by Melanie Wendel

Jesus repeatedly asks in the New Testament: “Do you understand?” Until personal understanding takes place in a person’s heart, spiritual transformation cannot happen.

Biblical storytelling and orality is a gift that gives a glimpse into the heart of the hearer. It is an interactive approach to presenting God’s Word in a non-threatening, relational way that can be used in home groups, children’s or youth gathering, sermons, ESL ministries, mission outreach—or even a friendly meetup over coffee.

An Innate Language

“What did you like most?” I asked as I debriefed the orality workshop in which 50 pastors and wives from our indigenous church in Colombia had participated.

The leader’s response saddened me.

“Since our people first became Christians 100 years ago, our church life has consisted of people sitting in rows, with one person standing in front preaching or teaching. While all the rest of our lives, the passing along and retelling of our native stories, our history, our traditions, our values, and any decisions that are made, are all done sitting around a campfire in community. Why haven’t we done this with our spiritual formation as well?”

I wasn’t sure how to answer. All I knew was that these stories of God had travelled from their heads to their hearts and would transform them in ways that literary methods hadn’t.

Statistics show that 70–80 percent of the global population, regardless of their educational or cultural background, are primary or secondary oral learners and communicators. When we only use literary forms and styles to share the gospel and to disciple, we risk only speaking to a very limited segment of the world.

Story is humanity’s innate language. Before any of us ever learned to read, we were making up our own songs, expressing ourselves, picking up values and rules, learning cause and effect, interpreting language, and making connections. Our lives consisted of relationships, love, affection, and laughter, listening to each other and responding. What if we were to use this natural oral preference approach as we seek to influence others and share God’s truth and love with them?

Stories give a pathway through which to engage the whole person—the aesthetic, cognitive, emotional, and relational sides—connecting the teller with the hearers.

Creating Sacred Space

The Bible itself is mostly composed of stories that naturally draw the hearer in.

Not only do individual stories of God transform lives, but the entire book is the complete story of God’s love, plan, and promise for us through the revelation of the person of Jesus Christ.

But in the practice of biblical storytelling, we are not simply telling another good story; there are many of those out there. We are creating sacred space and asking others to enter that space, where we know that through His Spirit, God will go before us and continue to work in the lives of others.

After our family left Spain in 2011, where my husband and I had served as international workers (IWs), we were told our daughter’s nine-year-old best friend once made the sign of the cross as she walked past our old apartment. Her mother, startled, asked her why she did that. She responded, “Because that is where I met God.” This little girl had been on holy ground in the living room of our apartment, and the only way she knew to express that was to cross herself in her Roman Catholic tradition.

Through storytelling, our hearers begin to feel the presence of God even before they have language to describe, express, or reject it. As we share stories from the Bible, we begin to provide a place for people to be able to identify, name, value, remember, recognize, and desire a continuation of a beautiful relationship with Someone whose character and actions they have come to know through the story!

One Alliance church planter, formerly an international worker physician, says, “As I watch people encounter Bible stories, often ones they have never heard, I am amazed at how, through the stories, God makes an end run around antagonistic worldviews and presuppositions and surmounts all sorts of blockages and still manages to present Himself accurately to the hearts and minds of people who do not yet know Him.”

Asking Honest Questions

Through telling the story to listeners and processing it together through open-ended, honest questions, we get to see a glimpse into each person. Questions often reveal what’s in a heart. We get to peek into a person’s worldviews, hurts, distrusts, and the lies that the enemy has used to keep them in bondage. We see a glimpse of the existential limits they are wrestling with: security, freedom, meaning and purpose, being seen and loved.

When we ask processing questions, we reflect our Rabbi, Jesus. In the New Testament, Jesus asks over 300 questions. And of the 183 questions asked of Him, He only answered eight—not always directly, and often with another quesion.

His questions always went straight to the heart, cutting to the marrow.

What do you want?

Who is it you want?

Who do people say the Son of Man is?

Who do you say I am?

What do you want Me to do for you?

Do you understand what I have done for you?

Have I not chosen you?

Do you love Me?

Why are you so afraid?

So you still not understand?

Through questions like these, Jesus extends an invitation—into His story and His transformation.

“What part of this story is for you?” I asked this question to a group of IWs after an orality training. I was using a Montessori-type methodology for telling biblical stories where wooden figures representing Abraham and Sarah walked through sand, laying stones for remembrance at “Shechem” and “Bethel.”

One IW leaned over and drew in the sand. “In the village in which we live, men go into the city to sell their livestock and goods. When they return, they will tell their circle of friends how it went, sharing the ‘story’ in the dirt. By using stones or sticks, they are able to represent different elements of the story, the shop they went to, the animals they sold, how much they were paid. Now I see how easily I can share the story of God by simply having some rocks and wooden figures in my back pocket!”

This Story Is for You

Inviting someone into this sacred space of encounter involved preparation. First, in your own heart. Ask the Lord what story He wants you to memorize and have ready. Then ask Him who He wants you to share it with.

Perhaps there is a question that could serve as an icebreaker as you create a safe space and community with one another. Sitting in a circle or across a table from someone puts us all on level ground. Depending on your setting, you may wish to use physical elements to tell the story or simply just tell it. Let’s use the story of Abraham and Sarah as an example.

Ask an opening question.

“I wonder if you’ve ever had to move. What was that like for you?”

As you begin the story, perhaps moving your hands through the pile of sand in a “desert bag,” say, “For our story today, we need a bit of the desert. Many amazing and incredible things happened to the people of God in the desert, but it is a dangerous place. No one goes into the desert unless they absolutely have to.”

As you lay down a block of wood (Ur of the Chaldeans) and two strips of blue ribbon (the rivers Euphrates and Tigris), tell the story of how Abram and Sarai left their home in Ur and traveled to Haran. They followed the rivers that gave them water and marked their way. Then God called them out to go to a new land, and this time they had to trust God completely. They wondered if God would be with them in this new land . . .¹

After you finish telling the story, ask the following four questions:

1. What did you like most about the story?
2. What was the most important part of the story for you?
3. Is there anything that we can take out of the story and still have everything we need?
4. Where are you in this story? Or what part of this story is about you?

For even deeper discussion, ask:

1. What does this story teach us about humankind?
2. What does it teach us about God?

After, make space for a time of response. Invite the hearers to sit in silence; we can hear God speak when we are silent. If possible, provide space for journaling, drawing, or creating something using simple materials. This response time allows the story to sink in even deeper as God’s Spirit works in each heart. At the end, ask if anyone would like to share something they heard, saw, or felt as they reflected.

You can also share a meal together or ask how you can pray for them. Sing together, if appropriate—this is another form of orality!

So We Do Not Forget His Deeds

Through biblical storytelling, we invite God’s presence and touch our most basic human needs:

To be loved (unconditionally).

To be in community with others.

To learn about the world in an innate way.

To understand our own existential limits and discover how only God can meet them.

To work out and process these limits.

To have a safe palce.

To experience moments of wonder—the grandeur of something greater than ourselves.

I would like to leave you with a passage from a beautiful psalm about the importance of storytelling.

“My people, hear my teaching;

listen to the words of my mouth.

I will open my mouth with a parable;

I will utter hidden things, things from of old—

things we have heard and known,

things our ancestors have told us.

We will not hide them from their descendants;

we will tell the next generation

the praiseworthy deeds of the Lord,

his power, and the wonders he has done.

He decreed statutes for Jacob

and established the law in Israel,

which he commanded our ancestors

to teach their children,

so the next generation would know them,

even the children yet to be born,

and they in turn would tell their children.

Then they would put their trust in God

and would not forget his deeds

but would keep his commands” (Psalm 78:1–7).

1. Adapted from storytelling resources created by the Godly Play Foundation. ↩︎

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