Jesus Humor

This Saturday night, April Fools Day, is the Bob Nelson comedy show at the Little River high school gym. Free tickets are available by request at Congregational Church website.

My wife once stopped inside a restaurant in East Texas on her way home from a retreat. There, she saw a portrait of Jesus--laughing. She said, "It just took me by surprise. I'd never seen anything like it before."

Indeed, when most Americans picture Jesus in their mind, they usually think of Warner Sallman's 1940's portrait or Bernard Plockhorst's Shepherd Jesus.

At the end of his book, The Humor of Christ, Elton Trueblood lists 30 humorous sayings of Jesus. From that list, and in the spirit of David Letterman, here’s my top 10:

#10 "So when you give to the needy, do not announce it with trumpets..." (Matthew 6:2)

# 9 "How can you say to your brother, 'Let me take the speck out of your eye,' when all the time there is a plank in your own eye? (Matthew 7:3-4)

# 8 "Do not give dogs what is sacred; do not throw your pearls to pigs." (Matthew 7:6)

# 7 "Follow me, and let the dead bury their own dead." (Matthew 8:22)

# 6 "If I drive out demons by Beelzebub, by whom do your people drive them out? (Matthew 12:27)

# 5 "Again I tell you, it is easier for a camel to go through the eye of a needle than for a rich man to enter the kingdom of God." (Matthew 19:24)

#4 "Woe to you, teachers of the law and Pharisees, you hypocrites! You clean the outside of the cup and dish, but inside they are full of greed and self-indulgence." (Matthew 23:25)

# 3 "Jesus went on: 'Does anyone bring a lamp home and put it under a washtub or beneath the bed?'" (Mark 4:21)

# 2 "Woe to you, teachers of the law and Pharisees, you hypocrites! You are like whitewashed tombs, which look beautiful on the outside but on the inside are full of dead men's bones and everything unclean." (Matthew 23:27)

#1 "Blind guides! You strain your water so you won't accidentally swallow a gnat; then you swallow a camel!" (Matthew 23:24)