Posts
Humor
I think God has a great sense of humor. Ever since I read in my King James Bible about how God punished the Philistines by smiting them with hemorrhoids* I have been convinced that as a prankster, the universe knows no equal. Not that the Almighty is arbitrary, mind you, after all the Philistines did have in their possession the “Ark of the Covenant” which didn’t belong to them. So, since it was going to be needed when the Israelites got their spiritual act together and, eventually, to make a movie, God had to make the Philistines give it back.
Leave it to God to, as it were, “get to the bottom” of the issue by making it worth their while to return it. As I recall, the whole incident ended up with the Philistines so desperate for relief that they made golden images of their hemorrhoids to worship—an Old Testament version of Preparation H—and sent the Ark packing on a cart piloted by a couple of cows, apparently among the few Philistines comfortable enough to travel.
Anyhow, stories like that persuade me that not only did God create the world, and love, and redemption, but He is also the author of a little humor now and then. The problem with us Christians is that we’re so busy wringing the last drop of fun out of what the bible calls “joy” that we scarcely notice when God gets a kick out of something. Therefore, in the interest of sanctifying our sense of humor before we forget we have one, I have decided to include these pages in our blog—sort of a Journal of clerical errors and amusing grace, a gallery of ecclesiastical boo-boos, biblical blunders and pastoral faux pas. Just click on the links below.
* You can find the whole tale in 1 Samuel 5 in the King James Version of the bible. Other versions use the word “tumors” but I think they’re just trying to take the fun out of it.
