My Mother was reading a Christan book by a Christian author about Dr. Laura. He is a friend of hers and told this joke in the book and she called me in to share it with me.

"Why did the chicken cross the road?"
"Because God said that the day thou crosses the road, thou shalt surely fry."

My Mother who doesn't laugh at much laughed at that. I snickered some and went back to my room. My Dad was in there and had heard it and rolled his eyes. I knew where he was coming from. Why my Mom found some of these things funny but not others was beyond him. I remember thinking that that joke would have been hilarious to a young child but not us. We are more mature.

But I thought about this. Why should it be considered more mature to not laugh at even the worst of jokes? Does it stand as a monument to humor and maturity that we are harder to get a smile out of? I do not see that as an upgrade in humor but a downgrade.

And this is common in all of life. We have lost the joy and wonder of what would impress a little child. You sit before a child and tell a fairy tale of a knight saving a princess by slaying a dragon and the child will react to wonder. Yet the mature adults will sit in the back and think that they are more mature as they do not respond the same way.

But why should this ever cease? Is losing wonder a good thing and an improvement? Is losing humor and wonder a good thing and improvement? Why not look to the one who is responsible for joy and wonder and see what his example is.

We know God never changes. Thus, if God has joy and wonder then would it ever cease? I know it is hard to picture God having wonder if it means God would learn something but if it means an impressiveness with his creation is it that hard to imagine? Can we picture the Trinity discussing amongst themselves in creation over the simplest things?

Look! We have created a daisy! Beautiful isn't it?! Let's create another one! Wow! This is beautiful! Let's create another one!

One can picture this going on. Each day was a day of wonder in the Trinity. Imagine yourself at a fireworks show and as you see those big explosions going off in the sky you stare up in awe and wonder and see the lights flashing in your own eyes. Or imagine yourself before a majestic waterfall. You stand in awe of the constant action even though it is never changing. You are in wonder.

God is in this much wonder at his creation. He is deliriously happy with his creation. True, it isn't perfect but God is happy. God will not cease to be happy because God never changes. All of God's emotions are perfect emotions we would expect due to his perfect nature of love. One who infinitely loves his creation would never lose the wonder of it. He will never grow bored of his creation.

And this of the most perfect being in the universe and we being imperfect beings think that we are in the better for losing our sense of humor and our sense of wonder? Maybe we need to pick up that book of fairy tales again and see how we read it and read it all anew.

Better yet, maybe we need to do this with our Bibles. We will read a story of David and Goliath for the first time to a small child and they will watch with wonder. Yet we over time have become so familiar that at times we have lost our wonder. Should the acting of God in creation be something that ever loses its wonder for us?

Sometimes the atheists will tell us that these are stories told by superstitious people who didn't know better. Even if that was so maybe the superstitious people would have known better. Maybe they would know that it is essential to wonder to have the stories of good conquering over evil.

Evil conquering over good is not a wonder. It is an atrocity. We all recoil at it and children might again be the best as they get especially mad at these. It is easy to get children to rally to a cause. They just have to be taught what is right and they will readily join a side. They don't doubt their own power to do good. A small child will donate a nickel to charity and feel that he has helped immensely. We more mature adults will say "But we know a nickel does no good."

But is that really so? What if I were to donate $100 to the charity. You would think that was something but is it not the same as 2000 nickels? Those nickels will add up over time and the willingness of children to always donate could very quickly soon outweigh my one-time donation which I would have probably saved and made a budget over. The child just gives and gives feeling that the donation makes a difference. We do the opposite. We save up a lot and give and feel our giving makes no difference.

Sometimes I think children know the gospel a lot better than us theologians. Could it be as simple as the childhood song we all learned? "Jesus loves me this I know. For the Bible tells me so. Little ones to him belong. They are weak but he is strong." Imagine how the world would be different if everyone believed the words of that song that the children believe so easily!

What if we rewrote the song? I think it might go like this in our more "Mature" world.

Jesus loves me if I do good things I really hope.

The Bible tells me so but I sometimes doubt it because I know more about who I am.

Little ones to him belong but they are too naive to know the difference.

We are weak and he is strong and overpowering us and we'd better be good because he said so.

Maybe we need to learn to take a cue from the young ones. Maybe we need to learn what they know. That life is a gift and we should enjoy it. That God loves us and lets be assured of that before we go on. That the Bible is true and let's be assured of that before we go on. That we are weak and Christ is strong and let's be assured of that before we go on.

And you know, maybe that joke really was funny.