[Comment: A month before, I had told this story at the church I was serving. A colleague at the Hispanic church in town invited me over to preach. I had embarrassed myself the year before by reading both the English and the Spanish versions of a sermon for them, so I decided to go with a translator this time. I sent her a triple-spaced copy of the text so she could get ready for the task.

She came prepared. While I read the story, she translated spontaneously. Even I was more captivated with her rendition, which I really did not understand, than I was with my own! I'm sorry I didn't tape record her translation for you.

I offer this story because it is done with a time dimension only lightly experimented with in the earlier stories. Bible stories are stories to be told, not just to be tal…