Free Will and God's Plan

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Permalink Reply by James on February 7, 2012 at 6:45pm

Regarding free will, I kind of consider myself "half-Calvinist".  The way I see it, there are 2 sides to "free will".  Yes, we choose our own actions and thoughts and God knows in advance what all of these are, but if we genuinely commit our lives to God, then God can steer our thoughts by giving us more faith.  I think the key point is faith.  If a person seeks for their faith in God to grow and to live for God, then they will be given more faith, and as a consequence end up doing the will of God as he would desire.

So yes, God can see the avenues you can take, the ones you won't, but you do have your own choices.  They're your choices, but I believe to some extent they're based on your level of faith.  If you have great faith they will be the right choices.  If you have very little faith, then you will make choices based on doing good things or what seems right or what is good for a church, rather than where God would lead you.  That is not necessarily "bad", as long as you are genuinely seeking God and seeking a higher level of faith, in which case I believe God will pull you off wrong directions eventually to where you are meant to be.

Jesus knew Peter would deny him 3 times, because Jesus had the mind of God and could at the very minimum spiritually sense what Peter was going to do in advance.  I guess it was probably a combination of Peter's lack of faith, and also God not giving Peter the strength in those cases to show that Peter's faith was not perfect.  I guess it helped show him that God knew Peter more than he knew himself.

Regarding Judas betraying Jesus...For sure Jesus/God knew Judas' heart, and knew that he would betray him, but I believe Jesus gave Judas every opportunity for his heart to change, if it had been possible. 

I don't expect others to believe all that I do, but I believe it comes down to this:  Some people's hearts CAN be changed, and often are by God, but some cannot, but we can't know for sure if someone's heart cannot be changed, and it would be wrong to assume/judge that someone's heart can't be changed.  If Jesus had patience with even Judas, then as Christians we should show have faith and love for others even if it appears they cannot come to God.  Sometimes it takes the faith of another to bring someone else to God.     

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Permalink Reply by Bruce on February 27, 2012 at 4:14am

with faith you willbe guided to the right decision. Listen for what God has to say. Sometimes the answer comes slowly and sometimes you dont like the answer but know itr is right. then you make the decision.

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Permalink Reply by Leonard T on February 7, 2012 at 6:57pm

Here is an article on this subject that I wrote about 5 years ago.

 

Predestination Vs. Freewill

Predestination and free will. It is not an either or, but actually "both." God has a plan that will come to pass. The prophesies have been given. The "end time" event will come to pass as God has said. God is sovereign and He is in control. These truths do not necessitate that God has to micromanage our life. God, in His authority and will, has given man freedom of choice (liberties). We have the freedom to choose many aspects regarding our life. We can choose our career, spouse, and location to live. These choices are limited by the interaction with other humans, such as choosing to marry a person, but one's choice choosing to reject them as theirs and therefore no marriage occurs. You also have the freedom to surrender to Jesus or reject Him. You can choose to go to church or reject church. The choice is yours because God has extended that liberty to you. Your activity will not derail the plan of God that arcs over all that is going on in the day to day activity of man.

God's plan has a purpose and will come to pass. God knows the future of each day's activity in advance. He knows when the end will come. Not because He predestined it to the last minute, but because in His foreknowledge He sees the culmination of all things. He did not set an hour glass into motion and say when the last grain falls the end is up. In fact He gave a clue to the timing in Matthew 24:14 "And this gospel of the kingdom will be preached in the whole world as a testimony to all nations, and then the end will come." (NIV) There is a difference in knowing the timing and causing the timing.

Therefore, God's plan is unfolding and coming to pass and at the same time, in the midst of it all we have the freedom to make choices. God knows the choices we will make in advance. This knowledge does not mean that He made you act this way or that. He knew what you would do and fits it into His plan and purpose. He also plans your blessings along the way as well as the discipline that He may have to apply to our lives to help us become what we ought to be as believers. An example of a blessing awaiting one who comes to Jesus is the gift of the Holy Spirit to come and indwell us. The blessing is prepared for us, but not actually received until we accept Jesus as Savior. Being filled with the Holy Spirit is a blessing that we may have coming, but not actualized until the time of sanctification. God also knows who will completely reject Him. This knowledge does not force Him to treat them any different. He loves them fully. They enjoy a full life on earth and often even prosper. What is amazing is that in His forbearance He knows they will reject Him and He gives them full life while the whole time they break His heart. God does not rejoice in anticipating their judgment, but weeps over their rejection and impending damnation due to their rejection of His Son.

One more aspect must be included. Sovereign God has given man free will, but He also may intervene at any moment overriding that will. For example, if a robber were to hold you at gun point and desire to take your life. The robber has chosen to kill you, God can intervene and save your life. We have multitudes of stories where God has done just that and there are times He does not intervene. In those times we must find comfort from His Word, such as Rom. 8:28. He may work on the will of an unbeliever to surrender something to His cause. He may use them for a certain purpose, such as Pharaoh. The Bible is clear on this and that is God hardened his heart. He did not harden it towards God. Pharaoh’s heart was already hard toward God. He hardened it toward Israel, because God knew what needed to happen to awaken the Israelites and the process that God would use to deliver them and to demonstrate His power.

A better way of saying what we have is "liberty" instead of free will. There is a limit to our freedom and God limits His interaction with us allowing us these liberties.

Summary (Sorry for the length, but I see no way of stating this in a short form).
* God's plan is coming to pass and man cannot stop it.
* God is sovereign and has made a ruling that established man's liberties.
* Man has liberties in this life to make decisions affecting our life on earth and with Him, but we do not alter or strop His plan from coming to pass.
* God's foreknowledge enables Him to know our choices in advance.
* In that foreknowledge He establishes our blessing and discipline, prepared for the right moment. He uses us and our decisions to fit into his plan. (Can you imagine God's plan as pliable. It can be stretched and altered in shape, but never broken or eliminated. It is flexible daily and yet set for eternity. The end will come.)
* He has the sovereign privilege to override our decisions.

Thus we find that God is still fully sovereign and we have liberties in this life granted us by God.

What about Judas? Father God knew the choices that Judas was going to make. God positioned Judas to be Judas (Jesus selected him) and at the same time fulfill God's plan all the way to the 30 pieces of silver, the betrayal, the kiss and even his death. God used Judas. God did not make Judas do these things. Judas was being Judas. This is impossible for us to orchestrate, but simple enough for our omniscient, omnipotent, omnipresent Father in heaven to accomplish.

 

Lord Bless,

LT

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Permalink Reply by Hodie86 on February 7, 2012 at 7:19pm

Thank you for your responses.  The idea of God knowing my future makes me feel that my destiny is pre-determined!  Based on the decisions God knows I'll make in the future, does he try and intervene now to prevent me from making the "wrong" choices?  If God knows the will and future actions of people, does prayer even help them if God already knows there fate and they are on that track to make that decision anyway?  I'm sorry for bringing up these questions, but they have been plagueing me as I'm trying to grow in faith and understand God.

Hodie

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Permalink Reply by James on February 7, 2012 at 7:34pm

I guess it depends in where your heart lies.  If you have a sin problem, you have to choose to repent of that sin (or in my view "repent as best as you are able to"), and have faith that God will deal with that sin accordingly.  If you are making choices which are just bad decisions, then you can learn from that and be wiser about it in the future.  God doesn't expect/require you to be invulnerable/perfect, he just desires your commitment and seeking to be closer to him.

Prayer is often necessary, because if it were not done some people would go to hell or be in a worse state, and it often DOES make a difference.  Does it always?  I don't believe so, but that doesn't mean we are right to assume it won't make a difference in a certain case when it might actually make a difference.  God knows when someone will pray or choose not to, but it's clearly better to pray than not to.  Like it says in the Bible, "pray without ceasing" (if you are lucky that will even mean praying during your sleep!!) 

Regarding what I said about prayer, I believe the effectiveness of the prayer will often depend on the level of faith of the person praying it.  If a non-christian or christian of little faith prays, there'll typically be no result, but if a person with "great" faith prays, then probably anything, even raising of the dead, could be achieved. 

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Permalink Reply by James on February 7, 2012 at 7:22pm

Whoa big post.  For the most part (or all perhaps) I agree with what you said LT.  I believe it's up to God to mold our hearts though, and for us to choose to let him do so.  

I agree with what you said about Judas...Judas was being himself.  I don't know what % of people in the same position would have performed the way he did.  Perhaps 50%, perhaps 1%, perhaps 0% (I really don't know).  I believe Judas had every opportunity to turn to God, but was constantly following his agenda with no real commitment or desire to turn to Jesus.  There's probably few people in this world with as many chances that Judas had, and it's important for us as Christians to help give others those chances, whether that be through preaching or showing the love of God to people.

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Permalink Reply by Terry Duncan on February 9, 2012 at 11:28am

I remember during the days of a school year. The teacher has nothing for us to do.  Kids are talking, drawing pictures...  Sometimes I had a marathon tick tack toe hour.  What a dizzy!  After a while you know where your appoint will play based of where you play first.  My friend always played in the middle first. I knew that well enough to count on it.  After I played next we knew just how it would end.

That is a silly game.  It is a decent illustration.  If we as humans can tell the future move in a game how much more can the all knowing God know what we will do next?

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Permalink Reply by Mary O on February 27, 2012 at 11:49am

Hi Hodie, God bless you!

Sometimes I ponder why God chose me and why He loves me. My past is very dark. I asked God about that. God, why me?  He said....It's because I chose Him. I could have said no and stayed in my not so merry dark ways. But there was a point, a fork in the road, and I accepted Jesus as my Lord. Freewill is very important to God. He wants to be my first choice.

I have never regreted my decision. And maybe sometimes there are things I don't understand. Things don't always go smoothly. But I understand He is pleased that I chose Him.

Love,

Mary

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Permalink Reply by Rita Cullimore on February 28, 2012 at 4:24am

Hodie,

Science comes into play somewhat in God seeing what our life will be. I think of God high and lifted up, I understand His being able to see from beginning to end.  Consider pictures you have seen of earth as seen from a space vehicle. From a great height, one can see half the earth. God has great vision. His sight covers distance and time. His hearing is great as well. He has the Holy Spirit here to act for Him. They are in communication at all times. 

We try to imagine God from our plain of life and understanding. He is far more than that.

I used to imagine God being high and lifted up and life as a line. From high and lifted up, He can see from beginning to end. We are not faded out to Him.....He can hone in on each of us as need be. I don't think there is anything that we can do to shock God. We are so much less than He that He can see our very weaknesses. He takes great pleasure from our accomplishments and He sorrows over those things we do wrong.....but He sorrows for our sake.....not His own. He sees those who never believe on Christ, and I am sure He mourns them, as well. He has created us, and wants us to survive. He has set down His own rules for our existence. He starts us all on an even path (usually) and watches how we progress.

As you grow to realize Who God really is, your faith will increase. Ask God...He will show you. He delights in our own interest through our questions...just as we delight in the questions of a child.

Keep in mind that although God is high and lifted up, He is also trained on you and how you think and feel, what your concerns are. He cares  what you think and He delights in showing you the answers you seek.

Blessings to you as you continue to ponder God and His awesomeness....

Rita

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Permalink Reply by Mary O on February 28, 2012 at 11:09am

Hi Hodie, God bless you!

I've been thinking about it a few days. Maybe look at it another way. See you said it's like thorns are choking your faith. Which tells me, you do have faith. Otherwise thorns would have nothing to choke. Why allow your questions to harm you in such a way?

Sometimes receiving answers requires patience. It depends how many questions you have and the depth of the question(s). Other factors...the Bible research materials you have...the length of time you have been a Christian...the depth of the knowledge of the ministers around you. I had this question about Psalms. I put a tiny note in the margin of my Bible. Yeah, I wrote in my Bible. I forgot about the note completely and gave the question to God. I asked Him to make it clear for me. A minister taught about it at a Bible seminar. I found my little note and rejoiced. God gave me the answer to that question.

Do not be anxious about anything, but in everything, by prayer and petition, with thanksgiving, present your requests to God. (Philippians 4:6)

These have come so that your faith--of greater worth than gold, which perishes even though refined by fire--may be proved genuine and may result in praise, glory and honor when Jesus Christ is revealed. (1 Peter 1:7)

Jesus will have praise for us. Peter the apostle who denied Jesus three times, said this.

You're a Christian, I can tell you what the future holds. Your future is very bright.

Love,

Mary

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