Let's Party!!!!!

Having fun... laughing at loud... being silly just because you feel like it... most grown-ups have forgotten how. We take ourselves and our lives and this world much too seriously.
As a child I was admonished to “behave” at church. You were expected to hold to a certain standard of decorum in the sanctuary. It was holy space and to be treated with respect and quiet behavior was the order of the day. If you were going to play, adults and children alike, you went outdoors.
Some churches, thank God, have managed to escape the oppressive hands of the holiness police and the seriousness society. They have a sense of fun and one waits for the party hats to come out during worship. After all, Jesus himself was accused of being a party animal by the religiously correct folks in his day. He ate and drank and laughed with all the wrong kinds of people at all the wrong times.
Michael and I have attended many worships in many different kinds of churches and synagogues. They range from one end of the theological spectrum to the other. They were different colors, different parts of the country, different denominations, different faiths, different economic levels, different styles of worship, different from us in many ways. The ones I remember with affection are the ones who played together.
At our first church out of seminary, Lake Shore Baptist in Waco, Texas, having a party and playing together was a religious ritual. One of the women had a party closet where she stored a communal gathering of tablecloths, napkins, dishes, vases, accessories of all kinds for anyone to use for a church party. This is the same church that loved to play jokes on each other.
One weekend the pastor was out of town and came home late Sunday night. In the wee hours of the morning, an old fashioned alarm clock went off. They looked and looked but couldn’t find it. Every few minutes another alarm clock would sound off. Finally they figured it out. While they were gone, someone had placed the clocks in the walls set to sound off. This same pastor woke up one Saturday to find a crowd gathered in his yard waiting for a yard sale to begin, a yard sale he knew nothing about. Lest you feel sorry for this pastor, be assured he played right back. The first sound one heard when entering this church was laughter and giggles and snorts.
Two of the churches I have loved had joke telling groups. In this age of e-mail jokes, the art form of joke telling seems to be dying out. What a pity. Church is a wonderful place for joke telling. In both churches, little old ladies told the best ones. Mabel Calder, a prim and proper looking old lady, loved to tell slightly naughty or downright dirty jokes. Nina, Judy and I would see each other at church and not say hello but “Have you heard the one about...”
My daughter Alison and her husband have a church with a sense of humor. When you read their order of worship, there is always at least one smiley place. And you will laugh out loud during worship, somewhere, somehow. Good humor, one of my most valued virtues, abounds there. The mothers get together to go out to eat and have a girls night out. Some of the men, including the pastor, are going coasting... riding roller coasters for fun. This same group meets for beer and movies . They are very active in peace and justice issues with light hearts. They cook for a homeless group at their church and have a party doing it. Children and families show up, cook together, eat together and are the family of God for all who come. Their work as a church is colored with hope and laughter even when confronting painful, difficult issues.
A friend sent me a web site for a new church in our community. It is a hip, contemporary, colorful, friendly interpretation of their community. I was struck with a passage that outlined the value they place on having fun together. Once a month, they meet to play. Worship, service and fun... what a revolutionary idea. I wonder if God gets tired of only hearing our angst and anguish in worship and drops in to some of these communities for comic relief? I think I’ll tell my blonde mortician joke at church this Sunday and see if I can get a laugh.

Blessed are you that weep now, for you shall laugh. Luke 6:21b For Leslie, Rob and Michael