Charles Spurgeon was known for making his congregation laugh. Some of his more austere contemporaries found this unseemly — what place did laughter have in the pulpit? Spurgeon's response was typically direct: "I purposely use much coarse illustration that arrests the people's attention and drives the truth home." He was not performing comedy. He was pastoring effectively.
The question of humor in preaching is not whether laughter belongs in a sermon — it does — but how to use it in ways that serve the message rather than replace it.
Why Humor Belongs in the Pulpit
Before we talk about how, it is worth establishing why. Some pastors operate under an implicit assumption that seriousness and holiness are synonymous — that the pulpit is no place for anything that might produce laughter. This is a cultural assumption, not a theological one.
Consider that Jesus used hyperbole constantly — a camel through the eye of a needle, a plank in someone's eye while trying to remove a speck from another's. These are images that would have produced smiles, at minimum, from His audience. Proverbs is full of wry observations about human nature. The book of Jonah contains elements that would have struck an ancient audience as darkly comic — a prophet running from God and ending up inside a fish is the stuff of satire.
Laughter is a response to incongruity — to the gap between what we expect and what actually is. Good humor, properly used in a sermon, exploits this incongruity to create insight. The congregation laughs because something true has been named in an unexpected way, and that laughter makes the truth more memorable, not less.
Humor also creates connection. A congregation that has laughed together is more relaxed, more open, and more trusting of the preacher. Laughter lowers defenses in ways that argumentation cannot.
The Different Types of Sermon Humor
Not all humor functions the same way in a preaching context. Understanding the types helps you deploy them appropriately.
Self-deprecating humor. Humor at your own expense is almost always safe and often powerful. It communicates humility, relatability, and emotional intelligence. A pastor who can laugh at themselves tells the congregation: I am not performing holiness for you. I am a human being with the same foibles you have.
Observational humor. Noticing something true and funny about human experience — the gap between our intentions and our behavior, the absurdities of modern life, the ways we deceive ourselves — is both good comedy and good homiletics. This kind of humor does not require a punchline. It just requires honest observation.
Story-based humor. A story that builds to an unexpected turn, or that contains a character whose behavior is recognizably absurd, produces laughter that is embedded in narrative. This is the form of humor Jesus used most often, and it is the most transferable for contemporary preachers.
Textual humor. Sometimes the humor is already in the text. Preachers who have spent time in the original languages or in careful literary analysis of Scripture will find moments of irony, wordplay, and comic structure embedded in the biblical narrative itself. Preaching the Jonah story well, for example, requires letting the congregation see the absurdity of a reluctant prophet.
When Humor Goes Wrong
The dangers of humor in preaching are real, and a pastor who has not thought carefully about them will eventually misuse it.
Humor that substitutes for substance. The most common misuse of humor in contemporary preaching is the sermon that produces consistent laughter but very little spiritual transformation. If people leave talking about your jokes, the humor worked against the gospel rather than for it. Humor should be a vehicle for truth, not a destination.
Humor at others' expense. Mocking — whether of political figures, cultural opponents, or even members of the congregation — produces laughter that divides rather than connects. Even when the target seems to deserve it, humor at others' expense tells the congregation: we laugh together at people who are not like us. This is antithetical to the gospel.
Humor that trivializes the sacred. There is a difference between finding the genuinely funny in the human situation and making light of God, Scripture, or the spiritual experience of suffering. The former is wisdom; the latter is irreverence.
Forced humor. There is nothing more uncomfortable in a preaching context than a joke that does not land. And the humor that fails most predictably is the humor that is trying too hard — the preacher who has inserted a funny story because they feel the sermon needs levity, not because the story genuinely serves the message.
Practical Guidelines for Using Humor Well
Let it arise naturally. The best sermon humor is not planned in the abstract; it emerges from the text, the illustration, or the honest observation of experience. If you have to search for a joke to insert, you probably don't need one.
Test it on someone who loves you and tells you the truth. A trusted spouse, friend, or colleague who will tell you when something isn't funny — or when it crosses a line — is an invaluable asset.
Know your congregation. What is funny to a congregation of forty-year-old professionals in a suburban church may not be funny to a congregation of sixty-year-old farmers in a rural one. Cultural context shapes humor deeply. A preacher who is not attending to cultural context will find their humor misfiring.
Match the emotional arc. A joke at the wrong moment in a sermon is not just ineffective — it is disorienting. If you have just brought the congregation to the edge of conviction or grief, humor will undo the moment. Read the room. Humor is best placed early in a message to build connection and lower defenses, not in the middle of a moment of deep spiritual engagement.
When preparing your sermons with a tool like GoRhema, pay attention to where your illustrations are landing. Sometimes what begins as a serious illustration contains an inherently funny element — a preacher who notices that is in a position to use it deliberately rather than accidentally.
The Goal: A Sermon That Makes People Fully Human
Humor, at its best, does not make preaching less serious — it makes it more fully human. A sermon that can hold grief and laughter in appropriate tension, that reflects the full range of human experience in the light of the gospel, is a sermon that will reach people where they actually live.
Spurgeon was right. The truth is arrested by laughter and driven home. Use it wisely, and use it freely.