A preacher's little boy inquired, "Daddy, I notice every Sunday morning when you first come out to preach, you sit up on the platform and bow your head. What are you doing?"
The father explained, "I'm asking the Lord to give me a good sermon."
The little boy said, "Why don't he?"
Edited from H.A. Williams' book Tensions:
No wonder the Pharisees, who seem to have been always wholly serious, had to have Jesus put down. He made their piety look ridiculous.
Who in reality had ever witnessed a pious man blowing a trumpet before he put a dollar in the offering plate? And then there were camels going through the eyes of needles, not to mention camels being swallowed easily by those who choked when they swallowed a gnat.
And worse: idlers who were given full pay, stewards who were successful cheats, wicked sons being distinguished on their return home - what had all this nonsense have to do with religion?
…but Eternity had the last laugh after all. Here are Caiaphas, Pilate, Herod and all theirs, have done their duty getting rid of a dangerous fool. He is safely dead. Now they can concentrate on the serious matters to which their lives are dedicated.
But behind their backs, the fool has popped up again like a Jack-in-the-box and is dancing about even more vigorously than before. People here, there and everywhere are falling under his spell…
If that isn't funny, nothing is. The resurrection is the supreme, the final, the ultimate joke. And since laughter is highly contagious, perhaps even the hardest heart will in time catch the disease, turn around, see the joke, and then laugh with the rest of creation because the kingdom of God has drawn near."
An elderly pastor was searching his closet for his collar before church one Sunday morning. In the back of the closet, he found a small box containing 3 eggs and 200 $1 bills.
He called his wife into the closet to ask her about the box and its contents. Embarrassed, she admitted having hidden the box there for their entire 30 years of marriage. Disappointed and hurt, the pastor asked her, "WHY?"
The wife replied that she hadn't wanted to hurt his feelings. He asked her how the box could have hurt his feelings. She said that every time during their marriage that he had delivered a poor sermon, she had placed an egg in the box.
The pastor felt that 3 poor sermons in 30 years was certainly nothing to feel bad about, so he asked her what the $200 was for.
She replied, "Each time I got a dozen eggs, I sold them to the neighbors for $1."
At the conclusion of the sermon, the worshipers filed out of the sanctuary to greet the minister. As one of them left, he shook the minister's hand, thanked him for the sermon and said, "Thanks for the message, Reverend. You know, you must be smarter than Einstein."
Beaming with pride, the minister said, "Why, thank you, brother!"
As the week went by, the minister began to think about the man's compliment. The more he thought, the more he became baffled as to why anyone would deem him smarter than Einstein. So he decided to ask the man the following Sunday.
The next Sunday he asked the parishioner if he remembered the previous Sunday's comment about the sermon. The parishioner replied that he did. The minister asked: "Exactly what did you mean that I must be smarter than Einstein?"
The man replied, "Well, Reverend, they say that Einstein was so smart that only ten people in the entire world could understand him. But Reverend, no one can understand you."
A farmer named Muldoon lived alone in the Irish countryside except for a pet dog he for a long time.
The dog finally died and Muldoon went to the parish priest, saying
"Father, the dog is dead. Could you possibly be saying a Mass for the poor creature?"
Father Patrick told the farmer "No, we can't have services for an
animal in the church, but I'll tell you what, there's a new denomination down the road apiece, and no telling what they believe in, but maybe they'll do something for the animal."
Muldoon said "I'll go right now. By the way, do you think $50,000 is enough to donate for the service?"
Father Patrick replied "Why didn't you tell me the dog was Catholic."
A slightly "humor impaired" preacher attended a conference to help encourage and better equip pastors for their ministry. There were many well known and dynamic speakers present to provide the guidance necessary.
One speaker boldly approached the pulpit and, gathering the entire crowd's attention, said, "The best years of my life were spent in the arms of a woman that wasn't my wife!" The crowd was shocked! He followed up by saying, "And that woman was my mother!" - The crowd burst into laughter and he delivered the rest of his talk, which went over quite well.
The next week, the pastor decided he'd give this humor thing a try, and use that joke in his sermon. As he surely approached the pulpit that sunny Sunday, he tried to rehearse the joke in his head but it suddenly seemed a bit foggy.
Getting to the microphone he said loudly, "The greatest years of my life were spent in the arms of another woman that was not my wife!" The congregation inhaled half the air in the room. After standing there for almost 10 seconds in the stunned silence, trying to recall the second half of the joke, the pastor finally blurted out, "...and I can't remember who she was!"
The teacher who was helping one of her kindergarten students put on his boots.
He asked for help and she could see why. With her pulling and him pushing, the boots still didn't want to go on. When the second boot was on, she had worked up a sweat. She almost whimpered when the little boy said, "Teacher, they're on the wrong feet." She looked and sure enough, they were.
It wasn't any easier pulling the boots off than it was putting them on. She managed to keep her cool as together they worked to get the boots back on, this time on the right feet. He then announced, "These aren't my boots."
She bit her tongue rather than get right in his face and scream, "Why didn't you say so?" like she wanted to.
Once again she struggled to help him pull the ill-fitting boots off. He then said, "They're my brother's boots. My Mom made me wear them."
She didn't know if she should laugh or cry. She mustered up the grace and courage she had left to wrestle the boots on his feet again. She said, "Now, where are your mittens?"
He said, "I stuffed them in the toes of my boots..."
Her trial starts next month.
A woman left work right away after receiving a call that her daughter was at home sick with a fever. She stopped by the pharmacy to get some medication but discovered when she got back to her car that she had locked her keys inside.
She didn't know what to do, so she called home and told the baby sitter what had happened. The baby sitter told her that her the fever was getting worse and suggested, "You might find a coat hanger and use that to open the door."
The woman looked around and found an old rusty coat hanger that had been left on the ground, possibly by someone else who had locked their keys in their car. Once back at her car, she had no idea what to actually do with the coat hanger.
So she bowed her head and asked God to send her some help. Within five minutes an old rusty car pulled up, with a dirty, greasy, bearded man who was wearing an old biker skull rag on his head. The woman thought, "This is what you sent to help me?" But, she was desperate and also very thankful for the assistance.
The man got out of his car and asked her if he could help. She said, "Yes, my daughter is very sick. I stopped to get her some medication and I locked my keys in my car. I must get home to her. Please, can you use this hanger to unlock my car?"
He said, "Sure". He walked over to the car, and in less than a minute the car was opened. She hugged the man and through her tears she said, "Thank You So Much! You are a very nice man."
The man replied, "Lady, I am not a nice man. I just got out of prison today. I was in prison for car theft."
The woman hugged the man again and with sobbing tears cried out loud, "Oh, Thank you God! You even sent me a Professional!"
One day God was looking down to earth and saw all of the evil that was going on and decided to send an angel down to earth to check it out. so God called on a female angel and sent her to earth for a time. When she returned she told God, "yes it is bad on earth, 95% is bad and 5% is good."
Well, God thought for a moment and said maybe I had better send down a male angel to get both points of view. So God called a male angel and sent him to earth for a time. When the male angel returned he went to God and told him yes the earth was in decline, 95% was bad and 5% was good.
God said this was not good and decided to send a letter to the 5% that were good and encourage them, something to help them keep going. Do you know what that letter said?.........................................
Oh, you didn't get one either?!
