Here is the first story of our “Hope of the Messiah” story set, a summary of Genesis 1-3. As I wrote previously, our goal is to be faithful stewards of Scripture while summarizing these stories to around 200 words. Let us know what you think! (i.e., if you have questions about why we included certain details but not others, why we worded things the way we did, etc.)
In the beginning God created everything and it was perfect.
God created Adam and placed him in the Garden to work it. In the Garden were the Trees of Life and Knowledge. God told Adam he would die if he ate of the Tree of Knowledge. Adam was alone, so God created Eve from his rib to be his companion.
One day the snake told Eve that instead of dying after eating of the Tree of Knowledge, she would be like God. When she saw that the fruit was beautiful and good for attaining wisdom, she ate it and gave some to Adam.
Because of this, God told the snake that one of Eve’s descendants would defeat him. God told Eve that her pain would increase in birth and he told Adam that with great pain he would work the ground.
Because of this, God did not want them to eat of the Tree of Life and live forever. So he expelled Adam and Eve from the Garden and placed cherubim at the entrance of the Garden to guard the way to the tree of life.
Meaning: This story tells us that God created everything that exists. Everything. And everything was perfect! He placed Adam and Eve in the Garden and they prospered in his presence. However, their disobedience shattered that perfection. All sadness, suffering, and death are results of Adam and Eve’s sin.
But, the good news is that God promised to send one who would crush the snake — who would save humanity by conquering evil. This promised one, a descendant of Adam and Eve, would make everything perfect again. Taken in context, this promised one would reverse the curses, give access to the Tree of Life, and allow us to walk with God in his presence once again. The Old Testament will go on to develop this promise and speak about the coming one who would defeat death forever.
Our Amazon Sojourn 
Question for understanding? In the Meaning section: Will your people understand the word Adam and Eve’s “disobedience“ would rebelled against God be more understood???? Just curious. Biblical or theological words are so familiar to us. Love Aunt Amy
On Mon, Jul 6, 2020 at 3:48 PM Our Amazon Sojourn wrote:
> gregojohnson posted: “Here is the first story of our “Hope of the Messiah” > story set, a summary of Genesis 1-3. As I wrote previously, our goal is to > be faithful stewards of Scripture while summarizing these stories to around > 200 words. Let us know what you think! (i.e., if yo” >
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Great question! As you know that is definitely a big part of the work – simplifying the story in terms of length and language! I have a couple of thoughts:
1. They do understand the concept of disobedience – even if not the word for disobedience (“desobediência”). As an example, we have heard stories about them disciplining their children for disobedience. Therefore, I might use a couple of different words during the story session to get at the concept even if they might not know the word (i.e., I’ll use the Portuguese words for “disobedience”, “not obey”, “not do what was right”, etc.).
2. In my personal notes I have put asterisks by words that they might not be familiar with so I can remember to define or explain them. As you are probably aware, one big question for us “storyers” is, “When do we introduce and define a new word that is important theologically, and when do we just substitute a word that they know even if it doesn’t convey the exact same thing?” In this first story, here are the words that I thought needed to stay as they are and be defined or explained: God, created, snake, wisdom, cherubim.
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