In the beginning God created the heavens and the earth. the earth was without form and void and darkness moved across the face of the earth and God said "Let there be light" and there was light.
several verses later, after going through the creation of the plants and animals and finally Adam and Eve, He created a garden. A paradise where Adam and Eve were free to do whatever they wanted EXCEPT eat of the tree of the knowledge of good and evil. They lived there for a while, the Bible doesn't say how long. Then the serpent came along and convinced Eve to eat and she gave it to Adam and he ate and their eyes were opened and saw that they were naked. So they covered themselves and hid themselves when God came calling them. They "confessed", that is they blamed somebody else for their sin. Adam blamed Eve and Eve blamed the serpent. All were punished Adam and Eve were cast from the garden, from Paradise, to struggle to survive.
Ever since that time, man has been trying to get back to Paradise. Man cannot find Paradise unless he lets God lead him/her to it. And the way back to Paradise is through God's son who died for our sins and was risen 3 days later showing that if we confess our sins to Him, He will forgive us and cast our sins as far away as the east is to the west.
Now there''s a hitch to all this. You may have accepted Jesus as your Lord and Saviour, and you are destined to go to Paradise, but you still have to live IN this world and deal with the daily grind and hardships that we all have to deal with so you think "some Paradise. I'm still suffering, I'm still in debt to my ears and the kids don't listen and every time it looks like we are getting ahead, something happens to knock us to our knees again." You cannot help some of that. You may not be able to take care of any of it. Maybe all you can do is watch and pray to God that He helps you through it all. Guess what. He will. He hears our prayers, our groaning and pleas for help and He helps. All we have to do, as children of His, is to trust Him.
Through Jesus, we can reenter Paradise and it is through the Grace and Mercy of God that He sent His only son to be the ultimate sacrifice for our sins. If you have received Jesus as your Lord and Saviour, then welcome to Paradise.
