"Humor can soothe, heal, build—and destroy," Bob Orben, a successful comedy writer, said in an interview with The Christian Science Monitor. The Christian Science Monitor, August 31, 1982. Although the writer indicated a concern that much of present-day humor seems to concentrate on "putting down" people and institutions, he also said he believed that humor is being more widely perceived as a healing agent.
What we laugh at and about tells a lot about us. It may even be an indicator of the level of our love (or lack of it) for mankind.
The joy, spontaneity, and delight that express themselves in vivacity and humor are native to us as God's children—inherent in our very makeup. To express joy through laughter and humor can be healing—perhaps to a greater degree than we realize. Laughing together can be a sharing, a trust. Enmities can be eased by it, burdens lifted, hopelessness banished. "A merry heart doeth good like a medicine: but a broken spirit drieth the bones," Prov. 17:22. we read in the Bible. This simile hints at much more than the influence of optimism. Have you ever thought about this: that joyful humor, in its highest sense, is a capacity derived from spiritual qualities?
