Insert Clever Title Here
Anyone who knows me personally knows that I am well versed in sarcasm. In our family, it's something of a love language. A well timed quip will make us feel as warm as if someone had just declared eternal love to us. Being clever bonds us.
However, I will say that I spent many years learning the difference between funny sarcasm that unites a group and biting sarcasm that is hurtful. I still don't have it mastered, but at the very least I've learned that when I'm not sure how it will be taken to shut it down. Just don't say it/blog it/facebook it. I try to get into the heads of the people around me and think, how are they going to take this? I have the least amount of worry with my immediate family members, because I know they will rise to the task and meet my sarcasm in a blaze of glorious counter sarcasm. Anyone else, I pause.
I must be growing soft, though, because more and more I'm not finding things labeled "satire" as funny as I used to. Perhaps that's because so much of satire these days is belittling, mocking, bitter and with the intent to wound. Nor do I back up the idea that in order to be funny, you have to have biting retorts and slamming comments. In fact, I personally believe this is one of the biggest problems in American society today. We have absolutely no respect for each other. We are an SNL culture that has no qualms about painting whomever we disagree with as stupid, uninformed, and utterly hopeless. We lump innocents in with whomever we're targeting, we assign them motives and assume we understand them. And then we all laugh.
Is it any wonder that we can't get along? That we are so divided we can't even speak civilly of and to each other? We've been stomping all over each other's dignity for generations now.
Perhaps most disturbing is how prevalent it is among Christians. How divided we have become. And how sarcastic we are about those who disagree with us.
It seems like Christians today believe it's appropriate to belittle each other. We even defend it, saying that it unites us, it is therapeutic, that we are encouraged when we find others who find certain things as ridiculous as we do. We laugh at other people's misguided sin. And it seems like the sarcasm is mostly pointed at staunch legalists.
I do not defend legalism. It's sin. End of story. I have experienced it. I've seen lots of negative fall out from it. There are wounds because of it.
But I can't come up with a good, Christlike reason to make fun of those trapped in legalism. I just can't.
Believe me, I want to. There's so much absurdity there that it would be easy. But then I remember the beam in my own eye.
Those legalists would have plenty to counter attack with.
I am married to someone who took legalism seriously. He spent thirty years of his life hiding sins, being buried in guilt, believing that God didn't love him because of his sin and shame.
To be clear, no one ever sat him down and told him these things. Even the legalists taught him that God forgives and loves. But he chose to hear only the parts about behavior. It was his response to the things he heard that led him to cling to his secret guilt. There were compassionate voices to be found that spoke truth, he had his own Bible to read, but he focused on the lies. He was absolutely miserable.
I say this because it was very easy for him to be bitter and sarcastic about legalism until he was truly healed. He would lump everyone together and make biting remarks. He took light hearted jokes about Baptists seriously. He couldn't separate the joke from reality. If one Baptist was hard shelled, all were, and therefore none of them deserved a friendly remark.
So you can see that even if someone making a sarcastic comment (such as myself) about how silly it was that we grew up being taught that women should only wear skirts, Seth would file this away in his arsenal against conservatives in general. Over time, this led to a dehumanizing and disrespect of anyone who held firm beliefs about Christian behavior.
It wasn't satire that healed Seth. It wasn't being able to gather around with others who thought Baptists were stupid and laughing at them. It wasn't shared frustration. Those things only served to embitter him more.
It was the truth delivered in love. It was hearing someone he respected and loved point out that he could not blame his guilt and sin on legalists, that only he was responsible. It was being encouraged to let go of the legitimate wounds he had received, to forgive those responsible without ever needing an apology. And, boy, did he have what I would consider legitimate wounds, moreso than probably anyone I knew. They went far beyond silly rules about behavior and into the darker corners of humanity. Seth's freedom came in choosing to think about his own hurt less and replacing it with Christ and with thinking about others.
Over and over, we see in Scripture that love heals. Love binds up wounds. Love covers wrongs. Love makes us able to forgive. Love tells our hurt feelings that others are more important than validation. Love, in a nutshell, is all about others. It's setting self on the back burner and knowing that true joy comes from loving and serving others, even knuckleheads and sinners.
If we're still finding relief in sarcasm toward those who have sinned against us, we're not healed. In fact, we're just picking away at our wound with our own fingers. We'll never get better that way. Never.
Having a sense of humor is a great part of being a human. God created us to laugh, and I believe that there are kinds of sarcasm that do in fact bring us together. But we really have to be careful and examine whether it's actually tearing us apart.
Luke 17:3-4 Pay attention to yourselves! If your brother sins, rebuke him, and if he repents, forgive him, and if he sins against you seven times in the day, and turns to you seven times saying 'I repent', you must forgive him.
1 Peter 3:9 Do not repay evil for evil or reviling for reviling, but on the contrary, bless, for to this were you called, that you may obtain a blessing.
Proverbs 15:1 A soft answer turns away wrath, but a harsh word stirs up anger.
Ephesians 4:31 Let all bitterness and wrath and anger and clamor and slander be put away from you, along with all malice.
Philippians 4:8 Finally brothers, whatever is true, whatever is honorable, whatever is just, whatever is pure, whatever is lovely, whatever is commendable, if there is any excellence, if there is anything worthy of praise, think about these things.
1 Corinthians 13:1 If I speak with the tongues of men and angels, but have not love, I am a noisy gong or a clanging cymbal.
However, I will say that I spent many years learning the difference between funny sarcasm that unites a group and biting sarcasm that is hurtful. I still don't have it mastered, but at the very least I've learned that when I'm not sure how it will be taken to shut it down. Just don't say it/blog it/facebook it. I try to get into the heads of the people around me and think, how are they going to take this? I have the least amount of worry with my immediate family members, because I know they will rise to the task and meet my sarcasm in a blaze of glorious counter sarcasm. Anyone else, I pause.
I must be growing soft, though, because more and more I'm not finding things labeled "satire" as funny as I used to. Perhaps that's because so much of satire these days is belittling, mocking, bitter and with the intent to wound. Nor do I back up the idea that in order to be funny, you have to have biting retorts and slamming comments. In fact, I personally believe this is one of the biggest problems in American society today. We have absolutely no respect for each other. We are an SNL culture that has no qualms about painting whomever we disagree with as stupid, uninformed, and utterly hopeless. We lump innocents in with whomever we're targeting, we assign them motives and assume we understand them. And then we all laugh.
Is it any wonder that we can't get along? That we are so divided we can't even speak civilly of and to each other? We've been stomping all over each other's dignity for generations now.
Perhaps most disturbing is how prevalent it is among Christians. How divided we have become. And how sarcastic we are about those who disagree with us.
It seems like Christians today believe it's appropriate to belittle each other. We even defend it, saying that it unites us, it is therapeutic, that we are encouraged when we find others who find certain things as ridiculous as we do. We laugh at other people's misguided sin. And it seems like the sarcasm is mostly pointed at staunch legalists.
I do not defend legalism. It's sin. End of story. I have experienced it. I've seen lots of negative fall out from it. There are wounds because of it.
But I can't come up with a good, Christlike reason to make fun of those trapped in legalism. I just can't.
Believe me, I want to. There's so much absurdity there that it would be easy. But then I remember the beam in my own eye.
Those legalists would have plenty to counter attack with.
I am married to someone who took legalism seriously. He spent thirty years of his life hiding sins, being buried in guilt, believing that God didn't love him because of his sin and shame.
To be clear, no one ever sat him down and told him these things. Even the legalists taught him that God forgives and loves. But he chose to hear only the parts about behavior. It was his response to the things he heard that led him to cling to his secret guilt. There were compassionate voices to be found that spoke truth, he had his own Bible to read, but he focused on the lies. He was absolutely miserable.
I say this because it was very easy for him to be bitter and sarcastic about legalism until he was truly healed. He would lump everyone together and make biting remarks. He took light hearted jokes about Baptists seriously. He couldn't separate the joke from reality. If one Baptist was hard shelled, all were, and therefore none of them deserved a friendly remark.
So you can see that even if someone making a sarcastic comment (such as myself) about how silly it was that we grew up being taught that women should only wear skirts, Seth would file this away in his arsenal against conservatives in general. Over time, this led to a dehumanizing and disrespect of anyone who held firm beliefs about Christian behavior.
It wasn't satire that healed Seth. It wasn't being able to gather around with others who thought Baptists were stupid and laughing at them. It wasn't shared frustration. Those things only served to embitter him more.
It was the truth delivered in love. It was hearing someone he respected and loved point out that he could not blame his guilt and sin on legalists, that only he was responsible. It was being encouraged to let go of the legitimate wounds he had received, to forgive those responsible without ever needing an apology. And, boy, did he have what I would consider legitimate wounds, moreso than probably anyone I knew. They went far beyond silly rules about behavior and into the darker corners of humanity. Seth's freedom came in choosing to think about his own hurt less and replacing it with Christ and with thinking about others.
Over and over, we see in Scripture that love heals. Love binds up wounds. Love covers wrongs. Love makes us able to forgive. Love tells our hurt feelings that others are more important than validation. Love, in a nutshell, is all about others. It's setting self on the back burner and knowing that true joy comes from loving and serving others, even knuckleheads and sinners.
If we're still finding relief in sarcasm toward those who have sinned against us, we're not healed. In fact, we're just picking away at our wound with our own fingers. We'll never get better that way. Never.
Having a sense of humor is a great part of being a human. God created us to laugh, and I believe that there are kinds of sarcasm that do in fact bring us together. But we really have to be careful and examine whether it's actually tearing us apart.
Luke 17:3-4 Pay attention to yourselves! If your brother sins, rebuke him, and if he repents, forgive him, and if he sins against you seven times in the day, and turns to you seven times saying 'I repent', you must forgive him.
1 Peter 3:9 Do not repay evil for evil or reviling for reviling, but on the contrary, bless, for to this were you called, that you may obtain a blessing.
Proverbs 15:1 A soft answer turns away wrath, but a harsh word stirs up anger.
Ephesians 4:31 Let all bitterness and wrath and anger and clamor and slander be put away from you, along with all malice.
Philippians 4:8 Finally brothers, whatever is true, whatever is honorable, whatever is just, whatever is pure, whatever is lovely, whatever is commendable, if there is any excellence, if there is anything worthy of praise, think about these things.
1 Corinthians 13:1 If I speak with the tongues of men and angels, but have not love, I am a noisy gong or a clanging cymbal.
Comments
love. :) (no sarcasm intended) ;)