TUESDAY'S TICKLES

We've all heard the old adage, laughter is good for the soul. Even in Scripture there is a time for laughter. 

Ecclesiastes 8:15 commends mirth. After weeks of both mourning and celebrating eternal rest of friends, I needed not only a smile to be a curve that sets things aright, but outright laughter. 

Much laughter was delivered right to my home on a previous Tuesday.

QUOTES AND QUIPS

Addictions come in all sizes. One of my al anon prayer partners confesses she is addicted to quotes.

Comparatively speaking, that's not a bad addiction.

Yesterday, alongside my collection of her quotes, "Suggestions are control coming through the back door", I added her latest one, "Expectations are pre-meditated resentments."

Seriously. Those are worth pondering, for many of us, I'd say.

At church Sunday, teacher, Rad, who is full of quips, shared two quips---"lunch on the grounds" in the south is *deviled eggs up to your eyeballs" (Mother called them dressed eggs. Maybe, she felt the devil's name should have no access to a church event.) His second quip reminded us that too often folks go home,

after church, to feast on "roast preacher." 

Son, Buddy, recently quipped, with serious undertones of truth, that parenting is difficult in this generation of "eye rolls and earbuds." He also quipped that he too often had "IDS"--irritable dad syndrome.

Humor's purpose in the midst of a sermon is often a way of facing the realities of our day to day lives in an accepting way. 

Together. Fellowship on the same side of "suffering" whether it's addiction or parenting difficulties. Knowing earth is not our final home does in no way negate that it is our home today. Humor can help make the best of what life offers us in the moment.

The quotes are helping remind me to leave my "control" tendencies in God's hands and the quips are helping to lighten my load/burden with humor as I stumble.

Quips that bring laughter can be therapeutic.

According to scripture, "He who has a merry heart has a continual feast," (Proverbs 15:15) even when one, with an egg allergy, attends his church's fall dinner on the grounds".

Laughter that is good for the soul

(12/2/10) What does that look like? In the circle of stoic Christians, laughter can be almost non-existent or forced humor can look like a bad case of locked bowels. Surely it’s okay to have fun especially during this joyous season of celebration, which too often can turn stressful. But how? For me, it’s not too hard because I’m married to a comic. My older brother with his droll personality and his sometimes dry and always off the wall sense of humor with an uncanny sense of timing is also humorous----and that’s putting it mildly. Anyone who prefaces his questions with, “What in the tarnation….?? is witty in my book. Put the two of them together and life becomes “wet your pants” funny. But, they’re rarely together.

Most of you might not have folks like that in your life so you have to “look” else where, especially when life situations aren’t offering too much to laugh at or joke about. Big brother solved that for his wife, Charlotte, and me and my amigas, Gigi and Bonnie. He treated us to a comical feast---an evening with “laugh out loud funny,” Anita Renfroe. Renfroe helped us laugh at our belly rolls, our jigglies, our mammogram experiences, our hubby’s snoring and everyone’s bad breath. It wasn’t raunchy.
It was good, clean laugh at yourself entertainment. It blessed me beyond measure. I continue to remember tidbits and smile when I think about them. She’s a former Baptist preacher’s wife (former b/c he’s now her manager) so her humor not only brings out the deep belly laughs, but it goes right to the soul.

All the days of the oppressed are wretched, but the cheerful heart has a continual feast. (Proverbs 15:15)