When God created people, he created Adam and Eve. They were created in God's image - perfect, creative and powerful. God charged them with looking after his creation. He made a garden of paradise for them to live in, where he brought all the animals to be named by them. In the evenings he went for walks together with them. This is how God intended things to be. In all of this paradise, God made only one rule for Adam and Eve - they must never eat from the tree of knowledge of good and evil. ^{Genesis 2}

After some time, Satan tempted Eve through a snake, saying "Did God really say you couldn't eat from the tree of knowledge of good and evil? Can't you see how good the fruit looks and that it will make you knowledgeable like God himself. God just wants to keep you from being like him." Eve considered his words and, seeing how good the fruit looked, took some and ate it. Immediately her eyes were opened as she gained understanding of good and evil - she encouraged Adam, who also ate the fruit.

Adam and Eve realized that they'd done wrong. They felt naked and tried to hide this by making clothes for themselves out of fig leaves. That evening, when God came for his usual walk with them, they hid, because they were ashamed about what they'd done - they'd betrayed his trust and polluted his creation and allowed Satan to have authority over them and all creation.

God was angry. He kicked Adam and Eve out of the garden so that they would not be able to eat from the tree of eternal life. Men would have to work hard to grow food, women would have great pain in giving birth and snakes would have no legs and would crawl on their bellies. God made snakes and people enemies, saying that the snake would pierce a person's foot and a person would crush the snake's head. This was in fact the first prophecy of the coming saviour, whose foot would be pierced with a nail, but Satan's authority would be crushed.

God helped Adam and Eve cover their nakedness with clothes made from sheep skins. He was still there for them, but as a loving father, he pulled through with the consequences of his children's actions. To cover their sin a sheep had to die - wherever there is sin; it can only be covered by death. As a consequence of Adam and Eve's rebellion, sin entered the world and through Adam's rebellion, he ceded his authority over all creation to Satan, causing natural catastrophes to occur and bringing all kinds of sickness and ultimately death. However, God had a plan for restoring people to him. For the next four thousand years, people would sacrifice animals to cover their sin, but this was not enough. The only thing that could cover sin for all time would be the death of a person who had never sinned. That would be the role of the saviour that God would send in Jesus Christ. ^{Genesis 3}

Adam and Eve had two sons - Cain and Abel. One day Cain was so upset with his brother that he decided to kill him. Adam and Eve had more children who had children of their own. It seems with each generation, they became more and more violent and evil. Eventually when God looked at his creation, he was really sad - so sad that he decided to destroy it all and start again. ^{Genesis 4}