This may sound outrageous to some people, but I would argue that the Bible is the most powerful s "self help" book ever written. It is true that most self help books are all promise and polish and end up helping the author to royalties and speaking fees more than anything else, but when it comes to the power to really transform lives, the Bible stands in a league of its own. No one has improved upon it and no one can because it speaks to who we are, why we seem to be afflicted, what we yearn for and how we can bring about change for ourselves and for others. The Bible is more than a book of ancient history about a people seeking and finding a homeland; and it more than a series of laws and regulations set in place to bring order out of chaos, though it includes both of these features. In its essence, the Bible is the epic story of the human race; it is a story that reveals our origins but has not yet reached a conclusion. It is an ongoing story that touches on the heights and the depths of the human condition with all of its complexity and richness. And standing behind everything is an author, a Creator, who is intimately involved in every aspect of the narrative.

The Bible speaks of man's beginnings-of a tragic choice that broke the bond with the one who created us-and of the long and arduous journey toward the freedom that would release us from the consequences of that choice. As we come to know the depth and the breadth of this epic story, we begin realize that we too are players in this narrative rather than mere passive pawns resting in indifferent curiosity on the sidelines. The more we come to see the story this way, the more it begins to shine a clarifying light on our own journeys.

The biblical narrative opens on a world in the midst of formation with a life-giving garden at its center: "Now the Lord God had planted a garden in the east, in Eden, and there he put the man he had formed."(Genesis 2:8) The garden was designed to be a pleasant place for the man, a place he could enjoy and cultivate: "The Lord God took the man and put him in the Garden of Eden to work and take care of it."(Genesis 2:15) God planted all kinds of trees and brought beasts of the field for the man to name. And God created a companion for the man so that together the man and the woman would fulfill God's purposes for them. From the very beginning, God created the earth for man's cultivation and care. It was only when the man and the woman defied God's one prohibition that a very different story began to unfold. God commanded Adam not to eat the fruit of the tree of knowledge of good and evil, "for when you eat of it you will surely die." (Genesis 2:17)

And we know what happens. Adam and Eve, the first man and woman, are deceived into tasting the forbidden fruit of that tree and that one act leads to the penalty of death. Immediately, they become self aware; their eyes are opened to their own nakedness and they feel shame. Then, when God comes into the Garden, they both hide. It is not our knowledge of good that causes us to experience shame and fear; it is the knowledge of evil that causes us to seek shelter in dark and hidden places away from the searching light of God. "'The man has now become like one of us, knowing good and evil. He must not be allowed to reach out his hand and take also from the tree of life and eat, and live forever.' So God banished them from the Garden of Eden...." (Genesis 3:22-23)

The pattern was set: Human pride leading to conflict and division, and separation from eternal life. The setting of mankind's story moved from the fullness of the garden to the barrenness of the wasteland. And yet all around we could feel and see evidence of what had been lost.

The choice of Adam and Eve had universal consequences. Every generation that followed seemed to inherit the same characteristic of a warring and rebellious heart. From the beginning both our ancestors and we seemed torn by conflicting impulses to worship and rebel, to serve God and to serve ourselves. At the center of this new story is conflict, for where there was harmony, now we find discord and anxiety; where there was a sweet home, now we find confusion and exile; and where there was abundance, now we find hard labor and travail. One could sum up the rest of the story of mankind by saying it is a story of exile and loss, of sorrow and death with no way out but for the Grace of God. For it is through the revelation of that Grace that the way back becomes the path forward.

The original storyline set in the fullness and warmth of the garden was radically changed by one act of thoughtless defiance. The new story is the tale that culminated as a stupendous act of love on a cross on Calvary. Only through painful experience and God's Grace do we come to understand what Jesus meant when he said: "the Son of Man did not come to be served, but to serve, and to give his life as a ransom for many." (Matthew 20:28) All men and women once again could enter the original storyline that had its origin in Eden. God's love for man, even wayward man, is the central truth of the Bible. Reestablishing the original relationship between man and God is the central purpose of the life and death of Jesus Christ.

As we journey through life, even as we are just starting out, we seem to be on a journey of recovery as well as discovery. We are motivated because something precious has been lost and we want to find our way back to it with God's help. That is the biblical narrative in a nutshell and it is your narrative and mine as well. Job says, "How I long...for the days when God watched over me...Oh, for the days when I was in my prime, when God's intimate friendship blessed my house...."(Job 29:4) This universal sense of loss was reversed on Calvary, but up until that moment in history, the human story was written by the choice of Adam. Even as we wanderer in a wilderness of our own choices, God was always preparing a way out of the universal human dilemma. It opens with Abraham and culminates on a cross. It begins with an act of obedience and ends in obedience when one man takes the entire weight of wayward man upon himself, thus freeing all men to live in a loving relationship to the one who has always loved us. "God made him who had no sin to be sin for us so that in him we might become the righteousness of God." (2 Corinthians 5:21)