Ann Ault as The Ugly Duckling

Yes, it's another episode of Famous Fairy Tales, the radio program where you learn the rest of the story from your childhood. So today, listeners, we're at Swan Lake, that very popular resort area just beyond fairy tale woods. And it's a beautiful day.

Lots of swimming, boating and water sports going on. How can I help you? I'm doing a feature on how some famous characters are doing now. Oh, you mean me. I'm flattered. Well, perhaps you know how I started out. Yes, you weren't exactly welcome in the company of ducklings, as I remember. That's putting it mildly. I look very different.

What do you mean different? Oh, I was gray and brown and not yellow. And my bill was black, not orange. It must have been difficult.

Oh, it was. It all changed the day the flock chased me out of the pond. And I waddled into a tiny chapel in the woods.

Really? A chapel? It was the singing that drew me in.

And I joined in. I've heard that swans aren't known for their singing voices. What was the hymn? It was the Little Brown Church in the Vale. Do you know it? I certainly do. It goes, Oh, come to the church in the wild woods, the little brown church in the Vale.

That's right. I like the part where you sing. Oh, come, come, come, come.

I sang, oh, squawk, squawk, squawk, squawk, squawk. So it was a regular church service? Yes, with a sermon and everything.

The pastor preached on Romans 10-9. If you declare with your mouth, Jesus is Lord, and believe in your heart that God raised him from the dead, you will be saved. So I believed in my heart.

And confessed with your bill? And I was saved. I was still an ugly duckling, but it didn't matter. God loved me anyway, whether I was drab and gray back then.

Or beautiful and graceful and white as a cloud, as you are now. Exactly. So what do you do now? I run a TZBS. A what? A poultry vacation bible school, open to swans and ducks alike. Excuse me.

Of course. Gather around, everyone. We're going to sing Jesus Loves the Little Children. Squawk, squawk, squawk, squawk. As you just heard, listeners, the words happily ever after are much more complicated than you might think. Tune in again soon for another famous fairy tales, the radio program where you learn the rest of the story from your childhood. Squawk.