I Have Freewill To Obsess On Predestination!

I was reading Exodus this morning and came across the use of the word "freewill" in the Revised Standard Version I am reading. I had been under the impression that "predestinists" claimed the term was not used in Scripture.

For fun, I ran a word search at BibleGateway.com, and here are the results:

Use of word freewill: 22 times
Use of word predestined: 4 times

Seems that freewill wins in this unofficial face off. At the very least, I am heartened to see that the term freewill DOES appear in Scripture. Since the Word can not contradict itself, we must assume there is a way for the two terms to exist in harmony. My answer is that the concept of predestination is applied from God's timeless point of view, who knows all things. He knows the choices we will freely choose to make.

What's yours?

An Argument For Free Will

We believe that God created the world according to His wisdom. It is not the product of any necessity whatsoever, nor of blind fate or chance. We believe that it proceeds from God's free will; He wanted to make His creatures share in His being, wisdom, and goodness: "For You created all things, and by Your will they existed and were created" (Rev 4:11). Therefore the Psalmist proclaims: "O Lord, how manifold are Your works! In wisdom You have made them all" (Psalms 104:24); and "The Lord is good to all, and his compassion is over all that He has made" (Psalms 145:9). (CCC 295)

God created the world of His own free will -- not out of necessity, or by blind will or chance. God was not forced to create this world and us men. He freely chose to do so. God has free will.

"Okay. So?" you say. Furthermore, God created man in His own image. Logic would suggest that if A contains B and C is like A, then C also contains B. By that reasoning, God has given man free will so that we also may know God, love God and serve God -- not by blind will or chance -- but because we choose to. After all, my wife's love for me would not me nearly as important to me were she forced to love me. It is only because she loves is out of her own free will (I think!) that I cherish it so greatly. Would God not think similarly?

This suggests that while proponents point out that the term "free will" is not mentioned in the Bible, it (like "Trinity") is implied by logic.

Now the rebuttal will be that predestination is likewise supported by Scripture citing examples such as Pharaoh's hardened heart (Exodus 7-11). The Church teaches in this instance that Pharaoh freely chose his sins and that God, ironically out of love and justice, allowed Pharaoh's heart to be hardened as a natural byproduct of his sins. In this scenario, it is plausible that one could state that God, who exists outside of our time line, could foresee Pharaoh's choice to turn his back on God and thus harden his own heart. But the hardening came as a result of the choices Pharaoh made out of free will; not because he was predestined to do so.

God, L-O-V-E, God

"God's love for Israel is compared to a father's love for his son. His love for His people is stronger than a mother's love for her children. God loves His people more than a bridegroom his beloved; His love will be victorious over even the worst infidelities and will extend to His most precious gift: 'God so loved the world that He gave His only Son'." (CCC 219)

Most hardcore Christians agree that the birth of the entire human race goes back to Adam and Eve who were created by God with an eternal soul. Further, we rarely argue that man (and by this we mean all men and women) are created in God's image and likeness. For whatever reason however, there seems to be some invisible wall that keeps some from arriving from those agreed on truths to the point that we are all God's children and that He loves each of us as a father loves his son.

Confusion seems to stem from the fact that God apparently has chosen an elect group (Mark 13:20, 2 Timothy 2:10, Colossians 3:12) as His own (leaving the others to a damnable ending). The argument revolves around Roman 9:21, "or does not the potter have a right over the clay, to make out of the same lump one vessel for a noble purpose and another for an ignoble one?" But God does not look upon His children as a potter looks on a lump of clay. His love for His people is stronger than a mother's love for her children.

Right, but who are "His children" they counter. Who are the elected, and what is the point of using the term "elected" if there was never intended to be an "unelected"?

I know it sounds like the answer is taken from some complicated sci-fi notion of the space time continuum, but the truth is that God is omnipresent; He knows which of us will ultimately choose Him and therefore be members of "the elect" and who will choose a different path which leads to damnation. The important thing to remember then is that we choose whether or not we belong to the elect. The gift is freely given to ALL -- it is our personal choice (does free will ring a bell?) as to whether or not we want to open that gift.

"For God so loved the world, that He gave His only begotten Son, that whoever believes in Him shall not perish, but have eternal life." (John 3:16) As this most well known verse in Scripture suggests, God loved the entire world. Note that there is no mention of the elect. Furthermore free will is implicitly stated in the words "whoever believes" which implies that one must choose to believe. If God chooses for us, then he cannot love us each equally since a parent would never choose unequally for his children. It is only by the child's own choices that his life leads to ultimate success or failure. Likewise God wants success for each and every one of His children but through our free will we choose whether our life ends in success (heaven) or failure (hell). God, who knows all and sees all may know our results now, but that does not imply that He chose them for us.

This issue opens the debate between predestination and free will. After all both concepts cannot exist side by side since to say that a person is predestined to eternal damnation suggests he does not have the free will to change that outcome. To say then that some are predestined for eternal death because they are not part of God's elect suggests that God cannot love each human being, as His creation in the image and likeness of Himself, as a mother loves her child. After all, can any mother honestly say that she would not love her child unconditionally despite any poor choice the child makes in his or her lifetime?

But did God not choose Israel for His own and thereby leave other nations to their peril? Yes, but for what purpose did God choose them? God chose Israel to be his priestly nation which is to say that they were chosen to evangelize and lead other nations to God. In this sense, it is correct to say that God has plans for each and every one of us; a vocation chosen just for us. We still have to choose to accept that vocation (as did the Jewish people). There were times the Jews went astray and did not follow that calling. They were still "chosen" in the sense that it was still their responsibility to lead others to God. In much the same way we are elected to lead others to Christ. Should they that have ears listen and obey, they will become members of the so called elect by their own free will and also reach out to yet others.

Do you now see how no one issue can be discussed in a bubble? The bottom line is that God is Love. If we review 1 Corinthians 13, we must accept that Love would never intend for evil to befall the recipient of that love. Likewise, God wants the best for each of His children. To step back and allow us to make our own choices and live with their effects shows us just how much He loves us. Oh that I might allow my children whom I love dearly to suffer and learn from their mistakes rather than protect them from all of life's evils.