Comedy & Dying To Self

Did Saint Peter Have PTSD? (Things That Matter, Part 2)

I’m not shy about my faith, about my religious convictions. I have spent the majority of my life trying to lean into them and live them out. Thus, it’s no surprise to me that there’s a strange connection between stand-up comedy and living out the Christian faith. I know, I know—one involves a lot of self-sacrifice, humility, and getting knocked down daily, and the other is…oh wait, same thing.

Hear me out. The Scriptures talk about the Christian life as dying to self daily. Paul writes in 1 Corinthians 15:31, “I die every day!” And in Luke 9:23, Jesus says, “If anyone would come after me, let him deny himself and take up his cross daily and follow me.” The message is clear: faith isn’t about comfort—it’s about dying to self.

Sound familiar? Well, John Vorhaus, a renowned comedy writer and teacher, describes stand-up the same way: “Dying on stage over and over again.” When I first read that, it blew my mind. That’s right—Christianity and stand-up comedy share a deep theological principle: dying to self is a core feature.

Think about it. Stand-up requires showing up, night after night, in front of a crowd that may or may not want to hear what you have to say. You tell a joke, and sometimes they laugh. Other times, they look at you like you just confessed to a felony. In faith, you step out, try to live with integrity, speak truth, extend grace—and some days, it resonates. Other days, you’re the guy who prayed before his meal at work, and now Karen in accounting thinks you’re about to start a cult.

In both cases, you’re dying to self—whether it’s a fearful self, an arrogant self, a self-hating self, etc.—for something you believe in. But the parallels keep going. In stand-up, you have to bomb to get better. Failure is required. There’s no shortcut. You can’t learn how to land a punchline without first learning how to not land a punchline.

The same is true in faith. You don’t become more Christlike by nailing it every time. You grow by failing, getting up, repenting, and pressing on. I’d be the first to bet that Peter didn’t feel like a great leader when he denied Jesus three times, but guess what? The guy went on to help build the early church. And if he were alive today, he’d probably do a tight five on why roosters give him PTSD.

And then there’s this: both stand-up and faith require honesty. You can’t fake it. If a comic gets up on stage and pretends to be something they’re not, the audience can feel it; many can sense it a mile away. They’ll check out. The same is true in faith. People can sniff out the difference between someone who actually loves God and someone who just knows the right Christian words to say.

That’s why Jesus had so many issues with the religious officials. They were all show, no heart. In Matthew 23:27, He calls them “whitewashed tombs”—polished on the outside, but full of dead bones on the inside. If that’s not a brutal roast, I don’t know what is. Jesus basically told them, “You guys look like a new car but I can’t stand that new-car smell.”

And that’s the real tension. Whether on stage or in faith, we have to keep going, even when we fail, even when we doubt, even when people don’t get it. That’s what real faith is. That’s what real comedy is. And at the end of the day, they both require the same thing: the courage to get up, take the hits, and trust that what you’re doing is worth it, and a willingness to die to self.

So, if living out your faith feels hard—if it feels like you’re dying to self daily—good news. You’re probably doing it right. And if stand-up feels like getting kicked in the teeth on stage? Also good news. You’re definitely doing it right. Because dying on stage and dying to self aren’t that different. One just involves fewer hecklers. Most of the time.