Taking Humor Seriously

What’s So Funny About God?: A Theological Look at Humor – Steve Wilkens 

Kasey Olander: 

Welcome to the Table where we discuss issues of God and culture. I'm Kasey Olander. I'm the web content specialist here at the Hendricks Center at DTS, and today I'm really excited because our topic is humor. We're joined by Dr. Steve Wilkens. He is the professor of philosophy and ethics at Azusa Pacific University, and he also wrote a book called What's So Funny About God? A Theological Look at Humor. Thanks for being with us today, Steve. 

Dr. Steve Wilkens: 

Oh, thanks for inviting me. Look forward to this. 

Kasey Olander: 

Yeah, I'm excited about it. We are also joined by Dr. Robert Duckworth, Director of Counseling Services and adjunct professor here at DTS. Thanks for being here, Robert. 

Dr. Robert Duckworth: 

Glad to be here as always. 

Kasey Olander: 

Yeah. Well, my hope today is, I'm going to borrow one of Steve's phrases, but my hope today is to think theologically about humor and also to think humorously about theology. Humor is just part of our existence as human beings. We all are created by God and so I think that there might be something meaningful in there, and so it'll be worth reflecting on. I wanted to start off with a quote that Steve uses in his book because it's highly appropriate for this conversation, but it says, "Humor can be dissected as a frog can, but the thing dies in the process and the innards are discouraging to any but the purely scientific mind." And apparently that's a risk we're willing to take here on the Table podcast. So I'm excited to jump in with each of you guys and interested to hear about how you guys came to think in this area. And so we'll start with you, Robert. I said that you're the director of counseling services, but how did you start taking humor seriously? 

Dr. Robert Duckworth: 

Oh, I think it was probably just as a child, watching my parents. My dad was a pretty humorous guy. It was not his intention to be humorous, but he was funny. My dad was a master impressionist. When he would talk about people in the community, people he may have been frustrated with at church or on the job, he would just naturally impersonate them and I would watch it. And he didn't realize it until many years later when one day he chastised us yet again when he was talking about a situation with someone that had done something he didn't approve of, and he was impersonating the guy, and we just were laughing. He said, "I'm not telling you this to be funny. This is just to help you all know not to be silly or ignorant like this." I said, "Dad, do you not realize all these years…?" 

And I had to stop him. I was an adult then, so I had all this authority to say these things to him. So I'm an adult, and I say to him, I said, "Do you realize all these years when you would talk about people, you would get into character and become them? And it was hilarious to hear you say things that they said and sound like them." And he said, "I never realized that." I mean, it was like a complete shock to him. He was well in his seventies by then, and I naturally picked up on those skills growing up. So I remember when I was in school, the guys, we used to have this thing. It changes over the years. I think now kids call it snapping or capping. I don't know what they call it today. You can never keep up with these kids, Steve. You can't keep up with them at all. 

Dr. Steve Wilkens: 

No. 

Dr. Robert Duckworth: 

But we would do it. They would even call it the dozens, and we would get in there, we'd talk about each other, but that's when I would make things humorous. And I took it serious. I was probably in fourth, fifth grade, probably even earlier than that because I remember a kindergarten teacher told my mom, she said, "He's so hilarious." And at that time when I was in kindergarten, I'm going to age myself, she said, "That's my little Richard Pryor." So I never forgot that, and I was just a humorous guy. 

So I think at a young age, I really took being funny seriously and then got to the point where I'd start writing things down that would be funny. And that was just kind of the way I was wired through family members, dad. Mom knew how to put storylines together, just because she was a good speaker. She was a teacher and my dad was this impressionist. And then I had an uncle that was just raw funny, and I would always be with him. So I enjoyed laughter, I enjoyed humor. I think that was the beginning for me as a child, that impression, and it still sticks with me today. 

Kasey Olander: 

So you started off young, and then what bearing did that have on your vocation as you grew into adulthood? 

Dr. Robert Duckworth: 

Oh my goodness. People think I'm confused, I've been in so many professions. I was in corporate America. I wanted to be a lawyer before I went to corporate America. I went to corporate America because I needed a job after I graduated from college. And I was like, "I need just to go to work. I don't have time to go back to school." And I had no interest in school after my bachelor's. And then I ended up getting a job, and then I continued to be the humorous person that I was on the job. And every so often people would say, "You should be doing something else in theater, other than business. Why are you doing this? I mean, you're good at your job, but you would seem like you'd have more excitement about doing that." And I said, "Yeah, I would," but I just didn't think it was realistic. 

So I started writing after so many people kept telling me that. In probably 1996, I started writing comedy routines and trying to figure out what it would be like to be a comedian. But I was like, "I don't think I'd ever go on a stage and try that. That is a very, very…" And it is a very, very difficult job to do. And I started writing those comedy routines back in 1996, and I held onto those jokes from '96 to probably '98 before I ever stepped foot on a stage. But what I ended up doing… Now, I just definitely believe this is a God thing and God's sense of humor. He took me through that corporate career and then having this sense of humor. And the first opportunity I ever had to go on stage as a comedian was not at a comedy club, but it was the National Association of Black Accountants. 

And they were having a convention, and I knew it was all these corporate folks, black folks. And I was like, "Well, I know two things in this room. I've been in the corporate world and I'm black," and I knew how to make both of those crowds laugh. And so I got in, did an act, and it went over very, very well. And in that particular show, met some comedians that were in that particular show that kind of groomed me and took me under their wing, and we started going to comedy clubs and they would take me to comedy clubs. And that's how I started doing comedy. But I kept my day job. I was not out of my mind. I kept my day job. I was moonlighting as a comedian for three or four years. 

Kasey Olander: 

That's fascinating. 

Dr. Robert Duckworth: 

It was a lot of fun. 

Kasey Olander: 

Yeah. I love that you did stand-up comedy. Yeah, that's really rare. And like you said, kind of providential that the Lord was working it out- 

Dr. Robert Duckworth: 

Absolutely. 

Kasey Olander: 

Even when you thought that you wouldn't do it professionally. But Steve, what about you? How did you first get started thinking seriously about humor? 

Dr. Steve Wilkens: 

Well, it almost sounds too simple, but I've always just loved humor and I love God. And so you kind of want to see how the two fit together. And so I started thinking, "Theologians poke their nose into everything. So surely there's something out there on theology and humor." There's "Theology and" books by the truckload. And I really didn't find much. And so I thought, "Well, I guess I'll just have to write it." So that's what I ended up doing. And I've never written a book that was so hard to write and so much fun at the same time. 

Kasey Olander: 

Sure. Well, I'm glad you did. It's kind of funny. My husband and I have this joke that humor is one of our family values. I'm pretty sure it's not a joke because I don't know what our other family values are. And pretty much every time we come home, we start off with, "Okay, this is what I said in a meeting today that was really funny," or, "This is that funny thing that happened to me at work." So yeah, I totally agree with what you're saying, Steve. I love God and I think that being funny has its value. So there must be some sort of way that they fit together. So as I was searching for resources on Amazon, your book was one of the things that came up, and I was like, "Oh, this is exactly what I was looking for and I'm glad that somebody has already done the legwork to write it." 

Dr. Steve Wilkens: 

Yeah. Well, as you get into it, you find that there have been others who have been in these areas as well, but a lot of times they were kind of writing off to the side of where I wanted to be, but their insights really helped me. And I also did some work in the philosophy of humor. Believe it or not, philosophers have taken humor pretty seriously, and psychologists have as well. And it makes sense because it's such a deep part of our lives. 

Kasey Olander: 

It is. And that kind of brings me to, okay, is it possible to define humor? Can we at least describe it or does it have some hallmarks? What is humor? 

Dr. Robert Duckworth: 

Very good question. You have all these different… Sometimes people say tragedy turned inside out. I think that's the terminology that's been used. I've just never thought about defining humor. It's just funny. I've just never thought of putting a definition on it or coming up with this scholastic response as to what it is. It's just humor. It is what it is. 

Kasey Olander: 

Yeah. I have the Merriam-Webster definition here that says, "Humor is that quality which appeals to a sense of the ludicrous or absurdly incongruous, a funny or amusing quality." And it just seems to me like that falls so far short of what the reality is when we experience humor. And yet it's because it's one of those things that's so difficult to put into words. We have almost a visceral reaction. Laughter is something that happens to us physiologically or biologically. I'm not a scientist, but it happens to us. It's a response to either situations or words or intentional jokes, things that we experience in the world. So what is it about humor that we love, or at least the three of us that we find ourselves drawn to? Steve, can I start with you? 

Dr. Steve Wilkens: 

Yeah. Well, again, it's kind of hard to put into words, but for me, humor's a love language. That's how I say I love you to my friends. As I said in the book, if I came right out and told my friends I love them, they'd think I'd probably just been diagnosed with stage four cancer or something. And it's that playful attitude with my kids, with my wife, that just is a gentle but understood way of expressing love. And I think there are a lot of other things that go with that too. So for example, on Match.com, both males and females put a sense of humor in the top three of what they were looking for in a potential mate. 

Kasey Olander: 

And that's kind of interesting, but we don't know how to define that. 

Dr. Steve Wilkens: 

We don't know how to define it. But at the same time, people who have a sense of humor, who laugh easily, are perceived as more loving, more social, and more caring. 

Kasey Olander: 

Which matters for us. 

Dr. Steve Wilkens: 

So there's that empathetic response. What happens when you see a couple of people laughing, as long as you're confident they're not laughing at you. 

Kasey Olander: 

Right. 

Dr. Robert Duckworth: 

That's right. 

Dr. Steve Wilkens: 

The first thing we say is, "What's so funny?" Because once they share that, you're in. It's a means of inclusion and can be. But on the other hand, it can be very exclusionary as well. We use humor as a blunt instrument. And so it's got power in both directions. 

Kasey Olander: 

As Christians, we care deeply about what it means to love somebody, what it means to show care to people, what it means to connect with people. And so if humor is a tool that we can use for that, it makes sense that we would want to explore it and delve into it. 

Dr. Robert Duckworth: 

Absolutely. Yeah. I would say I've used it tremendously in my work as a counselor. When I'm counseling clients, if we were somehow able to get all of these, many, many, many people, hundreds of people to sign a release, to come and give a testimonial about their time of working with me in counseling, and most of them would probably tell you that they were able to laugh in counseling with me. And in my work as a professor of my students, they laugh in class. It naturally happens. I don't go in there with the intention. It just happens. And it breaks down walls, so many walls. I've had some very difficult conversations with people. 

I've had many conversations on the subject of multiculturalism, diversity in a world where it creates a more of a divide. I have seen people be able to come together in the room by having a lighthearted conversation about those very subjects, and it breaks down walls. And I think God is excited about using that. And I praise God that he gave me this gift of humor to be able to do that in so many ways. And it doesn't have to necessarily be in a major comedy club or have your own television show. It makes a difference in people's lives in a 50-minute counseling session or in a three-hour class setting. 

Kasey Olander: 

It does. Yeah, it makes you relatable, it makes you personable. And I think sometimes too, it's a way of communicating truth to people- 

Dr. Robert Duckworth: 

Oh yeah. 

Kasey Olander: 

Whether it's by satire or whether it's by poking fun. And a lot of times, the comedians that are the funniest are the ones that are the most relatable. They're pointing out things. "Oh, yes, I've definitely been there. I've definitely had that experience." And that's what makes it so funny, is it's making observations about the world around us. 

Dr. Steve Wilkens: 

Well, and one of the interesting things about humor too is it's a form of confession. I'll tell you the truth about myself in a humorous way when I wouldn't say it in a straightforward way. And so I've often said that people don't go to the comedy club to see a hero, they go to see themselves and sometimes an exaggerated version. And so it's a way we can sit back and say, "I think they know me." And so it's kind of a catharsis. You go in there, you can kind of laugh at yourself, you can laugh at the world. And I think it's very important in that way. And I would say amen to what you said about the classroom. You may not believe this, but sometimes 19 year olds are intimidated by philosophy. And I can get them to loosen up a little bit if we can laugh a little bit and just throw in a one-liner here and there. So it lightens up the room. 

Kasey Olander: 

It does. I think it takes a level of intelligence too, to kind of, like you're saying, think on your feet and get it to be something that people are able to relate to. So I think we've highlighted a lot of really positive aspects of humor, that it helps us connect to people and helps us teach people truth sometimes. But another related question, do you think that we would have humor if it weren't for the Fall? 

Dr. Robert Duckworth: 

We wrestled with that in our little chat that day, and I purposely didn't read a word in Steve's book yet, but I can't wait to read it after get out of here today. But I wrestled with that because if you go back to that definition of turning tragedy into something beautiful or or tragedy turned inside out becomes humor, well, pre-fall there was no tragedy. There was no tragedy. Had a kind of little debate over the phone the other night with one of my buddies, and he said, "I think there would've been humor pre-fall." I said, "Well, I definitely believe it was joy. I think it was laughter between Adam and Eve." It was probably laughter somewhere between the end of chapter two and chapter three of Genesis. But they probably had laughter and joy and he picked on hers, he picked on… I don't know. 

I'm sure but it wasn't humor based upon tragedy or to make light of a difficult situation because there was no difficult situation. As far as I can see, all of that was post-fall. So that's kind of my thoughts on it. I think there was laughter, I think there was some joy, but would have there really been a need for humor or comedy prior to the fall? I don't think so. 

Kasey Olander: 

You don't think- 

Dr. Robert Duckworth: 

I think people would've laughed, but I don't know if it would've been in the context of a joke or a humorous situation, unless they were looking around at the different animals and just what they were doing. I don't know. Depends on what the animals were doing. Might have made someone laugh. And I guess that's humor. Yeah, maybe so, as I process through it. Steve, you are the philosopher. You can tell us, I don't know. 

Dr. Steve Wilkens: 

Well, I do have a little section in there on will there be humor in Heaven? And I agree with you. I think there'll be lots of laughter, lots of joy. But I think probably the most important trigger for humor is incongruity. We see things that don't fit and a lot of those things that don't fit is because we don't have a God's eye view on things. And so one of the things Christians struggle with is the fact that we are embodied beings. And far too many Christians act as if somehow we escaped from God's lab during beta testing and God was going to take our bodies away. 

But the fact that we die of the same diseases that our pets do, but at the same time, our pets don't have a sense of humor and they don't write constitutions, they don't compose poetry, so there's this odd incongruity. If you want to call it body and soul, let's call it that, but we've got two things that don't seem to fit together. And in the same way, the whole story of the incarnation. It's no accident that most of the earliest heresies arose in the church because of the inability of people to perceive God taking on meat and becoming flesh. And so we struggle with that. Whereas in heaven, we'll say, "That's kind of a no-brainer, I guess. It doesn't seem to be incongruous. It's just the way God intends it." 

Kasey Olander: 

Sure. So there may not be this juxtaposition of way that we think something should be and the way that it's not or any of that other incongruous things that you're talking about. 

Dr. Steve Wilkens: 

Yeah. And a lot of times I talk about how we live Holy Saturday. We are stuck between all the horrors and the ugliness of Good Friday and the Joy of Easter. And we live with a foot in each world. And I think a lot of our humor comes out of that. We live by two different calendars. We celebrate Holy Week, but we also celebrate Shark Week. And so it's that odd dual citizenship sort of thing that I think is at the root of so much humor. 

Dr. Robert Duckworth: 

Absolutely. And when I think about those… Well, using pre-fall and post-fall. I've always believed Jesus and those 12 disciples, those apostles that are traveling with him, I know guys. If I'm hanging out with 12 guys and we have work to do and we're doing all these things, at some point there's going to be horseplay, there's going to be some level of just jovial behavior. "Look at Judas' hair." I mean, it could have been anything like that. And everybody's having a fun time around this whole thing. I just believe they probably had a good time. And now we read about what's serious because our lives are hanging on this. But I have to believe Jesus as a child played with other children and they had fun, they wrestled, they did things. I believe the disciples probably in their travel… These were, I would say, adult men going out doing work. 

But I know how it is around here. Even at DTS, we do have fun. At DTS over here, and we laugh and we're jovial with each other. I think that's a part of the community that God has created in us and in that community, there will be humor that comes in that. And I just don't believe those 13 men hanging out didn't have a good time together. I just don't think they would've done that and didn't have a good time. And we know they debated, we know they had a hard time with each other on different things and didn't agree, but I think they had some fun together too, because that's what guys do when we get together. 

Kasey Olander: 

And even that's what friends do. It seems like a common misconception that holiness and humor are incompatible. 

Dr. Robert Duckworth: 

Oh Lord, yeah. 

Kasey Olander: 

Yeah. If we're going to take something seriously, then we never can laugh about it. But I mean, I don't know, I have a pastor who preaches funny sermons. A lot of times we might laugh in church or that'll be something that's really memorable is, "Oh, I know that was a joke. But the serious underlying meaning was actually really convicting, but he delivered it in a way that made it palatable for people." And so probably in the same way you're talking about Jesus and his disciples too. Just because of the relational aspect, how could they not have been having a good time? How could they not have been making jokes and probably saying something funny? 

Dr. Robert Duckworth: 

Absolutely. Most of the time when we have chapel speakers here, somebody says something, I would say the majority of the time someone is going to say something that's funny. And if you have any chapel speakers that were once students here, they'll say something that that entire audience relates to and it erupts in laughter. I think it's a natural part of who we are. So maybe that's our definition. Humor is a natural part of who we are, and it is very soothing and healing to us. 

Kasey Olander: 

Yes, absolutely. 

Dr. Robert Duckworth: 

See, put that in your dictionary. That's what we need to do. 

Kasey Olander: 

I'll call Merriam-Webster real fast. We'll have them edit that. 

Dr. Robert Duckworth: 

Absolutely. Good. Call them. Let's get that in there quick. Yeah. 

Kasey Olander: 

I think that brings us to… You brought up Jesus and the disciples. Where else is there humor in scripture? I'll start off with the most recent time that I read Esther, I thought that book was hilarious. Haman is doing some crazy things, he's cooking up these schemes, and he's acting all conceited, "Who would the king delight to honor more than me? No one." And so then he goes around and has to do all of this amazing stuff for his mortal enemy. That's hilarious. How ironic! And all of the "coincidences" in there that are really the lord's providence. So I noticed that the most recent time that I read Esther, but I wonder if there's anything else that comes to mind for you guys. 

Dr. Robert Duckworth: 

Things that come to mind… Steve? 

Kasey Olander: 

Steve? 

Dr. Steve Wilkens: 

Well, I did a little interlude on Esther in the book, but I also spent some time in… Oops, I forgot to plug my computer in. Did a little bit of work in Jonah, and I think Jonah's one of the most hilarious books in the Bible because here's this guy who's supposed to be on God's A Team, and God says, "I want you to go to Nineveh." And he heads for Tarshish, which is about as close to 180 degrees off compass point that you can get. So I think that's hilarious. And then he goes to Nineveh and preaches probably the most unenthusiastic sermon possible, but yet people repent right down to the livestock. I got to grab my power cord before I go dark on you here. 

Kasey Olander: 

No, yeah, those are good examples. And I think too that there are sometimes… I thought of Sarah this morning and how she laughs at the very idea that God could give them a child in their old age, and God calls her out, "Oh, you laughed." And she's like, "No, I didn't. No." And he's like, "Well, you did. Yeah, I'm omniscient so I actually know that you did." Stuff like that. 

Dr. Robert Duckworth: 

I couldn't imagine trying to change diapers at a hundred years old since I didn't want to do it at 32. All of those, yes. But you could find humor… I know when I first started writing, I used to struggle with it. I think I struggled with trying to write humor about scriptural context or stories or narratives in the scripture because I think I was wrestling with the fact, "This is holy stuff. I shouldn't really be making light of it, but I'll make light of the church." So that's what I would do. I did those things. 

A lot of my comedy, when I would do shows for churches, would revolve more around making light of the current church or the contemporary church or the church as we know it today, and all the stereotypes that go with the church today and the like. So that was kind of my genre that I wrote to. But I think if I was to go back now and write, which I am writing now, it is much easier to use content from the scriptures and really find humor in those things. And just finding anything. I just can't think of anything off the top of my head, but just Jesus's- 

Kasey Olander: 

The talking donkey. 

Dr. Robert Duckworth: 

The donkey, that's been used. People have talked about that. Jesus comes back. You are the promised Messiah, you died. You died a brutal death. And you come back, you walk through a door and the first thing you do is, "Hey, you guys have anything to eat?" You got to come up with something better than that, Jesus. How did this happen? He told us how it was going to happen, but the first thing he comes up, "Let's have some dinner," that kind of thing. So I just think that there's stories you can come up with altogether make it lighthearted, but it might convey a true message about the scriptures. And if it helps with the truth, well, praise God. Praise God. 

Dr. Steve Wilkens: 

I've got the belief that one of the most hilarious scenes in there is when Jesus joins the two disciples who are heading back to Emmaus, and he kind of comes up and says, "Hey, guys, what are you talking about?" And they said, "Are you the only one who isn't in on this?" 

Kasey Olander: 

"This guy is not in the know?" 

Dr. Steve Wilkens: 

And I just got to imagine Jesus doing everything he could to not burst into laughter and say, "Well, do tell. Bring me up to date on this." And I think that's absolutely a hilarious story. 

Kasey Olander: 

Yeah. Yeah, definitely is. I think perhaps that humor is one of those genre pieces that we need to look for in scripture, because there is so much of this irony. A dead person came back to life, they don't normally do that. 

Dr. Robert Duckworth: 

Exactly. 

Kasey Olander: 

Yeah. There's a lot of things that are incongruous or unexpected that I think it merits us, at least, looking at when we read scripture because it is God's revelation to us. And so if it's one of the means by which we understand things, then it's at least worth considering. 

Dr. Steve Wilkens: 

One other thing that fits in there too is if you're open to surprise when you're reading the Bible, look at how many times God does the least expected thing. David, the youngest of all these sons, ends up as King of Israel. Paul, Mr. Super Jew, becomes the apostle to the Gentiles. God is always choosing the least likely person. And when you look through that Hebrews 11 Hall of Faith, well, yeah, there's a lot they did that was admirable, but in many ways they were giant goof ups too. And so you got murderers, some swindlers in that group, and couple of guys who tried to pass off their wives as sisters so they could save their own bacon. It doesn't happen in the way you would expect it to. 

Kasey Olander: 

Yeah. 

Dr. Steve Wilkens: 

You get four Gentile women showing up in Jesus' genealogy and all of this stuff that shouldn't happen keeps happening. 

Kasey Olander: 

Yeah. That is meant to catch us off guard. Sometimes we, I think, wrestle with over familiarity in that we're like, "Oh, I've read this before. I know Jesus is coming back. It's not a big deal," but we need to appreciate those things that you're pointing out. That actually is really shocking that these different people would have these significant roles in the narrative of scripture. Yeah, it should bring us maybe some delight and pleasure that, "Oh, God uses regular people like us," and that should be surprising and not just what's expected. 

Dr. Robert Duckworth: 

Absolutely. I think about just using me. That's a great example. People find out now, "You've gone into ministry?" And people are just… I would go back to my college homecomings and we'd have these grand times and they knew me as this jokester and this humorous dude, always doing these fun things and just outrageous stuff and they're like, "You're in ministry?" And often times their response is, "God really does have a sense of humor to use you and to see this guy that would play practical jokes on people in college and to see you come back… Your whole goal was to humiliate people and now you're trying to build them up?" I said, "Yeah, I try to build back up the same people I humiliated. I just have to do it with Jesus Christ now. And it works." 

Kasey Olander: 

Yeah. 

Dr. Robert Duckworth: 

Yeah. He uses it. And I love what Steve is saying. I think that alone is humorous, but truth, that he uses these broken people to do such magnificent things to redeem us. So there's more to theology and humor than I ever even thought. Even in this conversation I'm learning about it. 

Kasey Olander: 

And just because something is beautiful and humbling, that the fact that God uses us, doesn't mean that it also can't be funny. 

Dr. Robert Duckworth: 

That's right. 

Kasey Olander: 

Yeah. Do you think that there is such a thing as objectively funny, the way that we have objective morality? We know that there is right and wrong, sometimes we disagree on exactly what right and wrong might be in a given situation, but there is a right and a wrong. Do you think that there might be an objectively funny, 

Dr. Robert Duckworth: 

A right and wrong, an objectively funny? So something that shouldn't be funny is what you're saying or-? 

Kasey Olander: 

No, just that there are categories of funny and not funny. 

Dr. Steve Wilkens: 

Yeah. It's funny, even if you're not laughing at it. 

Dr. Robert Duckworth: 

Yeah. 

Dr. Steve Wilkens: 

Well, a lot of humor is very cultural. And so one of the weirdest things that came out of this book is I had a Russian Christian ask for permission to translate the book into Russian because he says the Russian Christians tend to associate solemnity with piety. And he said, "I think your book really makes a good case for doing it otherwise." But he says, "I'm going to have to rewrite a lot of the jokes because they won't play in Moscow." 

Kasey Olander: 

Or the word play even, it just doesn't translate. 

Dr. Steve Wilkens: 

Yeah, yeah. 

Kasey Olander: 

Yeah. 

Dr. Robert Duckworth: 

There's things I won't do as a comedian. I wouldn't do, knowing that it would harm someone, causing harm to someone. And there's stuff that I could say that would be funny to a big audience, but if it would harm that one guy or that person here, yeah, I just don't touch it. But then there's other things that I'm just driving down the road and it pops in my head and I was like, "Man, if I had a place to go and say that, I would say it," and I'll say it to my friends and they're dying laughing over the phone or if we're on a Zoom or we're just hanging out or whatever, and they're laughing. They're like, "You need to write that down." I was like, "Where can I perform it? I'll lose my job at DTS, I won't get to preach at church. My family won't respect me." But it's hilarious. 

And there are things that you just… And have to keep it to yourself or keep it amongst your inner circle really, and don't go with it. But then there are some things that I do and it's edgy and I have done, and I've said them, and people loved it. And oftentimes it was people within a very pious Christian audience that would tell me, "Man, I love that joke you said about blah, blah, blah," whatever it was. And so you know it's not just you laughing and others are laughing. I mean, I wouldn't say all the people, but a lot of the people that I hang around with are Christians. I would say probably most of them are. Yeah, they are Christians. 

And as I'm thinking about my friend crowd, and there's some I'm still working on too because witnessing to them, but most of my friends are Christian, but they find some of these, I guess, probably even crass thoughts that I may have about some subject matter very humorous and they laugh at it. And then in the African-American community, we'll tell somebody, "You're wrong for that," but they'll die laughing because you know it's wrong, we shouldn't say that publicly, but you're laughing. 

Dr. Steve Wilkens: 

One of the main theories of what makes something funny is called benign violation. And so there's a little aggressiveness in the joke, but it doesn't go over the boundary. 

Dr. Robert Duckworth: 

That's right. 

Dr. Steve Wilkens: 

Okay? So you nudge the envelope. The problem is though, the line is in different places for everybody. And so yeah, I've got a pretty high tolerance for jokes that others might consider inappropriate, but you got to know the room. So I was here nodding my head, saying, "Yeah, there are things that I will say to my friends that I can't say in a classroom." 

Dr. Robert Duckworth: 

That's right. 

Dr. Steve Wilkens: 

It'd get me thrown out. Or I couldn't say to certain people with certain trigger points. So yeah, a lot of what's important in humor is the relational aspect, knowing the other. 

Kasey Olander: 

Yeah. Yeah, that's a really good point. 

Dr. Robert Duckworth: 

Absolutely. 

Kasey Olander: 

That there's always boundaries to be drawn because our goal is to love people. We want to care about people, we want to connect with people. And so we never want to use humor to dehumanize people or ridicule them. And at the same time, also, we can have a little bit of levity to, for example, laugh at ourselves. One time my husband and I were at a family gathering and somebody made a joke about our denomination. And so the people around us were like, "I'm so sorry. I didn't know they were going to say that." We were like, "That's okay, that's fine." It's okay to poke fun at each other and we didn't take it personally. And it was, like you said, very benign. And so I think that there's a delicate balance to this benign violation that you're talking about where it- 

Dr. Steve Wilkens: 

There's a huge cultural discussion right now. I mean, a lot of the biggest names in comedy won't do college campuses because everybody is so sensitive about everything and they don't need that hassle. They don't need people getting on their Twitter accounts trying to cancel them so they just don't do it. And so I've often wondered whether it's a good metric of how spiritually healthy we are if we are willing to be the target of humor and perhaps hear truths about ourselves that are funny and have truth but may have a bit of an edge to it too. 

Kasey Olander: 

Yeah. It's a difficult thing to take some things seriously and at the same time not hold them too closely. If our identity is ultimately secure in Christ, then maybe it's okay if people poke fun at us a little bit for whatever reason, especially in the context of a caring relationship, in the context of our friends and people that we've established relationships with. So we talked about that humor can connect people. Whether in a classroom, in a seminar, different things, humor can bring us together. And it also can be a tool that we use for even reading some of scripture and seeing… Yeah, Robert, I love that you pointed out that once you came to know Christ, it's not like everything funny about you went out the window. No. Now it's something that the Lord uses in your life. 

Dr. Robert Duckworth: 

He has, he's done that. Can I back up to the other thought of just on the cancel stuff with our college campuses? Steve's exactly right. And cancellation is going backwards and forwards in different ways because you can get canceled in environments where they're holding up a moral standard. The Christian Church, they have this standard, but if you say something humorous about and attack that, you would be canceled from that particular culture. So cancellation goes either way. It can be towards more of a believing audience, they can cancel you, or a non-believing audience can do. And I like to use that. I try not to go into the whole left-right debate because I'm just trying to get away from that. 

But back to your other question, so I wanted to just kind of point that out, but back to the question about how God can really use it after you have accepted Christ, I was able to explicitly see how that took place for me, the humor, because I remember the first time that my former church went in and did prison ministry at a prison in Palestine, Texas. This is a maximum security prison, probably more than 3000 inmates in this facility. I went through probably six or seven checkpoints or gates of some sorts to get into this prison, walked down a hallway that looked like a highway. It had yellow tape or lines in the middle where these guys have to walk on this side and other guys walk on this side. You're on a highway. And it looked like a highway. It was just this long gangway down here. And all you could see is bars and walls. So I'm in this prison and I go up and it was like the Lord was nudging me. I didn't hear a voice. 

I always tell people, "I didn't hear a voice, I didn't hear an audible voice, but I felt a nudging. 'Use what you have. Talk about your experience getting here.'" And the first thing I told those guys… When I went up, I took the microphone. I was scheduled to preach in the prison. And when I walked up and I described my journey to prison ministry and my first time of ever seeing an inmate working on the side of the road when I was growing up in Arkansas and didn't know what that was, and I was like, "Well, who are these guys out in these white suits out here working?" And I was telling these guys in prison, I said, "My dad did not give me the textbook answer. He didn't say, 'Well, those are guys that committed crimes and they're paying for their crimes. Oh, those are bad guys. They did wrong. All those guys are being punished for the wrong that they did in life.'" 

No, my dad said, "That's where you're going to end up if you don't stop being hardheaded." And when I said that, the room erupted in laughter. And immediately I felt like God was saying, "That's why I had you at the Laugh Factory. That's why I had you on television because I was training you for this moment right here." And when I saw men accept Jesus Christ that day, after I was able to preach the gospel and was able to connect with them and break down those walls in a building full of walls, that's when I knew God was using humor to make a difference in the lives of his people and draw them to him. So I was able to clearly see it, and that's why I love prison ministry. And even came full circle where there was some inmates that actually had recognized me from television, and it was amazing. So I'm just amazed at how God has used humor to help me really just deliver his word and deliver the message of the cross. 

Kasey Olander: 

That's beautiful. That's not just something that you're trying to excuse or rationalize. Actually the Lord is using it to draw people to him and to use you. 

Dr. Robert Duckworth: 

And we'll do it again. It is not just that… No, no. I will do it again to reach people for the Kingdom. 

Kasey Olander: 

Well, thanks for sharing that with us, Robert. And this has been a fun conversation. Really appreciate each of you guys and your willingness to take humor seriously, to really inspect it, and to think about how it really can be a gift from God and something that he can use and has used. And it's something that we can even use to love people well and teach them truth. So thank you, guys, each of you for being with us, Steve and Robert, really- 

Dr. Robert Duckworth: 

Thank you. 

Kasey Olander: 

Grateful to have you. 

Dr. Steve Wilkens: 

Thanks for giving me this opportunity. 

Kasey Olander: 

Yeah, it was fun. And we also want to thank our listeners. We're grateful that you've joined us, and we hope that you join us next time on the Table podcast when we discuss issues of God and culture.