A headline crossed my screen this week that I could not shake: Our God Hosts Parties and Tells Jokes. My first reaction, honestly, was a small internal flinch. Something in me wanted to reach for a caveat, to protect God's dignity, as if He needed my help. And then I sat with it a minute longer and thought: who taught me to flinch at that?
Because it is not the Bible that taught me. The Bible is loud with feasting. Read the calendar God gave Israel and you find a people commanded to stop working and eat well several times a year. Read the parables and you keep bumping into banquets, wedding halls, a fattened calf, a father who hears about the neighbors' opinions and throws the party anyway. The first public miracle of Jesus was not a healing or a resurrection. It was more wine at a wedding that was about to get awkward. He did not lecture the host on moderation. He made the celebration last longer.
Gladness as a command, not a reward
There is a moment in Nehemiah that has stayed with me for years. The people have just heard the Law read aloud for the first time in a long time, and they are weeping. Convicted. Undone. And the leaders say something that would sound almost irresponsible if it were not Scripture: "Go your way, eat the fat, and drink sweet wine and send portions to anyone who has nothing ready, for this day is holy to our Lord. And do not be grieved, for the joy of the LORD is your strength" (Nehemiah 8:10).
Notice the order. They were not told to celebrate because they had finally cleaned themselves up. They were told to celebrate because the day belonged to God, and because joy — His joy, not their manufactured cheerfulness — was going to be the thing that held them up for the hard work ahead. Gladness was not the prize at the end of obedience. It was the fuel.
And notice the instruction tucked in the middle: send portions to anyone who has nothing ready. A real party in Scripture always has its eye on the person who did not get invited anywhere. That is how you can tell holy celebration from mere indulgence. Indulgence closes the door. Holy joy sets another place at the table.
The humor we keep sanding off
As for the jokes — I think we read the Bible too solemnly to hear them. A camel through the eye of a needle is a funny picture. A man with a log in his eye offering to remove the speck from yours is comedy, and it lands harder because it is funny. God asking Job whether he has ever put a leash on Leviathan has a wry edge to it. Jesus nicknaming two brothers "Sons of Thunder" is the kind of thing that gets said in a locker room, not a lecture hall.
I am not making God casual. Holiness is real, and reverence is not optional. But somewhere along the way many of us picked up the idea that seriousness about God and delight in God are opposites — that the more mature you get, the flatter your face has to become. That is not maturity. That is fatigue wearing maturity's coat.
What I actually see
Here is what I notice as I lead people: the folks walking closest with the Holy Spirit are usually not the grimmest people in the room. They are the ones who laugh easily and cry easily, because both come from the same unguarded place. When the Spirit moves in a service, sometimes there is trembling and tears. Sometimes there is laughter that nobody scheduled and nobody could stop. Both belong. Galatians lists joy as fruit the Spirit grows in a person — it is not a personality type you either have or you don't. It is something God produces in ordinary people, on ordinary Wednesdays, in a small town in Michigan.
If gladness has gone quiet in you, hear me carefully: this is not a scolding. Some of you are carrying weights I know nothing about, and the last thing you need is one more command to perform happiness. You are not failing. Grief and joy live in the same house more often than we admit, and God is not standing at the door with a stopwatch.
But I would say this. Tonight we gather for Bible Study at 6:30, and one of the best things you can do with a room full of people and an open Bible is read the feasting passages out loud and let them be as good as they actually are. Do not sand them down. Let the wedding at Cana be a wedding. Let the father run.
Because at the center of all of it is Christ, who called Himself a bridegroom and told us the end of the story is a supper. The cross was not God learning to be joyless; it was joy paying a price to get us to the table. Whatever kind of week you are having, the invitation stands, and the Host is glad you came.
Join us this Sunday at 10:30am — Outpouring Worship Center, Ravenna.