A Theology of Comedy

Andrew Rappaport's Rapp Report

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February 21, 2024

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00:28: Jeep is a registered trademark. I do have, sometimes, a little bit that I have to overcome if people have only seen me in the bowtie, if they've only seen me in the videos, and they don't see, that's why
00:42: I'm pretty prolific in putting out as much as I can of the other stuff too, and so that they understand, okay,
00:48: I'm playing a role when I'm making jokes, and I'm enjoying that, it's fun, but there's a serious side too.
00:54: And so there is a danger that someone could think that you're just a jester, just a clown. And so I'm careful with that.
01:01: And I talked about that in the thing too. A man who cannot be serious cannot be trusted.
01:12: Welcome to The Wrap Report with your host, Andrew Rappaport, where we provide biblical interpretation and application.
01:19: This is a ministry of striving for eternity and the Christian podcast community. For more content or to request a speaker for your church, go to strivingforeternity .org.
01:28: Welcome to another edition of The Wrap Report. I'm your host, Andrew Rappaport. Here, we will answer your biblical questions.
01:36: We are looking to do biblical interpretations, applications of all things in the Christian life. I am the executive director of Striving for Eternity Ministries and the
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01:53: We are sure that you will find something worth listening to there. We put out about 40 hours a week.
01:59: So unless you're a truck driver or something, you probably won't be able to get to all of it, but you can pick and choose what you enjoy.
02:06: We're gonna have what I think will be a very fun episode today because we're talking about humor, good humor.
02:14: No, not the ice cream. We're actually talking about laughing. And I figured if we're gonna talk about humor, we should bring someone in, the king of amillennialism himself, also known as your
02:26: Calvinist, Mr. Keith Foskey. Welcome, Keith. Hi, Andrew. Thank you for having me on your show.
02:32: As always, I appreciate it. This is my, what, second or third time on. So I'm thankful to have been asked back.
02:38: That means I must be doing a good job. Let's get set to back row. Actually, lay first, in case folks don't know you, a lot of people think of you because of some of the videos you do.
02:49: You have been known kind of, somewhat your typecast for the videos you do on the international meetings or interdenominational meetings.
02:58: But on your website, I want you to talk because there's a lot more that you put out. You put out a lot of things for people having home worship with ways of memorizing scripture, different lessons, things like that that you're putting out regularly.
03:14: You have a news show. You have your whole lot more when we start including what you have with your role as pastor of your church.
03:22: So let folks know right off the bat a little bit about you, your YouTube channel, your other things that you're doing so that everyone would be able to be encouraged to go and check that out.
03:31: I'm the pastor of Sovereign Grace Family Church in Jacksonville, Florida. I've been serving as the pastor of that church since 2006.
03:39: So this is my 18th year serving as the pastor. And we have a sermon audio ministry that we started about 10 years ago that has an entire library of solid teaching on it.
03:55: And so a lot of people don't know that's available. So I say, if you want to hear lessons from the Bible, I've taught through entire books of the
04:01: Bible. I have two other elders who teach alongside of me. The current one's currently teaching through Daniel and others teaching through Job.
04:06: I'm preaching through 2 Corinthians. And so I point people to that. That's the most important thing.
04:12: Well, that makes a lot of sense because you said there's two other men. So when you said solid teaching, I was wondering about that.
04:18: Yeah. I bring up the rear, you know, I let the... So about a little over a year ago,
04:25: I've been doing the podcast for several years and I really enjoyed it. But a little over a year ago, my wife sort of had this idea of doing some funny short videos that might point people toward the podcast.
04:35: And we did an interdenominational video. The interdenominational video took off. And because it took off, it allowed me to start having a little bit more opportunities to do some other videos that I had wanted to do.
04:48: So you mentioned other things. I am currently doing a family worship series. And that was actually by request.
04:54: A church member said, hey, can you do something that I can use to help lead family worship? So now
04:59: I do a weekly family worship video. It's about eight to 10 minutes long. And I also do my news show, which is called
05:06: Church Soup. It's a playoff of the old TV show, Talk Soup and the
05:11: SNL Weekend Update. It's sort of a combination of those things where I talk about the news of the day that's happening in churches and I make fun of it.
05:18: And then I also do other things. I do movie reviews, I do sermon reviews, just anything that sort of catches my fancy and I wanna do it.
05:25: But in general, I have at least one or two videos that go out per week along with my podcast, which is the last thing
05:33: I'll mention. And that is the Your Calvinist podcast with Keith Foskey. And I've had a ton of people on the show.
05:40: I've had you on the show. I had you at the last time we were in Tullahoma together. I interviewed you. I've had James White and Layton Flowers and several other people on the program.
05:48: And it's an interview style show. So generally I'm interviewing people. Sometimes I'll do it as just a lesson show.
05:54: I'll do a lesson. But I save that for other things for like the family worship and stuff. So that's it. That's who
05:59: I am. And we should mention, you have rebranded the podcast to be Your Calvinist. So if folks knew from before, and they're like, hey, wait,
06:07: I thought, yeah, if you haven't been listening for a while, it's new. You've rebranded it. And since you always ended it with I'm Your Calvinist, it makes sense.
06:16: Yeah, Your Calvinist was how people knew me on Twitter and they weren't always connecting conversations with a
06:21: Calvinist. That was the title before. So I just went with Your Calvinist Podcast. And I do wanna give a shout out to Hans Feeney.
06:28: Hans Feeney is the brain behind the Lutheran satire videos. He is currently writing me a tremendous new introduction song.
06:38: It's a completely original song. It's an intro for the podcast. It is hilarious. I've gotten the first draft.
06:43: My wife and I laughed about it. It is such a great intro. So I think people will remember the new name after the new song comes out.
06:51: It's gonna be something special. It's set in the theme of a 80s
06:56: TV show theme song. If you can imagine that, and it's that. And Hans is so talented. So that's coming out hopefully pretty soon.
07:05: So Lutheran is writing your intro for a Calvinist show. Okay. The only problem with you changing your name is you went from the top of my list in podcasts to the bottom, right?
07:15: You went from conversations to your. So now I have to scroll down. How about that? Cause you're one of the ones,
07:22: I have a. Maybe I should have put one podcast. I have a lot of podcasts that are there and some that I'll get around to listening to.
07:33: Yours is one that I make sure I listen to. So I have to like purposely scroll through the list of 90 to find yours.
07:41: Well, I appreciate that. I do appreciate that. It's worth the scroll. So let's give the background.
07:48: So I, on your podcast, you had a talk that you had been invited down to Florida to talk about.
07:56: And it was a very interesting title. I know that I saw it on the YouTube channel. It was like, huh, okay, that's interesting.
08:04: And I got to mark that. So I remember to get back and watch that one. And then you put it on the podcast.
08:09: So I was like, oh, I can listen to it. So, and you started off with that. I'm just going to let you give the title and explain how that came about.
08:19: And then maybe you started off with giving the audience two jokes. So I want the other joke, you know.
08:26: Oh, I gave, okay. Well, the title was A Theology of Comedy.
08:32: Pastor Urie, who is the pastor of the church there, which is Providence Church in Pensacola, he sent me a message last
08:39: October. And that was about the time when the Harbor Freight Doug Wilson was really blowing up.
08:44: And for those who don't know, I do a little skit where I pretend to be Doug Wilson, but the off -brand version or Harbor Freight version of Doug Wilson.
08:52: And people think that's really funny. And so I did a thing called Open Borders October because he does no quarter
08:57: November. So I did Open Borders October where he talks about everything controversial. I talked about everything that's universally beloved.
09:05: I talked about kittens. I talked about just all kinds of funny stuff. And instead of setting things on fire,
09:10: I put an iPhone in a, I froze an iPhone. So like I felt like it was this, the total bizarro
09:15: Doug Wilson. Pastor Urie messaged me. He said, hey, can you come to Pensacola and talk about the importance of humor in the
09:24: Christian life? And so I wrote a message entitled A Theology of Comedy.
09:30: And I learned a lot in preparing that message. And I feel like people who have listened to it have said that it hit on things they didn't expect because it wasn't just an hour long comedy act.
09:42: It was talking about how humor affects us physically, how humor can affect us emotionally and spiritually.
09:49: And so that was the heart of it. Yeah, a lot of it did resonate with me and I'll tell you why. When I do our evangelism training, okay, our evangelism training we call
09:58: Ambassador Evangelism and we have three principles. The first principle is usually kind of sets some people off, but I say disarm their defenses by using humor and being polite.
10:10: The second one is to disarm our own defenses by learning how to ask good questions. The third is avoid being called judgmental by using the law.
10:17: But that first one, people are like, what? Like it's evangelism, it's not supposed to be funny. And I ended up spending a lot of time instructing the audience on the fact of what humor does.
10:29: And when you think about when you're evangelizing and it's something where people get emotional about it, it is really disarming.
10:37: And especially if you're like me and you make fun of yourself and I mean, Keith, I know you don't have the advantage I have, I got a lot of material to work with here that you don't have.
10:45: Oh, sure, what if I do? Oh, I have a ton of stuff to do. But you know, it is so disarming, especially if you make fun of yourself.
10:54: You don't have to be like a comedian, but just the fact that what humor does, and that's what
11:00: I really would like to dig into. And the other thing as a pastor or preacher, and I don't know if you've experienced this, but when
11:07: I was a young pastor and I would sit there, we had a guy front row, and he would sit right in the front.
11:13: I didn't know why, but he would be in the front. And then when I'd have everyone sit down after the prayer and I say, amen, he would just put his head straight back, close his eyes, and he stayed that way until the closing prayer.
11:26: And like, everyone looks at him and says, this guy is sleeping. And I one night, one time I like asked him, like, you know, hey, what do you do?
11:32: Well, the reality was he wasn't sleeping. He was trying to pay attention, but it's frustrating as a pastor or preacher to see someone fall asleep.
11:41: And you know that it's just, they've been up late. There was something happened, whatever. And I had a guy
11:46: I knew that he would actually stop in the middle of a message and go, hey, wake that guy up. And yeah, that prevents people from falling asleep a bit because they don't want to be embarrassed.
11:55: But I'm like, is there a better way to do it? And I learned humor, the way humor works, and you said some of this, but what humor does is it actually does wake you up.
12:04: It releases some endorphins and it actually helps you to pay more attention. And so I tell people like, typically if I see someone starting to doze off,
12:13: I try to figure some way that I can add some humor in at that point, not to be funny for no reason, not to, you know, but to help the audience.
12:21: And so there was a lot of that that you talked about in there. So, I mean, first of all, let me do this.
12:28: I want to encourage everyone to go to your Calvinist podcast and listen to the full thing. Because I don't want
12:34: Keith unpacking everything here. But with that, just give, if you could, some of the high level, what is it that humor does to us?
12:44: How is it helpful? Well, in the message, I broke down Proverbs 17, 22, which says a merry heart does good like a medicine, or some translations say is good medicine, and a broken spirit crushes the bones, or the term there dries the bones.
13:01: And Jameson Fawcett Brown had mentioned this. It says, it's like the marrow gets sucked out of the bones when the spirit is broken.
13:07: And what we have is we have a contrast of two things. The contrasting things are a merry heart and a broken spirit.
13:15: And so when we're trying to interpret what's meant by that, we sort of have to look at the parallel. That's how we just sort of determine.
13:23: And we know that there can be different ways to interpret a merry heart.
13:28: It doesn't just mean a laugh fest. It doesn't just mean that. But we also know that within the concept of a merry heart, generally, merriness includes a disposition of laughter, a disposition of happiness.
13:44: It's not people who are merry aren't looking like they're sucking on persimmon juice.
13:49: You know, it doesn't work that way. And so most people who read this recognize that we're dealing with something that deals with our countenance.
14:00: We can see on the face, whether the person has a broken spirit or whether the person has a merry heart. And the reason for that is there is a physical reality that happens when we are joyful or happy or we are expressing laughter.
14:14: And I will read one thing from my notes. I brought it with me. And this is the mental health side of laughter.
14:22: And this is from a website which specializes in this. It says, laughter decreases stress hormones.
14:29: It increases immune cells and infection -fighting antibodies, thus improving your resistance to disease.
14:35: Laughter triggers the release of endorphins, the body's natural feel -good chemicals. You mentioned that one. Endorphins promote an overall sense of wellbeing and can even temporarily relieve pain.
14:45: Laughter may even help you to live longer. A study in Norway found that people who have a strong sense of humor outlived those who don't laugh as much.
14:53: The difference was particularly notable for those battling cancer, end quote. I know this.
14:59: I use the term comedy as therapy. And then I found out that that is actually a website. So I have to be careful because I don't want to,
15:06: I don't want to take somebody else's idea. And I don't want to, I certainly don't want to infringe on anyone's trademark.
15:12: But the idea of comedy being therapy is found in this verse because it says a merry heart is like medicine.
15:19: A merry heart does good like medicine and a broken spirit dries the bones. So when we say it does good like a medicine, well, the science bears that out.
15:27: Not that we need science to confirm the Bible, but science does often agree with the Bible because the
15:32: Bible is true. And because the Bible is true, we're going to see that in the scientific data. And the scientific data is, yeah, a merry heart actually is like a medicine.
15:41: And this is why for eons, the phrase that's used is laughter is the best medicine.
15:48: And we know that's a colloquialism, but it's still true. And so that was part of the talk, was talking about the physical and emotional benefits.
15:58: And then I told some stories, real life stories of things that had happened. I'm not going to tell them on the show, but unless you want me to, but there were two very personal stories that I got permission to share where people in my life had gone through some tragedies and God allowed me the opportunity to bring some merriness into the situation, not being a clown.
16:18: And I don't want anybody to think I went in with a rubber nose and was honking people on the, you know, honk, honk, you know, it wasn't that kind of humor, but by sitting and telling stories, by sitting and talking, by sitting and simply sharing life with these people,
16:31: God was able to lift their countenance in a time where their spirits were absolutely broken.
16:38: And so, yeah. Yeah, and I think people should go, I'm encouraging, go and listen to the full message because it will benefit you.
16:50: But you like to have fun, right? Obviously. Oh, yeah. You're, I mean, you got known for that, but yet I've listened to your sermons.
16:58: They're very serious. You do debates. I've listened to some of your, like, you, okay. Let's be clear.
17:04: You've done some debates that were purely for fun. So you did a debate on whether Die Hard is a
17:11: Christmas movie. The thing that actually made that one so funny is how serious you both took it.
17:16: Like there was, there was a lot of debate. The lack of humor is what made that one funny. And then you did, you ended up doing a debate where you're talking serious issues, but you guys had so much fun with it that it was enjoyable to hear.
17:29: And yet you communicated what you believed, both of you. I guess he was dressed as a wrestler and you were the king of millennialism.
17:39: You reminded me about the Die Hard one. Cause I really, I didn't count that one, but I'm going to start.
17:44: Cause I was, I said, I have done five public debates. I've actually done six because Die Hard counts, but I've debated infant baptism twice, once with a
17:55: Presbyterian and once, actually both times was with a Presbyterian. I've debated now the pre -tribulation rapture with Spencer.
18:03: I've debated post -millennialism with Doug Wilson, but that one was a short debate. That one's hard. That was like a mini debate.
18:08: So maybe say four and a half. And I also have done a debate on the Sabbath, on my understanding of the
18:14: Sabbath. I'm not a Sabbatarian. So I took a position opposing the Sabbatarian position. Sunday is the
18:20: Christian Sabbath was the position my opponent took. That one was very serious. I was talking to my wife about that today. I spent three months preparing for that.
18:27: Like my, all of my extra study time that wasn't sermon prep or whatever was devoted to studying the
18:33: Sabbath. And I, and I really dove into that. And so that one is very, very serious, but yeah, the king of the millennialists brought me into that dispensational debate.
18:40: I never intended to debate eschatology ever. And it happens. But the first debate
18:47: I found out actually, when I had you on here, when we had that joint one with Greg, right?
18:52: From Dead Man Walking Podcast. And you mentioned the debate. I went out and watched it. And that was a great debate, very serious debate.
18:59: And there are some people who think if you're going to be a pastor, if you're going to want to be taken serious, you can't joke around.
19:08: You can't use humor, at least not publicly. If you do it, you got to hide it away.
19:14: I kind of know the answer to this question, but for the audience sake, do you agree with that kind of thinking? No, I will say this.
19:21: I do have sometimes a little bit that I have to overcome if people have only seen me in the bowtie, if they've only seen me in the videos and they don't see, that's why
19:30: I'm pretty prolific in putting out as much as I can of the other stuff too. It's so that they understand, okay, there's,
19:37: I'm playing a role when I'm making jokes and I'm enjoying that, it's fun, but there's a serious side too.
19:42: And so there is a danger that someone could think that you're just a jester, just a clown. And so I'm careful with that.
19:50: And I talked about that in the thing too, a man who cannot be serious, cannot be trusted.
19:56: And so if you only know how to joke, if you only know, if everything's a joke and you can't ever suck it up and get serious, then
20:03: I think that's a problem. That's the, you know, we have to be able to have a moment where we can be serious. But as GK Chesterton said, serious is not the opposite of funny.
20:12: Funny is the opposite of not funny. And so you can be serious and still have a light in the mood.
20:18: I mean, when R .C. Sproul said, what's wrong with you people? There's a sense in which he was very, very serious, but it was also very, very funny.
20:24: And so there's that part too. I remember being at an event with Paul Washer and he said something and everyone started clapping and he just looked at us, you know, why are you clapping?
20:37: That was about you, you know, the line that he's well known for in a totally different context.
20:43: And everyone burst out laughing. And it was funny because you just see this little smirk because I was like in the third row and you just see this little smirk from him and he knew it.
20:52: He knew what he did. He knew what he did. And, but it worked. It was effective. And so we,
20:58: I don't think we need to avoid it completely as some try to argue. Like you don't have to be completely stoic at the pulpit, but you're right if you're, you have people that can't be taken serious.
21:10: I mean, look, I know Ray Comfort is an example. The guy jokes all the time.
21:16: Like you think he's almost never serious if you get to know him. I mean, he's just, he is joking about everything.
21:21: He'll turn everything into a joke. And yet he's intensely serious when it comes to the gospel. And so when you get to, when you know him, you realize literally he just, everything to him, like we're driving down the street and he just points to the
21:37: Popeye's chicken. And he goes, hey, that must be a Catholic place. And I'm like, why? He goes, because it says
21:43: Pope, yes. And now every time I pass a Popeye's chicken and folks,
21:49: I'm sorry, but now every time you pass the Popeye's chicken, you're going to see it's actually says Pope, yes. But it's like his mind is so quick with things like that.
21:57: And yet no one accuses him of not being serious. Why? Because you see him sharing the gospel so much, kind of like you said, he puts out so much serious content that people don't know the amount of joking he actually does.
22:11: You're very much that same way. I didn't really know you before the Open Air Theology Conference last year. That's where we first met.
22:18: And it was interesting because the way, even though I had seen your videos, I didn't realize who you were.
22:24: Because I remember you showed me a video and I was like, oh wait, that's, you're that guy. No. I'll never forget what you said to James White.
22:31: Oh no. Because James White said, I knew Keith before he was famous. And you said, I didn't know he was famous.
22:37: And I was like, that was great. Because you weren't trying to be a jerk, but it was like, it was like that moment I got brought down a peg.
22:43: I was like, okay, yeah, that's so funny. And you didn't mean it in a mean way. James was like, I knew him before he was famous.
22:48: And you said, I didn't know he was famous. And that's, I always say being famous is like being a lady or being important.
22:54: If you have to tell people you are, you're probably not. Yeah. Yeah. So forgive me again.
23:02: No, no, again, I wasn't offended. It was just, it was one of those moments where I was like, yeah, yeah, that's funny.
23:07: That is funny how that worked out. I didn't, I just didn't know really much about you other than I realized after that, after that incident, you showed me the video.
23:15: It's like, okay. But there was the, I just saw you and James like back and forth on Twitter.
23:21: And I forget what it was, but I like, there was some joke you cracked and I was actually kind of defensive for James White.
23:28: And then James kind of put me in my place to be like, no, no, I know Keith. It was, you were sounding about wearing like, you know, the sweater or something.
23:36: And I forget now. Oh yeah, his Coogee sweaters, man. They're, it looks like Bill Cosby.
23:43: And so it was, but you know, that is something on social media that I do think we have to be careful because, you know, when you type, there's a big difference between written form and verbal form.
23:56: And I'll even emphasize a different way. There's a difference. You and I are talking right now. We can make jokes and we understand it's a joke.
24:04: There's a big difference when say, doing open air evangelism, where I'm having to raise my voice. One of the things, the reason
24:10: I make fun of myself so much in evangelism is because I discovered a lot of humor is voice inflection, which is hard to do when you're raising your voice.
24:20: And people don't get the joke because they can't hear the inflection. So they read into it the very same way that people read into text messages.
24:28: And so what I ended up doing was making fun of myself because I discovered when you make fun of yourself, everybody gets as a joke.
24:35: So, but in written form, people get themselves, okay, me, I get myself in trouble. I tell jokes and people don't perceive it as a joke.
24:43: As a pastor, I mean, can you, do you have like some warnings with the use of humor?
24:49: Is there places, like I'm kind of hinting of with written form, are there places where we shouldn't use humor?
24:56: Are there times we shouldn't use humor? Are there types of humor we shouldn't use? Because I want to ask this question specifically because I'm thinking back to your message and you mentioned one of the two stories.
25:07: One of those stories has someone who had a very serious issue in life, a loss, a great loss.
25:13: And that's not when people would think to use humor and yet it was really effective in that case.
25:19: So are there times, that'd be a time people say, you shouldn't use humor. So what should be our guidelines with humor?
25:25: When should we, when shouldn't we? And granted, it's not always gonna be a clear cut and dry, but are there times that maybe you should stay away and are there guidelines of when it's too much, when it's too far?
25:38: Well, let me just speak real quick to that issue of that. The only reason why in that situation that it worked the way that it did is because I had an already existing relationship with that person that just like you just said, if you know
25:52: Ray Comfort, you know he jokes all the time. This was my fellow elder who had gone through this tragedy and he and I, we talk two or three times a week, sometimes an hour to an hour and a half at a time.
26:03: We have so many inside jokes. We have so many things that are already built into that relationship that when he and I are sitting there and he's just come sit and talk with me, come and be with me as I go through this, as I process this loss, that's why it worked.
26:17: Sometimes the relationship has to be there. Like you said, on social media, I joke with James White a lot because I have an existing relationship with him.
26:26: I joke with Leighton Flowers. Even though we don't have a great relationship, we have enough of a relationship that he and I did a funny video together and I now,
26:36: I can make a joke about him that if somebody else made that joke, he might get offended, but he knows my heart.
26:42: He knows I'm not really calling him out or I'm not really saying he's a false teacher or something like that.
26:48: So he and I have a relationship and I think relationship adds to your ability to bring humor into things.
26:54: I think if you don't know someone, they might consider it crass. And let me tell you a quick story.
27:01: I think this will really make this make sense. One of my favorite comedians is Nate Bargatze. He's a very clean comedian and his father was a magician, which
27:10: I love because I used to be a professional magician and Nate Bargatze's father was a magician. Well, they were celebrating like his 50th anniversary as a magician or something.
27:19: So they asked Nate to come in and do his standup act as for his father's birthday.
27:25: Well, Nate came in and nobody said this guy's a comedian. They just said, come in and do your act and nobody announced it.
27:31: Nobody said, now his son, Nate, the comedian, he just came up and they handed him a microphone and they said, do your act.
27:37: And he said, if you don't know someone's doing comedy, it just sounds like a really mean speech.
27:44: And that phrase stuck with me, right? If somebody doesn't know who you are, if somebody didn't know my heart, they might think
27:50: I really hate Methodists, right? They might think that I really hate - Dispensationalists.
27:56: That I disagree. Yeah, exactly. I love my dispensationalist friends. And so when
28:02: I tease you guys about your charts or when I tease you about the rapture, because I disagree, that doesn't mean, one, part of me hopes you're right.
28:11: Some of these things we disagree about, but I don't think it's that big of a deal. And that's what makes the humor work is because guys like you know,
28:21: I made a joke about dispensationalists one time and I got so many people angry with me because they don't know me.
28:27: I laugh the hardest when you make fun of the dispensationalists. The one where we did at Buffalo Wild Wings where you have the dispensationalists disappear.
28:36: I cracked up at that. That was hilarious. And some people get offended because they don't know me.
28:45: And so I do think there is that disconnect. If you don't have a relationship with people, sometimes people can get offended. So that's right away, like, know your audience kind of thing.
28:52: Know who you're talking to. Second thing, when you talk about limits on comedy, the pulpit is not a place to be a clown.
29:00: That's not to say that you can't use humor. Like you said, if you see a guy falling asleep or you think you've lost your, people aren't listening to you, you can well -timed quip, a well -timed story or something may bring people back in.
29:12: But I know people who literally try to be stand -up comedians in the pulpit and they never get to anything serious because they're constantly trying to make the jokes.
29:22: And so I would say there's a limit there. I mean, there's nothing wrong with being winsome. There's nothing wrong with being humorous, but there is something wrong with seeking to be a clown in the pulpit.
29:31: So right there would be a limitation. And as far as limiting the content of our humor,
29:38: Paul draws lines for us. And he uses the word komos in several places.
29:45: The word komos is where, that's actually where the word comedy comes from.
29:51: Komos ode means an ode to revelry. So comedy means basically like a revelry song or a song of revelry.
30:00: But the way that Paul uses it is he always uses it in the context of crassness and vulgarness as a negative.
30:09: And he says that which is komos or in sometimes translated as orgies, that which is celebrating the vulgar shouldn't be something that Christians are engaging in.
30:20: And so I'm not saying we can never say anything that might be a little on the line because I do think sometimes like Doug Wilson, for instance, he'll get right up against that line.
30:31: And some people think he crosses the line. And so we do have to consider where that is. But we should not be, especially things like sexual jokes.
30:41: That's a line that we have to be careful not to cross. Making light of sinful things in a way that is gross or demeaning towards those things.
30:53: And so that's where I think there's a line there. And that's why I say, when I say somebody is a clean comedian, I can listen to Nate Bargatze with my kids.
31:00: I don't have to worry about anything he's gonna say. I don't even have to worry about any curse words. None of that's there.
31:06: And so that's the line. I was thinking as you were talking with having that history in this situation where you're talking with the person in your church that you know well.
31:16: Yeah, I thought there was a time where I was slipping into real depression. Just something that had happened in life that just I've been counseling enough.
31:24: I knew, reached out to a friend of mine, Matt Slick, and Matt literally just starts,
31:30: Matt just starts insulting me. And I mean, just one after another, and then
31:37: I started laughing. And we're just, all of a sudden, at one point we're just going back forth, having a good time.
31:44: He's insulting me left and right. And he goes, you feel better now? And it's, I realized like he literally, he ends up, we joke about it today.
31:51: He goes, hey, if you're ever feeling down, just give me a call. I will insult you till you get over it.
31:57: But it's similar thing. It's like, because we have that relationship, that humor that we've built up over years can actually be used as good medicine, as good counsel, where you're not really dealing with the hardship of the situation because what are you doing?
32:14: If you continue talking about the thing that is getting you upset, you're gonna continue to be upset.
32:20: So what does this do? It totally just changes the conversation. To sound completely different now. And I think that is so helpful.
32:27: And yet a lot of people, they don't think to do it. And I do think though that they're, like you said, coarse jesting.
32:35: And I'll be curious what your interpretation is on this because I remember my first church that I was at, there was a guy who thought coarse jesting was any kind of joking around whatsoever.
32:46: If you made any joke, that was a sin. It caused me to do some study in the passage.
32:52: I came to the conclusion he was wrong. But I first wanna hear what your thought is when in Ephesians 5, he's going through that.
32:59: Is coarse jesting, like is any kind of joking a sin? Is that what that's talking about? But no, you're right.
33:05: Ephesians 5 is one of the passages that I looked at when I was preparing for my time in Pensacola.
33:10: And it's in the message that I mentioned that it says either filthiness, nor foolish talking, nor coarse jesting, which are not convenient.
33:19: That's the King James. It doesn't say coarse, King James just says nor jesting, which are not convenient. And people will say, well, see the
33:25: Bible condemns all jesting, but it doesn't in the way that we know that is by context.
33:31: The context of Ephesians 5 is the context of fornication, uncleanness, covetousness.
33:37: It's the context of filthiness, foolish talking, and those things which would involve the vulgar.
33:43: And this is why modern translations translate it as crude jesting. That's the
33:48: ESV says crude joking. And the Laonida, which is for those who don't know, that's a
33:55: Greek lexicon. Laonida says coarse jesting, which involves vulgar expressions and indecent content.
34:04: And so even the lexicon defines this word, not just as jesting in general.
34:11: Like you said, if I poke you, or you poke me with a little joke, it's coarse or lewd or anything that would be filthy or unwholesome.
34:21: And so, as we say, is there a line? Absolutely. Do teenage boys often cross that line?
34:27: Yes. Do grown men in locker rooms often cross that line? Yes. And so, but we know where the line is, and we know when we've crossed it, because we normally look around like this, like we know we've crossed it, right?
34:37: Like, okay. And as a pastor, here's the fun part. As a pastor, when people find out
34:42: I'm a pastor, oftentimes, and you may have experienced this, Andrew, somebody finds out you're a minister evangelist, as soon as they find that out, they apologize to you.
34:51: They'll say, I'm sorry. I didn't mean to. I hope I didn't offend you because I said a joke or because I said something.
34:58: It's like, no, you didn't offend me, right? I'm not the one going to hell. No, that doesn't. You know, it's funny you say that, because that's actually, many years ago, when
35:07: I used to do the secular work, get to a job site, one thing I used to do when I started a new job was
35:13: I would evangelize everybody. I would, right out the gate, I want everyone to know I'm a Christian. I want them to hear the gospel.
35:19: But you know, I said somewhat, there's a second benefit of doing that, because when everyone gets together and tells the jokes, they usually will apologize and stop midway through because I'm in the room.
35:30: Like, so I did a lot of running and I would run with a bunch of guys. And literally, this one guy would go, hey,
35:36: I got a great joke, but I'll wait till Andrew takes off because we knew, like, there was a spot, we all ran at different speeds.
35:42: And so we would get to this park, we'd run to the park, and then we'd all take off at different, kind of the whole big group would break into smaller groups.
35:49: And so this one guy would always be like, I'll wait till we get to the park where Andrew takes off. Right? It was great.
35:56: Now I didn't have to hear it. That's true, yeah, yep. And there is so much that, like, those sexual innuendos that are just, they're right on the line.
36:05: And to me, I'll say this, and this is a thing that I think for Christians. I had this happen last week.
36:11: There was a guy that I know, he was retiring from his job, he plays golf. And so one of the group was gonna go, we all pitched him money, the guy's like, so I was gonna send an email saying, hey,
36:22: Bill's taking care of, I basically said he's gonna get some balls for Bob. Well, I had a guy, he's 60 -some years old.
36:30: He's like, ooh, ooh, ooh, ooh, ooh, ooh, like laughing at, I'm like, I didn't even realize what I said. He goes, oh, that's right, you don't have third grade humor like me.
36:38: But it didn't even dawn on me how he was gonna interpret that, right? I'm like, just going like, yeah, we were talking about golf things, like I just was being quick with an issue, a quick email out.
36:50: And it hit me this week, like, some of these things that the world, like they hear it and they can't stop laughing.
36:56: They think it's childish humor. And as Christians, we don't even recognize it because we're so far past the pettiness, the small, it's really, it is third grade humor, right?
37:09: The potty jokes. But that actually gets into something else
37:14: I wanted to ask you about, because I've noticed a change in humor in the last couple of decades.
37:20: I think good comedy is dead. I really believe Barack Obama killed it, but well, you're laughing because of two things.
37:28: One, you couldn't, he would, when he was president, you could not make fun of him.
37:34: It wasn't a lot like, they had this like edict where he was the first president where they have the roast and it's like, you can't laugh, you can't make fun of him.
37:43: There were certain things you could say, but he actually said, this is, you can't do this. And like, where that was always, presidents always got made fun of on late night
37:51: TV. It actually changed some of comedy where now what do you see? You have people that they say something where they make fun of a person or a group of people by something that's a little bit true, because all humor has some truth in it.
38:05: And it's like, oh no, you can't do any of that anymore. So we went from, I mean, good, like Red Skeleton and people like that,
38:12: Bill Cosby. And you mentioned Bill Cosby that used to listen to Bill Cosby. I mean, he had some humor that you had to think through.
38:21: We went from that to a humor that's just all about sexual innuendos and bathroom jokes to where now it's like, you can't make fun of anybody in humor.
38:31: Like, do you see the downgrade of humor? And as Christians, how can we approach comedy?
38:39: Well, I think humor has changed. And I would agree with you that there is a type of humor that has taken off.
38:49: And I mean, you can go back even into the 80s and 90s where a certain type of tremendously crass humor has taken off.
38:56: And it's the kind of thing that you don't even want to sit and listen to, much less have your children exposed to, or have someone that you wouldn't listen to it with your mom in the room, right?
39:05: Because that would be awkward. So obviously that's there. I think though, what has changed, and this is from a comedian,
39:13: I don't know if it's fair to call myself a comedian. I call myself a humorist, right? I've had an opera. I think after this much,
39:19: I can call myself a humorist. I've done a little standup comedy now. I've written for a satire magazine.
39:25: I've got a little bit underneath my belt. I can call myself a humorist, right? At this point, I could say humor has changed.
39:31: And here's what has changed in my estimation. Humor used to be about, there were jokes that people told, or there were observations that people made.
39:41: And now it's moved from that to more of a, it's almost like comedy has a, like everything that liberalism touches, it's like comedy has become a vehicle for the, what's the word
39:58: I'm looking for? I want to make sure I say it right. The message, right? Everything has a message, right? And so it's not just, we can't just make fun of things anymore.
40:06: We can't just talk about things anymore because now if a person says something or if a person does something, they'll get canceled if it's not in line with the message, right?
40:14: And there's this message. Like I heard a comedian today, I would just happen to be flipping through my phone and a comedian came up, never seen him before.
40:20: First thing he says was my daughter came to me recently. She said she had something serious to talk about. What do you want to talk to me about?
40:26: I'm dating a girl. And the whole audience was on there. They were just waiting. How is his father going to respond, right?
40:32: How's his father going to respond to this girl? His daughter's, obviously she's gay, she's dating a girl. And the father says, and I told her,
40:39: I'm going to love her no matter who she dates. I'm going to love her no matter who she's married to or whatever. And the audience erupted.
40:45: Yay! You know, you're just the best. If it would have went the other way, if he would have responded and said, you know, that's wrong.
40:52: The audience, he'd have never done standup again, at least not in any kind of secular position because everything has to be in line with the message.
40:59: And I know that's a little different than what you were talking about, but I think that also has changed humor. I mean, look at probably the most well -known secular comedian in the world is
41:08: Dave Chappelle. He says something against transgender people within not long after he has to come out and say, you know,
41:15: I love transgender people. I have transgender friends. And he had to correct it because even he's not immune to the things that, to the message.
41:23: The message is that. So I know it's a little different than what you were talking about, but it has, it's changed a lot.
41:28: Because I talked about that. There is that aspect where the modern humor is just really gone. And yeah, can't talk about Barack Obama.
41:36: Can't talk about this, yeah. Yeah, and I see, now I will say as a Christian, I have certain limits of what
41:42: I think we could do in humor, okay? I do not make fun of Jesus Christ. Ain't gonna happen.
41:48: Sure, yeah. But I got one other that people don't think about. You will never hear me make a joke about my wife.
41:54: My wife is never the butt of a joke. I'll make myself the butt of a joke, no problem. I will never make my bride a butt of a joke.
42:04: Why? Because what does the marriage represent? It represents Christ and the church.
42:10: Would I want Christ in, you know, making the church a butt of a joke? Because of the symbolism of it,
42:17: I personally, not saying what anyone else should do, but personally, I don't make fun of Christ and I won't make fun of my wife.
42:25: For me as a Christian, that's a limit I have. I mean, obviously the coarse jesting, you know, the sexual innuendos, things like that.
42:31: But are there any things that you have personally where it's like, you know, I have this line, I won't cross over,
42:37: I won't do. I mean, obviously you don't mind making fun of Leighton Flowers, which that was fun. Well, it's funny you mentioned about the wife because I want to speak to that for just a moment.
42:49: I have never intended ever to harm my wife or do anything wrong. There have been times though where I've told a story like, hey, my wife and I, this happened to us and it might have something in it that's embarrassing that I didn't even realize was embarrassing, right?
43:02: And so I think it's funny because this thing happened and then later she comes to me and says, I really wish you hadn't have told that story.
43:09: And I have to eat crow because I'm now ashamed of what I did to hurt my wife.
43:15: And so I didn't think it was embarrassing at all because it didn't register to me because I pretty much am like an open book.
43:21: I don't, my wife calls me an overshare. I don't know if you know what that is, but a person who shares too much. And so I'll tell people, you know, yeah, like one time, here's a good story.
43:31: One time I fell out of the shower, okay? I was showering, my foot slipped and I fell out of the shower.
43:37: I fell on the ground. Now that's a terrible thing to visualize. I'm not asking anybody to visualize it, but it happened on a
43:46: Sunday morning before church. So I walked into church and I was telling people, yeah, I fell out of the shower.
43:51: I fell out of the shower this morning. I can't believe it. You know, and my wife comes up to me. She goes, why are you telling people this? It's the worst visual that you can get on a
44:00: Sunday before you start preaching. And I was just thinking about it because I hurt, you know, like when
44:06: I hit the ground, it hurt. Like I slipped in the tub, I fell and it hurt. But the,
44:12: I was just not smart enough to feel like that did not need to be told.
44:17: And see, I just told it to your listeners and I brought it. Well, the only thing that I could think of that would hurt more would be paying full price for a
44:32: MyPillow. Like if you had to pay full price for a MyPillow, that would hurt. So what you should do is,
44:38: I mean, the pillow should be nice and soft along with your towels. And therefore what I think you should do is not pay full price.
44:44: If you want to get yourself a good night's sleep and at the same time support striving for eternity, go to mypillow .com,
44:51: get yourself a nice soft pillow to lay your head on or a nice absorbent towel that they have on sale right now and use the promo code
44:59: SFE. It stands for striving for eternity. So that when you put your head down on the pillow, yeah, it won't hurt like what happened to Pastor Keith just there.
45:10: So let me ask, I mean, the thing is when we say things, sometimes we're not always aware.
45:17: I'll embarrass myself a bit. We had a guy in church, I was a pastor, guy got saved, his wife was not.
45:24: Now you just have to understand something about his wife. His wife was like this very A -type personality. She was, you know, she would always excel to be in charge of anything she touched type of person.
45:35: I wouldn't let her become a member of the church. She was very upset with me because well, she wasn't saved.
45:42: And it was kind of interesting. I found out, this was like two years later after they left the church,
45:47: I found this out. Some of the ladies said that in the lady's Bible study, she was so upset.
45:52: She told the ladies that not only was she gonna be a member, but she had said within two years,
45:58: I'm gonna be the pastor of this church. And the ladies just, they knew not to laugh at her, but they were just like, yeah, that's not gonna happen.
46:07: Not ever. And so, but her husband and I were out, we're in a different state.
46:13: The phone rings, I'm in the front seat of the car and his phone was charging and I see it's his wife.
46:19: And I'm like, I go to hand it, but he didn't want it to be unplugged. So he's like, well, you just answer it. I go, well, can your wife take a joke?
46:26: And he goes, oh yeah. I'm like, no, seriously, because if I do what I'm gonna do and she can't take a joke, it's gonna be really bad.
46:32: And he goes, oh yeah, no, it's not a problem. So I answered the phone, I said, with a Scottish accent, I said, this is officer
46:38: O'Malley. Can I help you? And so she said, I said, well, we have your husband here. We have him under arrest.
46:44: And she just didn't find it funny at all. Now, I gave you a little bit of her background. Well, she thought she could use that against me.
46:52: So I saw her later that night when we ended up having a gathering and I went and apologized.
46:58: I asked her forgiveness and she goes, no, you owe me. And I was like, no, actually I asked your forgiveness.
47:04: Try to repair the relationship. But she goes, no, you have to let me be a member now. And so she was, this is her way, right?
47:11: She's gonna use this against me. I looked at her, I said, I'm not gonna give her a name, but I just said, look, I've done all that I have the responsibility to do.
47:19: I asked your forgiveness and now it's between you and God. And so, of course, the rest of the ride home and the rest of the evening, my wonderful bride was letting me know that you got to stop joking around so much because you get yourself in trouble sometimes.
47:36: And that time I did. So I think there are times, there's sometimes that, you know, like what my wife's helped me is, and this kind of goes back to something you said earlier, is you got to know the person.
47:47: Don't just joke with somebody that you don't know. So I try to get to know someone before I start making jokes.
47:56: Because I think what you said earlier is a really, really important thing is you got to have that relationship.
48:03: So we've been mostly serious in a episode about humor. No, because here's the thing.
48:10: Humor is serious business. It can be serious business. I said this in Pensacola.
48:17: Humor can be one of the most powerful ways that you get your point across. It can be one of the most powerful ways to get people to remember something.
48:25: And it can be one of the best ways to stab at and rebuke something is to rebuke it with a humor.
48:32: And again, some people don't realize in all the humor that I give about Big Eva and all the humor
48:37: I give about the Methodists and all the humor I give even about the Presbyterians, our superior theology, what's the joke?
48:44: The joke is that all of us have something that we need to consider. I mean, do we really think we are superior?
48:52: And some people do. I've got people, they really think they're superior. I've got, I know, you know, and the
48:58: Methodists, I mean, I said this in Pensacola, why do I joke about Methodists? Because they're so, their denomination has in a way become a joke.
49:05: And not all the Methodists, but this subsect of far left leaning
49:12: Methodists, which I get messages, and here's the thing, I get messages from Methodists that say, hey,
49:17: I'm a Methodist and I love you because what you're talking about is the same problems I have within my denomination. You're talking about the people that we all know are there.
49:26: And so it's a way to point out something and take a stab at something that needs to be poked, yeah.
49:32: I was just glad that when you did one on the different denominations with martial arts, that you saw that the superior, the real superior theology of dispensationalism had the superior martial art of jiu -jitsu.
49:44: I was glad for that. No, it didn't work that way? Krav, oh yeah,
49:52: Krav Maga is great. I used to teach it, so I'm pretty proud of it. Breaking that down,
49:59: I mean, there was some humor in there, right? Because what is dispensationalism known for? Israel, so you brought up the
50:04: Israeli martial art, right? So the joke there, folks, is I did, when
50:10: I saw that the first time, I did mention to you that I was glad that you admitted, because you used the Presbyterians with superior theology, and I joked that at least you'll recognize
50:18: Brazilian jiu -jitsu is the superior martial art. And I did that for a reason, though someone didn't know that online, because someone sent me a comment when
50:27: I commented to you, but they didn't know your background as well, because I do.
50:34: So this is something that might be a little surprising to people. You have a background in martial arts, a pretty high background, no less.
50:42: I have a fifth degree black belt in Shotokan karate, and I have a second degree black belt in modern Arnis, which is a
50:48: Filipino stick fighting art, and I've been in karate for 30 years. And so when people, it was an interesting thing, because it's something where, when you and I first talked about that, you said people get surprised by that, because you're a big guy, you know?
51:03: I'm a big guy. I've always been big, though. I mean, God bless my mother, you know,
51:09: I was a big baby. I've always, I've just been big my whole life.
51:16: I tell you, I bought beer on an eighth grade field trip just to prove to the other boys that I could do it. Full mustache.
51:22: I was at Kennedy Space Center on a field trip, and there was a stand that sold beer. I said, I bet you
51:27: I can walk over there and they won't card me. And the guy's like, oh no, they're gonna card you. Nope, I walked over there, I bought a beer and proved that I could do it.
51:34: So I have looked like I was 25 ever since I was a kid. Okay, so you do realize the question that the audience wants to know now.
51:42: Did you drink it? We all did so that no one could tell on anyone else. We all shared it, this like group of boys all took a sip so that none of us could tell on the other because we'd all have to sit, you know, it was sort of like a pact.
51:54: And I didn't get saved till I was 19. So before anybody brings anything. Oh, that's funny.
52:02: Well, I appreciate you coming on. I thought your message was very refreshing because to be honest,
52:08: I had never in my life heard a theology of comedy. So the title alone got my attention.
52:14: And a lot of what you said is stuff that I teach in ambassador evangelism. And I have had people that want me to take that out of the ambassador evangelism.
52:23: They don't think it's appropriate to teach how to use humor when evangelizing. And yet I think as you said,
52:28: I've always said it's a powerful weapon. It's a powerful weapon at disarming someone. And I think that you broke down in a theological way how humor and comedy works.
52:41: And so I just thought it was fabulous. And that's why I wasn't even done listening. I was about 75 % of the way through when
52:48: I contacted you and said, I need to get you on because it, I really, I think it's an important message people need to hear.
52:55: And so I want people to go to your Calvinist, subscribe or follow that podcast, check it out.
53:01: If you were paying attention as regular listeners, you just heard an episode we did on different ministries working together.
53:11: Well, your Calvinist, if you paid real close attention, you might've heard it before, where? Well, you heard it when the previous episode, when we had in truth and love network, because your
53:23: Calvinist is a part of that network. And so I hope that your
53:29: Calvinist is on, you're already following that you took my instruction from last week and checked that out.
53:36: So, but Keith, let me just ask if you could, did anything else that you would like to share and also just how can folks get ahold of you and find out more what you're doing?
53:44: Well, Andrew, I want to just say, thank you for having me on. Thank you for the encouragement about the message that I'm glad that you heard it.
53:52: And it coincided so well with what things you already were teaching. And that makes me feel good because I'm not out to lunch.
53:58: If what I'm saying is, you know, when a man's on an Island by himself and nobody else is saying, you got to kind of question, but to know that you were already sort of saying these things and explaining these things in the, you know, as an evangelist and seeing these things come together like that is very encouraging for me.
54:13: So I'm thankful. And again, if anybody wants to get ahold of me, you can email me directly at calvinistpodcast at gmail .com.
54:20: I actually have a assistant who helps me field those emails and get back with you. So if you have a question you want to ask me or have me do a podcast about,
54:30: I still take requests from listeners or suggest a guest. If any church is interested in having me come that's in the
54:37: Southeast area, obviously I'm limited on, I can't leave my church to go too far, but I have had churches talk about having me come and talk about the subject with their groups, with their men or whatever.
54:47: Would love to do that if anyone would like to have me. And again, you can contact me calvinistpodcast at gmail .com
54:53: or just go to calvinistpodcast .com. It will take you directly to our YouTube page. Well, as a listener, maybe
54:59: I could put in, I would love to hear you teach on the value and benefits and superior theology of dispensationalism.
55:07: It would be a great podcast for you to do. I am still working on our bow tie dialogue.
55:14: I haven't forgotten. I've been so jammed with everything else going on. But if I can get you and Michael Black and Ian and a few of the other guys that have already agreed to be on,
55:25: I would love to pick your brain and be able to hear your thoughts on things that I want to make sure people understand correctly about dispensationalism.
55:32: So I look forward to that. Yeah, and I'll close out just by saying your bow tie dialogues were something that really started with the
55:38: Presbyterians, the bow tie that you do in the comedy of the superior theology. But what he does there, folks, is he actually gets people of a different denomination in his own or different views theologically of his own and actually lets them talk.
55:55: And he just asks them questions. I have found it extremely valuable, learned things about each of the groups he's done so far.
56:03: And it's not like, oh, let me knock at you, but it's actually just having a, here's someone that's asking genuine questions to learn more about a different denomination or school of thinking.
56:14: So check that one out as well. You will learn a lot. So next week, we should return to the series that we're doing of What is a
56:23: Pastor? So we'll get back to that. We're gonna be digging into the topics of the pastor and his qualifications.
56:32: What are the proper qualifications for a pastor? That will be next week's episode.
56:38: So look forward to that. And until then, that's a wrap. This podcast is part of the Striving for Eternity ministry.
56:44: For more content or to request a speaker or seminar to your church, go to strivingforeternity .org.
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