My first engagement with the Scriptures came in my pre-literate days when my church friends and I absorbed the stories of the Bible. We heard them in Sunday school from faithful, 48-Sundays-per-year teachers who used flannelgraph representations so that children could visualize biblical characters and places. One week the cut-out figure stuck to the flannel surface might be Joseph of Egypt.  The next week he was Elijah, and the third week he was Stephen on his way to being stoned.  Somehow our imaginations were able to make the leap from character to character each week even though he always looked the same.

Sometimes the Bible stories were dramatized with each child in the class playing a role.  I particularly liked being Jesus in the storm-scene and learned to speak with great authority when it came time to shout (King James version), "Peace!  Be still!"

Mine is a story-driven faith.  Those stories drilled into my life from ages 2-9 are a large part of the formation my life and thought.  ...