Laughing in Church

We attend a church where we take communion every Sunday. This particular Sunday, the preacher was a guest speaker, and his entire message was centered around communion. My husband and I always sit in the same two seats, which are on the third row just to the right of the pulpit.

Normally in our church, we break off a small bit of cracker and sip grape juice as representations of the body and blood of Christ. This day, because of the emphasis on communion, we were breaking pieces from loaves of unleaven bread some ladies from the church had baked. We each get our own bread, and the juice is served in small individual cups. So today, we were to break off a piece of the thick, hard (unleavened) bread instead of the thin cracker we’re accustomed to.
After a congregational prayer of thanksgiving, and as our guest speaker is walking back and forth in front of us, speaking passionately about the meaning of communion, the plate of bread was passed to us. My husband, Austin, was the first to get the plate on our row. As he tried to break off a small piece of bread, he accidently broke a rather large piece off and flipped it into the air. It flew, and as if in slow motion, landed on an Elder of our church who had been sitting reverently behind us (until the bread landed in his lap).

Of course I saw what happened with the flying communion bread, and made the mistake of looking at Austin. His eyes were big, and he sucked in an “Oh”, and it became too much for us to hold in. We bowed our heads, and began to laugh quite uncontrollably. Tears were streaming down my face, and the harder I tried to stop laughing, the more I laughed. My shoulders were shaking, as were Austin’s. There was no way to hide the complete lack of control we experienced.

After a few minutes, I heard Austin begin to join in singing the hymn. I was impressed with his ability to gain control! Then his voice began to quiver, and he began to laugh again. I’m afraid we spent the entire service laughing or trying to contain our laughter.
Personally, I believe the Lord enjoyed that as much as we did.