Context for Kids

Through our studies of Genesis 1-3, we see that sin has come into the world and God has promised to deal with it. The Bible is a book all about the promises God keeps and their fulfillment—and in promising to deal with sin and death—well, that’s where Jesus comes in. So exactly who is Jesus, what did He do, and what is the Gospel of the Kingdom? What is it that we are called to believe in order to be saved?

One of the great unanswered questions of the Bible is “what if Adam and Eve had just admitted what they did and said they were sorry?” Of course, we will never know for sure but the Bible tells us exactly what to do when we sin. We have to get right with God by going to Him and admitting it.

Let’s put all that we have learned together and read Genesis 2 and 3 (or most of it anyway) as though we are right there. How does our understanding change based on a first-person experience?

Sin was now in the Garden but so was the Tree of Life. Sometimes God has to take us away from His blessings for our own good when we will misuse them. Also, sometimes the consequences of our sins can be far worse than we ever thought when that temptation seemed so worth it. But some things just can never be undone.

Eve, and then Adam, made a terrible mistake and trusted the wrong guy. Will they fess up or will they make their sin even worse?

In this episode, a new character emerges, a serpent with the tempting offer to make the two humans more like God and less like gardeners. What will they decide and what does it teach us about how we should relate to God?

Did you think that work just has to be a result of sin? And that no one had to work before Adam and Eve rebelled against God? Actually, the Bible tells us that the first thing God did once He put Adam in the Garden was to give him a job! Let’s find out about the job of the first Adam and learn about how the “second Adam,” Jesus, always knew how to do His job.

The Tree of Life and the Tree of the Knowledge of Good and Evil are two of the most mysterious things ever created by God—this week’s lesson takes us from Genesis to Revelation and into the ancient Near Eastern world.

Genesis 2 says that God caused a deep sleep to fall on Adam, and so we are going to take a look at the deep sleep of Abraham in Genesis 15 and burial practices in the ancient world to find out the original context of this strange account.

Hebrew word alert! Toledot is an amazing word meaning “generations” or “account” but what does it teach us about how we can always count  on God to never lose track of us, forget us, or lose interest in us? We will also talk about the very first Temple in history—the Garden of God!