Story Producer 007 - Leopards kill v1

Title ideas:
Small leopards become big leopards, and big leopards kill.
Small animals become big!
Small sins grow!

One cool evening, a group of young men gathered around a fire to tell stories. One of them, named Daudi*, began to speak.
[*Use a local name throughout the story.]

[Daudi said,] “The story I will now tell you involves a leopard [large wild cat], a Chief, and a double riddle which you must wait for at the end and try to answer [understand the meaning].”
And so, Daudi began his story.

One morning a man called Simon* took his spear and left the village early to go hunting. People in the village had seen a huge leopard in the past few weeks, and Simon wanted to get the prized skin for himself. [*Use a local name throughout the story.]

But the leopard saw the brave warrior first and hid among the rocks and waited for his own surprise attack.

As the winds changed direction, Simon caught the smell of the leopard. He could feel that there was danger nearby. When he looked back, he saw the leopard stalking him. "Oh no!"
Simon drew back his spear and aimed it.

The leopard jumped to attack Simon! But the warrior was strong and experienced. He rushed forward and speared the leopard in the heart. [chest].

When Simon saw that the leopard was dead, he sat down to cut off the beautiful skin. As he was removing the skin he heard another noise and looked around, sensing danger. He became tense! Was there another leopard?

Simon calmed himself and cautiously looked around. Ha, with relief, he saw that it was just a baby of the leopard he had killed. He put a rope around the little leopard’s neck and tied him to a bush.

Simon finished taking the skin off the big leopard, threw the skin over his shoulder, and said to the baby leopard, “Come on, Little Leopard, I'm taking you to the village for the children to play with."

When Simon reached the village, the children came running to see the baby leopard. They all laughed and giggled and patted him, saying, “Aaww … Little Baby Leopard is so soft and beautiful.“

Little Leopard was so small that Simon could hold him with one hand.

And he had the kindest [softest] eyes in the jungle!

The Chief came to see why the children were so happy and making such a big noise.

When the Chief saw the baby leopard, he thought to himself, “That leopard is small now and can do little harm. But little leopards grow big. And big leopards kill!”

The Chief said to Simon, “Give me the leopard and let me kill him."
But Simon said, “Ah, leave it alone. Little leopards can do no harm! Let the children play with him, and he will stay in my house. We will only feed him milk and porridge. He won't hurt the children."
And the children all cried to let Little Leopard be their pet.

Finally, the Chief allowed Simon and the children to have their own way because they insisted. But he knew it would be better to kill the little leopard before he got bigger and more dangerous.

The children gave Little Leopard milk [from a goat or cow] and porridge every day, and he grew fatter.

As each day went by, Little Leopard grew bigger and bigger...

... and he grew BIGGER!

When Leopard was grown, the children climbed on his back and rode around on him. They enjoyed playing with Little Leopard!

The Chief kept telling the people, “Kill the leopard!"
Some of the women in the village began to be afraid.

Then one day, one of the children was running along and fell over [on] a stump. His leg began to bleed. “Oh!” the boy cried because his leg was painful!

Leopard jumped down from the tree where he was sleeping and tenderly [gently] licked the blood from the child's leg.

When Leopard tasted the blood, he got a strange, confused feeling inside himself, and his eyes took on a fierce red look. He began to walk away.

Leopard went back to the village, stalking slowly, until he reached Simon's house.

Simon was in his house making arrows when he heard a noise and a growl. Simon tried to protect himself, but it was too late.

Leopard jumped at Simon and attacked him. The people heard Simon scream and ran away from the village into the bush [jungle / trees]. They were very afraid! [Make screaming sounds.]

When the Chief heard the people screaming and running, he grabbed his spear and his knife, thinking, “I warned Simon that this would happen. But he was deceived by kind eyes.”

And so the Chief ran, but when he reached the house, Leopard had already killed Simon.

Now, Leopard turned his angry eyes and saw only the Chief. When the leopard jumped to attack the chief, the Chief planted his spear on the ground and hoped it would not break when the leopard came down on it.

But the spear did break! So the Chief fought with the leopard, wrestling to kill the killer. The strong angry leopard scratched and bit the Chief many times. Finally, the Chief pulled out his knife and stabbed the leopard until the leopard died.

After Leopard was dead, the people stopped being afraid. There was peace and calm once again. The Chief had saved the people in the village from the danger.

At the end of the story Daudi said to the men sitting around the fire, “Warriors, do you understand? Simon did not listen when the Chief told him that small leopards become big leopards, and big leopards kill.

“And now I ask you, what is the lesson of the story of Little Leopard?"
One of the warriors said, “The meaning is this: the little bad things we do lead to big sins and sins -- big or small -- are dangerous."

Then Daudi said, “You have answered correctly. Let us also be careful to never say that the little bad things we do are harmless."

Daudi asked them another question, “And who can we compare the Chief to? What is the meaning of the Chief in our story?"

One warrior answered, “We say that the Chief who saved the village [people] is like Jesus. Jesus is our Savior. Jesus saves us from our sins."

"YES!-He was wounded instead of us. Because He was wounded, we are safe [saved from eternal death]. As the Bible says, Jesus took the punishment for our sins, and by His scars [caused from the beating, nails and spear when he was nailed to a wooden cross] we are saved!”