00:00number 41 Jesus employed humor Luke 14
00:07now before I read this passage I want to
00:09say that if you give the punchline away
00:12before the end of the joke it runs the
00:14joke and sometimes we've read these
00:16passages so many times we know the final
00:19line and we don't get the punchline feel
00:23so I'm going to read this this part of
00:26the scriptures and I'm going to try to
00:28help you recreate how the original
00:29audience would have heard the punchline
00:32and certainly they would have laughed
00:34but they all began making excuses Jesus
00:37says in this parable about about the
00:40wedding Feast one said I have just
00:42bought a field and I must inspect it
00:44please excuse me another said I've just
00:46bought five pairs of oxen and I want to
00:48try them out please excuse me another
00:51sir I just got married so I can't come
00:53the servant returned and told his master
00:55what they had said his master was
00:57Furious and said go quickly into the
00:59streets and alleys of the town and
01:01invite the poor the crippled the Blind
01:04did you laugh did you get the punchlines
01:07there are three of them
01:09who buys a field without first checking
01:13it out without first inspecting that's
01:15silly I I just bought a field I'm gonna
01:17go and take a look and see what I bought
01:19no one does that it's like people going
01:22that's a stupid excuse that's a lame
01:24excuse that's so silly that's ridiculous
01:27the next one was like
01:29I just bought five pairs of oxygen and
01:31oxen and I'm going to go and see if
01:35no one does that this was such a lame
01:38excuse so I I I bought a field I gotta
01:42check it out I've got about these accent
01:45I gotta check it out then I just got
01:49you can kind of if I was thinking I
01:52gotta check her out you know he doesn't
01:54say that but it's just just the pause
01:56that they've got to go like oh yeah we
01:58get we know we know what what needs to
02:00happen so I can't come and that that was
02:03and Chuckles would have been all around
02:05it would have elicited laughter from the
02:07crowd because these were ridiculous
02:11but Jesus used humor many times in
02:15Matthew 7 and Luke 6 the
02:18we have him telling the story of the man
02:21who has a ceases friend with a speck in
02:25his eye and wants to take the speck out
02:27of his eye but he's got a trunk in his
02:29eye you can see that when Jesus said it
02:31I'm sure he didn't just say it and
02:34and there was a man who had a speck in
02:37his eye and another man with a trunk in
02:39his eye he probably had inflection in
02:41his voice and maybe even dramatize it
02:43trying to look at this back and doing
02:45maybe maybe even picked up a log and
02:47stuck it in his eye and people would
02:49have laughed at what a ridiculous
02:51proposition this was this incredible
02:54delightful exaggeration
02:57must have been a hilarious crowd pleaser
03:00and it stuck when we laugh
03:03things stay with us it impacts our
03:06memories and our emotions are engaged
03:09and then the truth lands a little more
03:10deeply Jesus was a great teacher so he
03:13employed humor wisely