FREE WILL AND THE SOVEREIGN ALL KNOWING GOD- Gen.22:12

Does the fact that God is sovereign and all knowing lead you to believe that He knows every choice you and everyone else who has ever lived will make? That all your choices were programmed for you before you were born? If so then I believe there is a portion of scripture that may help you understand the truth about God’s sovereignty and all knowingness.

The portion of scripture I’m referring to is the account where God calls Abram in Gen.12 before his name was changed to Abraham to go “unto a land I will show thee.” Where we also see God telling Abram “I will make of thee a great nation, and I will bless thee, and make thy name great; and thou shalt be a blessing:

3 And I will bless them that bless thee, and curse him that curseth thee: and in thee shall all families of the earth be blessed.”

And we see that “Abram departed, as the Lord had spoken unto him; and Lot went with him: and Abram was seventy and five years old when he departed out of Haran.” So he did exactly what God told him to do. Was this programmed into Abram before he was born? Did God know before this that Abram would do what He told him to?

Now the person who has come to believe that man does not have free will would posit here that Abram’s choice had already been made for him. And that he had no real choice in the matter. But, only did what God pre programmed him to do. Because without free will to choose for himself what he would do he could only do what God sovereignly determined he would do.

Moving forward in time we see God tell Abraham that he was to sacrifice his son on the mountain. We see Abraham again doing exactly what God told him to do. Never faltering at God’s instruction.

And again those who believe Augustine’s doctrine of necessity, or sin nature, as it is most commonly called today, or total depravity as Calvin defined it, that explains why man has no free will. They will conclude that Abraham did what he was told not by his own free will choice. But, because God sovereignly caused him to.

Here’s how bad this thinking gets. Calvinist theologian James White when asked if when a child is raped is God responsible and did he decree it said, “Yes, because if not then it’s meaningless and purposeless and though God knew it was going to happen he created it without a purpose… and God is responsible for the creation of despair… If He didn’t [decree child rape] then that rape is an element of meaningless evil that has no purpose.”

Calvin himself said, “But where it is a matter of men’s counsels, wills, endeavours, and exertions, there is greater difficulty in seeing how the providence of God rules here too, so that nothing happens but by His assent and that men can deliberately do nothing unless He [God] inspire it.”

Quotes like this can be sited from Martin Luther, Augustine, and others as well. Pillars of a religion that bears little resemblance to the preaching we find in the Bible. Like we see in the choices Abraham made in the story we continue now to look at.

In Abraham’s life there are many examples that could be given that show he indeed made his choices by his own free will. How he responded to his wife. Why he had sex with Hagar. When he told Hagar to take her son and leave. And so on…

But, now let’s make the connection between free will and God’s all knowingness. Or omniscience. This shows itself when we see Abraham taking his son Isaac up the mountain to kill him. Because God had told Abraham, “Take now thy son, thine only son Isaac, whom thou lovest, and get thee into the land of Moriah; and offer him there for a burnt offering upon one of the mountains which I will tell thee of.”

And just as he is about to perform the thing God told him to do the angel of the Lord stops him saying, “Abraham, Abraham: and he said, Here am I.

12 And he said, Lay not thine hand upon the lad, neither do thou any thing unto him”.

So Abraham did not kill his son who he loved. And while waiting for further instructions he heard the angel of the Lord speak these words to him. He said that the reason he had him come on the mountain to sacrifice his son whom he loved was to prove something to God.

Wait, God needed Abraham to do this to prove something? Does this mean God did not know what Abraham would do? You be the judge.

But, from where I sit there is no question as to what was taking place here. And its implications regarding free will.

Because it was only after Abraham began the motion to thrust the knife into his son whom he loved that the angel of the Lord was able to say, “for now I know that thou fearest God, seeing thou hast not withheld thy son, thine only son from me.”

So it was not before Abraham did this that God knew. It was only after. Because the angel of the Lord did not say I’ve always known. He did not say I pre programmed you so that you would do what you were programmed to do. No, he said NOW I know.

And in vs.13 we see God providing a sacrifice for Abraham as “Abraham lifted up his eyes, and looked, and behold behind him a ram caught in a thicket by his horns: and Abraham went and took the ram, and offered him up for a burnt offering in the stead of his son.”

This is yet another proof of free will. And it is also proof that what some believe it means when they think of God being all knowing does not mean He has pre programmed everything we will ever do.

But, that God has given man free will and dominion and has never taken these away. So that what Augustine believed and taught regarding free will was a lie. As well as what his students John Calvin and Martin Luther taught. Who are also the progenitors of the lies being taught in virtually every church today.

The truth about God being all knowing can be summed up this way. In eternity past God created a blue print of sorts that would be the plan for how things would progress for His creation through time. Until the culmination of His plan would be reached.

Culminating when in the fulness of time Jesus would come to make men who were born natural and not spiritual just as Adam was when he was made into spirits. Spirits that can now relate to God spiritually just as Jesus said we must in John4:24. Something that before Jesus came was not possible.

It was by God’s sovereignty then that God creates all men having free will and dominion. And that design continues throughout all time. And His sovereign will does not change.

Because without free will the love the Bible says God is could never be experienced by man.

Because love, the real love of God that is defined as sacrificial in John3:16 and elsewhere, can not be truly known without free will. Both parties involved in the relationship must have free will for both to experience and express love in their relationship.

This is also why love is absent in so many marriages. Neither will humble themselves before God in the way that will manifest God’s love.

They resist because of some perceived hurt that happened between them. Making it impossible to progress beyond a sort of business like relationship. Stemming from how they perceive their relationship with God. A business relationship where God keeps them from going to hell as long as they perform their duties.

Not only is this not love. It is actually a choice not to love. Because rather than sacrifice, it is a choice at not making the other person in the relationship angry simply because anger might adversely affect the business of the relationship.

But, this is not the way God designed free will to be used. Because when it is used to its full potential it creates the kind of loving relationships, first with God and then with others, for which God gave us free will.

And now knowing that it is by God’s sovereign will that we have and use our free will. We must also realize that this is what makes us responsible for our decisions. And that God has not made many for hell and few for heaven through no choice of their own as the sin nature doctrine teaches men to believe. But, that where a man spends eternity is expressly based on our own free will choice in response to God’s call to every man to be saved.

And knowing this and the heavy price God paid so that we can be set free from the power of death. I must ask the question, Why would anyone choose to reject His love and amazing grace?

Jesus said you must be born again to enter the kingdom of God. And that being born again is by the Spirit of God. Because when we trust in Him and His resurrection He creates a spirit in us that we never had before.

This is what makes men, who were once only flesh and blood and of the course of this natural world by nature subject to wrath as we see Paul teaching in Eph.2:3, children of God and heirs to His kingdom.

And as His heirs we are eternal beings. First spiritually by the spirit birth when we trust in Jesus. And at the resurrection eternal beings having a new body given power unto eternal life by our spirit that will be housed by it.

If you want this life Jesus came to provide for all men. Then Paul says all you need to do is confess with your mouth the Lord Jesus. And believe in your heart that He has raised from the dead. Do this and you shall be saved. Do it not and you will be damned.

The choice is yours. God designed His creation this way. He designed it so that free will and dominion are the necessities for a truly loving relationship with Him and others. And in John17:3 Jesus said it is our relationship with Jesus that is eternal life.

Which is why He takes our choices so seriously. As Joshua told Israel, “Choose this day whom you will serve…” choose today because today is the day of salvation. It is the day the Lord has made. And we who choose to humble ourselves before God accepting His salvation will rejoice and be glad in it.

Do this and you will have eternal life right now. Do this and you will have the immortality at the resurrection. Do this and become a child of God and heir to His kingdom. Do this… and I will see you there or in the air!