We experience it a hundred different ways: It’s the call from the doctor telling us the tests are back, and it doesn’t look good. It’s the string of long nights spent at the office only to be passed over for the promotion. It’s the hurricane that wipes out half a city in an afternoon, and the political unrest that doesn’t seem to care who gets caught in the crossfire. It’s the marriage counseling that didn’t work; the guy who said he’d call but doesn’t; the pregnancy test that comes back negative; the child who’s losing her way—and we can’t do anything to stop it.
No one has to tell us. No one has to convince us. Something’s “off” in this world, and we know it. We feel it.
Between natural disasters, socio-political disruption, and personal disappointments, our lives hardly resemble the world of Genesis 1 and 2. And not without reason. While the first two chapters of the book of Genesis give us a glimpse of an idyllic paradise, only one chapter later paradise is lost.
Deceived by a snake and led by her own faulty thinking about God’s explicit command, Eve takes fruit from the tree of the knowledge of good and evil, eats it, and gives some to her husband (Genesis 3:1–6). A moment later, the open, perfect fellowship of Genesis 2, what made it possible for the man and his wife to stand before each other naked without a trace of shame, vanishes, and for the first time Adam and Eve use God’s creation to hide themselves, both from each other and from God (Genesis 3:7–8). Only four verses later, an already strained relationship is pushed to the limit as the man turns against God and his wife (v. 12). Before all is said and done, all of creation—the woman, the man, the earth—will suffer the effects of Adam and Eve’s sin (vv. 14–19). As Genesis 3 comes to an end, God drivesAdam and Eve out of the garden to make their life east of Eden.
It’s all too familiar, what we see in Genesis 3. And if all we were left with was a picture of a man and his wife broken by sin, it would be almost unbearable. But the thing about God is that he’s merciful. And so, in the midst of shame and hiding, blame and accusation, the pain of childbirth and the cursing of the ground, God made a promise, not to the man and not to the woman, but to the snake. God says, “Because you have done this . . . I will put enmity between you and the woman, and between your offspring and her offspring; he shall bruise your head, and you shall bruise his heel” (vv. 14–15). Wrapped in that promise we find the foreshadowing of the gospel—the good news that God would send someone who would set right what Adam and Eve’s sin had broken.
And God has been true to his word, moving heaven and earth to restore what was lost in Genesis 3. It is toward this movement of redemption that we now move.
For me, relationships feel beyond repair in my life. I feel disillusioned of the hope of a healthy partnership in the future based on the trauma and hurt, physical and mental, brought from relationships in the past. I feel myself questioning whether or not I have the circumstances, tools and sheer luck to find what I feel God wants for me and to sustain it. God, I know a partner is not a promise you’ve made to me, but I just want to trust you in this process and this time of my life. I pray Father that you can guide me into healthy relationships. I pray for the discernment to know what is for me and what isn’t, what you want for me and what you don’t. I pray that you can mend my body and my heart of the pain caused by poor choices and past partners. Father, heal me up and help me feel that I am whole, resting assuredly in your love. I love you and I trust you, Lord. In Jesus name I pray, Amen. <3
Kevin,
Sometimes it feels like the relationship with my mother is broken beyond repair. We lack closeness and connection. I will always honor and respect her but I desire to enjoy her company again. But there is a lack of trust in her actions, words and decisions. They often bring heartache and frustrations. This past year I have a new found trust in God’s promises. I am circling prayer around my relationship with my mother and trusting God can redeem all!
My children were raised in church and seen my relationship with thr Lord. They are intelligent and wise kids but choose to walk with God casually. I am praying for a full blown intimate relationship with the Lord on fire and sold out for His purposes. And trusting God for their spouses.
I have really bad depression and anxiety. I feel like I will not find a healthy relationship. So tired of being alone.
Every minute of every day!
The area of my life that I feel the most broken is my relationship with my spouse and God. I feel we are not having a similar relationship with each other and putting God at the center. It feels all one sided. I need to entrust God with my relationship in him. I need to entrust my prayers about my spouse and our relationship will be answered in God’s time, for he is God and he is good.
my family
I am blessed with a wonderful marriage of 8 years, children , and a Gospel-centered church. Being in these relationships revealed my sinful nature and my desperate need for a Savior. I see that I am impatient, quick to anger, always want to be right, selfish, insecure, unforgiving, prideful, envious, entitled, limited in love, and it’s embarrassing to say this, but sometimes I even want to retaliate my 3-year-old boy for what he does to me intentionally during a tantrum! Surely there are days I feel discouraged and hopeless about all these sins and brokenness in me, like, will I ever be free of them? Thanks to Jesus, He is a God of redemption and in Him I am a new creation. As long as I am on earth, I am in this sinful flesh, BUT sin no longer has victory over me! I can have hope, as I trust in a good, living, and faithful God.
My anxiety in stressful situations.