Why so serious?
Sometimes I wonder where I left my sense of humor. Seriously, I like to laugh, have fun, tell a joke (funny or not), but when I start writing I get all serious. I used to write and find humor in all sorts of things. People said that it reflected who they knew me to be. Now I’m like a grumpy old man sitting on a porch yelling at people to slow down. Where did my sense of humor go?
Maybe it was in my Masters degree. My first paper was filled with witty insights, social commentary, and a healthy dose of sarcasm. Then I realized that Masters Degree students have no sense of humor. This is serious work. These are serious times. There are governments to reclaim, religious ideas to refute, Bible translations to defend, and denominations to promote. We are not in a ‘fun and games’ time of our lives. These are serious times and they require serious people. Maybe I lost my sense of humor somewhere between deconstructionist theology and the theoretical foundations of human nature. See, nothing about that sentence was fun or funny.
Maybe I lost my sense of humor because I just found out that the world is supposed to end in December of 2012. Yep, people got tired of Christians predicting when Jesus would show up so they have jumped ship to the Mayan calendar for a dose of world ending terror. The difference is that the Mayan story lacks an airlift rescue before it all goes bad. All of that makes me wish Y2K was true because all that crisis predicted was a total economic and societal collapse, but there would still be sunsets. On the bright side, we still get one more Summer Olympics to watch and at least one more Fall color tour. We will, evidently miss Christmas. Maybe this 2012 idea will build up steam in the Christian community and we’ll give a rebuttal that the actual time of Jesus’ arrival is later. Then we could sell a few more books and stuff. After all, if you add the digits in 2013 they equal six and you can’t go wrong predicting the end of the world when the numbers add up to six, right?
Maybe I lost my sense of humor because of the political climate of our time. If Carbon Dioxide is one of the culprits of global warming, the temperature is going to climb over the next couple of weeks and months because of the political conventions. We have politicians yapping about all sorts of things. Each party is staking their claim to God and their right to rule. And we Christians on both sides are poking holes in their lives and policies trying to prove that our candidate is actually the ‘chosen’ candidate. I almost expect to hear the voice of James Earl Jones say at the end each political ad, “I’m God and I approve this message.”
Maybe I lost my sense of humor because I lost sight that God has never been too concerned about who was king, emperor, Caesar, or president. Maybe I lost my sense of humor because I forgot that Jesus has already been crowned King. Maybe I lost my sense of humor because I forgot to love the things that God loves. Maybe if I realized that nothing can come between me and God I would get my sense of humor back. If Justin Timberlake can bring sexy back, maybe God can bring funny back. What do you think?