Do angels have a sense of humor?

Imagine an idyllic camp scene. Wide sparkling blue summer sky as a backdrop to mountains and trees surrounding a campsite, a burbling creek winding past it. The family is climbing out of the RV to start their day. Except it’s just Dad, snagging his fishing pole to cast for some fish in the creek.

You can hear Mom arguing with the kids to go enjoy the outdoors, the kids protesting being in the wilderness with no cell service, no hotspot, no Wi-Fi, no Xbox.  “Boring!” they yell back.  Sounds plausible.

Now picture a couple white-clad angels hanging out on a cloud overlooking this scene. Glorious wings folded back. The one with his halo askew pushes up the sleeves of his flowing robes and says to the other: “Watch this. Hold my ambrosia.”

A fluffy white cumulus cloud scoots over the scene, goes dark gray, builds and spurts out a micro-blizzard. The kids pile out of the camper, scoop up handfuls of snow and start a snowball fight. They pelt Dad with gobs of cold and wet. Mom joins in. It’s a free-for-all. Lots of laughter. Gray cloud fades back to white. But the family is still smiling and united in that spontaneous moment of fun and joy.

The angels grin. The one takes back his tankard of ambrosia (could be beer) from his fellow angel, who nods approval and says: “Nice job.” 

 The prankster angel shrugs. “Boss doesn’t like those freak of nature events. Gets him a lot of grief. I’ve been saving up.”

“Wait, that piece of toast with Jesus’ image on it -- was that you?”

With a smile and wriggling eyebrows, he answers: “One of my favorites. I did the potato chip, too.” 

I think of my brother up there doing his goofy stuff. Harmless, silly things that are unexpected and get a laugh or smile out of whichever human(s) he has targeted. I can hear his laugh and see his smile. He would be bending down, hands on his knees, shaking his head as he belly-laughs at the result of his prank. His fellow angel might be rolling his eyes (as I often did for Kent’s pranking) and holding his can of Mountain Dew.

I like to think that there is this sort of “lightness” in Heaven. That it’s not all serious business to instill us recalcitrant humans with goodness and nudging us to do good. Because that just seems like a lot of work. Like Clarence, the angel trying to earn his wings in the Jimmy Stewart movie “It’s a Wonderful Life,” he had a tough gig. Jumping into a freezing river, getting in a tussle with cops, struggling to get George Bailey to see the light. He deserved to have some fun. I hope he got to pull some pranks in his future assignments. 

Now you. How about you give yourself an assignment to make someone laugh or smile every day? You should practice for when you’re up there on a cloud looking for something fun to do.