Saturday, August 4, 2018

FREEWILL: THE TRUTH IS STRANGER THAN FICTION



This has been the lesson of science. The more we know, the more we see how little we do know. We have even learned that our senses have betrayed us. I always thought that my table was made out of solid oak. However, science has enlightened me that my table is made out of huge spaces. Even more surprisingly, science has been unable to tell us what matter actually is.

Besides, the mysteries of this world abound, even in regards to the basics. Science is unable to define light, space, time, let alone sub-atomic particles. If our world remains incomprehensible, it would stand to reason that its Creator would be no less mysterious.

I’m leading up to a subject surrounded by perplexity and disagreement - human freewill. If you deny that there is anything beyond this material world, you probably also believe that all matter falls within the grasp of the laws of science. Consequently, I would venture to guess that you also believe that all of our thinking and choosing is strictly the product bio-chemical reactions determined by the laws of science, which exclude the possibility of freewill and objective moral accountability.

Taking this reasoning one step further, if our thinking and choosing is entirely controlled by these laws, it also means that we were never able to do other than what we have already done.

Interestingly, many Christians also deny that we can exercise relatively free choices. Some limit this judgment to those who haven’t been regenerated, while other Christians would include everyone in this judgment.

They argue that if God directs our steps and even our intentions (Philippians 2:12-13) and deeds (Ephesians 2:10; Isaiah 26:12), then our lives are a matter of His will and not our own.

Here’s where I’d like to introduce one aspect of God’s many mysteries. I think that the Biblical evidence forces us to the conclusion that it’s not a question of either God’s will or our will. Instead, it seems that they are both working together, something that the Christian should already acknowledge. In what way?

Let’s start with the phenomenon of Scripture. While we believe that it is fully God-breathed (2 Timothy 3:16-17; 1 Thessalonians. 2:13; 2 Peter 1:19-21), we also must acknowledge that it is also the word of man. For example, Paul often mentioned his feelings, experiences, and associates and even used his own distinctive style and vocabulary in his epistles. These point to the fact of Paul’s active freewill involvement, even though he acknowledged that he was writing the Word of God. This overlap of intentions, Divine and human, suggests something quite strange – that human thinking and choosing are compatible with God’s sovereign oversight.

This compatibility is also acknowledged by the Scriptures. For example, while the Assyrians culpably intended to conquer and devastate their enemies, God intended to bring justice through the very same evil actions:

  • “Woe to Assyria, the rod of my anger; the staff in their hands is my fury! Against a godless nation I send him, and against the people of my wrath I command him, to take spoil and seize plunder, and to tread them down like the mire of the streets. But he does not so intend, and his heart does not so think; but it is in his heart to destroy, and to cut off nations not a few;” (Isaiah 10:5-7)

By the same action, evil Assyria intended one thing while God intended something very different. Was Assyria merely a pawn of God or was Assyria a responsible freewill agent? According to the context, Assyria acted with intent and forethought even as they accomplished the work that God had intended. Somehow, God was able to direct Assyria’s freewill plan for His own purposes.

Did Assyria have a legitimate excuse for the evil they had brought upon other nations? Not according to Scripture! Why not? They knew better (Romans 1:20):

  • Though they know God's righteous decree that those who practice such things deserve to die, they not only do them but give approval to those who practice them. Therefore you have no excuse, O man, every one of you who judges. For in passing judgment on another you condemn yourself, because you, the judge, practice the very same things. (Romans 1:32 -2:1)

Paul declared that evil has “no excuse” for itself. The evildoer stands condemned before God. However, if Assyria was just a pawn of God, lacked freewill, and couldn’t have done otherwise, they would have had the perfect excuse along with Hitler and Pol Pot.

Scripture acknowledges the greater seriousness and guilt incurred by intentional sins over unintentional sins. If everything we did had been caused exclusively by God, such an important distinction couldn’t be made. All of our sins would be the same – all foisted upon us by deterministic forces. Instead, Scripture informs us that deliberate sins are far more culpable:

  • For if we go on sinning deliberately after receiving the knowledge of the truth, there no longer remains a sacrifice for sins, but a fearful expectation of judgment, and a fury of fire that will consume the adversaries. (Hebrews 10:26-27; Numbers 15:30)

What difference would having the “knowledge of the truth make” if we are incapable of acting otherwise? Instead, the entire Bible requires us to take responsibility for our sins:

·       Let no one say when he is tempted, “I am being tempted by God,” for God cannot be tempted with evil, and he himself tempts no one. But each person is tempted when he is lured and enticed by his own desire. (James 1:13-14)

A worse charge would have been, “I am just a pawn of God, and I couldn’t have acted in any way different than the way I have acted.” However, even Israel never resorted to such a charge. Instead, God had insisted that He gave Israel everything that they needed to live uprightly:

·       “What more was there to do for my vineyard [Israel], that I have not done in it? When I looked for it to yield grapes, why did it yield wild grapes [unrighteousness]?” (Isaiah 5:4; Jeremiah 2:5)

If God had withheld the gift of freewill from Israel, Israel could have easily charged, “You withheld from us freewill, and so we are not morally responsible, and You are not just for judging us.” Although Israel had charged God with many injustices, they never charged Him with this one. Why not? It probably seemed too ludicrous to them. Why? Because it is so obvious and undeniable to all of us that we make freewill choices! The mugger never says to his victim, “I couldn’t help but mug you.” Or, “God knew that I would mug you, and I had to act according to God’s foreknowledge and ordination.”

Here is another explicit portrait of how freewill human intentions work in accordance with God’s sovereign plan:

·       But Joseph said to them [his brothers], “Do not fear, for am I in the place of God?  As for you, you meant evil against me, but God meant it for good, to bring it about that many people should be kept alive, as they are today. (Genesis 50:19-20)

The brothers were guilty for their treachery against Joseph, but Joseph claimed that he wasn’t in the place of God to judge them. Instead, he acknowledged that through their act of treachery, God had shown grace to all of them.

Likewise, the Apostles had acknowledged that Jesus was crucified according to God’s plan, and yet the perpetrators weren’t mere pawns. Instead, they were guilty of their crime (Acts 4:26-29).

Consequently, we don’t have choose between either the freewill/moral responsibility of humanity and the sovereign determination of God. Nor need we deny one of the other. Although the mechanics are perplexing, it seems that they both work together.

Nevertheless, there are verses that teach that we cannot come to God unless He draws us. These seem to suggest that our freewill is highly attenuated. Indeed, freewill is a relative commodity. The comatose, addicted, and infants have less freewill than others. As we lose freewill as we become addicted to drugs, so too can we lose our freewill as sin controls our lives, we become slaves to sin.

Consequently, I don’t regard these verses as arguments against freewill but an acknowledgment of a loss of freewill. Consequently, I thank God for awakening me from my self-imposed blindness and rejection of Him.

In summary, the Bible insists that we are relatively free and responsible moral agents who will ultimately be judged for our choices.

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