Before Timothy changed his teaching methods, he had been frustrated by his people's lack of response. He thought the problem was theirs, that perhaps they were not very intelligent. When Timothy changed his methods the people responded and he discerned that he had been the problem because he had not been communicating effectively. He said, "I have learned to be patient with learners and not to condemn them rashly when they give some 'stupid' answers that are not relevant to what we are discussing. This has encouraged most that didn't use to respond to questions to do so now."

An oral, storying approach can likewise be effective for church planting. A recent church planting movement took place in South Asia among a highly oral people.28 The oral peoples consisted of various scheduled castes, some of whom were animists while others were of Hindu religious background. From 1997-2003 an agricultural project combined with a chronological Bible storying approach led to approximately two thousand new church starts. An expatriate strategy coordinator worked with two media specialists-one a national and one an expatriate-to develop the biblical stories and the communications strategies. The stories were chosen and crafted with biblical accuracy to engage the people at their worldview values and beliefs level. The stories that were told in the villages were the same stories they heard through the FEBA radio broadcasts. The media specialist and FEBA provided taped recordings that served to improve the hearers' memory of the stories. The local Christian farmers, who were trained in implementing vital agricultural and health technologies, mentored other farmers even on large plantations.

In using those technologies, they told the Bible stories in sequence in the evenings after the agriculture sessions. Those who demonstrated further interest in the Bible stories they heard were invited into Bible story listening groups focused on the radio broadcasts. In the groups they would hear the stories told again but in those groups they were organized to discuss the stories as they heard them. Later the stories were also told face to face by those who became interested in the stories and who embraced Jesus Christ as Lord and Saviour. Again, the stories were circulated on audiocassette. It is important to understand that the stories heard on the radio, the stories told in the fields and villages, and the stories heard on the cassettes were the same stories.

Thousands of believers have come from this wedding of agricultural, health and storytelling technologies. As this church planting movement continues to escalate through these partner methods, the locals are now addressing aberrant doctrinal beliefs through stories. An independent evaluation of this situation revealed a situation where the lay pastors discipled and trained by oral methods maintained essentially correct doctrine, compared to more literate pastors in the same people group, trained by literate means, who exhibited syncretized doctrinal positions. This group dates its origin to a preacher who came in the 1760s. They had about 250 churches when the multiplication of churches began through the storying approaches. Since they began storying, they have gone from a mathematical average of approximately one new church a year to approximately one new church a day.

Another example of church planting using similar storying strategies comes from Romania.29 Expatriate church planting strategists with the Deaf were involved in a storying approach with associates in planting five Deaf churches. Those among the Romanian Deaf community who became believers through a storying approach in those five church plants went on to plant twenty more Deaf churches. They used the telling of their own testimonies in their heart language, Romanian Sign Language, coupled with chronological Bible storying.

28 This account is provided by James B. Slack.

29 This account is provided by Mark Sauter and Vesta Sauter.