had walked out and spent the week at his cousin’s house trying to reason out his next move. But tonight he was returning to the gathering place. They were his friends, after all, his best friends, and Thomas needed to work this out with them. He had brought a half dozen loaves of bread, a couple of dried fish and three bottles of wine in his bag. It was the last of his money and tomorrow he would have to start moving…in spite of the sadness and in spite of the danger. It was time to move on to…wherever…
Thomas let himself in and after a silent hug from Peter and Andrew and nods from the others, he began passing out the food. They were quiet and reflective tonight, not carrying on like last week, which was good, he thought. Maybe they had come to their senses and realized that what they had seen was not real. But even as he was thinking this he saw the others go wide-eyed staring at something behind him. Turning around to look, his knees went suddenly weak. There was Jesus, holding out his hands to him – the scars from the nails clearly visible, “Thomas…put your finger here and see my hands…reach out your hand and put it in my side. Do not doubt, but believe…”
Max Lucado, pastor and insightful teacher of scripture looks at this story and sees Thomas not as someone filled with doubt, as he has been labeled for so long, but as one who lacks imagination, who lacks vision of what could be, just because he has not yet seen it himself. In that favorite upper room conversation where Jesus tells his followers, “Let not your hearts be troubled…neither be afraid…in my Father’s House are many dwelling places and I go to prepare a place for you …and you know the way,” it is Thomas who just can’t imagine such a thing. Although Jesus describes a wonderful image of heaven and new life, Thomas can’t see it: “Lord, we don’t know where you are going, how can we know the way?”
And when Jesus’ friend Lazarus dies (we read that story just a couple of weeks ago) and Jesus tells his disciples that they are going to Bethany to “wake Lazarus up,” it is Thomas who just can’t imagine “waking up” a dead man. He has seen Jesus do a lot of amazing things, but life restored after death is something beyond his imagination.
What he lacks in imagination, however, Max Lucado points out, Thomas makes up for in loyalty. “Okay,” he says after Jesus has described something he just can’t picture, “I don’t see that happening, but if you’re going, we’re going with you…even if it costs us our lives.”
It is that kind of loyalty that brings Thomas back to the upper room and the gathering of the disciples after another gloomy week. It is that kind of loyalty, coming to the place where others have met Jesus that Jesus rewards. In the gathering of disciples, Jesus shows himself and somehow Thomas sees and Thomas hears and Thomas experiences the healing presence of the risen Christ: “My Lord, and my God,” he confesses and life is forever changed…maybe not to a life if giddy laughter and dancing…life is still serious and difficult after all and none of Jesus’ disciples are going to get out of this life alive…but Thomas is transformed to a life of lasting hope. While all is not laughter, there will be moments of laughter and there will be many a moment when a smile of serene confidence – actually what the Bible refers to as joy is a “not-giddy-but-serene” confidence in God’s dependable presence – will cross his lips in time of danger and difficulty, because having been in the presence of the risen Jesus Thomas knows that even in the darkness there is light, that even in loss there is newness, and that even in death there is life.
It is that serene confidence in God that the disciples pass on to us who gather like Thomas with other believers in this room, in the presence of Jesus’ Spirit, and in the promise of His Word. We, too, come out of our gloomy week, wondering if there is indeed anything to laugh about, or if we even believe this story. We too may have come out of loyalty if nothing else…and Jesus promises that he will meet us as we come.
“Blessed are those – confident are those – who have not seen as did Peter and Mary and Thomas, but believe because of their confession. Blessed are those who hear these words written, these stories told, and receive the Spirit given…that they, too – that you, too – might believe that the risen Jesus is the One sent from God, and that believing you might have life in his name.”
And even if you don’t feel like laughing today…that should at least bring a smile to your heart. Let’s pray…
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