There’s Never Jocularity in Prayer
This thought occurred to me: Never, when we are at prayer, is there ever the remotest thought of praying with levity or jocularity. Never is humor added as if to maintain the attention of people who might be silently praying along. Never in the prayers of the church, or for that matter, in personal prayers, is humor thought to be a helpful ingredient. Not even during personal prayers when they are said aloud, say, in a family setting. Of course this would not be the case in church when saying printed prayers and collects in a liturgical setting, but never even when ex corde prayers are uttered by the pastor (if that is his inclination during the prayer of the church). Never.
And so I thought, How odd. How odd, that is, that whenever we speak to God we are dead serious. We are not trying in the slightest way to be funny, or evoke laughter. We would never.
So why, then, is there so often such a strong push to employ levity or evoke laughter when it is time for us to hear God? When there is preaching? For not only is reading Scripture aloud the hearing of God’s word. Preaching is too, as the catechism says: “We should fear and love God that we may not despise preaching and His word, but hold it sacred, and gladly hear and learn it.”
The sermon is the integration of God’s word with the words of the pastor, but even the words of the pastor are the application of God’s word, by God’s own direction. The Gospel is to be preached, not simply read aloud. And for that matter, even prayers themselves are best said when they integrate God’s promises with one’s own supplications, as also the Psalms routinely do. They confess the faith and they implore God, and in their case all the words are His, in a primary sense. In a derived sort of sense, the same ought to be true of the sermon. It, too, is all God’s word, although when the pastor preaches he is employing his own words. Still, he is doing a holy thing, though of course in a much lesser sense than in the case of the Psalter. The whole sermon is still called God’s word. The sermon must be norma normata, that is, “normed” by the Scriptures. The Scriptures must be its guide and compass. It must be derived, governed by the Scriptures. That is required of preachers, though of course they have great latitude in how they preach and apply God’s word.
Still, the sermon is not stand up comedy. It is not a time to connect with the hearers in the way that motivational speakers might do. It’s different. It’s norma normata. Certainly the pastor is using the sermon to connect with the hearers, but why must he feel constrained to so so with levity? Why with jokes?
You don’t joke around when speaking to God, so why, then, should you joke around when you, O pastor, are the vehicle through which God is speaking? We are, as the catechism says, to hold preaching sacred. Certainly this applies to the preacher as well as to the hearers.