Let's Laugh Day | JOY for Today

JOY is the sound of laughter. Laughter that radiates from your head to your toes. Laughter that won't stop and keeps bubbling up for more. Laughter that brings forth a radiant smile even from a memory. Laughter that restores, connects, and heals. Let's laugh, friends, for in our laughter we know JOY.

Let's Laugh Day | March 19th Annually

JOY for Today Offerings:

• Did You Know... Five laughter facts that we didn't know.
• Wolfe Stew Connects To God's emotions.
• Bible Verses and Quotes About laughter.
• Activity Suggestions: How-to guide, laughter machine, JOY box, discussion questions, and family challenge.

UPCOMING HOLIDAYS: 

• Palm Sunday (The Sunday Before Easter - 3/24/2024)
• Easter (The Sunday following Spring's first full moon - 3/31/2024)
• April Fool's Day (April 1st Annually)

Did You Know:

1. Some scientists think laughter was our first form of communication? Millions of years before we developed the lung strength required for speech, laughter might have been a primary tool for relating to one another. Laughter is so strongly woven into the fabric of humanity, that all cultures recognize the common syllables produced in the sounds of laughter: ha-ha, ho-ho, and he-he. Even babies begin laughing as early as 17 days old. (Reader's Digest, Medical Health Humanities, Fact Retriever & Well Doing)
2. Laughter's benefits are numerous? Socially - it connects us and allows us to forgive each other faster. Physically, it strengthens, relaxes, and protects us. Emotionally, it boosts moods, lessens stress, and improves our ability to adapt. What's more, laughter's effects are quick and reliable. (HelpGuide.org, Mayo Clinic, & Cleveland Clinic)
3. Contagious laughter strengthens social bonds? Chuckling reflexively in response to another person's unbridled laughter deepens cooperation and positive communication levels among the people who experience the phenomenon. The response is similar to the way we mimic the verbal and nonverbal speech patterns of the people we talk to. Positive stimuli (i.e., laughing, smiling, cheering) are more contagious than negative stimuli (i.e., retching, frowning, screaming). Just being near someone you think is funny prepares you to laugh more frequently. (Greater Good, The Washington Post, BSW Health, & Live Science)
4. Relationships last longer if you tackle life with laughter? Couples who find humor in stressful situations feel better while discussing the issue and report higher relationship satisfaction levels overall. These couples, who find a way to laugh in the face of stress, ended up staying together longer than those who could not. (Reader's Digest, Help Guide & Fact Retriever)
5. Some people fear laughter? Referred to as gelotophobia, people who fear laughter believe the laughter is negatively directed at them. As many as 13% of people suffer from gelotophobia. (Fact Retriever Scientific American & BBC)

We'd Love to Know:   

Which laughter fact was new to you?

Wolfe Stew Connects

What words do you use to characterize God? What emotions does He feel?

Usually, its anger for God: 

"When God heard, He was filled with wrath and greatly abhorred Israel." Psalm 78:59 NASB

And love for Jesus: 

"By this we know love, that he laid down his life for us, and we ought to lay down our lives for the brothers." I John 3:16 ESV

And it's true. God does get angry, and Jesus does love; just as God is love (I John 4:7-12), and Jesus got angry (see Bible Study Tools' post: "5 Times Jesus Got Angry").

Our God is emotional. He feels everything we feel.

• Sadness: "I will cry with the grapevines of Sibmah as Jazer cries for them. I will drench you with my tears, Heshbon and Elealeh. The shouts of joy for your ripened fruits and your harvest will be silenced." Isaiah 16:9
• Jealousy: "For I am jealous for you with a godly jealousy; for I betrothed you to one husband, so that to Christ I may present you as a pure virgin." 2 Corinthians 11:12 NASB
• JOY: "The Lord your God in the midst of thee is mighty; he will save, he will REJOICE over thee with JOY; he will rest in his love, he will JOY over thee with singing." Zephaniah 3:17 KJV

Our emotions are a way that we can connect with God.

• When we are angry, know God understands anger. Seek to understand why His anger is justified (because He alone knows what is right) and respond how He tells you to: forgive others as He forgave you. 
• When we love others, it helps us relate to God's love for us. In love, we experience a deep connection to another, but love also teaches us to respond with compassion when we are hurt, to remain faithful when we are tempted to stray, and to speak the truth boldly when we would rather stay quiet. We find strength to love when we realize these are all ways God demonstrates His love for us.
• When we cry, we can remind ourselves that we don't cry alone. God cries with us. He collects our tears in a bottle (Psalms 56:8) and each tear is a work of art (See Smithsonian Magazine's post: "The Microscopic Structures of Dried Human Tears").
• When we are jealous, we remember God is jealous for us (Exodus 34:14, I Corinthians 6:19-20, & 2 Corinthians 11:2). We can understand, then, how He feels when we choose anything other than Him.
• When we find JOY, our laughter offers an incalculably minute glimpse of the JOY that is to come (Psalm 16:11, I Peter 1:8 & John 16:22). I think for both God and humanity, the fullness of JOY won't be experienced until we're reunited in eternity. Until that day, let your laughter bubble over, flowing from fountains of JOY, to remind you of what is to come.

From this day forward, I hope you seek to connect your emotions with the robust fullness of God's character, a character full of emotion. He understands emotions better than anyone because He created them.

In response:

1. Choose Bible verses to match emotion words. Write each verse in an emotional color of your choosing (i.e., red = anger; yellow = JOY; blue = sadness, etc.) and display them. Regularly read the verse that matches your mood.
2. Join us as we study Isaiah. In chapters 15 and 16, we witnessed God weeping for the fate of Moab.

Bible Verses and Quotes 

Bible Verses 

• "A merry heart does good like a medicine, but a broken spirit dries the bones." Proverbs 17:22 MEV
• "A time to weep, and a time to laugh; a time to mourn, and a time to dance;" Ecclesiastes 3:4 KJV
• "He will yet fill your mouth with laughter and your lips with shouts of JOY." Job 8:21 TLB
• "And Sarah said, 'God hath made me to laugh, so that all that hear will laugh with me.'" Genesis 21:6 KJV
• "At destruction and famine thou shalt laugh: neither shalt thou be afraid of the beasts of the earth." Job 5:22 CEV

Quotes

• "A person who knows how to laugh at himself will never cease to be amused." - Shirley MacLaine
• "The earth laughs in flowers." - e.e. Cummings
• "Laughter is the sun that drives winter from the human face." - Victor Hugo
• "Laughter is the shortest distance between two people." - Victor Borge
• "Trouble knocked at the door, but, hearing laughter, hurried away." - Benjamin Franklin

We'd Love to Know:

Which verse or quote best expresses your recent experience with laughter?

Activity Suggestions

Create a How-To Guide on Laughter

• Collect ideas. Resources: Mayo Clinic, Scrubbing In & Daring to Live Fully.
• Create a display. As a poster, a collage, a step-by-step plan, a slide show, or a mini-book.
• Share. With a team, a friend, a class, or in a hallway with the school.

Make a Laughter Machine

• Get a group of people together. Classmates, family, friends, teammates, etc.
• Lay on the ground. But use each other's stomachs as pillows.
• Try not to laugh. Inevitably, someone will laugh. When it starts, enjoy the chain reaction.

Start a JOY Box

*This idea is from Stick a Geranium in your Hat and Be Happy! by Barbara Johnson

• Find a shoe box. Decorate it.
• Collect mementos that bring you JOY and laughter.
• Keep it accessible and add to it often.
• Look through it as needed, especially in moments when laughter is missing.

Discuss "Would You Rather..." Questions

• Laugh so hard you get the hiccups or shoot water out your nose?
• Play the quiet game or last to laugh game? 
• Read comic strips or watch a funny show?

These questions are unique to this post. If you would like three "Would You Rather...?" questions for every March day, download this Wolfe Stew PowerPoint or get it (for free!) at our TPT store.

Take on the Family Challenge

Make a list of laughter-inducing activities that your family enjoys. Ensure that everyone contributes equally. Cut the list apart, placing the slips in a container. Draw one activity to engage in each weekend until the container is empty. Then, reflect. Which activity produced the most laughter? Plan to do it again.

We'd Love to Know:

What makes you laugh?

We’re excited to share one more day with you and wish you JOY for Today and HOPE for Tomorrow. 

Your Partners in JOY Finding,

Sample these related posts:

To connect laughter with strength and honor.

To smile at the future.

To pull a prank or collect some jokes.

To discover a picture book that made us laugh.

To connect with God in every mood.

Find even more JOY for Today in our monthly calendars, holiday, and seasonal posts.

*Image credit: ​Smile​ by ​a​​st25rulos​ at ​Pixabay