"Laughter really is good medicine. It reduces stress, relieves pain, lowers blood pressure and boosts the immune system. It puts people at ease and can lower the tension level in your relationships.  Frequent laughter may even reduce your risk of heart disease. "Craig Hassed General Practioner, Melbourne, Australia.

It is good to laugh. One supremely lovable soul said, “God will forgive me, if I serve Him cheerfully.”

The doctors tells us that is it literally a medical fact that he who laughs most lives longest, for laughter expands the lungs and makes a man breathe deeply. You will never see on any death certificate laughter given as the cause of death.

It is strange how often the Church has been suspicious of laughter. There was a time, and not completely at an end yet, when it was considered an act of heresy to make a congregation smile.

Eric Linklater tells of a school report he received when he was a schoolboy, which stated, “On the whole he is doing fairly well, but he is handicapped by a sense of humour.”

Jesus could teach with a smile. What a picture he drew when he talked about a man with a plank in his own eye gravely trying to remove the speck of dust from someone else’s eye! (Matthew 7: 3-5)

How the disciples must have seen the funny side when the nickname ‘Sons of Thunder’ ’became attached to that tempestuous pair of brothers James and John!

Do you think Jesus failed to laugh and be seen to be enjoying himself when he attended the wedding reception in Canaan of Galilee? I don’t think so.

Remember…..Laughter is the sun that drives winter from the human face.