SEVERING OURSELVES
Sermontelling Luke 16:19-31 (NL 334)
BIBLETELLING
Below is the Narrative Lectionary passage for the coming week. It is followed by Bruce’s notes on the text which aim at a general understanding of the text and some notes on the structures and techniques used by the Biblical storytellers.
“There was a rich man1 who was dressed in purple and fine linen and lived in luxury every day. At his gate was laid a beggar named Lazarus,2 covered with sores and longing to eat what fell from the rich man’s table. Even the dogs came and licked his sores.
“The time came when the beggar died and the angels carried him to Abraham’s side. The rich man also died and was buried.3 In Hades, where he was in torment,4 he looked up and saw Abraham far away, with Lazarus by his side. So he called to him, ‘Father Abraham, have pity on me and send Lazarus5 to dip the tip of his finger in water and cool my tongue, because I am in agony in this fire.’6
“But Abraham replied, ‘Son, remember that in your lifetime you received your good things, while Lazarus received bad things, but now he is comforted here and you are in agony.7 And besides all this, between us and you a great chasm has been set in place, so that those who want to go from here to you cannot, nor can anyone cross over from there to us.’8
“He answered, ‘Then I beg you, father, send Lazarus to my family, for I have five brothers. Let him warn them, so that they will not also come to this place of torment.’9
“Abraham replied, ‘They have Moses and the Prophets; let them listen to them.’10
“‘No, father Abraham,’ he said, ‘but if someone from the dead goes to them, they will repent.’11
“He said to him, ‘If they do not listen to Moses and the Prophets, they will not be convinced even if someone rises from the dead.’”12
Luke 16:19-31
THREE STORIES
The following three stories pair well with the Narrative Lectionary passage for the coming week. They are followed by Danny’s sermontelling footnotes which explore the stories’ theological connection to the passage as well as insights into craft and performance. Our advice is to read the story first before digging into the footnotes.
Eliezer the Drink Giver
But Abram said, “O Lord GOD, what will you give me, for I continue childless, and the heir of my house is Dammesek Eliezer?”
Genesis 15:2
This one mention in Genesis 15 is all the Bible says about Dammesek Eliezer, the mysterious servant of Abraham who stands to inherit his blessing. But the Jewish midrashic tradition has imagined a greater story for Eliezer as Abraham’s trusty sidekick in his earthly life and, perhaps, his heavenly one…
What’s In a Name?
The ancient rabbis have given a couple different explanations for Eliezer’s unusual name, Dammesek. Some took this to mean he was from Damascus.13 Another very popular tradition was that the title was to be broken up into doleh umashkeh, ladles out and gives to drink. That name has a double meaning. First, as Abraham’s servant, Eliezer would have been the one to ladle and provide him a drink. Second, as Abraham’s disciple, Eliezer drew from the deep well of Abraham’s teaching and served it to others.
The ancient rabbis found hidden meaning in Eliezer’s first name as well. The preceding chapter describes the war of the kings in which Abraham takes part to rescue his nephew Lot. According to the scripture, Abraham led 318 trained men, born in his house. But this number was a hint at what really happened. In truth, Abraham brought one man: his trusty servant Eliezer, born in Abraham’s house, who had the strength of 318 men!14
How did the rabbis discern this? According to the rules of gematria, the name ‘Eliezer’ adds up to 318!15
The Quarrel on the Road
There is another story that ancient interpreters read Eliezer into. When the time came that Abraham was commanded to bind his son, Isaac, and sacrifice him as test of his faith, two young men accompanied him.16
According to tradition, the two young men were none other than Eliezer and Ishmael. While on the road to Mount Moriah, the two argued about who most stood to gain from the sacrifice of Isaac.
Ishmael said that once Isaac was sacrificed, he would be the only heir left and would stand to inherit Abraham’s blessing.
Eliezer reminded Ishmael that he had been banished into the wilderness and so would never again be the heir. As Abraham’s loyal right-hand man, Eliezer stood the most to gain.
Their argument was interrupted when the Holy Spirit revealed to them what was actually to take place upon the mountain. Isaac would be the true heir but both Ishmael and Eliezer still had important roles to play in the story.
The Test of Kindness
The most important passage that Eliezer was read into is the story of the anonymous servant who traveled to the city of Nahor to fetch a wife for Isaac.17 The servant was described as the oldest servant of the house who had charge of all that Abraham had. Who else could it be? In synagogues to this very day, the servant in Genesis 24 is matter of factly referred to as Eliezer.18
Even the ancient rabbis noted that an inordinate amount of time was spent on this story compared to others. Many events are recounted twice: once as they happen and later as they are recalled word-for-word by Eliezer at the dinner table.19 Why did the Torah devote so much scroll space to this simple courtship narrative? Space that could have been devoted to more properly explaining some of its more obscure laws? The Rabbis said that the ordinary conversations between the patriarchs and the servants in their household were more important than the Torah given to their descendants.20 And so the story of Eliezer was read with great closeness to extract all of its many lessons.
Eliezer’s anonymity itself was a lesson for all who seek to serve their master (as a disciple). Eliezer was so without ego (perhaps after being humbled at Mt. Moriah) that he never introduced himself as anything other than the servant of Abraham. Also, Eliezer devoted himself fully to his master’s mission at great sacrifice for he had a daughter of his own that he would have liked to be married into the family. So too should disciples humbly serve their rabbis, not seeking to make name for themselves or increase their own wealth.
There are many details in this story that ancient interpreters were able to derive great meaning out of but perhaps the greatest lesson lay in Eliezer’s testing of Rebekah. Eliezer knew that a wife for Isaac must be wealthy and beautiful. Those qualities would be easily known by the eye. But the wife of a patriarch must also be extraordinarily kind. This trait, being indivisible, he would need God’s help discerning.
So Eliezer prayed that God would reveal the chosen bride to him through a test of kindness. The test was this: he would stand by the well at Nahor and beg all the women who approached for a sip of their water. Whichever not only granted him a sip, but also drew water for his camels, would be the one.
And so Eliezer waited by the well and asked each young woman who came by if they would give him a sip of water. Each said that they needed all the water they had drawn for their own households. One did give Eliezer a sip but didn’t offer any to the camels.
It was finally Rebekah who, when Eliezer asked for a sip of water, agreed. Not only that but, when Eliezer had finished drinking, she drew water for his camels as well.21 It was by this prearranged sign that Eliezer knew that Rebekah was the wife that God had chosen for Isaac. He rejoiced that God had shown such loving-kindness to his master Abraham.
The Heavenly Eliezer
As a reward for his years of faithfulness to Abraham and his selflessness in finding Rebekah, God granted Eliezer a blessing granted to very few. He did not taste death. Rather, he was taken up into heaven.22
In Midrashic literature and Jewish legend, those who are taken up into heaven are able to go back and forth between heaven and earth, often in disguise, as the great many stories about Elijah, Enoch, and Moses attest. Eliezer himself is said to have come back in disguise as the young Caleb who journeyed with Joshua to spy on the promised land. According to legend, he stopped in Hebron at the cave of the patriarchs to seek help from his master for the journey. Then, after the conquest, he settled in Hebron so he could once again join Abraham’s side in eternity.
It’s impossible to know exactly what tales Jesus knew about Eliezer the Drink Giver. Did he know him as an eternal servant who remained at the side of Abraham? Had he heard tales of Eliezer continuing to go back and forth between heaven and earth disguised as a beggar to test the kindness of mortals? Did he know the legends of Abraham going back and forth between the chasm between hell and paradise?23 And did his servant provide drinks of water for those suffering on the other side?
Who knows what tales Jesus knew about the man the Greek septuagint called Lazarus, but it is tantalizing to think that this servant who went nameless for most of his life might be the one person named in all of Jesus’ parables.24
~ Tales retold from the Hebrew Midrash
Innies & Outies
If all your friends have been talking a lot about innies and outies lately, they’re likely not discussing their belly buttons. They’ve probably been watching the hit tv show Severance.25
For the uninitiated, Severance is a dystopian sci-fi drama about a mysterious corporation called Lumon.26 At Lumon, the work done by the employees is so top secret and confidential that a normal NDA won’t do. To work there, you have to have a microchip implanted in your brain so that when you are outside of work, you can’t remember anything that happened at work. This procedure is called ‘severance.’
When Lumon’s severed employees go to work every day, they get in an elevator going down. The next thing they remember is that they are in the same elevator going back up. There work day is over and they are free to go home and socialize with their families unburdened by any of the stress at work. They know nothing of their jobs. They don’t know what they’re working on, who their fellow employees are, or whether their boss treats them with respect. As far as they are concerned, they are completely unburdened by their work lives.27
You may be thinking that sounds pretty good. But there’s a catch. The horrifying thing is that the process works the other way as well.
The first time a Lumon employee goes to work, they wake up on a conference room table groggy from a surgical procedure they have no recollection of consenting to. They know nothing about their lives outside of Lumon, they have no memory of their past, or any sense of identity. They are blank slates. From then on, their whole lives, as they experience them, will occur in the brightly lit offices and hallways of Lumon. In this world the severed individuals are two consciousnesses sharing the same body. They think of their other halves as separate people. In the parlance of the show, the self that experiences the world outside of Lumon refers to the other self as their innie. When the innie sits at her desk all day moving numbers around, and wonders what their other self gets up to, they are thinking about their outie.
In the world of Severance, the innies and outies are treated as different people. In many cases, they have drastically different personalities. An innie may develop an office romance completely unaware that his outie has a wife and kids at home. An innie may be confident and together and their outie’s life may be a total mess. Or an innie might be a cruel bully and her outie may be meek and kind.28 Severance is obviously a metaphor for work/life balance and the way compartmentalize ourselves, but when I watch it I can’t help but think of the Church.
Many of us adhere to a kind of severance theology. We separate the self that exists in church on Sunday morning (our innie) from the self that exists in the world during the week (our outie). When we pass through the doors of our church buildings it is as though we were going down the elevator to the severance floor. During our time of worship we are confronted through prayer, song, and liturgy— in fellowship, sacrament, and the word proclaimed —a set of values and symbols that are deeply meaningful to our innies. We talk of what it means to know Christ and be Christ to others. This isn’t hollow empty talk. Our innies have deep reverence for scripture and a passionate love for God. We really do want to be in this world like Jesus.
But.
We leave the building and all of that remains there. We pass through the doors and we are once again our outie selves. The selves that are cruel online. The selves that do unethical things at work. The selves that seek recognition and selfish gain. The selves that find their hope, not in the Gospel of Jesus Christ, but in avatars or resentment and grievance. What our innies feel and believe at church is completely severed from what our outies say and do in the world.
According to the book of James, the one who merely hears the word and doesn’t do it, is like someone who sees themselves in the mirror and then goes away and immediately forgets what she looks like.29 Faith and works cannot be severed without damaging the soul. And yet. We try.
In the 16th Chapter of Luke, Jesus is addressing the Pharisees who are trying the ol’ severance procedure, themselves. Their lives are split between loyalty to God and their enjoyment of money.30 Jesus warns them that you can’t serve two masters. Eventually the two worlds will collide and your true love will be revealed.
Then he tells them a parable about a rich man dressed in fine purple robes and a poor beggar at his gate named Lazarus. While the rich man is inside enjoying all manner of luxury, Lazarus is outside longing for the even the crumbs from the rich man’s table as dogs come and lick his sores.
It’s a stunning visual. I have to admit that I’ve always told this story wrong when I’ve preached it. I always talk about how the rich man walks by Lazarus every day and never makes eye contact. But that’s not what Jesus actually says. In the parable, the rich man and Lazarus never encounter each other until after death. Their lives remain totally separate. We fill in the details and imagine that the rich man must pass Lazarus at his gate as he goes to and from, but that’s not what the story says. For all we know, the rich man has stayed in his mansion his whole life and only sent servants out for the things he needs. His inner world is completely severed from the outer world.
He might be one of the ones who says to the Son of Man in Matthew 25, “When were you hungry, thirsty, naked, or in need of visitation? We didn’t know!”31 But later when they both die, the rich man accidentally gives up the game to Abraham when he calls the beggar by name.
The irony of the parable though is that in the rich man’s attempt to sever his inner and outer worlds, he has severed himself from the source of salvation and hope. In Hades, the rich man is completely severed from Abraham and Lazarus. He’s also completely severed from his family back home. But when the rich man bemoans his state, Abraham reminds him that this severance is his own doing. When he severed his inner life from the outer world, he severed his soul from God.
It’s a chilling warning to be sure. But there’s still time for us.
Early in the first season of Severance, the main character is approached about a procedure called reintegration. This is a highly risky surgery that promises to merge the innie self with the outie self. It promises to heal the severance and restore wholeness.
Healing and wholeness are on offer to us as well.
As we look toward Holy Week, we are reminded that new life is possible. But it is a new life that comes through letting the old severed self be crucified with Jesus and a new whole self be raised with him. This is not without risk. This new self is untamable and unpredictable. This new life will wreak havoc on the careful compartmentalization you’ve set up to divide your religious self from your, home self, your work self, and your online self, because this new self cries “Abba Father” to the Lord of all!32
So I warn you: Don’t go down this road unless you are serious. Because this new self will not be your slave, content to just exist in the four walls you confine it to. When you are raised with Christ into healing and wholeness, the same power that rolled the stone away from the empty tomb might just blow the doors right off of your church!
The Carpenter
I once heard that a couple counties over from here, there were two neighbors who each owned a nice plot of land.33 The locals will tell you these neighbors were friends a long time ago but they had a falling out.34 No one remembers quite what it was about but it was so bad that the two of them could hardly speak without shouting at each other. It got so they each only came to the edge of their property when they were absolutely sure the other wouldn’t be there.
Now one day one of those two neighbors35 got so mad at the other that he got it in his head to dig a deep trench between their two properties so that neither would be able to cross to the other side.
When the other neighbor woke up one morning and saw all the workers digging up the boundary between the two yards, he was beside himself with anger. He hollered and cursed at the other neighbor across the deep trench.
When he’d worn himself out yelling, he had a thought. I’ll do him one better. I’ll replace that rinky dink fence between our properties with a big huge fence. The planks will be so close together you can’t see between them and so high you can’t see over them. I’ll never have to look at that smug S.O.B’s36 face ever again.
So he looked in the yellow pages37 and found a listing for a carpenter:
J.C. Carpentry. Will travel anywhere. Specializes in disputes between neighbors.
Well that was perfect so the neighbor called the number right away. And wouldn’t you know: the carpenter told him that it just so happened that he was already in the area. If the neighbor went and got all the wood and nails he needed, the carpenter could start first thing in the morning.
So the neighbor ran out and got all the supplies and set them by the trench. To his surprise, when he woke up in the morning, he heard the clacking of a distant hammer. The carpenter was already at work! He must have started before the rooster crowed. When the neighbor made his way to the edge of his property, the carpenter had just driven the last nail into his project.
To the man’s dismay, instead of a tall fence, the carpenter had built a big beautiful bridge between the two properties over the deep trench. The man stood there speechless working up the words to tell the carpenter off, when suddenly his neighbor appeared.
When his neighbor saw the bridge, a single tear ran down his cheek. He stared at the bridge, then at the man, then at the bridge again.38 Finally he crossed it.
When the neighbor reached the other side, he said, “After I dug that trench, for you to go and make a gesture like this? Well… will you forgive me for being an old fool?”
The two of them laughed and hugged. They began talking and making up for lost time. They didn’t even notice the carpenter disappear, walking down the road. But he did. And I hear he still around these parts. He goes to this county and that, lugging his tool box in nail pierced hands, traveling anywhere they need a carpenter who specializes in disputes between neighbors.
~ My telling of an anonymous parable
SERMONTELLING NOTES:
The context of this parable is challenging. We receive no connecting statement to introduce it. Narratively it appears to come right on the tails of a brief teaching against divorce, which is itself preceded by a disjointed couple of verses about people trying to force their way into the Kingdom and the eternal nature of the Torah. The NIV editors also seem a bit flummoxed by verses 16:16-18, giving them the vague italicized heading “Additional Teachings.” Going further backward through the text, though, we find verses 16:1-15 contain a parable and dialogue about the shrewd use of money to secure “eternal dwellings.” Whatever we choose to make of 16:16-18, the current parable seems to pick up the thread of 6:1-15 by introducing one of its main characters as a very rich man.
The rich man remains unnamed, while the poor beggar’s name is given. This would invert the early hearers’ expectations that the rich man would be well known, and the beggar regarded as a social nobody.
The poor man receives an honorary escort into the presence of Abraham.
The Greek word “Hades” used here is often translated as “Hell” in English Bibles. In general, however, the word “Hades” refers simply to the realm of the dead, rather than the place of eternal punishment usually equated with the English word “Hell.” The mention of torment and fire in this passage actually evoke Greek mythology, in which monsters and evil humans descend to the deepest regions of the afterlife. By contrast, Lazarus receives the traditional Jewish reward of going to the “bossom of Abraham,” or “join their ancestors.” As Jesus tells the story, the rich man apparently goes to the pagan “Bad Place” while Lazarus goes to the Jewish “Good Place.” To think of their two destinations as simply “Heaven” and “Hell” misses some of the subtlety and humor of Jesus’ story.
In death, as in life, the rich man does not speak to the beggar, but seeks out someone of status from whom to request his favor.
In pagan mythology, the deepest part of Hades is reached by crossing a lake of fire.
The “great reversal” is a particularly strong theme in Luke’s gospel. See the text of Mary’s song in 1:46-55, for example.
The “Great Chasm” is probably not to be seen as literal geography of the afterlife, but as symbolic of the chasm created by the social elites between themselves and their lessers. If the rich man had found a way to cross this chasm in life, this might have been a very different story.
Again, Lazarus is spoken of in the third person rather than addressed directly. He is viewed as a possible messenger service carrying information between important people.
The strong implication is that the teaching of the Hebrew scriptures contains all that is necessary for the five brothers to avoid the rich man’s punishment. Perhaps something akin to “Do justice, love mercy, and walk humbly with your God.”
The rich man holds out little hope that his brothers will suddenly find religion and change their ways. Why would he? He’s sitting in the place of eternal punishment and has experienced no change in his own state of heart. He is yet to recognize Lazarus as a fellow human being.
To early Christians, this comment will have struck home. Even the Resurrection of Christ has failed to bring about repentance among many of those around them. In Jesus’ own lifetime, of course, he has made intimations about his coming death and resurrection. Even his own disciples, however, seemed incapable of absorbing this talk as something that was actually going to happen. They probably only get the joke later, after the fact.
Burying a detail in a story to be discovered by a clever listener-in-the-know is called—wait for it— an “Easter egg.”
Eliezer the Drink Giver
This is not without narrative problems. A plain reading of Genesis 15 states that Eliezer was a slave born in Abraham’s own household. If Abraham was from Ur, how could Eliezer be from Damascus? Some ancient rabbis looked to a detail from the war of the kings in the previous chapter:
He divided his forces against them by night, he and his servants, and routed them and pursued them to Hobah, north of Damascus.
Genesis 14:15
Perhaps Eliezer so distinguished himself in routing and pursuing the enemy forces all the way to Damascus that he gained the nickname, Damascus Eliezer! Other interpreters resolved this contradiction by looking for alternative meanings in the consonants (remember there are no vowels in Biblical Hebrew so words can be reinterpreted by suggesting different vowels).
This tradition led to some midrash that depicted Eliezer as a supernatural giant trained by none other than his father, Nimrod (who, like Eliezer, despite appearing in a few verses of scripture has had a long life in Jewish legend)! One midrash says that Eliezer the giant settles in the land of Bashan and becomes its king under a new name, Og.
According to Rashi, the numerical value of Eliezer is 318 (א=1,ל=30, י=10, ע=70, ז=,7, ר=200, and 1+30+10+70+7+200=318). Chabad.org has a good explainer on this (as it does so many other things).
See Genesis 22:3-5, 19.
See Genesis 24.
In the comment section of an article I read for this story, one Jewish student reported being shocked when a teacher pointed out that Eliezer’s name appeared nowhere in Genesis 24. This sounded analogous to the shock Christians often experience when it is pointed out that the devil doesn’t appear anywhere in Genesis 3.
Some might say the servant tediously recalls the events before allowing anyone to eat, as the food no doubt grew cold!
Bereshit Rabbah 60 also states that: The washing of the feet of the servants of the patriarch’s household is more significant than the Torah laws of the descendants, for [the Torah] found it necessary to write even about the washing of [Eliezer’s] feet, The creeping animal is one of the fundamental laws of the Torah, but the fact that its blood imparts impurity like its flesh is learned only from a derivation based on an extra letter in a verse.
There are some traditions that the patriarchs knew an oral Torah that was passed down from Adam. But even without that legend, the point is that the Patriarchs were so holy that their words and deeds are preserved as examples of the Torah in action before its revealing at Sinai.
According to one version, she didn’t even have to lower a bucket. The water simply rose up to fill it. I like to imagine that bluebirds then carried her cloak to her and nearby deer blushed as she sang them a lovely rendition of Someday My Patriarch Will Come (Disney, call me).
One of 8 people to do so, according to the Talmud.
One version of this tradition is preserved in the first century Apocalypse of Zephaniah.
There are Biblical scholars who wonder if the parable of The Rich Man and Lazarus might be Jesus’ spin on a well known folktale (lost to time). Some of the reasoning behind this is that the tale is the only of Jesus’ parables to contain names. Also, it contains many folkloric motifs, and, while teaching many lessons, does not seem designed to illustrate one specific point. Some versions of this theory suggest that the Lazarus of the original tale would have been Abraham’s trusty sidekick, Eliezer.
Innies & Outies
I realize that this is not a story in the proper sense and that illustrations like this don’t have a very long shelf life, but I’ve found that congregations love it when you can connect the ancient story to the stories they are encountering in pop culture. The Apple TV series Severance is having a pop cultural moment right now.
It is one of the very few ‘water cooler shows’ that people like to discuss the morning after they air. You probably can’t scroll through your social media feed without encountering references to innies and outies. Much like Lost, back in the day, Severance is a show that generates a lot of speculation and fan theories. It’s also a show that deals with big ideas about society, grief, and the nature of consciousness. In other words, it’s a show that is ripe for spiritual conversation. It’s second season just ended on a pretty big cliffhanger and it has been renewed for a third.
When you are sharing pop culture connections with hearers who may not be familiar with it, you have some important decisions to make. It is a delicate balance. You have to make sure you explain enough that the uninitiated can follow your illustration but not delve so deeply into the details that you use the thread. Your question should be what do they need to know?
In this case the basic premise of the show is enough. The host of amazing characters, the strange world building, and the deep themes are all things that your hearer can discover on their own if they want but the main point of this particular story is the severance procedure— the divide drawn between the inner and outer lives of Lumon’s employees which will be compared to the Church and public lives of Christians.
Do I want to talk about goat rooms, melon parties, and the world’s most menacing marching band? Yes. Yes I do. Would that add to anyone’s understanding of what I’m talking about? No. No it would not.
In the world of the show, the Lutheran Church has even declared that innies and outies have separate souls and may wind up in separate afterlives.
See James 1:22-25.
See Luke 16:13-15.
See Matthew 25:31-46.
But when the set time had fully come, God sent his Son, born of a woman,born under the law, to redeem those under the law, that we might receive adoption to sonship. Because you are his sons, God sent the Spirit of his Son into our hearts, the Spirit who calls out, “Abba, Father.” So you are no longer a slave, but God’s child; and since you are his child, God has made you also an heir.
Galatians 4:4-7
It’s one more idea than this story can handle but there is actually a character in Severance whose innie, Helly, like all innies, is a slave to the Lumon corporation. She is completely unaware that SPOILER ALERT! her outie, Helena, is actually the heir to Lumon. Her innie is powerless because she is unaware that her true self has authority over all her oppressors. What a difference it makes to know your true identity!
The Carpenter
The Carpenter is my retelling of an old preacher story whose provenance is unknown. I chose it because of the powerful metaphor of the carpenter who came to bridge the chasms we put between ourselves and God. It pairs nicely with the parable of the Rich Man and Lazarus because it offers a redemptive vision of how the work we do on earth can help us avoid the terrible conclusion of Jesus’ parable. But it is not work we do on our own. It is work that is done on our behalf.
My version presents the simple parable as a story overheard about some actual neighbors. This is a nod to the Fred Craddock’s style of storytelling where he tells an event that is clearly parabolic as if it actually happened to him in order to disarm the hearer. I’ve got a smart congregation. They’ll catch on.
The fact that these neighbors are both described simply as ‘neighbors’ in the archetypal style of a parable does present a storytelling difficulty. The teller has to take care to make sure the story doesn’t get confusing. There are some approaches that could work to make things easier. You could assign the neighbors different genders. You could give them names. Or you could give them different occupations like a farmer and a rancher.
“I know that’s not church talk but I didn’t say it, the guy the next county over did…” In my context, the S.O.B. line followed by this one would get a good laugh. You know your own context.
I know yellow pages are antiquated. I suppose the character could look it up on their phones but I like the image of a physical listing. After all, this happened years ago, a couple counties over. You could joke it off by saying something like: Now kids this was back when we had something called the yellow pages. What are the yellow pages? Well… just imagine Google but it’s a book… and instead of conspiracy theories, it shows you actual information…
We’re slowing down the narrative at this point to drum up a little suspense.