What's humorous?

Do you know what you get when you cross a termite and a mantis? A bug that prays before it eats your house.

One of the retired ministers in residence here told that joke before saying grace over our meal yesterday.

As jokes go, it’s not bad. It’s not good either, but it’s not bad.

His contention is that we need humor, that laughter is good for us. And I certainly agree with that.

And I laugh – or groan with faint humor – at most of his jokes. But I’m also just a little uncomfortable.

I never know what he is going to say. Sometimes when he can’t find a G rated joke, he strays over into whatever the rating would be for sexually suggestive language.

I know God laughs. He must or we wouldn’t know how to. I don’t know what He laughs at or about. I wonder if He doesn’t often find us laughable in gentle, loving ways, as a father or mother might with a loved child.

And He surely knows all about sex. He may understand our infatuation with it and our use of sexually suggestive language to produce laughter. But not when it demeans anyone.

Besides, I can’t help feeling the timing is a bit off. To me “saying grace” is praying; it’s offering thanks to the Giver of all we have and that’s serious business.

Prayer does not have to prim and proper. Honest and real are much better than that. But sexually suggestive?

And when grace is being said over a public meal, the “audience” is kind of trapped into listening.

I did ask him to draw a line he wouldn’t cross in telling jokes before saying the blessing. He didn’t answer. Just walked away.

Most people don’t seem to mind.

I think I will suggest we set aside time for a “humor hour,” a time for jokes and laughter. And everyone who wants to tell jokes can come and do so. And if anyone cracks a joke someone else doesn’t like, well, that person can just get up and go home.

I haven’t done that yet in the dining room. I stay and finish eating.

And come here to complain.

Dear Lord, help me not to take offense – even if it is intended, and I don’t think it is. My sense of humor may be rusty. Help me, instead, to say a blessing over him.

Murmur, Murmur, Grumble or Not

While driving over to have breakfast with John, I suddenly realized the name of my malady. It is Discontent!

I’ve had a bad case of this for several weeks now, if not longer. But in the last few days it has really begun to take me over. All I can think about is how this is not right and that is wrong.

But with my attention diverted by paying attention to my driving, a thought arose from my subconscious – or somewhere -- that my problem has a name and it is Discontent.

I don’t think I discovered that. I think it was revealed to me.

Meaning , I was being given the change to deal with it and not just keep on grumbling things like:

“My memory is shot. I spend too much time going back for things I’ve forgotten!”

“I don’t know what to say. If I say anything, it comes out wrong. I just make a mess of it.”

“All these people have problems and want to tell me about them and I’m tired of listening.”

And on and on and on. And these are only the “nice” ones.

So I took a look at what Discontent was hiding:

“God, You really haven’t been doing a good job for me lately.”

Wow. That’s what I’ve really been saying. And that really isn’t what I want to say.

Let’s try again.

“I sure do forget a lot, but I remember more than I forget. And I am physically able to go back for the stuff I’ve forgotten. And when I see it, I know what it is and what it’s for. Not so bad after all.”

“I don’t know what to say. Maybe silence is the right thing here. Maybe if I think a bit before I talk, I won’t say so many foolish things. Thank goodness I already know I can be wrong!”

“When people tell me their problems, I don’t have to have the answer. As a friend reminded me one day, the name of the Savior is Jesus, not Barbara. Listening can be all that is required. Really listening, not waiting for the other person to stop so I can start.”

When I think about it, I do trust God to be doing very well by me. Of course, God’s definition of good may not match mine sometimes. I can’t see far enough ahead to realize it. But, well, He’s God and I’m not. And He has proved faithful in the past.

And I really like my second set of thoughts better. I like me better in them.

I suspect I will fall back into discontent again, because it’s an old enemy. But for the moment, I see it for what it is and I choose to turn it around and show it the door.

It’s not just playing Pollyanna. It’s letting the Lord have His way instead of insisting on my own.

While driving over to have breakfast with John, I suddenly realized the name of my malady. It is Discontent!

I’ve had a bad case of this for several weeks now, if not longer. But in the last few days it has really begun to take me over. All I can think about is how this is not right and that is wrong.

But with my attention diverted by paying attention to my driving, a thought arose from my subconscious – or somewhere -- that my problem has a name and it is Discontent.

I don’t think I discovered that. I think it was revealed to me.

Meaning , I was being given the change to deal with it and not just keep on grumbling things like:

“My memory is shot. I spend too much time going back for things I’ve forgotten!”

“I don’t know what to say. If I say anything, it comes out wrong. I just make a mess of it.”

“All these people have problems and want to tell me about them and I’m tired of listening.”

And on and on and on. And these are only the “nice” ones.

So I took a look at what Discontent was hiding:

“God, You really haven’t been doing a good job for me lately.”

Wow. That’s what I’ve really been saying. And that really isn’t what I want to say.

Let’s try again.

“I sure do forget a lot, but I remember more than I forget. And I am physically able to go back for the stuff I’ve forgotten. And when I see it, I know what it is and what it’s for. Not so bad after all.”

“I don’t know what to say. Maybe silence is the right thing here. Maybe if I think a bit before I talk, I won’t say so many foolish things. Thank goodness I already know I can be wrong!”

“When people tell me their problems, I don’t have to have the answer. As a friend reminded me one day, the name of the Savior is Jesus, not Barbara. Listening can be all that is required. Really listening, not waiting for the other person to stop so I can start.”

When I think about it, I do trust God to be doing very well by me. Of course, God’s definition of good may not match mine sometimes. I can’t see far enough ahead to realize it. But, well, He’s God and I’m not. And He has proved faithful in the past.

And I really like my second set of thoughts better. I like me better in them.

I suspect I will fall back into discontent again, because it’s an old enemy. But for the moment, I see it for what it is and I choose to turn it around and show it the door.

It’s not just playing Pollyanna. It’s letting the Lord have His way instead of insisting on my own.

Babe Ruth sparks memories

I bought a Babe Ruth candy bar yesterday. I can’t remember the last time I did that.

But I can remember when I used to do it regularly. It was when I was in high school.

My friend and I would go to the drug store after seeing a movie and we would each buy a candy bar. Mine would always be a Babe Ruth. I can’t remember right now what hers was. I’ll have to ask her next time we talk, which we d not regularly but pretty often.

I bought it yesterday because Mary bought a Payday and I couldn’t find anything in dark chocolate except a Mounds and I don’t like coconut and chocolate a whole lot.

We bought candy and a small bag of chips to share while she received her chemo treatment. They were running late because all the Monday –a holiday, remember – people had to be inserted into the schedules on Tuesday, Wednesday or Thursday.

Anyway, her 11 a.m. appointment to see the doctor was delayed until 12 and he suggested we go get lunch before coming back to the procedure room. We did and bought stuff on our way back in.

It was 2:15 before they had her all hooked up, and I ate my candy bar.

I told her I couldn’t remember what was in it or whether I would still like it after all these years. She assured me I would.

And I did. In fact, I ate the whole thing.

Then I sat with an open book in my lap and watched her work her cross word and word search puzzle book.

And thought about how much and how little I know about her, my daughter.

And about the fact that I know next to nothing about any of the other patients in their recliners except that they have sne kind of medical problem and are receiving some kind of chemotherapy.

I was reminded of trips by train from Jacksonville to Atlanta when I was a girl and shared a lower birth with my mother. I would wake early and let the window curtain up just enough to watch the countryside go by. And I would wonder about who lived in the houses where lights we on and whether they wondered about who was on the train speeding by.

Not deep thoughts. Not new thoughts. But I thought again about the staggering wonder that God can know all this about us and about everyone everywhere.

I understand it’s called omnipresence – being everywhere at one time. Or omniscience – knowing everything. Or both, I guess.

But the long words don’t matter really. They are just short hand for something much bigger than they are.

Jesus knew all about the woman at the well. He knew all about the hearts and thought of all the people He met while on earth. And He still does. He knows all about me and all about you.

And He loves us anyway. In spite of ourselves. And anywhere. Everywhere.

Including my friends David and Deborah who are right now in South Sudan living with a native family of a tribe that had seen no white people until about two months ago. Them, too.

And all the rest. All at one time. All at every time.

Beyond my comprehension. But not beyond my desire -- sitting there, full of too much sugar -- to give Him thanks and praise.

So I sang a little love song to Him, quietly in my head.

NOTE: I started this Thursday and finished it today. In between, the computer decided not to work. I don’t know why. Along with a lot of other things I don’t know.