What is Free Will?

Vince Lotito — Fri, 11 May 2007 16:41:32 GMT

My friend Joan got me into a discussion regarding free will (as the answer to the problem of evil). In that discussion, I raised the question what is free will? What is free will in light of God’s foreknowledge and the fact that God has foreordained things…

Not to long ago I was watching a rerun of Law & Order on TNT, and the Executive D.A. Jack McCoy was negotiating a deal with a suspect in the typical Law & Order fashion, when he said don’t tell me that you believe that you can see the future… then that means you believe in predestination? Interesting thought… how could one know the future if it were not already determined before hand.

So does God’s foreknowledge eliminate human free will? Do the immutability of God and the omniscience of God put an end to human freedom? If our actions were not known in advance by God, then when He found them out, God would have a change in His knowledge… but that’s not possible because, God is omniscient and immutable.

If our actions are known by God in advance, then they will come to pass exactly as God knows them. So, if God knows that tomorrow I will do something then tomorrow I will do what God already knows, exactly as God knows it. So with God, my future behavior is absolutely certain. So does that mean that my future is absolutely determined or even coerced by God?

In our discussion, Joan said, that we are not puppets… the idea of God as a puppeteer. God pulling the strings as the feet and the arms of the puppets jerk and dance. No we are not puppets. Puppets have no will. They have no soul, no heart. Their bodies are filled with sawdust.

Conversely, God is not a spectator… that is, God is not sitting on the sidelines observing the action (so to speak). Where, he makes careful notes about the action, and as the ultimate spectator, He second guesses what’s happening next. The idea of a God as spectator renders God powerless to affect the outcome of the future -- that He is the God who reigns but never rules… He would be a God without authority, He wouldn’t be sovereign.

God foreordains all things and that all future events are under His sovereignty. The future is absolutely certain to God. He knows what will take place, and He foreordains what will take place. Does this mean that God coerces? No. It simply means that God wills that something take place. God may even will future events through the free choices of men. God can will the means as well as the ends of future events. God can even will good through the wicked choices of men.

For instance the crucifixion, the greatest event in history and at the same time it is the most diabolical. Think about it, Christ was hated by the Pharisees, they pressed for his death… Judas betrayed him. Pilate succumbed to mob. Did God coerce Judas? No, Judas betrayed Jesus because Judas wanted to betray him. Did God coerce the Pharisees or Pilate or the mob? No. But the cross was not an accident; the Bible says that is wasn’t. So then what? The outcome of God’s eternal place for redemption rested with Pilate, who could have released Christ and had Barabbas executed instead—relegating God to a spectator who merely hoped for the best and had no control over the events that surrounded the cross.

God did more than hope for the cross. God willed the cross. God sent His Son for that very purpose. Before Jesus was brought to Pilate, He pleaded with the Father for a different verdict. He begged that the cup might pass. And long before Pilate could do anything it was so, therefore, Jesus was delivered by the determinate forecounsel of God.

So then, what is free will? If God wills everything that is to come to pass, and God makes it come to pass, how can He do so without violating our free will?

The Problem of Atheism…

Vince Lotito — Thu, 22 Mar 2007 13:18:00 GMT

In the past couple of months I’ve met a self professed atheist, who in his world view struggles with the concept of a Christian God. He claims that the existence of evil contradicts the notion of the Christian God. He argues that (1) if the Christian God is all-powerful and all-loving, and (2) if he is all-powerful, then he is able to end all evil, and (3) if he is all-loving then he wants to end all evil, but (4) evil still exists, then (5) the Christian God does not exist.

Many refer to this as the problem with evil. When I look at this I refer to this as “the problem of atheism.” You see the argument is flawed. As Christians we affirm that God is all-powerful and has the ability the overcome evil. We also affirm that God is all-loving. However, by what reason can we expect that since God is all-loving that He would want to destroy or end all evil? What is the definition of love? Is it one that says love wants to end all evil? Or by what definition of love do we know that an all-loving God would have already destroyed evil? You see the premise is a non-Biblical definition of love. Nowhere in Scripture do we see a definition of love that love that requires God to destroy evil, or to have already destroyed evil. Scripture teaches that God is loving, it also teaches that there is evil in this world, and that this evil is ultimately under God’s complete and sovereign control. Therefore, Scripture itself denies that there is any contradiction between the love of God and the existence of evil.

For the argument to stand, one must establish the premise that “The love of God contradicts the existence of evil,” or something to that effect. But Scripture itself does not affirm this premise, and when an atheist tries to argue for this premise with definitions of love (and evil for that matter) found in his own non-biblical worldview, then all he’s done is shown that the biblical worldview is different from the non-biblical worldview. Obviously, we already know this…

So then what has become of the problem of evil?

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Theology

What is Free Will?

The Problem of Atheism…