Some have said that modern satire--comedy's brainy older brother--is peaking these days.  Sarcasm has colored our language and shaped our thinking, and as a Christian, I must ask myself where humor fits into God’s worldview. In my biblical concordance there are no categories for comedy, humor, satire, or irony, but let's not assume God has nothing to say about such things. I can't find topics like blogging, blind dates, or broom hockey in the Bible either, but God's principles, as revealed in the Holy Scriptures, have a way of illuminating the non-essentials.

Somewhere in the middle of Jon Stewart’s faux civics textbook entitled America is reprinted the daily schedule of a fictional political convention. It includes, among other things, the 7:25 a.m. “Adulterer Walk of Shame” followed by the juxtaposition of an 8:00 a.m. prayer breakfast.

It’s one example of Stewart’s enormously cynical view of American politics. Along with South Park, The Onion, Borat, and The Office, Stewart and his clever contemporaries have forged a modern brand of high-definition humor, where sometimes serious issues are filtered through a sharply comic lens. Even cartoons have become snarky commentaries on modern life, while sarcasm is every high school boy’s weapon of choice, and YouTube gives any kid with a camera the right to become Jonathan Swift for a day (but perhaps I shouldn't give that colorful YouTube kid Fred that much credit.)

Most of it is offensive. Some of it is absolutely hysterical.

Even though our household pulled the cable plug years ago, such humor has seeped into my family’s diction. I always hear people suggesting that God must have a sense of humor: for example, the well-worn citing of God’s creation of the elephant, or using a donkey to talk to Baalam in the Old Testament. But why does most of God’s supposed humor come from animal punch lines while very few jokes center on you and me?  I'm not sure what God thinks about stand-up, but I do know that most of our humor becomes a cheap substitute for joy. Have we drawn the boundaries too conservatively? Or should we merely lighten up? My answers, like all good conclusions, should be informed by biblical thinking, and I realize God has a lot more to say about the subject than I once thought.

The ingredients of some forms of modern humor are already contaminated, so an investigation is hardly necessary. Do we need biblical proof? The writer of Proverbs has a lot to say about a rotten, filthy mouth:  it brings ruin and invites disgrace.  Depending on the translation, it’s been called a stagnant swamp, a dark cave, and even poison. Ephesians 4:29 states: Watch the way you talk. Let nothing foul or dirty come out of your mouth. Say only what helps, each word a gift.  Rationalizing this brand of humor, I’m afraid, betrays my soul’s sorry state of affairs.  

All right, so dirty’s out. I had a good idea already.

Next I might categorize modern humor according to its humiliation index. In this brand of comedy, the writer gets laughs at the expense of some poor sap. It doesn’t really matter who—fat people, the disabled, the President of the United States, or your grandmother—as long as it’s really funny. Need I check the Holy Scriptures for insight on this one? I John 4:7-8 gives me some clarity:  Dear friends, let us love one another, for love comes from God. Everyone who loves has been born of God and knows God. Whoever does not love does not know God, because God is love.  

What we sometimes call satire is often just cheap humiliation or entertainment parody in more expensive clothes. Making fun of human nature or mocking sacred conventions isn’t always high satire. The boys in my high school classroom are masters of the put-down, but their one-upmanship breeds contempt and insecurity—not laughter. We are ready to lay down our lives for the brethren but are eager to disgrace his honor or dignity for a cheap laugh. Later in I John, God’s message is again clear: Whoever loves God must also love his brother.  The command is so disarmingly simple; we cannot miss it. Yet we do.

Thirdly is decoy comedy, the kind that pitches a flimsy little tent to cover our pain when we really need a fortress. Men in particular are most susceptible to using jokes as an undercover disguise for terrible insecurity or crushing pain. Mel Brooks said, “humor is just another defense against the universe.” Of course, I’m not talking about natural optimism that counteracts suffering, or the comic relief in the middle of a Shakespearean tragedy. Decoy comedy in its worst form takes our pain and buries it under nervous laughter and denial. An apt metaphor might be Monty Python’s infamous Black Knight who, while denying the gushing blood from his severed arm, declares, “It is merely a flesh wound.” The flesh wounds of sin, betrayal, and despair need no camouflage. Romans 5:3-5 tells us not to run from our suffering: Not only so, but we also rejoice in our sufferings, because we know that suffering produces perseverance; perseverance, character; and character, hope. And hope does not disappoint us, because God has poured out his love into our hearts by the Holy Spirit, whom he has given us. 

Okay, so if we’ve established that nasty, humiliating, or cover-up comedy has no value for the follower of Christ, is there any space left to laugh? There seems to be some negotiating room. Satire, for one, can be a highly effective way to expose some truth, but it has a little secret: It’s rarer than we think. The old Romans believed that the satirist is a refined man who sees stupidity and insanity everywhere, but is moved to gentle laughter rather than to rage, Some modern comedians are hardly refined, and sometimes their targets are ill-conceived.

Geoffrey Chaucer, a medieval satirist whose painful observations about human nature exposed hypocrisy, knew many kinds of humor. (The same man who uncovered the painful corruption of the Roman Catholic church also penned 600 year-old farting jokes.)

But Chaucer’s deeper purpose was often to pick at scabs and see what was underneath. When he found an infection, he knew this was precisely the right spot. The mark of a gifted satirist is not in his ability to get a laugh, but the ability to smoke out the real criminals. Like Jonathan Swift or Mark Twain, the satirist uncovers the truth in ways that we haven’t thought of.  Swift’s audience at times thought he was a nut case calling for cannibalism—when in fact he was trying to expose the policies that were leading to poverty and the mistreatment of children. Mark Twain was considered a racist even though some consider Huckleberry Finn to be a great anti-racist masterpiece. That’s the trick behind satire: your supposed purpose is so radically opposite of reality that we are forced to see the truth.

If some laughter is born in a dirty little swamp, other laughter is born in the joyful light of day. How do you know when your brand of humor is born of God? There are no scantron answer keys, but the heart inclined toward goodness will always know. Those little spasms of joy inside a private family conversation, hysterical moments with a spouse, ridiculous paradoxes when laughter practically bubbles over the surface—these are the healing moments that God gives us to balance out life’s heaviest concerns. God’s humor always brings life. It is a medicine, not an illness. It lifts up rather than reaching for the lowest common denominator. It celebrates friends rather than exposing their weaknesses.  And it always grows in the sunshine instead of creeping, mold-like, in the dark.  

How ironic that our “high definition” entertainment defines comedy in the lowest terms possible. If you want high definition, the Bible still gives us the clearest picture. The fourth book of Philippians seems to frame our boundaries: Celebrate God all day, every day. I mean, revel in him! . . . Summing it all up, friends, I'd say you'll do best by filling your minds and meditating on things true, noble, reputable, authentic, compelling, gracious—the best, not the worst; the beautiful, not the ugly; things to praise, not things to curse. 

Are we there yet?  No, but that’s no excuse to keep reaching for the highest definition possible.