Jai Roza is a born-again follower of Jesus Christ whose life was transformed by God's grace after a season of spiritual wandering and hopelessness. Once searching for meaning in alternative beliefs and facing the depths of despair, Jai encountered the life-changing love of God, setting him on a new path of faith, gratitude, and purpose.

Today, Jai uses his creative gifts to point others toward biblical truth through Eden's Conflict, a faith-inspired card game designed to encourage meaningful conversations about Scripture and the Christian walk. His passion is to help others discover the hope, redemption, and transformative power found in Jesus Christ, reminding them that no one is beyond God's reach and that He can make all things new.

https://www.edensconflict.com

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God chose us to have a conversation with us, his creation.

Our prayer is that this listening space brings growth and transforms your life forever.

Praise God for you, Jair Rosa.

It's a great pleasure to connect to you.

What part of the world are you in right now?

I'm in Southern California.

Why did you come to me, Jesus?

The first time I truly, I say, saw Christ for myself was the night I was planning to take my life.

And to make a long story short, that evening as I was sitting on my couch and deciding how I was going to end it all, I was 17 at the time.

And as I was sitting there and planning, I'm going to end it, I can choose to end my life, and I'm going to do that, that a friend calls from another state, and they just ask out of the blue, they're like, what are you doing right now?

And I told them, I said, I'm planning to take my life.

And they begin not to rebuke or to tell me why I shouldn't or talk me down, they simply began to pray, and to claim Scripture.

And it was in that moment, that as they're doing that, the spiritual world around me, like lit up for just a second.

While it's metaphorical, it was also very literal to me in that moment, because I was I was in a

place where I was practicing trying to see the spiritual world and interacting with spirits that

were not from God, that, that that sign that that light that overtook the room for a second

was enough that when I got off that phone call, I was convinced that there was something else out

there, some deity or power or, or thing that revealed itself to me, just to get my attention.

And I realized that I was facing a choice that I could either end my life, or I could choose to push on and try and see what that thing is, who, who was that deity that that entity that could reveal such power to me in that moment.

And I didn't come away from that conversation being like, well, it's, it's the God of the Bible, it's Christ, it's all, but it was enough to shift my focus, so that I went from pursuing a life of death, ultimately leading to death, to pursuing hope.

I look back on now, and I realized that that was the first time that I saw Christ was he is that that message, that hope that gives us something, something just beyond our sight to aim for.

And when we do that, when we choose to align ourselves to that hope, that is when we will ultimately end up discovering who he is and what he has to offer.

Hmm, how old are you now?

I'm 37 now.

So this has been 20 years.

How has life evolved since then?

I'm now happily married.

I have a wonderful wife who is very supportive of ministry.

I run a company called Eden's Conflict, where our whole mission is to teach, teach creative evangelism through gaming and like other creative aspects.

So we're trying to take, cultivate a love and passion for Scripture in different ways.

Our main product is a card game that I developed that teaches you how to use Scripture decisively.

So it's us playing the card game against the game, which represents the tempter.

And so we're using Scripture to battle the tempter.

So my whole life has gradually through that process become a pursuit of God to a degree where it's like, now, the way in which I pursue him even further is by teaching others how to be decisive to pursue him for themselves.

To help save other people's lives.

Yeah, that's exactly it's like, and it's not even that it's like, in a way, it's still selfish on my part, because it's like, the reason I teach others is so that I can have a greater and deeper appreciation for who Christ is.

And so there is that little bit of selfishness still in my heart that it's like, I want to know more about Christ.

But you know, if you love me, keep my commandments.

And the commandments is how we treat each other.

So it's like, even if we allow that, that side of ourselves allow that that selfish side of ourselves to desire Christ, it's like, you'll know when it's right, because the benefit is not just selfishness for yourself, but it's for the selfish uplifting of those around you.

And that is the biggest sign, I think the greatest miracle you'll ever see is the miracle of a transformed and changed heart.

And so to me, it's like, that's how I know that God is doing different things.

God is the one at work in me, because it's like the desire, even my selfish desires are shifting towards the improvement and uplifting of those around me.

And yeah, I'm fascinated by the evidence of Christ showing up, because the connection I've seen is that where he shows up or when he shows up is usually tied to your ministry.

I'm seeing clearly the fact that scripture and the importance of it has powered through from your life being saved to the card game being created.

What is the connection to gaming though?

Where did that power through as part of your purpose?

Sure.

So the reason I focused on gaming was twofold.

One, I had 2014, I had gone to an evangelistic program.

And it's a whole story on how I got there.

It was literally God opening doors.

But when I was graduating, I realized that I didn't want to be a traditional evangelist.

I didn't want to go just do series at churches and all of that.

And I felt kind of bad, because it's like, I just basically got a free scholarship, right, to go through this program.

And now I feel like I don't want to do it.

And so I'm having this conversation with God at the end of the program, and we had to choose a verse that was our key verse for like our graduation ceremony.

And so the verse that I found was Matthew 7.7, where it's asking, be given you seek and you shall find knock and the door shall be open.

And so I'm saying, God, what do I do with this?

Because I do want to serve you, but I don't feel motivated to serve you in the ways that I've learned and the stuff I've been studying and all of this aspects that I've just spent the last three months building up.

And so, but I felt confident that it was like, if I asked to serve him, he will guide me into that.

So I just said that I was like, God, whatever you want, you know, bring me into a place where I want to do what you want me to do.

You know, make me willing to be willing is another way of saying it.

And so I got home from the program.

And the day I got home, my brother was actually working on his own card game.

It was like a word based game, kind of one of those play on words, or if you combine different syllables or letters and stuff, and you can make points on however you score your words you get.

And so, as I'm sitting on the couch and listening to him explain some of the rules, I'm just kind of throwing out ideas and just saying, hey, here's something you could do, or you could have words that do this, blah, blah, blah.

Now, what was interesting about the evangelistic program, just a little backstory on was that I, as like part of the program that we as we finished it was we had to do an evangelistic series.

And I had been in charge for the previous month of the children's program.

But I had been given that role very last minute.

So every day I had to create a creative way to show what was being talked about in the main service for the kids.

And so my brain is fresh off this mindset of like creating things and sparking ideas.

And so as I'm sitting on the couch, and I'm hearing my brother create a game, and I'm throwing out ideas of how he could make stuff, that was kind of where the Spirit spoke to me and said, if you could only tell people about how God has used Scripture in your life, but the only way you could speak to them was through a series of instructions in a game, what would that look like?

And so that kind of began the question.

And that was to me a motivation because a lot of my life had been spent wasted in what I thought wasted in games, video games, card games, whatever.

It's like I felt like I didn't have the intellectual capacity to really be a minister for Christ because it's like I've wasted so much of my life.

And so when that question was posed to me, it's like, if you could only explain your life, your testimony, the way God delivered you using the Scriptures, but the only way you could talk to people was through a set of game instructions, what would that look like?

And that began my pursuit.

And the funny thing is like, I thought I had it solved, and I was like, oh, I'll know what to do in like a month.

Just give me a month, God.

I'll have this figured out.

I'm just going to work on this, and I can make something.

Well, a month later, I did have something, and I took it to my uncles, and it was actually Thanksgiving.

We were there as a family, and I was like, hey, you guys want to play this game I've been working on for the last month?

And it bombed.

Like there were so many holes in it.

And so that began, like that made me realize, okay, there's a little more to making games than I thought.

Like there's things you got to be aware of.

And it took seven years before the game was finally finished.

Whoa.

And so it was a journey of basically it became a part-time job over that seven-year period.

Towards the end of that time, my wife was like, look, either you need to do something with this game, because she had known me before I started it.

And as I'm like, continue to work on it through our marriage and all that.

She's like, you either need to do something with this game, or you just need to put it away.

And she says, if this is what you feel God is calling you to do, then I'll support you through this.

And she has.

She's like, you went to, you supported me while I went through school, I'll support you if this is the school that God needs to put you through.

And so that's why I say it's like, she's been, my wife has been such a love and support for this project.

And that was three years ago now.

So we're going on 10, actually 11 years now.

Whoa.

That I've been now in total working on this.

But the last three years have been me promoting it full time, where she's been able to support me as I try and figure out how to get this company off the ground.

And God really has.

There are so many, like I said, this is a much bigger story than just this episode.

But there are so many ways in which God has used this pursuit of Him.

And that's really what it comes down to, my desire to pursue Him.

God took the places where I desired to pursue Him, and He's used those time and time again, to teach, to inspire, and to, like, uplift me to His standard, and help me realize where I fall short, and how I can improve and how I can grow.

And so it along the way, it just became natural that it was like, you know, I have to teach this to others, I have to give this to others.

Five years from today, you're listening to this conversation, you would have heard the evolution of the 17 year old, to the married man, to the card game developer.

What's a message you'd leave for future you?

Never stop pursuing that which is just beyond your sight.

Like that to me is the biggest thing.

Every time I felt discouraged, and actually there's a quote that I think best summarizes it, it's like we have nothing to fear from the future, except that we should forget how God has led us in our past.

And every time I've been afraid, every time I've been let down, every time I've been distracted, or, you know, surrendered back to my past, it's because I've forgotten God, what He did in my past.

And basically, it's like I took my eye off Him.

But every time I've learned to refocus and to realign my sight to God, and that comes partially through the moments I can look back on and see where He was at work.

And, you know, like just conversations like this, where I'm able to share the way God worked in my life.

Yeah, that just changes that focus to, okay, I don't know what's coming next.

But I know it's just beyond my sight, just beyond my horizon.

And then all of a sudden, it's like, I've got testimony, I've got a history, I've got an experience that is like, oh, yeah, there it was.

And now what do I look for just beyond my sight, and it's always that pursuit of Christ is just beyond my sight.

But I will always always confirm you're pursuing Him, right, because you'll have a history of moments where you see Him in your life.

Hey, this has been an honor.

Before we leave, is there anything else you'd like to share?

I would just say that it's like, in today's world, I think we see the world is getting ready for something big.

There's something coming that I think is going to shake the foundation of a lot of people's faith.

And so regardless of what you see in the world, always learn to see your life from God's perspective.

Like, look to God first.

And again, like my own story says, I think it really goes to Peter, where it's like, when he kept his eyes on Christ, he walked on water.

The moment it says that he turned back and he looked back, his eyes got distracted by the waters around him, and then he began to think.

But even in that moment, he calls out to Christ, and Christ immediately seizes him by the hand.

So it's like, learn, make it your life pursuit to learn to see Christ.

Jai, a pleasure, I treasure.

Thank you for being on What Is Inspired by 12 and the Convoys.