Restrained By Love
Divine Authority, Human Choice, and God’s Self-Imposed Restraint
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In your relationships with one another, have the same mindset as Christ Jesus: Who, being in very nature God, did not consider equality with God something to be used to His own advantage; rather, He made Himself nothing by taking the very nature of a servant, being made in human likeness. And being found in appearance as a man, He humbled Himself by becoming obedient to death, even death on a cross. Therefore God exalted Him to the highest place and gave Him the name that is above every name, that at the name of Jesus every knee should bow, in heaven and on earth and under the earth, and every tongue acknowledge that Jesus Christ is Lord, to the glory of God the Father. (Philippians 2:5–11 NIV)
There are few questions that return with such persistence in the life of faith as this one: if God is sovereign over all things, why does He so often refuse to overrule us? Why does the Almighty allow resistance, delay, and even defiance, when He possesses unquestioned authority to bring every will into immediate submission? Scripture does not dismiss this tension but carries it through. At the center of this tension stands Christ Himself.
The apostle Paul does not begin his appeal to the church in Philippi with power, but with posture. He calls believers to adopt the mind of Christ, a mind revealed not in domination but in descent. Though Jesus was in very nature God, He did not clutch His equality with the Father as leverage. He did not exploit His status. He chose restraint and obedience. He chose the long surrender of love that carried Him all the way to a cross. This is not the story of diminished authority, but the unveiling of authority’s deepest expression.
This past weekend, gathered in a small Astoria apartment, bowls of chili warming our hands, that ancient question surfaced again. How does God’s sovereignty coexist with human freedom? How can divine authority remain absolute while human choice remains real? The conversation moved sharply but reverently, as such questions should. Not because answers are scarce, but because the mystery runs deep. What emerged was not a system to defend, but a Person to behold.
Philippians 2 does not resolve the tension by explaining it away. It reveals it in flesh and blood. The sovereign God takes the posture of a servant. Not because He is overpowered, but because He is secure. Not because He must, but because He loves. The One before whom every knee will one day bow first bent His own. And in that kneeling, He showed us that God’s reign is not threatened by human choice. It is revealed by His willingness to bear its cost. This is the sovereignty that does not crush the will, but waits for it. The authority that could command obedience, yet seeks love. The power that rules heaven and earth, yet pauses at the door of the human heart.
To speak of God’s sovereignty rightly, we must let go of our instinct to define it by force. God lacks no power, and nothing resists Him successfully. No will, human or cosmic, stands as an equal counterweight to His purposes. What He intends, He accomplishes. What He purposes, He brings to pass. Sovereignty, in its truest sense, is not fragile. It does not compete, and it does not strain. And yet, the God who can overrule all things so often refuses to overrule the human heart. This refusal is not impotence but intention. God does not dominate the will He created because domination would contradict the very purpose for which that will exists. He formed humanity not as machinery to be controlled, but as image bearers capable of communion. The same God who spoke galaxies into being chose to speak to Adam. The same authority that commands oceans chose to walk with man in the cool of the day. Sovereignty did not diminish in that choice, it was expressed.
Here we begin to see the quiet distinction Scripture assumes but we often confuse: power and authority are not the same thing. Power can crush resistance. Authority must be received. Power can compel behavior but authority establishes order through legitimacy and trust. Many can and do possess power. Authority, by nature, must be delegated. It flows from origin, not force. God governs not by overpowering love, but by authoring it. He rules not as a tyrant demanding compliance, but as a Father seeking willing sons and daughters.
Nowhere is this more clearly revealed than in a garden at night. Gethsemane is not merely the prelude to the cross. It is the unveiling of divine sovereignty at its most profound depth. Here stands the Son, equal with the Father, bearing within Himself all authority in heaven and on earth. And here, that authority kneels. “Not My will, but Yours.” These are not the words of weakness. They are the words of perfect alignment. Creation itself bends beneath the weight of that prayer. The most sovereign moment in history is not the speaking of light into darkness, but the surrender of the Son’s will to the Father’s purpose.
In that surrender, we learn something essential about freedom. Free will is not man’s independence from God. It is God’s gift that makes love possible. Love that cannot be refused is not love at all and obedience that is guaranteed carries no devotion. God does not seek subjects who comply because they must, but worshipers who respond because they see Him as worthy. This is why salvation is offered, not imposed. Why grace invites, not coerces and why the Spirit convicts, not controls. The tragedy and the beauty of human freedom is that it can say no. And the glory of God’s sovereignty is that He allows that no without surrendering His throne. He bears the risk of rejection in order to preserve the possibility of love. Heaven is not populated by forced loyalty, but by surrendered hearts.
This is why Scripture dares to show us the ache of God. In Deuteronomy, the Lord does not thunder. He laments. “Oh, that their hearts would be inclined to fear Me and keep all My commands always.” This is not the cry of a ruler unable to enforce obedience. It is the grief of a Father who refuses to rule without love. The Almighty is not frustrated by lack of power, He is moved by the absence of willing hearts. The sovereignty that kneels does not abdicate authority but reveals its truest form. God reigns not by crushing the will, but by patiently calling it home.
To understand God’s sovereignty, then, is to understand the options placed before us. When Moses stood before the children of Israel and set before them life and death, blessing and curse, he was not presenting a philosophical puzzle. He was naming a relational choice. To choose life was to choose love. To choose obedience was to choose communion. Jesus later makes this unmistakably plain when He says, “If you love Me, you will keep My commandments.” Obedience is not the price of God’s love. It is the evidence that love has been received. God is not after compliance detached from the heart, He desires devotion freely given. This is why Scripture dares to show us the grief of God. The Almighty grieves not because He cannot rule, but because He refuses to rule without love. He will not force the affection He desires, nor compel the loyalty that must be chosen.
God could have ruled us as stones that cry out. Instead, He chose sons who might walk away. This is not weakness, this is sovereignty restrained by love.
Prayer to Rediscover Love and Respond to God’s Sovereignty
Heavenly Father,
Draw us back to the place where Your love is no longer assumed but received. Strip away our fear of surrender and teach us to trust that Your authority is not against us, but for us. Open our eyes to see that Your sovereignty is revealed not in force, but in the freedom You give us to respond. Where our obedience has grown cold or mechanical, awaken love again, the kind that chooses You without compulsion. Teach us to answer Your call not out of duty alone, but out of desire shaped by grace. We yield our wills to You, knowing that in choosing You we are not losing ourselves, but coming home.
Grant us the grace to love You as you have loved us.
In Jesus’ name.
Amen.