Church can be a funny place. That doesn’t mean that really serious stuff doesn’t happen at church. It simply means church can be funny. Like hilarious.
The problem is sometimes we don’t know if it is OK to find the funny in church. Then, sometimes, the funny is so obvious you just can’t miss it. Let me give you an example.
It has been several years that this happened. It was back when we were all still doing Sunday night church. That tells you how long ago this happened.
We had planned for some baptisms to happen at the beginning of the service. I was upstairs where the baptistry and the dressing rooms were. There was a young boy, dressed in a baptism robe (to make it official), sitting on the floor very quietly. All of these were a bit out of character for him. I had never seen him in a baptism robe. I don’t remember seeing him sitting on the floor. And I surely don’t remember him being very quiet. But there he was.
His mom was standing next to him. She mouthed the words, “He is nervous” to me.
So, I asked this young man, “Can you swim?” He looked at me with great big eyes and nodded. Being a preacher, I asked a follow up question: “Can you dive?” Same great big eyes. Same almost imperceptible nod. I went on about my pre-baptism preacher routine.
When the time came, I waded off into the baptistry, which is an appropriate description because I was wearing waders. I also had on the official pastoral baptism robe. All I needed was a baptismal candidate.
As I spoke to the congregation, I reached out with my left arm and made the official “come here” motion with my left hand. Things were going along swimmingly (No pun intended).
I will never forget what I heard next. It was a noise like the word splat. It wasn’t loud but it kept getting louder. I turned to look at what was making this remarkable sound when I saw him. The young, nervous boy who had been so quiet before our baptism service started was running toward me, and went into a full tuck cannonball, flying through the air at me. The look on his face would lead you to believe he was going at least 100 mph. His eyes were wide open, and he had the biggest grin on his face, as he was flying straight at me.
Thankfully, my catlike reflexes took over and I turned my back as he flew into the water. Thankfully, he didn’t make much of a splash. I don’t know if that was because of how he completed the dive or because he probably wouldn’t have weighed 50 pounds soaking wet. He went completely under.
As I turned back around, he popped up out of the water like a red and white fishing bobber. Same wide eyes, same grin. He was looking out through that little strip of glass that used to ordain all baptistries at the congregation who was sitting in stunned silence.
So I put my hand on top of the young one’s head and shoved him back under the water not once, not twice but three times. By that time the congregation had started breathing again and busted out in the loudest, righteous laughter I think I have ever heard. And, yes, for those of who you are wondering I counted those extra dunks as additional baptisms on our Annual Church Profile.
There were probably some folks in church that night that did not find that funny. They were the same folks that didn’t find much of anything funny. But there were a bunch who did. And they should have. It was funny. Like real funny. Like hilarious. God gave us a funny bone. We ought to use it every once in a while.
