Genesis as the Story of Every Human Life: Part 3

A part of the ‘On Second Thought‘ series

By: Ezra Nadav

Previously in the Series:

In Part 1: Conception and Innocence, we began with Eden — a symbol of our earliest beginnings, when we live in unconscious trust, gifted goodness, and untested belonging. It is a time before shame, before striving. A time we are destined to leave, but not to forget.

In Part 2: Knowledge and Estrangement, we explored what it means to awaken to consequence. Adam and Eve’s eyes are opened, Cain strikes Abel, and we are introduced to the painful tension of freedom. Innocence is lost, replaced by moral agency, and the ache of separation. This stage is marked not by simplicity, but by complexity, where the self is no longer protected — it is responsible.

Now, in Part 3, we come to the long, uneven work of becoming someone.

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Covenant and Identity: Becoming a Self

If Genesis begins with paradise and continues through loss, it is here that it starts to ask:

What will you do with what you now know?
Who are you becoming, and whose are you?

The story of Abraham begins not in perfection, but in movement.
He is called to leave his father’s house, his homeland, everything familiar.
He is not given a complete vision, only a direction.

“Go to the land that I will show you.” (Genesis 12:1)

This is the first moment in scripture when someone steps into the unknown not out of punishment, but promise. It is the beginning of covenant, a sacred relationship based not on what has been, but what might be.

In human development, this mirrors the moment when we begin to live beyond the expectations of others.

We form identities not just as responses to loss or pain, but as choices.
We ask not only “What have I suffered?” but “What do I stand for?”
Who am I, not in reaction, but in intention?

Yet identity is never formed without struggle.

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The God of My Father, Or My Own?

Isaac follows Abraham, but his journey is quieter, more internal. He redigs his father’s wells. He tries to sustain legacy. He is often seen as passive, but perhaps Isaac reflects something deeper: the attempt to hold faith and identity in place after disruption. To stabilise, before something new can be born.

Then comes Jacob, the one who wrestles. From birth he struggles, with his brother, with his name, with his own sense of self.

He deceives. He runs. He contends. And then, alone in the night, he is met by a stranger and refuses to let go until he receives a blessing.

“What is your name?” the man asked. “Jacob,” he replied.
“Your name will no longer be Jacob,” the man told him. “From now on you will be called Israel, because you have struggled with God and with humans and have overcome.” (Genesis 32:27–28)

This is the turning point.

Not the end of struggle, but the beginning of identity formed through it.

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What Does It Mean to Be Called?

To be called is not to be perfect. It is to be in process, to be bound in relationship, to walk forward with purpose even when the path is unclear.

In covenant, we move from being cared for to being responsible to. We begin to live for something, and in doing so, our lives gain shape.

Abraham is not praised for arriving. He is praised for going. Jacob is not loved because he is morally pure, but because he fights to become someone real.

In this part of the journey, we are invited to do the same.

This is the long middle stretch of life:
where we make choices that shape our name,
where we try to walk with integrity,
where faith becomes something personal, not just inherited,
where struggle is not a sign of failure, but the very path of becoming.

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The Inner Shift

Just as the Genesis narrative slows down to follow individual lives, Abraham’s doubts, Isaac’s silence, Jacob’s wrestling, our own lives begin to take on depth through detail.

There is no single “moment” when identity is achieved. But there are many moments when it is tested. Moments when we are asked, not “What do you believe?” but “Who are you, really, when the blessing seems far off?”

This is the work of covenant. Not a contract, but a commitment to show up in the becoming. To stay in the tension. To keep naming and renaming what we value and who we are becoming.

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Coming Next:

In Part 4: Dreams and Detours, we enter the life of Joseph, where identity is put to the test through abandonment, injustice, and delay.

It is the story of a dreamer whose path winds through prison cells and palaces, betrayal and redemption.

As Joseph matures, we begin to ask: What happens when purpose is real, but unreachable?

Can we still live faithfully in seasons of silence? And how do we hold on to the thread of meaning when everything we planned for falls apart?

Shalom Aleichem