Basic Bible Stories To Get Started in Bible Story Telling

Many people coming to this blog for the first time are looking for a set of basic bible stories to tell.

The issues in either the pre-Christian third world or the post-Christian west is that the people we are talking to have no biblical framework for accepting the message of Jesus Christ as "Good News".

That happens when people have their understanding of the Bible as a whole either created for the first time or recreated.

Now when you get into the texts written by professionals in the field of Bible Story Telling like Jack Day, you'll learn that the actual choice of stories to tell your unreached people group should be influenced by the world view of the particular group you're reaching. For instance, some cultures would hear the story of Cain and Abel and cheer for Cain because they glorify homicide. So that's a story that you'd tell later after establishing enough spiritual context for them to understand it. (In this bible story telling sequence it's omitted because they have a limited time in their "program year" and needed to complete a Bible survey in 35 weeks!)

So this list might need some tweaking and you want to study Jack Day's texts to modify what you're doing. But to get started, here's a list from a church in Idaho, US. They're using it with their mid week small groups and doing story telling.


God’s Redemptive Story
1. Creation-Genesis 1:1 to 2:3
2. Man and woman-Genesis 2:4-2:25
3. Fall-Genesis 3
4. Noah and the flood-Genesis 6:11 to 9:17
5. Tower of Babel and Abrams Call-Genesis 11-12:9
6. Abraham and Isaac-Genesis 22:1-19
7. Joseph-Genesis 37-46
8. Burning Bush-Exodus 3
9. Passover and Exodus-Exodus 11:4-14:31
10. The 10 Commandments-Exodus 19:1-20:21
11. Spies in the promised land-Numbers 13: 1-14:41
12. Joshua at Jericho-Joshua 6
13. David and Goliath-1 Samuel 17
14. Everlasting Kingdom-II Samuel 7
15. Prophets of Baal-1 Kings 18
16. The people of God in Exile Daniel 3: 1-30
17. Promise of the Messiah-Isaiah 6:1-8, Tell: Isaiah 53
18. Jesus is born-Luke 2:1- 20
19. Baptism/Temptation of Jesus-Matthew 3:1-4:1-11
20. Jesus Calls the disciples-Luke 5
21. Jesus heals the paralytic-Mark 2:1-12
22. Woman at the well-John 4:1-42
23. Sheep, Silver & the Prodigal-Luke 15
24. Peter’s Confession of Christ-Matthew 16:13-28
25. Zacchaeus-Luke 19:1-10
26. Last Supper-Luke 22:1-24, John 13:1-17, Luke 22:35-38
27. Garden/Betrayal-Matthew 26: 36-56
28. Trial and Crucifixion-Matthew 27: 11-56
29. Resurrection-Luke 24:1-49
30. Ascension/Great Commission- Acts 1:1-14
31. Pentecost-Acts 2
32. Persecution-Acts 3:1-31
33. Paul’s call-Acts 9:1-31
34. Cornelius-Acts 10:1-48
35. Judgment and Heaven-Rev 20:11-22:7

You can see these in book mark forms at their website.

They also have many free resources for Bible Story Telling here. If you scroll down the page, you can hear the stories being told.