If there is one gift I miss from childhood, it is giggling. In my own experience young girls share this gift with one another with unfettered generosity. I am sure we giggled at slumber parties when we were supposed to be sleeping, but I also remember giggling while playing games—it’s really hard to throw a soft ball and giggle at the same time. Why is it that giggling and needing to pee always go together? I digress. My cousin and I would giggle in class. She had a great giggle. It didn’t take much to get her started, but stopping for either of us was almost impossible. Our 7th grade math teacher put up with a lot of giggling, but after a time he would say, “Now girls, that’s enough.” Something in our bodies or minds or hearts or throats refused cooperation. Okay. Nothing short of horrible could suppress the giggles. No. I’m serious. The only way I could stop giggling was to remember that President Kennedy had been shot. I needed to think of something completely opposite of joy, and well, in my particular world, that was the saddest thing I had ever seen.
I most often think of a weeping God, One who mourns over the tragedies and terrors we do to one another. But can we, every once in a while, ponder a Glad God? Can we imagine that when God sees a toddler’s first steps, or hears the sounds of cousins, or gets invited to tea by a little one, or listens to a second grader tell a very silly joke, that God’s response is to giggle?
May our Giggling God shake your spirit with delight and your body with joyful wonder.
