Tactic Of The Day: Humor That Hurts
One of my fondest memories growing up was a long travel trip with my brother and mom from Utah to Washington state. The drive took a few days to complete and on this drive one the things we did was listen to the sirus-xm comedy radio stations. We spent 2 full days laughing at all these different comedias and after hours and hours of listening I just could not believe people had the job to just make people laugh. It was so fun and such a core memory I really remember thinking how much I loved standup comedy and just humor in general from that experience.
As I got older I still loved to listen to that radio station and even branched into watching comedy specials from all sorts of comedians. There was one thing that comedians have in common though and that is they pushed the boundaries. As I’ve watched lots of comedy specials over the years I have noticed a real progression of the amount of vulgar content in them. It seems like there has been a continual progression of the jokes that are allowed and what people are willing to entertain.
As I noticed these goal posts moving there was a special I watched that was going above and beyond on the level of grossness. Now personally I’d just tune out or fast forward through those parts but God confronted me during that specific comedy special I was watching and clear as day I heard God ask “why is that funny”
As I was sitting watching the comedy special it progressively and more intensely got further and further from God’s nature and I really sat and thought, goodness that is not funny at all. This was a really critical point in my walk with Christ because it seemed like God removed a veil from my eyes. All the things I thought used to be funny, or not bad enough to turn the show off. Now I was just seeing how hurting, demeaning and belittling all those jokes really were.
When I continued to think about this It seemed like every special I watched I just could not get away from this overall concept of what should and should not be funny. Now this was a hard thing on my heart because all the way from the story I told at the beginning to my early 20s comedy was something I really almost put identity into. It was just such an amazing fun time but as God confronted my heart it really put me in a place of correction. This correction went even further because I was seeing the ways that I joked were inline with the nature of the comedy I was watching. As I continued to evaluate this every time I’d make a joke that was condemning God would ask “why is that funny?”
The revelation was that for many people the core way we even joke or have a good time with people is by condemning humor. How many times have you told a joke that was not really kind but was still “funny”. The reason it’s funny is because sin rules our heart. If people are all sitting around joking and every joke is really just negative or poking at people why would we think that is how God would want us to be in relationship with His children.
There is a verse in the book of Proverbs King Solomon gives us and it says: Death and life are in the power of the tongue, And those who love it will eat its fruit. Proverbs 18:21
After reading this verse as God corrected me on this topic I could only think about how much death has been spoken for comedy sake.
Have you ever been in a situation where someone makes a joke that was not nice and when they told the joke it didn’t land. The person they told the joke to took offence. How much was the person hurt by the bad joke? These moments can scar and imprint people and it’s because we let this Humor That Hurts Tactic of torment win.
Fundamentally would God tell a joke that would be condemning or hurtful? Of course not, so every one of these jokes is from the army of evil that are just disguised death. The reality is it’s not funny to bring people down and speak death over them but we have a whole industry that is operating off that premise.
Now I don’t bring up this tactic of torment to be a boring person. I say it because we need to evaluate what we are saying and ingesting. The way humor is given now has been hijacked by evil to be evil and we need to evaluate what is really funny or not.
Just as Romans 12:1-2 talks about a renewing of our mind we need to evaluate our mind and thought process to fitting into God’s nature. The funniest thing is God created humor. Humor is joyful and fun but just like everything else God created the enemy tries to corrupt. We can all still laugh and have a good time but we need to evaluate what is funny and not.
Think about it like this, it’s a very predatory cycle by the enemy. Someone has the idea given by a power of evil to tell a joke that speaks death. The person decides to do so and now speaks death to someone. That person that received the joke either understands they did or did not get death, spoke to them and perceived it as hurt, or humor (that hurts) then what do they do? Proceed to speak death back by telling the next joke to the person right back. This happens until someone gets upset and takes it “personal” and then is hurt. Now even for the person taking it “personal” they are soft and sensitive when in reality everyone was speaking death in the first place.
Now where in this terrible cycle was God. God was listening to every joke and every comment made to each other and watching his children continuously speak death over each other. Now as God looks at the scene of the enemy and his army are just laughing as they have God’s children tear each other apart.
The hardest thing to see about these tactics of torment is all of them are designed by the enemy and his army for one purpose and that’s to lead you to death. We need to really watch ourselves and align our hearts with Gods and not pour fuel on the fire when people are using humor that hurts. It is okay for us to say “that wasn’t funny” or “ we don’t joke around like that”. We are the light in the world and it does take someone confronting the enemy’s tactics. Then we can guide people on how to joke in God’s nature. It is possible to laugh and have a good time while not tearing people apart and speaking death and it’s up to us to set that standard.
Joy is a Godly trait and we need to pray for God to reconnect us to His joy. Psalm 51:12 says “Restore to me the joy of your salvation and uphold me with a willing spirit.”
Psalm 16:11 says: You make known to me the path of Life; in your presence is fulness of Joy at your right hand are pleasures forever more.
We see that joy comes from a relationship with God and joy is an intrinsic trait of God. We need to redirect our humor as God would see funny and be the beacon of light in this world and not the ones speaking death. Remember there are only 2 options: death and life, let’s move towards God’s joy and choose life.