Can Jesus Affect My Life?

As a youth worker, I’ve had the privilege of speaking to thousands of people about my faith. I’ve loved all the interaction, all the light-hearted debates and I've loved all the questions. I’ve literally been asked every question under the sun... About my clothes, about my love life, about heaven, about hell, about aliens; even Santa! And more often than not I'm going to be asked about the story of creation and about Adam and Eve. And I can understand the intrigue because if you've ever read the first book of the Bible, Genesis, about the story of creation, the details can be a little bit confusing. God created the world in six days. 'Six days? Are you having a laugh? Have you seen the size of this place?' At the end of the 6th day he made Adam and Eve and put them in the Garden of Eden. Did they have belly buttons? Why would they? How did they explain their belly buttons to their kids?! It’s written that in the Garden there was a tree of the knowledge of good and evil and that they weren’t allowed to eat from it. Was it an apple? Why do we always think it’s an apple? It doesn’t say that anywhere in the Bible! Maybe it was a pear. Or a mango. Or a Pa - pi - ya! Then one day, a talking snake came out of the woods and tempted Adam and Eve to eat from the tree... And this talking snake was able to create doubt in the minds of Adam & Eve to get them to question the Goodness of God, and convince them that God was holding back on them. So Adam and Eve went against what God asked of them, ate from the tree and 'their eyes were opened'. This was the moment that guilt entered the world. They realized that they were naked, were overcome with shame and ran into the woods to hide. Now Christians from around the world disagree on how to interpret this story. To some, it happened literally as it was written. Others will say that the first few chapters of Genesis are written in the style of poetry and therefore can’t be read literally. The reason why I read Genesis and learn from it is the reason I believe it was written in the first place. It’s not a science textbook. It was written to tell us about the nature of God, why he created us and the relationship that we have with him. You see, whether you believe this story is literal or not, I believe what happened to Adam and Eve is true today. As in I know what it's like to want to hide. I know that feeling of shame when I mess up. I know what it's like to pretend to be something I'm not so that the world won't know what I'm truly like. But why do we feel this way? Why is it sometimes so hard to let go of our failures? Why is it so hard to do the right thing, or even to forgive others? Why do we struggle with this inner brokenness which causes disconnection - from ourselves, from others, and from God. Was humanity always like this? How did God intend to create us? What were Adam and Eve like before they ate from that tree and ran into the woods? We’re told they were made perfect in the image of God, that they felt absolutely no shame and walked side by side with God himself. And so if we are also made in the image of God, then we need to grasp God's nature so that we can understand ourselves better. The problem is that God is a bit of a mystery, the good kind. God is three-in-one, meaning Father, Son and Holy Spirit. God is a self-contained community that desires to create and share. And I think when humanity is at its best it reflects the image of God, like when we create great works of art and achieve technological developments. Even think of parents who long to have the love between them shared with a growing family. That’s why, before God created Eve, he said, ‘It is not good for man to be alone.' Because God made us to be known, to be seen, to be accepted, to love and be loved. And that's what ‘Jesus has to do with me’. It’s not my desire to be super religious, it’s about what God has to say about what and who I am. And I need this because I struggle to believe these things. I struggle to believe that I'm accepted, to let myself be known, loved, and even forgiven. And I’m pretty sure I’m not alone in that either.