“JOAN ‘N THE WHALE” – By John Duckworth

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Joan was in her dorm room eating an O'Henry bar, listening to the radio and having her quiet time. All at once the Lord spoke to her, out of respect she stopped chewing and turned the radio down, (a little).

"Joan", said God, "I want you to arise and go across the hall to Mininiver, the girl who lives in room 207, and I want you to be her friend."

Well, Joan giggled, then she laughed so hard that her fish-shaped earrings and cross necklace shook. "Come on God" she said, "don't kid me, I'm a busy person and you know perfectly well that I've got to study hard so I can go be a missionary for you at upper Tarsustand", she chuckled again.

"I'm not kidding," said God, not sounding terribly amused.

Joan closed her Bible, (five versions not counting the paraphrase) and frowned at the ceiling. "Lord," she said, "It's simply out of the question! Mininiver is the girl they call the whale and she must weigh three hundred pounds! If I were seen with her I'd be a social outcast!" She tossed her candy wrapper in the garbage, and that would just ruin my witness!!"

There was silence and Joan looked up at the ceiling again but just saw the light fixture and to her surprise God did not speak to her again. In fact, she did not hear a word from Him, not even a postcard for the next six months. Not that she worried about it too much because, you see, she was busy these days and before she knew it, she was ready to fly away to upper Tarsustand. So, she packed her suitcase full of missionary stuff and boarded a plane to a far away land.

But the Lord sent three skyjackers upon her flight and half way across the Atlantic Ocean they pulled out their guns and hand grenades and everyone was so afraid. Everyone, that is, EXCEPT Joan. She was sound asleep in her seat next to a nervous hardware salesman from Trenton, New Jersey. "WAKE UP!!", cried the

salesman, shaking Joan. "How can you sleep through this? We're being skyjacked!"

Joan opened her eyes, "What, what?" She mumbled.

"I noticed you wear a cross", the salesman said frenetically. "Maybe if you pray, we'll get out of this mess!"

Joan brightened, "I'm glad you suggested that", she said whipping out her New Testament. "Let me witness to you", and she proceeded to read thirty-four verses to the hardware salesman, as well as the Lady Senator, two Army Generals, a Baseball player, and several ministers and before long she had read her verses to nearly everyone on the plane.

Suddenly, one of the skyjackers burst into the cabin, "All right," he yells, "I want one hostage to keep with us and we're going to let the rest of you go!" The passengers cheered and jointly pointed to Joan, "Take her, take her!!" they cried in unison and a sigh of relief echoed up and down the aisles as she was led away. And so the plane landed and the passengers were set free. But Joan was tied up in the cargo hold and was in the belly of that plane for three days and three nights.

Then Joan prayed to the Lord from the belly of the plane, saying, "Okay God, I get the picture. IF you get me out of here, I'll go back and I'll witness to the whale…I mean I"ll witness to Min."

"HOLD IT!" said God. "Who said anything about witnessing? I said to be her friend!"

"Gotcha!" Exclaimed Joan, and the Lord spoke to the skyjackers and they kicked Joan out upon the landing strip. So Joan returned to her dorm room and in a few months she was Mininiver's best friend. It took a lot of work but low and behold after almost a year, Joan introduced Min to her friend God…and the three of them became better friends than ever before!

And one day the word of the Lord came to Joan a second time saying, "Joan, Arise!"

"Oh no!", said Joan, "Where to this time?"

And God said, "Why to upper Tarsustand of course!"

Joan said, “Gotcha!”, but THIS time she took a boat!