What is Worth Smiling About Right Now?
Good Morning Friends,
Everybody laughs once in a while don’t they? And even if they don’t laugh, I’m sure they smile sometimes. I think I’ve seen every person I have spent significant time with laugh or smile at least once. There was a time I was even praying with two women in a dementia unit. One was 99 years old and the other 101. One had been married for 76 years! I got a smile out of one and the hint of a smile out of the other. I knew who they were. But if I had asked them and they we able to respond to the question, ‘Who are you?” They might well have answered “I wish I knew?” Given the universality of laughter, it seems logical that Jesus laughed too. So today’s question is for you to answer individually as you contemplate what might have made Jesus laugh or at least smile. So for you, What is Worth Smiling About Right Now?
Scripture: To the leader. A Maskil of David, when Doeg the Edomite came to Saul and said to him, ‘David has come to the house of Ahimelech.’1Why do you boast, O mighty one, of mischief done against the godly?* All day long 2you are plotting destruction. Your tongue is like a sharp razor, you worker of treachery. 3 You love evil more than good, and lying more than speaking the truth. Selah
4You love all words that devour, O deceitful tongue.5 But God will break you down forever; he will snatch and tear you from your tent; he will uproot you from the land of the living. Selah
6The righteous will see, and fear, and will laugh at the evildoer,* saying, 7 ‘See the one who would not take refuge in God, but trusted in abundant riches, and sought refuge in wealth!’*
8But I am like a green olive tree in the house of God. I trust in the steadfast love of God for ever and ever.9 I will thank you for ever, because of what you have done. In the presence of the faithful I will proclaim* your name, for it is good.
Psalm 52:1-9 (NRSV)
21The Lord dealt with Sarah as he had said, and the Lord did for Sarah as he had promised. 2Sarah conceived and bore Abraham a son in his old age, at the time of which God had spoken to him. 3Abraham gave the name Isaac to his son whom Sarah bore him. 4And Abraham circumcised his son Isaac when he was eight days old, as God had commanded him. 5Abraham was a hundred years old when his son Isaac was born to him. 6Now Sarah said, ‘God has brought laughter for me; everyone who hears will laugh with me.’ 7And she said, ‘Who would ever have said to Abraham that Sarah would nurse children? Yet I have borne him a son in his old age.’
Genesis 21:1-21:7 (NRSV)
But Jesus said, Suffer little children, and forbid them not, to come unto me: for of such is the kingdom of heaven.
Matthew 19:14 (KJV) he will wipe every tear from their eyes. Death will be no more; mourning and crying and pain will be no more, for the first things have passed away.’
Revelation 21:4 (NRSV)
Message: At any given moment, life is filled with unanswered questions, that cannot be answered by clowns that never stop smiling or a Cheshire Cat that disappears leaving only a sinister trace of a grin. Still it is worthwhile I think to seek answers that continues to give our lives meaning. Honestly, you can spend your life wallowing in despair, wondering why you were the one who was led down a road strewn with trouble and confusion, or you can smile anyway with a sense of courage. Such is the story of our faith journey. So, today as we contemplate what is worth smiling about, we explore the benefits of what makes us smile and laugh. A recent scientific study showed that doctors who are put in a positive mood before making a diagnosis consistently experience significant boosts to their intellectual abilities, which allows them to make accurate diagnoses almost 20% faster than doctors less positive. The same study then shifted to other vocations and found that optimistic salespeople outsell their pessimistic counterparts by over 50%. Students primed to feel happy before taking math tests substantially outperform their neutral peers. So it turns out that our minds are literally hardwired to perform at their best not when they are negative, or even neutral, but when they are positive. Now if smiling means we are more positive then science would indicate that we should smile more often. A smile, a friendly gesture of gratitude is universal. No a smile is not the same as hope and yet there is a particular joy in communicating our unity without words. The beauty of a smile is that you cannot fake it. Friends, when our brain feels good and tells us to smile, we smile and tell our brain it feels good and so forth. Smiling is a loop of love. I still do not know what makes me smile, but I am convinced we all should do it more if only to help us face the sorrow we cannot expunge of an unredeemed world.
Pray we see the absurdity of living a life that does not smile. Pray we realize that God wants to bless us young and old with the gift of laughter. Pray that we receive a deep satisfaction when we give someone a surprise that makes them smile. Pray we make our faith visible in good deeds with a smile. Pray we look others in the eyes and smile involuntarily as a sign of the comfort and warmth of knowing Jesus.
Pray we recognize the Holy Spirit working in us. Pray we have the courage to cooperate in what the Spirit is doing. Pray we recognize that joy increases the closer we get to God. Pray we bring a smile to another’s face today.
Pray we rejoice in all the small miracles. Pray we rejoice in the transformation of frowns into smiles…of fears into hope…of sorrow into joy. Pray we find joy in the smile of a child. Pray we imagine a situation of joy before events occur. Pray we practice smiling with Jesus. Pray we become comfortable smiling with the Spirit. Pray we realize that a culture without sadness is a culture without hope. Pray we realize the cure for sadness is God and that should make us smile.
Blessings,
John Lawson
Daily Devotionals 