Freewill vs. God's Sovereignty, Pt. 2

If I had to guess, I'd say one of the biggest reasons this debate is even out there is because people completely misunderstand what it means to follow "God's Will."  You know how I know?  Because we use the term "God's Will," as if there is one single, set Will of God.  In other words, we have made God's Will to be a singular thing when, in fact, God has numerous wills.

That's because the word "will" was, historically, a verb; we've turned it into a noun, but it was a verb, initially.  Our English word "will" comes from the Old English word - sorry, I'm geeking out on you here - wyllan, and means "to want, desire, or wish."  We have turned it into a noun, as I said, but even in its noun form, it still means "a want, desire, or wish."  We do see this in our modern language today:  a person's last will and testament is his or her stated desire for what should be done with all of his or her stuff.  We actually see it in the future tense of the verb "to be," as well.  If I say, "I will go to the store tomorrow," what that more literally means is, "I want to go to the store tomorrow."  It used to carry with it the recognition that future plans were merely based on our desires, not a guaranteed outcome.  I cannot, in all honesty, claim that I will successfully be able to go to the store tomorrow, because I do not know what the future holds.  So, if this were 900 A.D., I would be saying that, if all goes well, my desire to go to the store tomorrow is going to be successful.  I will to go to the store.  Oh, and in German (our sister language with the same linguistic roots), if I wanted to do something, I'd say, "Ich will . . . ."  I want.

Now, do any of us go through life with but one will and desire?  No, of course not.  We have multiple wills and desires as we go through life.  For example, I want different things for my daughter than I do for my wife.  I want different things for my wife than I do for my neighbor.  I want different things for my neighbor than I do for his dog.  Furthermore, my desires for each of these individuals can change from day to day, moment to moment.  In the morning, I desire my daughter to eat breakfast.  In the evening, I desire that she go to bed.  I do not, however, desire that my daughter go out to the backyard to pee, as I want for my neighbor's dog when I am dog-sitting.  I have multiple wills - sometimes for the same person (or pet).


And just as we - who are made in God's image - have multiple desires and wants in life, so does God.  We looked at I Thessalonians in the last post, but we know that God desires for us to avoid sexual immorality, but it would be quite ridiculous to say that - though this is God's will, as Paul puts it - it would be quite ridiculous to claim that this is "God's Will."  That is, to claim that God's entire purpose and plan for every person, without anything else at all on His mind, is that we avoid sexual immorality, is quite ridiculous.  No one claims that, of course, so we instinctively recognize that God has multiple wills, and yet, many can stand at a pulpit or sit in front of a computer and claim, "Nothing can thwart God's Will!"  Well, which will are we talking about there?  Which desire of God are you referring to, if we all recognize that God has numerous desires?  Because the Scriptures reveal numerous times where God's desires are thwarted.

The same Paul who told the church at Thessalonica to avoid sexual immorality also told numerous other churches and groups of believers to stop being sexually immoral.  Well, if they were being sexually immoral, then they were not enacting God's Will - they were going directly against it, in fact.  We can push this further and say that any time we sin, we are going against what God wants.  Why?  Because God never wants us to sin - sin is never God's Will.  Here's the really - to me - odd thing:  I have heard numerous pastors and theologians (read:  Calvinists) assert that sin is never God's Will in one breath, but in the next, they will pronounce that nothing can thwart God's Will, because His Will is Sovereign.

That is utter insanity, as it is - quite literally - self-contradicting.  It is a bizarre attempt to make two inherently contradictory statements agree, but it doesn't even actually make them agree - it just declares them to both be right.  This is the foundation of Hinduism, on a side note.  In Hinduism, the basic thought process is that everything in the world is valid and right.  All gods are valid - even the ones who claim to be the only gods; all beliefs are valid - even the ones that contradict each other; truth is in the eye of the beholder - therefore contradictions don't matter.  What we're seeing here is very cleverly disguised version of Hinduism - a version of Hinduism that has been dressed to look like Biblical Christianity.

The counter-argument to all of this is rather interesting, because the argument is that, if God's will can be thwarted, then God isn't really in control.  But that's because we confuse "being in control" with "being controlling."  These two things are not the same.  Look at a manager who attempts to dictate every thought, word and action of his or her employees.  We call that "micro-managing," and it doesn't work.  That is an employer who, while he or she may control the employees, actually has no control whatsoever.  Morale is always low, grumbling and rumors abound, and, eventually, people stop listening and caring, and do whatever they want.  The more controlling an employer becomes, the less in-control that same employer is.

As another example, you are controlling of your car when you drive:  you steer, you accelerate, you break, you turn on your blinkers, you stop at (or run!) red lights, etc.  You are, quite literally, controlling your car.  But you are not in control of driving.  Why?  Because you cannot predict the other guy who runs a red light, or the girl texting on her phone who swerves into your lane.  You may be controlling, but you are not in control.  These two things are separate ideas, and it is so with God.

God does not control everything, but He is in control. Why? Because we know that in all things, God works for the good of those who love God and are called according to His purpose.  God works things for good.  No matter what our free will throws at God, He can still work with it - because He's God.  He does not need us to be obedient in order to accomplish His purposes.  He wants (wills) us to be obedient, He commands us to be, but when we're not, He is still God.  He is still in control, even though He is not controlling, and even though we went against His desire for our lives.

Why There Are Some Christians Who Deny Free Will
Okay.  This is a tricky thing, because it may require me to throw some people under the bus.  I'm going to try very hard not to, and I'm going to try very hard not to be facetious, but I may not have a choice (Ha ha!  See what I did there?).

If you go to your favorite search engine and type:  "Do we have free will?" or some variation of that, you get quite a few hits - I found 911 million results - many of them secular.  If you do a little bit of digging, however, you will come to some that are written by Christian groups who deny the existence of free will.  And all of them - all of them - refuse to answer the question simply.  Almost without exception, they all begin by throwing around theological jargon and fifty-cent words.  For example, www.reformation21.org begins this way:

"Studying 'free will' is challenging because it is not defined in Scripture.  Further, it is complex because it connects to many other larger theological issues; it intersects with philosophy, historical theology, and systematic theology"

"What is 'free will'?

"We should start by learning the standard terminology associated with the 'free will' debate. 

1. 'Will' means the function of choosing.
2.  Constraining forces cause people to act against their will.  For example, a person being robbed at gunpoint is constrained in this sense.  Non-constraining forces do not cause people to act against their will but are sufficient to cause an action.  For example, if you have a fear of heights, you probably will not want to talk on the edge of a tall building's roof; that fear is a non-constraining cause.
3.  Indeterminism holds that genuinely free acts are not causally determined.  Determinism holds that everything is causally determined (i.e., that prior events and conditions necessitate every event).
4.  Incompatibilism holds that determinism and human freedom are incompatible; it rejects determinism and affirms human freedom.  Compatibilism holds that determinism and human freedom are compatible.
5.  Libertarian free will is the ability to either do something or not.  Free agency is the ability to do whatever a person wants to do (apart from constraining causes).  This difference is not a small one.  For example, do non-Christians have the inherent ability either to choose to trust Christ or not?  Is such a decision ultimately dependent on their will." . . . 

The site goes on from there, but that's the start of it.  Confused?  Well, maybe you should see what The Village Church (the church run by Matt Chandler) has to say on the topic.  After a brief introductory discussion of slavery (both in the Bible and in America), the author of the article writes:

"What Types if Freedom are We Considering?
When speaking of free will, one is not typically referring to the freedom to make mundane daily decisions.  There is instead a more nuanced realm in which theological free will is discussed.  Theologians call this area soteriology, the study of salvation.  In this discussion, I want to limit our focus to this realm.

"I am explicitly asking about the role of the human will in coming to Christ.  Will an unregenerate person trust Jesus without any external compulsion or must there be a prior work done in us to allow us to come?  Furthermore, if there is this prior work, is it granted by God to all or only to some persons?

"Therefore we should bear in mind that this discussion of "free will" is not concerned with mundane daily choice or decisions believers make.  It is concerned with the choice of an unbeliever to believe in Christ."

That was a bit better.  But only a little bit.  Notice how, with a wave of his hand, the author literally dismisses any and all examples of free will in our lives, focusing instead on what he considers to be the lack of free will in the most important aspect of life (as you'll see if you continue to read the article).

We could look at John Piper, Tim Keller, or the like, but we would find the same arguments, the same jargon, and the same dismissal of practical, real-world experience.  But more than that, we find a dismissal of Scripture and a very zealous hold on a small, select number of passages that are being taken completely out of context.  So, as I promised in the last post on this, let's take a look at some of those passages that people decide to use in order to argue against free will.

"I will make you into a great nation
   and I will bless you;
I will make your name great,
   and you will be a blessing.
I will bless those who bless you,
   and whoever curses you I will curse;
and all peoples on earth
   will be blessed through you."

God is speaking to Abraham here, having just called him out from Ur (see Genesis 11:28,31), and this is a pretty big deal for Calvinists - as well it should be.  God, Creator of the heavens and the earth, is calling to a specific person, and He's doing so for a very specific purpose.  Here's the issue, however:  most Calvinist theologians equate God's calling here with Abraham's salvation.  This is not true, however.  Why?  Because not once did God, in any of this, say, "I will give you eternal rest in My presence."  God said, "Get up and move, and I will make your descendants numerous."

Right?  That's exactly what God says.  This isn't a promise of salvation that God is making, but a promise of action.  How can I claim this, aside from the obvious statement of the text?  Several reasons.

First, Abram obeyed and moved, but brother man split the scene as soon as the going got tough.  See, what some theologians do is talk about Abram's great faith when he moved, and that his trust in God revealed his salvation.  But Abram didn't trust God - he obeyed, but only temporarily.  He heard a Voice speak, and he did what It said, but that doesn't mean he acknowledged the voice as the One and Only God, or the Creator of the Universe Who knows the end from the beginning.  This interpretation is one that is being shoe-horned into a text that reveals the opposite.  Notice:

Now there was a famine in the land, and Abram went down to Egypt to live there for a while because the famine was severe (12:10).

God said, "Here's your home; I'll take care of you."  Then the grocery store closed, and Abram left.  "I'll take care of you" didn't resound anymore.  Abram obeyed, but he didn't trust. 

Further proof?  What does he do with Sarai?  Check out 12:11-16:

As he was about to enter Egypt, he said to his wife Sarai, "I know what a beautiful woman you are.  When the Egyptians see you, they will say, 'This is his wife.'  Then they will kill me but will let you live.  Say you are my sister, so that I will be treated well for your sake and my life will be spared because of you."

When Abram came to Egypt, the Egyptians saw that she was a very beautiful woman.  And when Pharaoh's officials saw her, they praised her to Pharaoh, and she was taken into his palace.  He treated Abram well for her sake, and Abram acquired sheep and cattle, male and female donkeys, menservants and maidservants, and camels.

Dude pimped out his wife to save his own skin.  God had promised to make him into a great nation, but he was afraid of dying.  He didn't trust God.

Now, some may point out that, as believers, we often don't trust Him when we should.  And I would agree with this; the letters of the apostles are filled with encouragement and reminders to trust in God, which would be completely unnecessary if wavering trust weren't an issue.  But there's a second reason we know Abram wasn't saved when God called to him:  because we're told when Abram was saved, and it didn't happen until Chapter 15:

Then the word of the LORD came to him:  "This man [see 15:1-3] will not be your heir, but a son coming from your own body will be your heir."  He took him outside and said, "Look up at the heavens and count the stars - if indeed you can count them."  Then He said to him, "So shall your offspring be."

Abram believed the LORD, and He credited it to him as righteousness.

He also said to him, "I am the LORD, who brought you out of Ur of the Chaldeans to give you this land to take possession of it" (4-7).

God called Abram to move to the land of Canaan in Chapter 12, but Abram wasn't saved until he trusted in God in Chapter 15.  How do I know?  Because it's what the Bible says.  To interpret this any other way is to deny the plain statement of Scripture.  Furthermore, God did not enter into a covenant with Abraham until Abraham was saved.  Check out 15:12-19:

As the sun was setting, Abram fell into a deep sleep, and a thick and dreadful darkness came over him.  Then the LORD said to him, "Know for certain that your descendants will be strangers in a country not their own, and they will be enslaved and mistreated four hundred years.  But I will punish the nation they serve as slaves, and afterward they will  come out with great possessions.  You, however, will go to your fathers in peace and be buried at a good old age.  In the fourth generation your descendants will come back here, for the sin of the Amorites has not yet reached its full measure.

When the sun had set and darkness had fallen, a smoking firepot with a blazing torch appeared and passed between the pieces [see 15:9-11].  On that day the LORD made a covenant with Abram and said, "To your descendants I give this land, from the river of Egypt to the great river, the Euphrates. . . ."

So what happened here?  God called Abram in Chapter 12, but did not enter into a covenant with him until after he was saved, which only happened after he believed. Abram was called by God, yes, but he had to believe before receiving the righteousness of God, and he had to be saved before being part of the covenant.  Calvinism reverses this, saying that God makes a covenant with us from eternity past, choosing us and not others, so that WE are saved in order for us to believe, and others will NEVER believe because God has rejected them from eternity past, and any apparent "decision" we make to trust God is only an illusion, because God has decided for us.

In other words, our entire existence and faith is a farce and a sham.

As I said, eliminating free will makes God out to be a liar.

Genesis 20:1-6:

Now Abraham moved on from there into the region of the Negev and lived between Kadesh and Shur.  For a while he stayed in Gerar, and there Abraham said of his wife Sarah, "She is my sister."  Then Abimelech king of Gerar sent for Sarah and took her.

But God came to Abimelech in a dream one night and aid to him, "You are as good as dead because of the woman you have taken; she is a married woman."

Now Abimelech had not gone near her, so he said, "Lord, will you destroy an innocent nation?  Did he not say to me, 'She is my sister,' and didn't she also say, 'He is my brother'?  I have done this with a clear conscience and clean hands."

Then God said to him in the dream, "Yes, I know you did this with a clear conscience, and so I have kept you from sinning against Me.  That is why I did not let you touch her."

For those who deny free will, there are eight words in this entire passage that they latch onto:  "I have kept you from sinning against Me."  The argument is that God kept Abimelech from doing what he wanted, thus proving we have no free will.  But the entire point of prevention is because Abimelech has the option of acting out his desires.  I do not have to prevent my daughter from flying away because she doesn't have that option.  She may desire it, but she can't do it, and I therefore do not have to prevent her.  Prevention is only necessary if free will exists.  If God controlled our wills, then Abimelech would not have even taken Sarah to begin with.  

Now, what I just wrote was an awful lot of speculation, I admit, but I have a second reason for claiming this:  verse seven.  Check it out:  "'Now return the man's wife, for he is a prophet, and he will pray for you and you will live.  But if you do not return her, you may be sure that you and all yours will die.'"  What's God doing here, in light of His next proclamation?  He's giving Abimelech the choice of repentance, providing him with the consequences of either choice.  This is meaningless posturing if God has already determined Abimelech's choice for him, and is, once more, deceptive on God's part.

Once again, using this text as "proof" that we do not have free will is blasphemous to God, and denies the clear teaching of the Scriptures.

Okay, so this went on for far longer than I had anticipated.  Therefore, I will wrap this up today, and the next post will deal with a few more passages commonly used to defend the non-existence of freewill.  In the meantime, if you have a passage that you believe proves, without doubt, that free will doesn't exist, sound off below! 

Flood Legends on Kindle

A few weeks back, I posted that Flood Legends was #1 on Amazon's "Histriography" list.  Now,three weeks later, it's STILL in the top 100 (#93, to be precise)!  That's insane!  This is the longest run it has ever had in the top 100 in this category.  Thank you for being so interested in the Scriptures!