Hold Your Tongues
On a Tuesday morning Ezekiel “Zeke” Treadwell, a part-time youth pastor and full-time vape enthusiast, was struck by lightning while attempting to retrieve a rogue frisbee from the roof of the First Baptist Church of Greater Tuscaloosa. When he came to, he was speaking fluent Aramaic, Basque, and what several linguists later confirmed was a dialect of dolphin clicks.
Zeke burst into Wednesday night Bible study like a man possessed—or at least mildly electrocuted. He delivered a sermon in tongues so impassioned that Sister Marlene fainted and Brother Curtis tried to call the Discovery Channel. Pastor Rick, a man who once banned tambourines for being “too charismatic,” was not amused. “This ain’t Pentecost, son. This is Alabama.”
Zeke was promptly demoted to parking lot duty and given a pamphlet titled “When the Devil Speaks Esperanto.”
Rejected by his flock, Zeke wandered the highways of Dixie, preaching to truckers, raccoons, and a particularly receptive scarecrow outside a Cracker Barrel. He gained a modest TikTok following under the handle @ZekeSpeaksAll.
But fame is a fickle mistress, especially when your sermons sound like a cross between a Gregorian chant and a malfunctioning modem. Zeke met his fate at a twenty-hour Waffle House in Macon, Georgia. He stood atop a Formica table, arms outstretched, reciting the Beatitudes in Klingon.
A waitress named Loretta, who had seen three divorces and one exorcism, hurled a waffle at his head. Patrons followed suit. Hash browns flew like hand grenades. A man in a Bass Pro Shops hat shouted, “Stone him with carbs!”
Zeke collapsed beneath a hail of syrup packets and righteous indignation. He now resides in a modest trailer behind a defunct Circuit City. He speaks only in Pig Latin and occasionally hosts Zoom revivals for linguistics majors and confused Unitarian youth.