Good morning! By now, you’ve probably figured out that Holy Humor Sunday has meant some different things in our worship service. I’d like to begin the sermon with a little congregational participation. I hope you’re up for this. Can you help me tell some Knock-Knock jokes?

Boo / Boo-hoo? Don’t cry, the sermon will be over in 20 minutes.

Control Freak / You’re supposed to say . . . see, the jokes on you, because the sermon isn’t over until I say it’s over.

We are at the beginning of the second week of the Easter season. Easter season begins on Easter Sunday, and goes the following six Sundays until Pentecost, which this year is May 27. Who knew that Easter is a season, like Advent or Lent? It’s kind of backwards from those, because unlike Advent, which ends with Christmas, or Lent, which ends with Easter, the big deal of Easter -- which is resurrection -- comes at the very beginning. Unlike presents! Or candy!

Resurrection is a difficult thing to pronounce, let alone understand or believe. Once the eggs are found and the chocolate bunnies are eaten, it may be hard to know what to do with the rest of the Easter season. This is difficult for adults, let alone children. I’m reminded of the Sunday School teacher who asked her class of young children, “Who can tell me what Easter is about?” Christmas tree, Santa, presents Costumes, trick-or-treating, candy Jesus was killed on a cross, they buried him in a tomb, and on the third day he came out . . .and if he sees his shadow . . . (Janet’s not the only one with a favorite Easter joke)

For those of you who were here last Sunday, Janet gave us a descriptive and memorable phrase for the Easter season. Do you remember what it is? I’ll give you hint, it isn’t Ta-DAH! It’s: Jesus is on the loose!

Jesus is on the loose! Maybe you saw that in the Gathering Area on the Prayer Wall -- which I guess now is the Haven’t Got A Prayer Wall. It was also on the announcement screen. Jesus is on the loose! What does it mean to have Jesus afoot in the world? How are things different the Sunday after Easter than they were the day before?

To help us think about Easter through the coming weeks, we have created a magnet for you to take home with you. [Slide: Jesus is on the Loose!] Please take one per family, or one to share with a friend. It says “Jesus is on the Loose!” and the Creekside name and website. You can put it on your refrigerator or on your car as a reminder. I don’t know about you, but I open my refrigerator door way more often than I open my car door. Put this magnet where other people will see it, and if they have questions, invite them to come to Creekside -- we’ll ask them even more questions. There are a couple larger magnets, too. If you want one of those, please make a donation of 50 cents to cover materials. There’s a sign up sheet on the ushers table.

If we are bold enough to claim that Jesus is on the loose, we’re going to have some explaining to do. The possibility of resurrection turns our whole concept of life and death upside down. Frankly, the 1st century folks of Corinth weren’t buying it. Corinth was a cosmopolitan port city in Greece, a hotbed of the arts, philosophy, culture, and a creative variety of questionable behavior. These folks were way too sophisticated to proclaim some hayseed version of the bodily resurrection of a Jewish criminal. Are you kidding me? That makes no sense. It’s ridiculous! It’s so crazy it’s laughable. It was a hard sell to both the Jews and the Greeks. The Jews couldn’t believe it because it didn’t fit their concept of who the Messiah was going to be; the Greeks didn’t believe it because dying is for humans, not for divine beings. What was God thinking getting mixed up in a religion like that? Its almost as if God isn’t playing by our rules at all. God is treating hard-won human wisdom and philosophy like so much foolishness. Which is exactly the point, according to the apostle Paul.

Holy Humor Sunday is a way of acknowledging human foolishness. In order to experience the season of Easter, we have to move beyond the dead seriousness of Good Friday. [Slide: Was that supposed to be a pun?] Part of the joy of Easter is the surprise of the empty tomb: no one, except maybe Jesus, saw that coming. We laugh with surprise and we laugh with joy, because now Jesus is on the loose, and now anything can happen. [Slide: And in this service, it probably will.]

I have been around for a while; [Slide: You can say that again.] I don’t know if I’m any less foolish than I was 20 years ago, but I can tell you, death feels closer to me now than it used to. [Slide: Grim Reaper graphic] It’s not a particularly comforting thought. But because of Jesus’ resurrection, we no longer have to think of Death as a big scary thing looming over us . . . it’s behind me, isn’t it? [Slide: Kitten] [Turns] ? [Turns forward] [Slide: Grim Reaper graphic] Death isn’t a big scary [Slide: Kitten] [turns suddenly] thing that is our final and eternal destiny. Death, as the Easter hymn says, has lost its sting. This is cause for joy; we can literally laugh in the face of death. Because of Jesus’ resurrection, we know that God has the power to bring life from death. This is the power that Paul talks about in verse 24 when he writes, “but for those who are called [to be followers of Christ], both Jews and Greeks, Christ the power of God and the wisdom of God.”

We worship a God who knows everything about us. Psalm 139 [Mary Lou Martin should stand up and begin to leave the Worship Center] tells us that God knows when we stand up [Slide: MaryLou, please return to your seat]. [Rosemary Pletcher takes out her cell phone] . . . and when we sit down. God knows what we do, right or wrong. [Slide: Rosemary, put your phone away.]

It might seem intimidating to serve a God who knows everything about us. After all, most of us have things we’d rather hide -- from God, other people, and ourselves. But all of this wisdom of God is, paradoxically, good for us. God doesn’t take away our freedom; God knows all about us and tells us that despite our foolishness, despite our bad choices, despite our sin, that Jesus’ death on the cross has accomplished our salvation, if we are willing to claim it.

This may seem crazy to people around us who don’t get it. There may be times when it seems crazy to us: Jesus has already saved us? Before we even asked? And this was accomplished with a cross that caused public humiliation, torture, and death? And now we’re going to put that cross around our necks and in our places of worship, and celebrate it in worship and music. That is just crazy; and that is the great reversal of Easter. The cross which was once despised and reviled as a symbol of death has become the path to new life. The man who was once despised and reviled as a political criminal in some Roman backwater has opened the gates of resurrection so that all who believe in him should not perish but have everlasting life. Jesus is on the loose. Death has lost its sting.

The question I ask myself every time I preach, [Slide: “Does this pulpit make me look fat?”] the question which every preacher needs to ask [turns] [Slide: Kitten] The question every preacher -- and every Christian needs to ask is-- am I living this reality in my life?

There are as many ways to live the reality of Christ’s resurrection as there are Christians, but I would suggest that a common denominator for all of them is joy. Joy doesn’t always present itself as hilarity. Sometimes joy is a grin rather than a guffaw. Joy may even be tears of sympathy, or compassion. The opposite of joy is not sorrow; the opposite of joy is a deadly kind of seriousness which kills conversation, smothers worship, and strangles committee meetings.

When we take ourselves too seriously we meet new people and new challenges with a snarl instead of a smile: we laugh at other people’s expense rather than laughing along with them, and we never, ever, laugh at ourselves because we’re too important for that kind of foolishness. I love the quote which is printed in your bulletin: “Joy is the most infallible sign of the presence of God.” True joy, not simply happiness or temporary giddiness, but the kind of joy which changes our lives and the lives of those around us, is a gift from God. Like faith, joy can sustain us in difficult times. It can be the water of life when we are in the midst of the drought of doubt or despair. Joy is a gift which comes when we hold ourselves lightly, when we put our trust in Christ the power of God and the wisdom of God.

Let me try one final interactive part of this sermon. It’s an ancient Christian greeting which you probably heard several times last Sunday: Christ is risen! (He is risen, indeed!) We may hear the news of the resurrection with doubt, disbelief, or incredulity. The first disciples certainly did, and they took a little convincing. But if we can come to the place where we can proclaim, as individuals and as a community of faith, the foolish and improvable claim that Christ is risen indeed! We have found reason for joy which will never die.