Why We Never See Jesus Laugh In The Bible (Part 1)

I love to laugh. Most of us do. In the midst of this life we live, in which many times sorrow and hardship are our bedfellows, laughter is like medicine to our souls. Most of us are familiar with the oft-quoted maxim that says, “Laughter is the best medicine.” Even science and psychologists have come to accept this as a true saying. But did you know that the Bible never records a single moment in which Jesus laughed.

Yes, it’s true, there is not one single reference to any time that Jesus laughed. Now, I am not saying that I don’t believe He never did. Having taken on humanity in His incarnation, Jesus possessed all the same emotions we do, though He never sinned in His expression of them, as we do. But the Bible does not record a single instance in which Jesus laughed. Why not?

The answer to that question is very important in our understanding of who God is. God has revealed Himself to us in scripture and it is the only trustworthy source by which we can come to know and understand Him. We do find that God laughs in the Old Testament. But when God laughs, it appears it is in a derisive way and directed at those foolish enough to plot against Him.

Psalm 2:1-4
Why do the nations rage and the peoples plot in vain?  The kings of the earth set themselves, and the rulers take counsel together, against the LORD and against his Anointed, saying, “Let us burst their bonds apart and cast away their cords from us.”  He who sits in the heavens laughs; the Lord holds them in derision.

Psalm 37:12-13
The wicked plots against the righteous and gnashes his teeth at him, but the Lord laughs at the wicked, for he sees that his day is coming.

Do a word search on laughter in the Bible sometime. It is interesting to see what the Bible has to say about laughter.

Returning now to the thought of Jesus and why we don’t have stories of Him laughing, I think it is important to us to get a good grip on the purpose for Jesus coming to us as a man. Though the answer to this question is a study within itself, I think 1 Timothy 1:15 gives us a simple and concise answer. There we read that “Christ Jesus came into the world to save sinners.” And the truth of that mission reveals to us the extreme serious nature of sin as it relates to our most holy God. The holiness of God demands that He not tolerate sin in His Kingdom. (The idea that God cannot be in the presence of sin is the wrong way to describe it since Jesus was fully God and yet was constantly surrounded by sinners sinning.) But the truth is that God’s holiness and His just nature results in righteous indignation that will result in His wrath being poured out in the final judgment against sin. Again, much more to the story than this, but simply put, we are sinners in need of a savior to be restored in fellowship with God. This is why Jesus came.

So, who is this man Jesus, who the Bible never speaks of as having laughed. The Prophet Isaiah gives us a picture of Jesus in Isaiah 53:2-3 saying that “he grew up before him like a young plant, and like a root out of dry ground; he had no form or majesty that we should look at him, and no beauty that we should desire him.  He was despised and rejected by men; a man of sorrows, and acquainted with grief; and as one from whom men hide their faces he was despised, and we esteemed him not.”

If you have more than one child, you know that people are born with certain dispositions. You might have one born with a natural inclination towards being happy all the time and maybe your next baby just seems to be more serious. As they grow, distinct personality traits come forth and they become who they are. Jesus is described by the Prophet Isaiah as a man of sorrows. Isaiah goes on to say that He was acquainted with grief and even tells us that He was no beauty that we should desire Him. This does not sound like the picture of Jesus our grandmother had up in her living room. Quite honestly, it doesn’t sound like the Jesus we hear about in church. But to the Christian, it is an imperative that we understand why the Holy Spirit inspired the writers of scripture to describe Him in this way.

Though Jesus came doing miracles and healings to many, the main purpose He came for was to go to the cross. He came to suffer and die. He came to become sin for us, so that we could be redeemed from our own slavery to sin. He came to face the wrath of God so that you and I wouldn’t have to. What He came to do was going to be the most horrible experience anyone might ever imagine. What He came purposed to do is no laughing matter.

This morning I was studying the passage in Mark 14:32-41. I believe that in this short story of the night of His arrest, we can find many truths that will help us understand better, who Jesus is and why He came. Part two of this writing will look into this night that occurs in the Garden of Gethsemane.

I leave you with a thought to ponder about this great passage of scripture. Gethsemane means “olive press.” Olive presses are the tools that extract the oil from the olives by crushing them. That’s how we get Olive Oil. Take time today to read the Gospel accounts of Jesus in the Garden of Gethsemane and meditate on He would be pressed and crushed in the coming hours after praying in the garden.

Until next time, God bless you.