This one is something that’s come up in conversation a few times with friends. How does Gods will fit in with the fact that He’s given us free will and won’t cross that line to make us do something or accept him. The conversation that really got me thinking about this was a recent one with a friend who was talking to me about her brother and about him turning away from God. My advice at the time was to trust God and keep praying. The response was that it’s not about trusting God, because her brother had made the decision and God won’t mess with free will. Which is partially correct, we need to trust God, but he won’t mess with free will.
Yep, thats right. God will not reach down, stick a finger inside our heads and twiddle away at the neurons until the right one fires and a decision is made that I need to become a christian and love God. It might seem that way sometimes but free will is an institution that God invested in man right back at the start and it’s not something that He’s going to violate because he is integrity. And there are no levels to the free will thing. It’s not like he’s given us the scope to choose what we’re going to wear today or how much sugar we put in our coffee or which insurance company we’re going to go with; and not the big life changing things. No, He’s given us the ability to make the choices in the trivial and the important.
So how does this work with scriptures like that in Luke 18 about the persistent widow and the judge? Using the parable of the widow who has been dealt a hard hand by the courts, Jesus explained that we should be persistent in our prayers, petitioning constantly for the justice we need and for those things that we desire. Now take this with the other way that we’re told to pray in the Lords Prayer (Luke 11:2) which says “your kingdom come, your will be done on earth as it is in heaven”. So it’s pointless asking for thins that are clearly not God’s will, but last time I checked I was pretty sure that God’s will was for every one of us to come to know him. After all he didn’t send Jesus to die on the cross for a part of the population, he sent him for the World. (John 3:16)
So how does this marry up? God won’t make the decision for us. He won’t make us love Him any more than He’ll make us do anything else, but he says that if we petition strongly then how can he refuse to do what we ask? The way I see it, God is a shrewd and very skillful negotiator and a brilliant builder of arguments. As I stated in a previous blog, He’s the master strategist, every element falling into it’s specific place in the plan. If his people are petitioning him night and day, unrelenting, for the salvation of people He will do everything in His power to bring that about. He’ll build heavy arguments in the favour of coming to know him. He’ll your hand to be forced, allow you to find yourself in difficult positions as a result of your choices, so that a decision is required. But there’s a but.
I won’t say that it’s a sure thing. Simply because we as humans are pig headed and stubborn. So we can’t afford to give up if we have people on our target list to see won into the Kingdom. We can’t afford to relent for a moment. After all God is omnipotent, all powerful so he’s got a pretty big armory to bring to bear. He’ll show you the truth, He’ll show you what your missing out on and then if He needs to do it again and again he won’t let up until it’s sunk in.
And then after all that. It’s your decision.
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Free will vs. God's will. Ah, the eternal question. And by "eternal" I mean "entirely momentary and as soon as we get to Heaven we'll get an answer and we'll never worry about it again for all eternity." Reading this has really got my head thinking about this and so I thought I would share my thoughts with you on it.
This is one of those things that has divided Christians for goodness knows how long (well, goodness and people who study the history of the church!). You've got some people pointing to verses about being chosen before creation and saying "Look! Look! God chose us and has plans for us and works things out for us! Everything that happens must have been preordained!" And then others are pointing to verses about the choice God has given all of us and they're saying "Look! Look! God gave us all free will and the choice about what to do! My destiny is entirely in my own hands and God's there just to help me along the way a bit!" Those being the two extreme ends of the spectrum. And there are people who fall everywhere in between. And then there are those who just stay off the spectrum entirely saying "I don't know and it doesn't make any difference to me to know so I'll be content with it as a mystery and God can explain it to me when I'm in Heaven... if I care enough to ask Him then." So, what do I think?
I know that God loves it when we search out to find the truth about Him and His ways. Imagine being married to a girl who didn't really care to know who you are and what you're like and how and why you do things, and you'll quickly understand why. But I also know that God doesn't want us getting so caught up in the details about things that ultimately won't change how we live that our focus is taken away from what's really important. Will the question of free will vs predestination affect how we live? Probably. But it's not as high up on the list as, say, "love God with everything and love all people as you love yourself." Or "go into all the world preaching the good news." Or "forgive so you can be forgiven." For example. I, personally, think it's some beautiful mix of the two (God giving us the right to choose and yet God choosing us) that's a bit too big for our human brains to comprehend until these earthly trappings are stripped away. I know that kind of sounds like the cop-out answer. But, really, that's where I'm at. That doesn't mean there aren't days when I should be asking God for further revelation on the subject, so I can get to know Him that much better. And when I come across verses, I should chew on them for a while. And trying to figure out pictures or concepts of things to help me out in it all is, well, helpful. But, ultimately, for me it boils down to trusting that God is good and that He loves me. (Which really does answer my questions in this area - He is good enough to give me a choice, to not violate the rules He has made for this earth, etc; but He loves me enough to make a path for me to enter His family, to plan out good things for my life, etc.)
Being one of these questions that has verses seemingly going both ways, and one of those questions that has been answered differently in the minds of people who think similarly on many other things, if the answers you and God come up with together are a bit different from the ones He and I have, then that is okay too.
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