Growing Up Is Learning What To Want (Genesis Part 7)

Ever stood in the supermarket sweet aisle, paralysed by choice? Jenny Mariner knows that feeling. She once took her five-year-old to choose any chocolate bar he wanted - what should have been a treat ended with him lying on the Co-op floor, screaming.

"Choices can be overwhelming," Jenny reflected as she unpacked this week's message on Genesis 3. And if a simple sweet selection can reduce us to tears, what about the bigger choices we face? The ones that shape our character, our relationships, our very souls? Jenny argues that the ancient story of the forbidden tree isn't about God being mean - it's about learning the most important skill of all: knowing what we should actually want.

When Wanting Goes Wrong

Before diving into solutions, we need to understand what's really happening when our desires lead us astray. Jenny painted a picture that hits uncomfortably close to home: we see something we want, we convince ourselves we need it more than we need God, and then we take it.

"We get to the point of thinking I need that thing more than I need God," Jenny explained, holding up a plastic apple she'd borrowed from someone's desk. It's probably not happening with actual fruit these days, but the pattern remains unchanged - whether it's approval, success, relationships, or security.

The serpent in Genesis 3 doesn't tempt Eve with something obviously evil. He misrepresents God's character, painting him as withholding rather than generous. "Did God really say you must not eat from any tree?" he asks, twisting God's abundant provision into apparent stinginess. Then comes the lie: "You will not certainly die."

Sound familiar? The whisper that says God's boundaries are about restriction rather than protection. That what you want right now matters more than what God says is best.

God's Framework for Good Choices

Here's where Jenny's Karate Kid analogy (despite admitting she'd never actually seen the film) becomes brilliant. The student wants to learn karate to fight bullies, but the teacher gets him to wax cars and paint fences. The kid thinks he's just doing chores until he realises those exact movements are the foundation of the karate he needs.

"Adam and Eve need the knowledge of good and evil," Jenny explained, "but they don't get it by just taking it from the tree. They get it by learning when to say no and when to listen to God."

The tree wasn't God being vindictive - it was spiritual wax-on-wax-off. Learning wisdom isn't about taking what we want when we want it. It's about developing the muscle memory of trust, the daily practice of saying "your will be done" even when our desires pull us elsewhere.

Jenny pointed to Jesus in the wilderness, hungry after 40 days of fasting, offered bread by the devil. Unlike Adam and Eve, Jesus chose God's sustaining word over immediate satisfaction. "Food feeds him for a day, but God sustains our lives eternally."

Making It Real

So how does this ancient wisdom translate to modern life? Jenny got refreshingly honest about her own journey. She shared about a relationship in her student days where she'd pray "God, I just want your will for my life" whilst carefully keeping the option of ending the relationship off the table.

"It's like I was taught you just have to pray something and then it will magically happen," she reflected. "But we've got our own will, haven't we?"

The transformation comes through what Jenny called "dying to self" - not a dramatic one-time event, but daily choices that slowly reshape our desires:

• Getting out of bed to read Scripture instead of scrolling for five more minutes
• Choosing prayer over Netflix when we're tired
• Sometimes fasting to teach our bodies that we don't have to satisfy every desire immediately
• Learning to hear God's voice in the ordinary moments

"Day by day you're just learning how to walk with God," Jenny explained. "Then when you hit that big decision, you're not suddenly going 'help me know your will' - you're already in the habit of walking with God."

Conversation Street Insights

The Paradox of Choice in Daily Life

When conversation moved to practical application, someone raised the "jam experiment" - a psychology study showing that shoppers bought less jam when offered 32 flavours instead of 6. With thousands of daily choices, how do we apply biblical principles to decisions Scripture doesn't directly address?

"The longer I've been a Christian, the easier I've found those choices," Jenny responded. "God has slowly taught me about how he thinks and who he is." She compared it to marriage - after years with someone, you know whether they'll appreciate broccoli or not.

The key isn't having a biblical rule for every decision, but developing such familiarity with God's character that you naturally align with his heart.

Who Was Weaker - Adam or Eve?

An interesting theological debate emerged about whether Adam or Eve bore more responsibility. Jenny pointed out a disturbing pattern that runs through Genesis: "Passive husbands exposing their wives to harm."

Adam wasn't off working in his shed when Eve encountered the serpent. Scripture makes clear he was "with her." His silence during the temptation, his failure to protect or speak up, his eventual participation - it all points to what Jenny called being "silently complicit."

"Six of one and half a dozen of the other," she concluded, though the pattern of passive male leadership would continue through Abraham and beyond.

What Really Changes

Jenny's balloon analogy captured something profound about human transformation. She held up a deflated balloon - recognisably a balloon, but "not living its best balloon life." Only when filled does it become what it was designed to be.

"We're all humans, but how do we live as best we possibly can? It's by allowing the Holy Spirit to fill us. This is the balloon being the best that the balloon can be."

The invitation isn't to become something other than human, but to become fully human - the humans we were designed to be when filled with God's Spirit and aligned with his purposes.

Your Next Steps This Week

Jenny's message calls for practical response, not just intellectual agreement:

Start small with daily surrender - Choose one area where you'll practice saying "your will be done" instead of automatically following your desires.

Develop God-awareness habits - Whether it's morning Scripture reading, conversational prayer throughout the day, or fasting from something that dominates your attention.

Practice healthy self-questioning - When you want something intensely, pause and ask: "Do I need this more than I need God?"

Build Christian community - Surround yourself with people who can help you discern God's voice and hold you accountable to his wisdom.

Remember the bigger picture - As Jenny put it: "The one thing we take from this physical life into the next is our relationship with God."

The Long Game

Jenny's story about her student relationship revealed something crucial about repentance - the longer we delay making the right choice, the harder it becomes. What starts as a simple "no" to God can develop into patterns that require much more dramatic intervention later.

But here's the hope woven throughout this message: God isn't interested in our perfection, but our participation in relationship with him. The tree in the garden wasn't a trap - it was an invitation to trust. Every choice we face today carries the same invitation.

Growing Into Who We're Meant To Be

Why did God put that tree in the garden? Same reason the karate teacher made his student wax cars - we learn wisdom not by taking what we want, but by learning when to say yes and when to say no.

"We're not made as robots," Jenny concluded. "We're made for relationship with him."

Growing up really is learning what to want. And what we're meant to want, ultimately, is God himself - his will, his way, his wisdom shaping our desires until what we want aligns with what he wants.

The plastic apple on Jenny's desk was a perfect prop after all. Sometimes the most ordinary objects carry the deepest truths: that every choice we make is a chance to grow up a little more, to want what's truly worth wanting.