he hath made you free.

In Helaman 14:30 we read, ". . . for behold, ye are free; ye are permitted to act for yourselves; for behold, God hath given unto you a knowledge and he hath made you free."

I like to switch out a word at the end; "God hath given unto a knowledge and he hath [created] you free."

I know it's not much of a change, but it helps me consider the importance of my divine identity.

Before we came to this earth to receive bodies, we only had a few things, namely our spirits and our ability to choose for ourselves.

I don't know how it was done, but our spirits were created and we came into existence. Heavenly Father created us with the ability to choose - it was an integral part of our spiritual identity and our ability to progress. And it's something he expected us to exercise immediately. I figure that existence resembled our current one - we started as spiritual infants and as we learned and exercised our agency, we grew.

We all chose Jesus Christ as our Savior - the evidence being our existence here on this earth.

God loved us enough to send us here and allow us to choose for ourselves. He doesn't stop bad things from happening and he doesn't control us, and it is out of love and respect for our spiritual identities. We were created free. We can sacrifice that freedom through our choices, but we can also retain or regain that freedom through our choices - by turning to the Savior's Atonement and turning to God.

I'm grateful for God's love and his trust.