Its crazy how a simple passage of scripture can really get you thinking about your life, and about God’s true character. This morning I forced myself out of bed, decided to go back to bed because I was too tired, and then mentally slapped myself and got back up. After that tumultuous episode with myself I decided to break open a new Bible study that I recently discovered through Instagram. It breaks the Bible down into two study books: one being for the Old Testament, and the other being for the New Testament.

I have done several studies and devotions in the past, but have had a difficult time finishing them or just sticking to them consistently. If you know me closely, then you know that I love to write… but that I hate to read. Well, I don’t HATE it, I just can’t keep myself and my mind still and focused for the duration that reading requires. That probably explains why I am such a game nerd, and why I was recently officially diagnosed with ADHD. But this study really drew my attention and I just had to give it a go.

The author, Zach Windahl, has quite an amazing and relatable testimony. He was a college student who, like me, became a product of today’s society. He got his Bachelors because he was told he needed it to succeed in life, worked relentlessly on projects that never fully came to fruition, and ended up broken and confused with life and all that he thought he had accomplished.

Who else reading this blog feels similarly to this guy? My initial thought was “Wow, been there done that. Now what, right?” He describes how he let others tell him what he was going to be or what he should be, and that he always struggled figuring it out for himself. So because he couldn’t figure it out, he went with what other people demanded he should be… and their demands were high. That encapsulates me and my life journey perfectly, right up until I graduated from college.

Right off the bat I was like, “Okay, this guy really gets me.” I remember the phone conversation that I had with family when I was an impressionable and undeclared freshman in college like it was yesterday. I have always loved to write, and I have always been good at writing, grammar, and the like. But I remember most of my family telling me, “Summer, you need to do something that is going to make you money. Being a writer won’t support you enough, go with a more reliable major… something you can do something with.” So, faced with my own insecurities, confusion about what I wanted to be, and fear of failure later on in life, I listened to voices instead of God’s voice. Honestly, I still do. Which brings me into Genesis.

I have always had questions about the events in Genesis. Not necessarily about the creation of Earth, but about why God decided to create man. Some of my questions have been the following:

1. Why did God create man if he knew that he would disobey from the start and have to be banished from paradise and spend his life in agony away from God?
2. Why put a tree in the Garden of Eden and tell man not to eat from it? Isn’t it obvious that the man is going to eat from it just out of sheer stupidity and curiosity? I mean, he was just created, how smart can he be?
3. How is satan allowed in the Garden of Eden? Was he supposed to tempt them all along to get them to fall into sin, or would Adam and Eve have done that on their own?

These are questions that have always been in the back of my head whenever I read Genesis, and when I reread Chapters 1-4 today, they were still there. Let me just preface this with this: I think it is completely okay to question the Bible and want answers to questions, but as a Christian we also have to understand that some questions will never be fully answered, or even answered at all. God asks us to trust and have faith in Him, and I trust and have faith in Him regardless of my questions.

But some things did come to light to me today regarding my lingering questions. Through my study I realized firstly that God longs for a relationship with His creation. He wants us to CHOOSE Him, and He wants us to want to choose Him. If we don’t get to choose Him, then we aren’t choosing out of love; we are choosing because its the only option, or out of fear. That answers my question about satan in the Garden of Eden. Not only was it a test of obedience, but it was also a choice that God was giving them, which was the choice to follow Him, or not.

Secondly, I noticed that God does not hold back in Genesis when it comes to lavishing everything on man, which is His ultimate creation. He wants the best for us, and He wants us to be happy, succeed, and thrive. BUT, we were designed to succeed WITH Him, not apart from Him. That is how we were made, and as a Christian this is an extremely important and fundamental fact that I am really 100% realizing today. A part from him, we are nothing.

However, a part of me still struggles with question number one. If Adam was destined to fall from the start, then why create us at all? I think I can mostly answer it now though. Its because God wants to show His love even more to us in our sin and rebellion. He wants us to realize what life is like without Him, so that we learn to love Him even more when we rely on Him and put our faith and trust in Him. For all the beauty there was in the Garden of Eden, nothing is as beautiful as what God did to save His creation from sin, and ultimate death. I think this following quote that I wrote down from a sermon I watched this recent Sunday pretty much sums it up: “I am thankful for my struggle because without it I wouldn’t have discovered my strength”.

Without the struggle, we don’t get the deep, intimate relationship that we so longly desire above anything else with God. All of our struggles here on Earth point to Him, His love, His forgiveness, His grace, and His mercy. He wanted us to see what life without Him would be like when we chose to go without him so that we would come to love and desire Him even more after we fell. We may have been doomed to fail, but Christ was ready from the very beginning to make a way for us to come back to Him regardless because of His love for us.

When I was reading the passage where Adam and Eve have the insanely short dialogue with the serpent I was like, “Wow, that took like 2 seconds, what morons. They were convinced that easily? Sheesh at least think it through. I wouldn’t have eaten that stupid fruit. Thanks a lot for the pain in childbirth Eve.” I mean, couldn’t they have gone to God and asked Him why the tree was off limits instead of listening to a random serpent?

But then I realized that I make the Adam and Eve decision every day. I choose whether to seek Him, trust Him, and obey His calling for us Christians to live close to Him, or go my own way and see how it turns out. You would think by now that I would have learned my lesson, but I am still the moron who usually looks at the day and goes, “Okay time to work and get my list done” without even a thought of what God might have for me that day.

Its not like bad things will happen all at once, but you get worn out and burnt out super easily, just like the author of the Bible study did. For some it may take a while and they will be happy at first with their own way, but they will eventually end up in misery wondering where their life went. For others they will notice it right away and want to get on track, but then they will quickly get blown off the track by life. For some, they will live their whole lives their way and think that their way creates meaning, but will ultimately fail to produce anything of real meaning. I think I am that second person all the time.

I am glad that I can admit that though and get back on track. Thats why Jesus died, so that we could have every chance we would ever need to come back to Him. Although I feel so weak all the time, and I feel like I am constantly failing others and myself, I know that Gods power can and will shine the brightest through me if I can only keep my focus on Him. Even when our focus isn’t on Him, He still never leaves us, and knows when we will come back out of our little self-centered worlds. Its the coming back that is the best part, because thats when I remember that I already have what truly matters and that it can never be taken away. Striving in this world and constantly stressing about worldly success doesn’t matter at all. What matters is an intimate relationship with Christ, and with others. Our ultimate goal as Christians is to share the Gospel with others so that they can find their way back to Jesus too.

You will never hear me say that living close to Jesus is easy. For me, its a constant uphill battle. But I hope that my journey and experiences will inspire those who are reading, and if anything just remind you that you aren’t alone in how defeated and worthless you may feel sometimes.

Just remember, like I am remembering today, that God is for you, loves you, and wants to have an intimate relationship with you. We have a relational God, who has paved a way for us to be with Him in Eden again someday. Let that be the reason you wake up and stay up today. 🙂