REFLECTIONS - The Story Behind The Story

“I have set before you life and death… therefore choose life.”
— Deuteronomy 30:19

Love without choice is not love at all.

From the very beginning, Scripture reveals a God who desires relationship—not obedience born of force, but devotion born of love. And love, by its very nature, requires freedom.

In the Garden, God placed a tree.

Not because He wanted humanity to fail—but because He wanted humanity to choose.

The presence of the tree was not a trap; it was an invitation. An opportunity for trust. A declaration that obedience would be meaningful because disobedience was possible.

Without choice, there is no love.
Without freedom, there is no faith.

This truth carries through all of Scripture.

God allows humanity to choose—again and again—not because He delights in rebellion, but because He honors the dignity of genuine relationship (Deuteronomy 30:19).

The cost of that freedom is real.
So is the love that makes it worthwhile.

Love That Risks Rejection

God did not create humanity to control them.
He created humanity to know them.

Again and again, Scripture shows God allowing choices that grieve Him—yet never abandoning His people in the aftermath of those choices.

Israel chose idols. God pursued.
David chose sin. God restored.
Peter chose denial. Jesus redeemed.

At no point did God revoke humanity’s freedom.
Instead, He absorbed its cost.

The greatest example of this truth stands at the Cross.

Jesus was not forced into sacrifice.
He chose it (John 10:17–18).

Love always chooses the cost.

Freedom Fulfilled, Not Removed

The Resurrection does not erase choice—it redeems it.

Through Christ, humanity is not stripped of freedom, but invited into a greater one. Freedom no longer defined by fear of death, but by life in the Spirit (Romans 8:1–2).

God does not coerce obedience.
He transforms hearts.

The same God who allowed choice in the Garden now offers new life through choice in Christ:

“Choose this day whom you will serve…” (Joshua 24:15)

The invitation remains.
The dignity remains.
The love remains.

A Closing Thought

Freedom was never humanity’s curse.
It was the cost of love.

God did not miscalculate when He gave it.
He paid for it.

From Eden to the Cross to the Resurrection, the story has always been the same:

A God who risks rejection
to gain relationship,
who allows choice
to make love real,
and who redeems failure
without ever withdrawing freedom.

That is not weakness.
That is greatness.

A Prayer 

Lord,

Search my heart and test my thoughts.
If anything in these reflections is not from You, let it fall away.
If anything draws me closer to Your truth, let it take root.

I do not ask to be proven right—
only to be made faithful.

Teach me where I have misunderstood.
Correct me where I have assumed.
Lead me where I have been afraid to look.

I choose truth over comfort,
light over certainty,
and You over my own understanding.

I place every question, every reflection, and every word
back into Your hands.

Amen.

Miss Bess

What surrender really means.

The phrase “die to self” is often misunderstood.

For many, it sounds like erasure.
Like shrinking.
Like disappearing in order to please God.

But Scripture never presents surrender as annihilation.

Jesus did not come to erase who we are.
He came to redeem it.

When Christ calls us to deny ourselves (Luke 9:23), He is not asking us to become less human—He is asking us to become fully alive.

Self-denial in Scripture is not the rejection of identity, but the rejection of control.

The Difference Between Surrender and Self-Rejection

To surrender is not to say, “I am nothing.”
It is to say, “I am not my own.” (1 Corinthians 6:19–20)

There is a difference.

God does not despise the person He created.
He seeks to free that person from the weight of self-rule—the exhausting burden of believing we must save ourselves.

Adam reached for control and lost intimacy.
Jesus released control and restored it (Philippians 2:6–8).

Dying to self is not about disappearing.
It is about trusting God with the parts of us we fear to release.

What Actually Dies

What dies is not personality.
What dies is pride.

What dies is not purpose.
What dies is self-sufficiency.

What dies is the illusion that we know better than God how our lives should unfold.

And in its place, something truer rises.

Life on the Other Side of Surrender

Jesus promised that whoever loses their life for His sake will find it (Matthew 16:25). Not a lesser life—but a fuller one.

The paradox of faith is this:

• Control feels safe, but enslaves.
• Surrender feels risky, but frees.

God does not ask us to disappear into Him.
He invites us to live through Him.

A Closing Thought

Dying to self is not the loss of identity.
It is the recovery of it—no longer built on fear, but on trust.   

When belief becomes visible.

Faith is not meant to remain invisible.

It is not merely something we think, or feel, or quietly assent to.
Scripture repeatedly affirms that genuine faith eventually moves—sometimes uncomfortably—into action (James 2:17).

This does not mean faith must be loud.
But it must be lived.

When Belief Stays Hidden

Many believers are sincere—but silent.

Not from lack of love, but from fear:

• Fear of being misunderstood
• Fear of being judged
• Fear of saying the wrong thing

Yet Scripture does not call us to perfect speech.
It calls us to faithful obedience.

The men and women of Scripture were rarely eloquent.
But they were willing.

Faith Steps Into the Light

Jesus did not tell His followers to win arguments.
He told them to be witnesses (Acts 1:8).

A witness does not convince by force.
A witness simply tells what they have seen.

Faith becomes visible not when it demands attention—but when it refuses to hide.

The Cost of Visibility

There is a cost to being seen.

Light exposes.
Truth unsettles.
Obedience invites scrutiny.

But silence carries its own cost.

Love that never speaks becomes indistinguishable from indifference.

And so faith, when mature, begins to ask a different question:
Not “What will they think of me?”
But “What would love require here?”

A Closing Thought

Faith does not need to be aggressive to be bold.
It does not need to be polished to be powerful.

It needs only to be honest, lived, and willing.

The same God who calls us to believe also walks with us as we learn how to live what we believe.