The Story Our story today was called “Second Creation – The Falling Apart.” This is the second of the two Creation stories in the Book of Genesis: Genesis 2:4-3:24. The first Creation story tells how the People of God sought the elusive presence of God. We now begin at the beginning with Adam-Eve and how they “fell apart” from God, from each other, from God’s creation, and from the image of God in their deep selves. We learn how those relationships were restored. Here is an abridged version of what was presented today. You can skip down to the bottom of today’s post to find a link to a story-teller presenting both creation stories should you wish to see it for yourself. “When God created everything, God said, “It is good.” And God put God’s own image in the creatures that walk on the earth. In the midst of creation was God’s wonderful garden. Everything was there and so close that it was all together. God was with the rocks and plants and animals, and they were with God and each other. All the people were also together in one person who was called “Everyone” or, in their language, “Adam”. Eve was there too. She was always there, for she came from Adam. She and Adam were a kind of Adam-Eve. In the middle of the garden grew two trees. God told Adam-Eve that they should not eat the fruit from these trees. One tree was about differences and one tree was about forever. If you ate the fruit of the tree of differences, you would know about differences, and if you ate from the forever tree, you would live forever. Now, the serpent was more clever than any other creature that the Lord God made. And he suggested that Adam-Eve taste the fruit from the tree of differences. And they did. Adam-Eve ate from the tree of differences and things fell apart for them. They became Adam and Eve. The difference between them and God also came apart. And the difference between good and evil did too. God called for them and they hid, but God found them. They did not know how to be with God anymore, because of the differences. There were: good and evil, close and far, high and low, God and people, Adam and Eve...and many more. The differences also did something wonderful. Now Adam and Eve could take things apart and put them back together again, becoming creators, almost like God. They couldn’t create something out of nothing, but they could create out of differences. After the differences, Adam and Eve couldn’t go back to when everything was all together in the Garden. They could only go forward and they did. God sent Adam and Eve out of the Garden. They couldn’t go back, they could only go forward. God went with them on their journey to help them be the best creators they could be, and to be with God in this new way, and to stay one with God.” The Wondering Today’s story was followed with the four standard wondering questions we tell after a sacred story. Beneath each I will share some of what we heard from the children today. I wonder what part of this story you liked best?
I wonder what part of the story was about you, or what part you were in?
I wonder what part was the most important?
I wonder if we could leave anything out of this story and still have all we need
Creative Response Time The kids dove right in to work today. We had painting, drawing, chalkboard work, modeling clay, reading, and story retelling all going on today. Some continued work began last week while others dove into working with today's story. Several began paintings and drawings of the Garden of Eden and couple of snakes and an apple were modeled from clay. After helping a few get out their materials, Hannah and I were able to largely observe the kids, take a few pictures, and whisper about how wonderful it was to see the kids focused and self directed an their own meaningful work. Restoring the Classroom I'll let the pictures speak for themselves. The kids did an amazing job today of restoring the room to it's original state. I just love seeing them work together to take care of our wonderful space. Praying Before Breaking "Bread" (okay - they were gluten free oreos today) We are still experimenting to find the best way to reorganize for our feast at the end of class. Today we passed the candle around and prayed before bringing out the snack. It is nice to see the the kids becoming more and more comfortable with each other and with this part of our time together. So much of what is wonderful about this program is the community it creates among the children - today it was nice to have plenty of time left for each child to offer a silent or spoken prayer, to share in our feast, and to spend some time just talking as we waited for parents to come pick everyone up. Check back next week for a blog about one of the new stories we were able to purchase this year - Noah and the Flood. The kids have been eyeing up on the shelf for weeks now. I'm looking forward to adding it to the mix next week. Thanks for reading. Please feel free to add comments or questions below - we'd love to know if and how Godly Play has come up outside of the Sunday School classroom or what other questions parents and visitors have for us. Also please visit our news and information page for information on how you can help support us in this work. Until next week, Genya Useful Links
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Godly Play TeamHannah Hannover, Minister to Children and Families and Genya Coffey, Christian Education Team Coordinator make up our current team of guides and storytellers. Both have attended workshops in order to receive certification from the Godly Play Foundation. They will take turns authoring the blog posts found here. Interested in joining the team? Be sure to let them know through the contact page. Archives
September 2016
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