Keep It Simple: Laughter and Tears
By Dr. Tom Pace
May 28, 2017
I Timothy 4:4-5, Romans 5:3-5
Today we’re concluding our sermon series that’s focused on “Keep It Simple” and looking at some sort of simple values, short Bible verses that we can kind of hang onto; that when we reach the end of our lives and look back and we say, “Gosh did I live life in an intentional way? Did I live the way the way that I wanted to live – that I felt I was called to live?” That these are the values that we can hang onto.
So today we’re going to talk about laughter and tears, experiencing the whole gamut of life and thanking God for it. Listen now as we hear the Scripture read, two different passages, one from I Timothy and one from the letter of Paul to the Romans.
For everything created by God is good, and nothing is to be rejected, provided it is received with thanksgiving;for it is sanctified by God’s word and by prayer.
I Timothy 4:4-5 (NRSV)
There’s more to come: We continue to shout our praise even when we’re hemmed in with troubles, because we know how troubles can develop passionate patience in us, and how that patience in turn forges the tempered steel of virtue, keeping us alert for whatever God will do next. In alert expectancy such as this, we’re never left feeling shortchanged. Quite the contrary—we can’t round up enough containers to hold everything God generously pours into our lives through the Holy Spirit. Romans 5:3-5 (The Message)
Let’s join together in prayer. O God open us up. Open our eyes that we might see, and our ears that we might hear. Open our hearts that we might feel. And then, O Lord, open our hands that we might serve. Amen.
When I reach the end of my life and I am looking back I want to be able to say at least four things. First, I want to be able to say that I’ve been a compassionate person, (we talked about that three weeks ago) that I lived life with the same motivation that Jesus did, because everything Jesus did was motivated by compassion.
Second, I want to say that I invested in relationships, close relationships with family and friends and that I didn’t miss those. Those were indeed the most important things to me.
Third, I want to be able to say that I did meaningful work, something that mattered, that I invested my life in something that made a difference.
And finally, today I want to talk about laughter and tears, that I experienced the whole gamut of life. The Scripture says that King David died, “an old man full of days,” that I was able to experience the whole breadth of human experience and that I embraced it with gratitude.
“To everything there is a season and a time for every purpose under heaven, a time to weep, a time to laugh. A time to mourn and a time to dance.” To be able to say I did all of those.
This last week I had the opportunity to be part of a memorial service for Bob Gow. Many of you know Bob, a member of our congregation. But, boy, when I found out about his life I was just amazed. He was born in Paris and did all of these amazing things. He had started all these different businesses and half of them worked and half of them didn’t. Things like a honeybee farm. David, his son, who shared some of the eulogy, said that when he was little he and his sisters had to run around in bee suits out on the corner of Hillcroft and Westheimer trying to get people to come in to the bee farm, the bee store. Also, he started a goat farm for mohair goats - all of these crazy things.
He went to the Yucatan Peninsula and bought an abandoned hacienda that had been abandoned for 500 years and renovated it completely. Just all of these amazing things. And here’s what David said about his father, “My dad knew he had a good life and he loved it and he was thankful for it.” Wow – I wonder if you could say that. Could you say, “I know I have a good life and I love it and I’m thankful for it!”
I think sometimes there are these things that get in the way of us experiencing that. I’ve lifted up four syndromes, these sorts of clusters of symptoms that I think get in the way of us really experiencing the fullness of life.
The first one I call the “Somewhere Else Syndrome.” That is, that I’m not going to be here where I am because I’m going to be somewhere else.
A young father came to me recently and was bemoaning the difficulties. He has a set of twins and he said, “When I’m at work, I really think about what I should be doing at home. And when I’m at home I think about what I should be doing at work. And the whole time, no matter where I am, I’m not really there.”
I thought how many of us live that kind of life. We have this idea that we can multi-task. We say, “I can multi-task!” The truth is that there’s really no such thing as really multi-tasking.
There’s a place in Denmark called the Potential Project and they’re doing all sorts of research on the way we think. Neuroscience and the way we think. And what they’ve come to prove is that there’s no such thing as multi-tasking. We do what’s called “switch-tasking.” It’s where you do something, then you do something else. You do something then you do something else. You go back and forth so fast that it feels like multi-tasking, but the truth is that you’re not doing any one of them very long. Then you’re moving on to the next one. They say that it burns huge amounts of energy and it is incredibly inefficient.
Here’s the test and this kind of blew my mind – it helped me to understand it. They said, “Write the following sentence: ‘I am a multi-tasker.’ So you do that. Then underneath it you write the numbers 1 through 20 in order. ‘I’m a multi-tasker – 1, 2, 3, 4….’” They say that’ll take most people about 20 seconds. “Now try it again but write the first letter of the sentence and then the number one, then the second letter of the sentence and the number 2, and the third letter of the sentence and the number 3. That will take you well over a minute to finish that task.” And that’s the way most of us try and function. We’re going to move back and forth and back and forth and we’re never really completely focused on where we are.
Look, you and I know that the biggest culprit in this is our telephones, our fancy smart phones. We’re like, “Yes, I’m listening to you, dear… I am...” Dee and I have both been trying to work on holding one another accountable for this and it’s difficult. This is one of the reasons I’m not on social media personally – I know it would suck me in and I’d find myself on it all the time.
I was watching this documentary recently, maybe you saw it. It was two Silicon Valley engineers, one had formerly been with Google and one with Facebook. They were talking about the strategies that the software engineers use to suck us in, to hold our attention. They use the same strategies that they use in Las Vegas, like a slot machine.
So what it is that they want to prevent you from getting these little treats, like the “likes” – where you say “Oh, I got a ‘like’- that felt good!” But what they do is hold some of them back. Instagram will hold some of them back. So you’ll look and there’s no “like.” And then you look again and there’s no “like” and then all of a sudden there are five “likes” at once.
It’s like a slot machine where you think, “Ooo…I won a big prize! And I’ve got to keep doing that!” Everything is designed to take our attention, to keep us from being right where we are in that moment, to live in the moment that you’re in and to celebrate it.
So that’s the “Somewhere Else Syndrome.”
The second one is “It Could Be Better” or the “I’m Too Cool Syndrome.”
Let’s look at Paul’s letter to Timothy. There was a group of people in Ephesus, particularly, that were Christians who were ascetics who would say, “Now you really shouldn’t enjoy worldly things and instead you should focus on holy things.” So Paul says to Timothy, “Look, everything from God is good and it’s to be celebrated and it’s to be received with thanksgiving, and consecrated by prayer and the Word of God. The life you’ve been given…”
Those of you who were here last week, we talked about the Garden of Eden. The first thing God does is to give us permission. He said, “You may eat of any tree of the Garden…” That’s before he tells us about the one that we can’t eat from. We’ve been given this whole amazing creation to experience and enjoy, and sometimes what happens is that we never really allow ourselves to reach the highs, to go all the way to the top.
We might say, “I got 90 on my test! Say, I could have gotten a 95. I could have gotten a 95.”
Look, it’s great to strive for a 95, I’m not saying you don’t do that. But there’s a time to laugh, there’s a time to dance, there’s a time to say, “Look at this! This is awesome –this is amazing that I can experience this.”
My wife has in our house a little sign that I love. It says, “Life does not have to be perfect to be wonderful.” To realize the incredible wonders that God has given you, and to just enjoy them and celebrate them. Dance! Laugh!
Sometimes what we do in the “I’m Too Cool Syndrome” is that we live life at sort of this moderate volume. We live life like we’re watching a tennis match or a golf match, not like a football game. We never really seem to want to let ourselves go and hoot and holler.
We had the privilege to go to the Astros game on Friday night and oh, man! So here we are we’re ahead 2-0 and we’re in the 8th inning and the Orioles load the bases. Sure enough, you hear the crack of the bat with the bases loaded and you see the ball heading out toward right center field. You’re thinking, “Oh, no!” And sure enough he snatches the ball right at the yellow line and hauls it in. All around you people are “high-fiving,” people you didn’t even know! To choose to really decide that you’re not “too cool” to go and experience the joy of life.
Now the third one is the “Good Old Days or Someday Syndrome.” Here’s the way that works. You remember the song the Beach Boys had where they say, “Wouldn’t it be nice if we were older?” When you’re ten years old you want to be twelve, and when you’re twelve you want to be fourteen. And when you’re fourteen you want to be sixteen… or sixteen you want to be eighteen… or eighteen you want to be 21. Then when you’re 21 you want to be 25… and that’s all fine when you’re a kid. But when you reach a certain age you’re going to wish your whole life away.
I remember when we were young and had kids and were struggling financially, I thought to myself, “One day if I could just get where I could get by and not be worried about money all the time…then I would be happy.” Then you get to that place and you look back and you say, “Wow, those were great days. Those were great days when the kids were young…” Boy, that was fun – but why did I miss it? The Scripture says, “This is the day the Lord has made - this day – let us rejoice and be glad in it.” Today. “Now is the acceptable time.”
Here’s the last one I want to lift up for you that kind of gets in our way. It’s the flip side of not being willing to go high enough, it’s not being able to go low enough. Not willing to go all the way to the bottom and experience the depth and the pain.
I really like the way that Eugene Peterson translates Romans 5. I’m going to read it to you again. He says, “We continue to shout our praises even when we’re hemmed in with troubles, because we know how troubles can develop passionate patience in us, and how that patience in turn forges the tempered steel of virtue, keeping us alert for whatever God will do next. In alert expectancy such as this, we’re never left feeling shortchanged.”
Do you ever feel short-changed? No, with this attitude you’re never left feeling short-changed.
He goes on: “Quite the contrary—we can’t round up enough containers to hold everything God generously pours into our lives through the Holy Spirit!”
Even in the times of tears and mourning we thank God for life. For the good and the bad. The ups and the downs. Sometimes I think we decide that we want to live our lives like superheroes. Like nothing will really hurt us and we think, “I’m just going to be tough.”
I looked up online all the superhero movies coming out. It’s been bothering me. Now I like superhero movies, I have to say. But it’s starting to make me long for a chick flick that there are so many of the superhero movies.
Here’s some titles and this is for the next twelve months: “Guardian of the Galaxy 2,” “Wonder Woman,” “Transformers: The Last Night,” “Spiderman Homecoming,” “Alien Covenant,” “Blade Runner 2049,” “Thor: Ragnarok,” “Justice League,” “Black Panther,” “The Flash,” and “Avengers Affinity War.” That’s just for the next few months! Can we not get some imagination here, people? These formulaic deals.
And here’s why people like them: Because the superheroes never get hurt, never really get hurt. They get knocked down, thrown through brick walls, and then they get right back up and come after the bad guy. And what happens is that we get in our minds that we’re superheroes. We think, “You know what? I’m not going to let anything hurt me. I am tough, I am strong. Nothing will hurt me. And if anything kind of hurts me I’m going to anesthetize myself from that.”
You remember Jimmy Dugan who was the character that Tom Hanks played in “A League of Their Own.” He says, “There’s no crying in baseball.” You know that’s sometimes how we live – there’s no crying in life. You just go back after it. The only problem is that it’s just not true. It’s just not true. There’s a time to weep, and a time to laugh, a time to mourn, and a time to dance.” The whole spectrum. The whole thing.
Some years ago I came across a book by Thomas Moore. He’s a former monk and is a psychologist and it’s called Care of the Soul. I bought it because it sounded like something a preacher ought to read: Care of the Soul. Here’s what he writes: “The goal is not to make life problem free but to give ordinary life the depth and value that comes with soulfulness. The soul presents itself in a variety of colors, including all the shades of gray, blue and black. To care for the soul we must observe the full range of all its colorings and resist the temptation to approve only of white, red and orange, the brilliant colors. The idea of coloring old black and white movies is consistent with our culture’s general rejection of the dark and the gray.” We don’t want anything that doesn’t excite us.
Friends, I want to encourage you to experience the whole of life. Now what’s the solution? Two things I think jump out. One is we have to live in the moment. Right now.
Last Friday I had the opportunity of taking my grandson who’s not quite two, to the park. There were a bunch of people playing there and he and I were there. We played on the swings and the slide, and he ran all over everything. It was getting hot. So the ice cream truck comes by playing the music and he stops right there. Now I’ve parented for a hundred years and the tapes kicked in that said, “You don’t need any ice cream… No ice cream… You don’t need any ice cream…” I’ve said that forever. “You don’t need any ice cream…” But then I thought, “I’m not a parent, I’m a grandparent!”
I could put that tape away! So I went over and I got one of those strawberry chunky ones that have the real strawberries in them and are all frozen. Three dollars for an ice cream bar, by the way. So I got it and we shared it. I’d take a bite, and then he’d take a bite. He couldn’t hold it very well and it started to melt pretty quickly, and soon it was all over him and all over me. We ate the whole thing.
I was sitting there in the heat eating a Popsicle with my grandson, and I thought, “This is about as good as it can get. This moment…” And I honestly thought of how many of these moments I’d missed because I was looking at my phone, or worried about what people think… or just needing to get on home to whatever the next thing is. To stay in the moment.
And second, to receive it all with thanksgiving. You know, that’s why we say grace. It’s because it forces us to at least pause for just a moment to be thankful. Thankful that we have enough food to eat, thankful that we have friends and family and whatever is going on in our lives. To just stop for just ten seconds and be thankful.
Why don’t you do that right now? Just stop and be thankful. Right here. To be thankful for what’s in your life, and for even this very moment to worship together.
I know Stephan Colbert is quite controversial. I’m not particularly a fan and besides, he’s on after my bedtime so I can’t watch anything he says. But he is one of the Hollywood personalities, despite his controversial stuff, who is outspoken about his faith. I saw an interview with him not too long ago where he discussed what happened when he was ten years old and his father and two brothers were killed in a plane crash. His oldest brother had already left the home so it was just him and his mother. Here’s what he said: “I was raised in the Catholic tradition. That’s my context for my existence. It’s that I’m here to know God, love God, and serve God. That makes a lot of sense to me. I got that from my mom and my dad and my siblings. I was left alone a lot after Dad and the boys died. It was just me and Mom for a long time and by her example I’m not bitter. She was broken, yes, but bitter, no. Even in the days of her unremitting grief she drew on her faith, that the only way to not be swallowed by sorrow is to recognize that our sorrow is inseparable from our joy.”
J.R.R. Tolkien wrote in a letter: “What punishments of God are not gifts? So it would be ungrateful not to take everything with gratitude. It doesn’t mean you want it. I can hold both of those ideas in my head. I was 35 when I was walking down the street and it just stopped me dead. I went ‘Oh, I’m grateful. I feel terrible. I feel guilty to be grateful for this.’ But I knew it was true.”
Could you decide to look at the whole spectrum of your life from the top of the mountain to the bottom of the valley and be grateful for the whole enchilada, the whole thing?
Gracious God, thank you. Thank you for everything. For the tears and the laughter, for the mourning and the dancing, for everything in between. For every moment of every day. Thank you. Amen.