Choice

This is an interesting concept. This is going to be a bit philosophical, so hold on to your hankies!
I actually began pondering this concept recently after having a...temptation (I guess you could call it that). I had an inkling to do something that I don't think God would have been happy about (I'm not telling, so stop wondering! You know you had one of these inklings lately too). Anyway, directly following this little inkling was this amazingly simple and profound thought - I have a choice. I don't have to do every little thing that comes into my brain to do! It was not that I didn't realize this before, but the simplicity of it just struck me. I have the ability to say no when I am tempted. You have that ability too. This sent my mind careening through a wonderful series of concepts that I'll probably preach on some day. So here goes...
Theological:
We all know the story of Adam and Eve, and how God placed them in the middle of the Garden and said, "You can eat of any tree in this garden except that one," (God points to the Tree of the Knowledge of Good and Evil), "Don't eat the fruit of that tree or else you'll die." (The Jeff Rossman paraphrase).
To many Christians this sounds like a "Don't think of a purple elephant" scenario. I mean, let's admit it, if someone were to invite you over to their house and say, "Hey, make yourself at home, but whatever you do, don't open that box over there!" Your mind would be fixated all night on that box, right? So, this is how we see the story of the Garden.
HOWEVER, think of it from a different angle. What if God decided not to put that tree there? For sure there would have been no temptation, we'd all still be holy and in perfect fellowship with God, right? Or would we?
Without that Tree there, our first parents would never have had the option of disobeying God, for sure, but they would never have had the opportunity to truly obey God either. The whole idea of obedience is predicated upon the reality of choice. Robots do what we tell them to do because that is how they are programmed. They really don't have the capacity to disobey, and thus they really don't have the capacity to obey (although there are times when I feel like my computer is being very stubborn). Thus we do not ever ascribe moral qualities to machines, because they have no choice.
With animals it becomes more complicated, because on some level I think they do have the power of choice. But not like we do. Any choice they make is based on pure instinct. Instinct tells them to run to the right instead of the left when in danger. Not that they couldn't have gone left (implying that there was choice), but they don't have the ability to contemplate choice.
Then we come to human beings. We have the ability to choose, and the ability to contemplate our choices. This makes us culpable (morally responsible for our choices). Sometimes we do things that defy our own conscience (does anyone else find that strange?). We do things that we know we shouldn't do, that we don't even want to do, but we do them anyway and then feel guilty about it. This is because we made a conscious choice. Without choice we could never be held responsible for our sin, but neither could we be held responsible for doing the right thing. There would be no righteousness. There would be no obedience.
This is why God gave our Parents a choice in the Garden, because without choice they could never choose to love God, they would simply be "programmed" to love, having no other option.
Practical:
Okay, so we understand then that God gave us the gift of choice so that we would choose to serve and love Him. But this is all easier said than done. Even if I am consciously aware of the fact that I have a choice, this doesn't ensure that I will make the right choice. When tempted I may weigh my choices knowing full well that one path leads to righteousness and one path leads to sin, and I may still choose to sin. Anyone been there? Am I the only one who has ever consciously disobeyed God?
Let's face it, when we boil everything down, we're still wicked, we're still sinful, there's still a lot of darkness in us. So how do we make the right choices? Try harder? In my experience, "Try harder," never really works. Then what? Here's the only answer that works...we need God's help!!! We need to remember that we're not doing this thing called life alone. So often we leave God out of our decision-making process. Oh, sure, we include Him in the "big" stuff like, what job should I take, or, which house or car should we buy? But is this really the "big" stuff? Should I lie to my wife about where I was last night? Should I keep myself sexually pure until marriage? Should I forgive that person who hurt me? THESE are the big questions, and how often we make choices like these without ever consulting God, without praying and asking God for strength every day to make right choices...