The purpose of entertainment

I was reading Adrian Plass's new book, The Sacred Diary on Tour (which is great for a laugh and I suggest you read it sometime :-)

There was a character in it that I identified with a bit - a guy named Barry (no, that's not why I identified with him :-p) who could quote, at the drop of a hat, any number of Bible verses and had a profound knowledge of the Bible. However, at one point in the book, they were talking about heaven and Barry described what he thought it would be like, leaving God out of the picture, and he sounded quite happy. But then when he talked about heaven and God, he went back to unhappily quoting Bible verses. And one of the characters said that God must be quite upset about Barry not enjoying the idea of heaven with Him in the picture. And then I felt a bit angry.

Later on, I was thinking, "why did I feel angry?" Maybe the answer has to do with how well I feel my relationship with God is going - maybe I know too much about God and don't know God well enough. Maybe what I need is not more intellectual knowledge, but more heart knowledge about who God is.

And that, my friends, is the purpose of entertainment!! To allow us to reflect on who we are, what direction we're going in, and then change, if it's necessary, or to keep going.

I think it's amazing that God would use a funny book (which I only bought cos I really needed a good laugh) to point out something I need to learn. I guess He likes humour and creativity :-) Yay!