choice
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Freedom of choice.
These are words I hear a lot. In this country, we think of liberty as the freedom to choose just about anything: our vocation, our spouse, our gender, our politicians and leaders, our family makeup, the course of our lives. From innocuous choices like the food we choose to eat or the clothes we choose to wear all the way to something as heavy as the fate we choose for our unborn children, it often feels like the single highest value that all Americans still share—as divided as we are on the particulars—is freedom of personal choice. Whatever side you’re arguing of whatever issue, chances are, the core of your perspective is shaped primarily by a concern for the freedom of someone in the scenario to exercise their freewill.
And, of course, I believe that our prioritization of personal autonomy is a good thing that has made our nation great. But the more heavily “freedom of choice” colors every single headline and issue, the more convinced I am that a society which values choice above all is an empty one. In the words of the Preacher, “Vanity of vanities! All is vanity” (Ecclesiastes 1:2b).
Paradoxically, it’s the death of Queen Elizabeth II—not any particular event in my own nation—which has brought this to a head for me. David French wrote a poignant piece this week on how decidedly apolitical she was; in it, he quoted another tribute to Her Majesty written by Andrew Sullivan, which I will also quote here:
[Queen Elizabeth] was tasked as a twenty-something with a job that required her to say or do nothing that could be misconstrued, controversial, or even interestingly human—for the rest of her life.
Our American media, pop culture, and borderline-obsessiveness with all things monarchy (particularly the British crown) would have us believe that a king or queen is some kind of all-powerful but mostly-benevolent dictator, who enjoys all the best that wealth and fame can offer. We tell fairy tales about princes who can summon every woman in the kingdom and pick a wife from among them like he’s shopping at the grocery store. Consciously or not, we often paint our mental pictures of monarchs as a blend of all the most desirable colors: someone who is beloved, famous, rich, and both free and able to do whatever they want with it all.
But we know that’s not the story of Queen Elizabeth II.
In fact, it would appear that the longest-reigning royal of the United Kingdom had very little freedom of choice in her position at all.
She didn’t choose to be born into the House of Windsor; God made that decision for her. For that matter, she had no say in the fact that her father’s elder brother King Edward VIII had no children, which could have precluded her from ever acceding to the throne. She was not even given an opinion on when she would take up the highest role in the land, and I’m sure that if she had been, she would have chosen to spend more years with her father—not take his place at the young age of 26.
And once she did take up that role? It required her “to say or do nothing that could be misconstrued, controversial, or even interestingly human—for the rest of her life.”
In other words, she had to set aside her personal interests, opinions, passions, and freedoms in order to fulfill the high duty of being more symbol than soul. Sure, she had the resources and the platform we so idolize, but—if she were to care about her people more than herself—she had no freedom whatsoever with how she chose to use it.
We don’t remember her for her hot takes or her activism or her flaunting of power, but for her steadiness and service across seven decades of tumultuous history.
Of course, not every ruler—not even most rulers—have reflected the same kind of sacred self-denial. I just finished reading through the book of I Kings, and was struck by the following passages:
Jeroboam said to himself, “The kingdom might now return to the house of David. If these people regularly go to offer sacrifices in the Lord’s temple in Jerusalem, the heart of these people will return to their lord, King Rehoboam of Judah. They will kill me and go back to the king of Judah.” So the king sought advice.
Then he made two golden calves, and he said to the people, “Going to Jerusalem is too difficult for you. Israel, here are your gods who brought you up from the land of Egypt.” He set up one in Bethel, and put the other in Dan. This led to sin; the people walked in procession before one of the calves all the way to Dan.
- I Kings 12:26-30
Even after this, Jeroboam did not repent of his evil way but again made priests for the high places from the ranks of the people. He ordained whoever so desired it, and they became priests of the high places. This was the sin that caused the house of Jeroboam to be cut off and obliterated from the face of the earth.
- I Kings 13:33-34
Earlier in I Kings, we learn that Jeroboam was not destined to be king over Israel by right of birth; he actually worked his way up in the ranks of King Solomon’s officials and then rebelled against the king (see 1 Kings 11). When God officially appointed Jeroboam as Solomon’s successor over the ten northern tribes, He gave the soon-to-be king a key choice:
I will appoint you, and you will reign as king over all you want, and you will be king over Israel. After that, if you obey all I command you, walk in my ways, and do what is right in my sight in order to keep my statutes and my commands as my servant David did, I will be with you. I will build you a lasting dynasty just as I built for David, and I will give you Israel.
- I Kings 11:37-38
From these three passages we can piece together the stakes of the decision God placed before Jeroboam.
Option 1: Obey God as King, and Jeroboam and his kingdom would enjoy the blessings of God’s presence and a lasting dynasty.
Option 2: Set up self as king, and Jeroboam and his dynasty would be obliterated from the face of the earth.
Clinging to power, afraid of losing his grip on the kingdom, Jeroboam commissioned carved images to represent Yahweh and directed his subjects to sacrifice in places other than the Temple where God’s presence dwelt. Wielding his position as ruler, he did away with God’s strict requirement for only Levites to serve Him, and gave anyone who desired it the right to become a priest. Jeroboam chose Option 2 and damned his family and his nation to bear the consequences of his sin.
Perhaps choice is not the highest good we have been led to believe it is. Perhaps true greatness is revealed when someone sets aside their rights in favor of doing what is right. After all, having the right to do wrong will never make doing wrong right.
We are born.
We are born male or female.
We are born to a set of parents and, often, siblings.
We are born in a location on the globe.
In these things, we have no input. They are what they are. We can kick and scream until we collapse from exhaustion but they will never, ever change. We don’t get to choose.
Sometimes, we are born with sexual propensities we didn’t choose, and the choice now before us is whether we will bear the responsibility of living in opposition to them.
Sometimes, we conceive a child we didn’t choose, and the choice now before us is whether we will bear the responsibility to care well for that child anyway.
Sometimes, we even find ourselves in circumstances we did choose—a marriage, perhaps—but at a level of difficulty we didn’t sign up for, and the choice now before us is whether we will persevere when it would be within our rights to give up.
The freedom to choose is a wonderful thing, but the denial of that freedom in favor of righteousness is far better. We don’t reach our highest potential by continuously reaching for the next thing our eyes and hearts desire, but by disciplining our minds and bodies to prioritize what is good over what feels good.
For Queen Elizabeth II, a commitment to duty superseded her personal desires and ambitions and opinions; for King Jeroboam, an addiction to power superseded his opportunity to steward Israel with God’s blessing. One chose what was good, and one chose what merely felt good. Each is remembered accordingly.
Likewise, Eve plucked a beautiful fruit off a beautiful tree and with it, banished the entire human race from God’s presence (Genesis 3:6, 24). That was her choice, and God gave her the freewill to make it.
But the Son of God Himself relinquished all His rights and was obedient to the point of death—even death on a cross (Philippians 2:8)—and when He bowed His head and gave up His Spirit, He gave us all the right to become children of God (John 1:12).
We may hate the way God created us, or that He created us at all. We may despise Him for having the audacity to tell us what is good and what is evil. But until we give up our liberty to live in whatever sin we choose—until we let go of being our own rulers and submit to the rightful authority of our Author—we will not know true freedom, only the counterfeit version that kills people and families and nations.
