What is Free Will?
What is Free Will?
Norman Geisler states: “...God made the fact of freedom; we are responsible for the acts of freedom.” (Chosen But Free, p.23, emphasis mine)
This simple statement, well accounts for the origin of sin, such as, “Where did Lucifer get his desire to sin?” God created the fact of freedom, but Lucifer is responsible for his acts of his freedom, and hence God has a logical basis upon which to hold him accountable and ultimately judge him. However, if you were to say that God’s sovereignty is the origin of Lucifer’s desire to sin, then you would have what he terms, “Extreme Calvinism.” Notice that even Calvinist, R.C. Sproul, stops short of stating that God is the origin of the sinful choices by truly free creatures. Concerning Adam & Eve, before the Fall, he states:
Therefore, for those who insist that in order for God to be “truly sovereign,” that He must have caused the fall of Adam & Eve, Lucifer and the fallen angels, and rendered it certain, have clearly gone further than R.C. Sproul. I might also add, how are Calvinists going to tell Arminians that they are wrong about the nature of Free Will, when even they cannot explain it?
Consider 1st Corinthians 10:13 which states: “No temptation has overtaken you but such as is common to man; and God is faithful, who will not allow you to be tempted beyond what you are able, but with the temptation will provide the way of escape also, so that you will be able to endure it.”
One member of The Society of Evangelical Arminians states: “God promises Christians that they never have to sin. He gives grace to aid the Christian so that the Christian can resist temptation, even though he is obviously able to give in to temptation. So if you take two Christians, and one gives into temptation, while another does not, then why does one give in while the other remains faithful? It cannot be a difference of grace--they are both able to resist the temptation. By the Calvinist argument, it must be because one has some good in him, apart from God or grace, and must be able to legitimately boast. But this is obviously, patently unbiblical, and shows how the Calvinist argument is invalid.” (SEA, emphasis mine)
This makes for a great response to the Calvinist who asks why a person chooses one way over another? Here you have two Christians, both with the same grace, and yet one overcomes the temptation, while another does not. Why? The answer is free will.
Hal Lindsey states: “So God did this because He did not want to create robots. You see, He wanted a creature that could respond to Him. But, most of all, He wanted a creature that could respond to His love. Now, there cannot be love without freedom of choice. Unless you can choose not to love, you can’t love.” (Gospel of John, emphasis mine)
Billy Graham writes: “God created man in His own image and gave him an abundant life. He did not make him as a robot to automatically love and obey Him, but gave him a will and freedom of choice. Man chose to disobey God and go his own willful way. Man still makes this choice today. The is results in separation from God.” (The Enduring Classics of Billy Graham: The Secret of Happiness, Happiness Through Peacemaking, pp.125-126, emphasis mine)
By the grace of God and through the free will of men to believe in Christ, some are saved (Ephesians 2:8), while others, who are disbelieving, remain condemned and perish. (John 3:18) Our free will is subject to outside influences, both from the negative influence of the devil, through sin, and also from the positive influence of God, through His preceding grace, which enables a man to receive Him.
One member of The Society of Evangelical Arminians states: “God, for some reason or another, seems just as concerned about how one comes to salvation than whether one comes to salvation. After all, salvation means to be rescued. God could rescue us without our consent: without our faith. For some reason He declared that we shall be saved by faith, and whatever made Him put the condition on salvation also causes Him to make revelation conditional as well.” (SEA, emphasis mine)
On the basis of Romans 10:17, what reason is there to believe that saving faith is not available to all? The Calvinist will immediately respond, “then why don’t all believe?” On that basis, the Calvinist will insist that something more than just the Gospel is needed for someone to believe, namely, a changed heart by means of preemptive, Regenerative Grace. Many have converted to Calvinism over that very point. However, God doesn’t give Regenerative Grace to sinners in order to believe. Rather, God gives believers Regenerative Grace in order not to sin, and to accomplish the holy calling in which each Christian has been uniquely called by God to serve within the Body of Christ.
So, then, how does anyone embrace the faith produced by the Gospel? The answer that Jesus gave was that you had to receive the Word with “an honest and good heart.” (Luke 8:15) However, Calvinists simply see that as a sign of regeneration because the natural, unregenerate man does not possess an honest and good heart, but rather possesses a heart that is “deceitful above all things, and desperately wicked heart.” (Jeremiah 17:9) However, Jesus didn’t mention anything about “Preemptive Regeneration” in His presentation of Luke 8:15. In fact, Jesus never specifically taught Preemptive Regeneration, period. So if not for Preemptive Regeneration, how does a “deceitful” and “wicked” heart become an “honest” and “good heart” in order to receive the faith produced by the preaching of the Gospel? The simple answer is that it doesn’t. Evangelism is not about seeking out the race of the good-hearted in order to get them saved. Many with a wicked heart have received the Gospel, while those of a lesser evil nature, remain unrepentant. Why? Because Jesus never said that good-hearted people are inclined to receive the Gospel. What He said was that you need to have “heard the word in an honest and good heart,” not that you must already possess an honest and good heart, as Calvinism teaches that Preemptive Regeneration operates. For instance, a wicked person can be utterly broken and convicted by the Holy Spirit (John 16:8), and therefore sincerely surrender under the weight, burden and guilt of sin, empowered by the faith-producing Gospel. Becoming a Christian is not about being a good person, but rather bad people surrendering under fear and pressure induced by the Holy Spirit. Hell is real and Jesus taught more on hell than anyone one else in the Bible. For instance, the two thieves on the cross next to Christ weren’t good-hearted people at all, but yet one of them heard what was being said about Jesus (through the scoffing of the Pharisees), and heard it with honest sincerity, and as a result of it, surrendered to Christ under the conviction of his sins. However, the Calvinist will still ask why one surrendered and the other didn’t. The answer, again, is that one sincerely embraced it, while the other hardened his heart. And why is that?, the Calvinists will still protest. Ultimately, it comes down to a free choice, under pressure of the Holy Spirit, empowered by the faith-producing Gospel. Jesus said to an unrepentant Saul of Tarsus, “It is hard for you to kick against the goads.” (Acts 26:14) Will you choose to sincerely embrace hope, or will you harden your heart in faithlessness? For instance, Adam and Eve were sinless creatures while in the Garden of Eden. Were they not? Yet, they freely chose to sin, did they not? It was a perfectly free choice. Most Calvinists seem to loathe that analogy, but it was nevertheless a free choice, and like Adam and Eve, God gives us the glorious privilege of being able to receive reconciliation with Him, like the one thief, or the dubious privilege of rejecting Him, like the other thief. Man is enabled, and then held accountable for the enablement. In terms of such accountability, 2nd Peter 2:21 states: “For it would be better for them not to have known the way of righteousness, than having known it, to turn away from the holy commandment handed on to them.” Real opportunity is presented, and which also something Calvinism denies, apart from Elective and Regenerative Graces.
However, the Calvinist will still protest. Why, they will ask, does the one surrender under the weight of the pricking of the Holy Spirit, and not another, if not by preemptive Regenerative Grace by way of eternal in the Father Election? The answer is that one hardened his heart and not another. Naturally, the Calvinist will persist with, why did one choose to harden his heart, and not the other? The point of the Calvinist is simple, in that the difference between the two individuals is something that lies within themselves rather than something that lies within God, as Calvinism teaches, whereby God irresistibly helps the one to make the right choice, that is, the eternal elect individual in the Father, while withholding help for the other. Although the Calvinist perspective is functionally sound, it is nevertheless not biblically sound, and the Arminian is left to explain the concept of a free-will choice to the Calvinist.
Daniel Whedon explains: “Ask then what fully caused the Will in its conditions to cause the volition and the reply is, nothing. However, in the cause of the volitional decision to repent, God’s prevenient grace does exert an enabling influence on the will. Jon vi, 44; xvi, 8-9. An influence is not the same as a determining cause or partial cause. The will is still free to go in alternate directions.” (Freedom of the Will: A Wesleyan Response to Jonathan Edwards, p.74, emphasis mine)
Daniel Whedon comments: “…the grace of God frees the Will from being completely bounded by sin since the Fall, but it does not determine or cause which way the Will volitionally decides. Even for the pagan, the Will is free to choose between sin, relative human good or repenting to become a Christian. Or if the question is: In general, why did the Will in equipoise choose thus rather than otherwise? The reply is, because the Will was a complete and adequate cause for that choice rather than another; and when an adequate cause is assigned the Why is answered.” (Freedom of the Will: A Wesleyan Response to Jonathan Edwards, p.74, emphasis mine)
How is it complete?
Daniel Whedon comments: “Our very definition of a free Will is, a power of choosing in a given direction, with a full power of choosing otherwise. Now the rejection of a counter for which there is full power, in given forth the actual, is included in the very idea of a free will.” (Freedom of the Will: A Wesleyan Response to Jonathan Edwards, p.75, emphasis mine)
This is called the “power of contrary choice.”
What if God took a person and dropped him in hell for two minutes. Upon lifting him out, he might come out cursing, or he might come out surrendering. It just depends upon the free choice of the individual. This, incidentally, is the very picture of “the rich man” at Luke 16:19-31 who suddenly had the heart of an evangelist while in hell, persisting in an attempt to persuade Abraham (on the other side of the chasm) to reach his lost brothers who were soon to join him in hell and fiery torment. Now did “the rich man” require preemptive Regenerative Grace to arrive at this new perspective? The Calvinist will protest that this is simply not the manner in which God deals with the lost. Or is it? When the Holy Spirit convicts the world of sin, in conjunction with the faith-producing Gospel message, the world is essentially placed under that very same perspective of fear and impending doom in an eternal hell, contemplating the same exact future as “the rich man,” and some become bitter and harden their heart, while others submit. Some put off a decision for Christ for another day, while others walk the aisle and surrender their heart to Christ. Either way, for both, it is a life-changing event. For the one, their heart is regenerated and are now being born again. For the other, their heart has been hardened, and they don’t even realize it, which is why Isaiah warned: “Seek the LORD while He may be found; Call upon Him while He is near.” (Isaiah 55:6) The perfect picture is the two men on the crosses next to Jesus. Both of them had their eternal future starring them right in their face, and one submitted and the other didn’t. It’s a Free Will choice, and you don’t get Regenerative Grace to make it. Just as what Abraham told the “the rich man,” they have Moses and the Prophets to listen to. (Luke 16:29, 31) Today, however, we have the Bible. Abraham’s answer is that even if someone should return from the dead, even that will not un-harden their heart. They have the free choice either to remain stubborn, which God warned against, “Harden not your heart” (Psalm 95:8), or to surrender and quit fighting and quit kicking against the goads. The Calvinist will still reject that, and ironically, that is entirely their free-will choice.
According to Calvinism, if God went ahead with creating a world that He foreknew would fall away, then God is responsible for all that that world would ever do, both good and bad. Otherwise, God could have stopped it from ever coming to pass, and if God chose not to stop it, then He must have a purpose for it.
In this illustration, if you did continue to have sexual relations with your wife, then it would not be because you approved of her eventual murder, but instead because you desired a normal relationship. For God to have proceeded with the act of creation, knowing that by creating the fact of freedom, people would misuse their freedom, does not require that God approved of their misuse, but rather that there was something else that God did desire. The parable of the Wheat and the Tares, exemplifies this. Jesus stated: “The kingdom of heaven may be compared to a man who sowed good seed in his field. But while his men were sleeping, his enemy came and sowed tares among the wheat, and went away. But when the wheat sprouted and bore grain, then the tares became evident also. The slaves of the landowner came and said to him, ‘Sir, did you not sow good seed in your field? How then does it have tares?’ And he said to them, ‘An enemy has done this!’ The slaves said to him, ‘Do you want us, then, to go and gather them up?’ But he said, ‘No; for while you are gathering up the tares, you may uproot the wheat with them. Allow both to grow together until the harvest; and in the time of the harvest I will say to the reapers, “First gather up the tares and bind them in bundles to burn them up; but gather the wheat into my barn.”’” (Matthew 13:24-30) Quite obviously, the enemy was Satan, and the Garden of Eden comes to mind. As Genesis records, what God created was “very good.” (Genesis 1:31) In this parable, the only reason why the Sower permitted that tares to continue to grow was because He did not want the wheat to be harmed, rather than having any secret purpose for the tares.
According to the Calvinist: God has a purpose for everything that takes place. I do not believe that God simply rolls the dice of creation and crosses His fingers hoping that everything turns out for the best. I believe in a God who is great and sovereign over all His creation and He has worked out all things according to His own purposes and for His own glory. Nothing comes into existence apart from God. It becomes an exercise in absurdity to try to imagine anything taking place outside of His will.
That’s the religion of a Calvinist: God has a purpose for sin. God ordained sin. If something happens, it’s because God has a purpose for it. That’s Calvinism.
However, I’m not so sure that the “ability” to sin in Heaven will be removed, so much as the desire to sin will be removed, viz. a new nature, one that is like Jesus’. For instance, when Jesus was on earth, perhaps He had the physical ability to sin, though with His spiritual nature, He had no desire to commit sin, due to His nature which had no desire to sin. On the other hand, with fallen man, whether it be the “unregenerate unbeliever” or even the “regenerate Christian,” we still have a sin nature (Romans 7:14-25, in terms of the conflict of 2 natures). Someday in Heaven, the sin nature will be removed, and all that will be left is the regenerate nature.
The fact is, that the Calvinist cannot explain free will within the context of their “Determinism” when the creature in question is not “unregenerate,” such as Adam & Eve in their pre-Fall state, including the pre-Fall of Lucifer and the Fallen Angels. Even with the Calvinist’s version of Compatibilism, nothing is left but Hard Determinism, with a mere illusion of Free Will (since what is “compatible” must be meticulously programmed within them, in order for their “free” choices to be rendered compatible with a predetermine purpose, or else their unprogrammed, freedom to do a multitude of other free choices [good or bad], would interfere with a predetermined purposed. In other words, their potential freedom to commit sin-series: B-Z, would interfere with the predetermined purpose of them committing only sin-series: A. Hence, the need for meticulous pre-programming so that their “free choices” may appear compatible with their actual choices). Hence, the Calvinist version of free will, is nothing more than Hard Determinism. For more on this point, see here.
Question: How does a person harden their own heart?
Answer: By stalling or procrastinating. It isn’t necessarily by rejecting Christ immediately. But each time a person stalls, like Pharaoh, and puts off God, their heart becomes a little bit harder. As the next day rolls into the next, they perceive that they’ve gotten away with putting off God, all while abusing God’s long-suffering patience, until the day that it catches up with them.
Question: So, how are men saved?
Answer: Saving faith in Christ.
Question: Where does saving faith come from?
Answer: From Christ’s Word which is “living and active.” (Hebrews 4:12). Romans 10:17 states: “So faith comes from hearing, and hearing by the word of Christ.”
The Calvinist perspective: If you agree that God created all things with explicit knowledge of all that would come to pass, then you would have to say that God approved of it, in the sense that God approved that the act will take place. In this sense, Calvinists believe that God ordained sin.
That statement came from the question of whether or not Abortion was the will of God.
Calvinists present the following illustration: Suppose you knew that prior to your child’s birth, that this child would someday murder his mother. You have not yet impregnated your wife. Would you chose to continue having sexual relations with your wife, knowing the end result? If you did, would you say that you were in some way approving or consenting to the ramifications?
Calvinists contend that the Arminian view is faulty because if Arminians are correct, then we will be less free in heaven since the ability to sin will be removed.
Calvinist. R.C. Sproul, states: “But Adam and Eve were not created fallen. They had no sin nature. They were good creatures with a free will. Yet they chose to sin. Why? I don’t know. Nor have I found anyone yet who does know.” (Chosen By God, p.31, emphasis mine)
Adrian Rogers explains: “God is the author of everything. God made everything perfect, and when God made man, God man His creature perfectly free. Free Will, then, man’s Free Will, is the origin of evil. God did not create evil. God created perfection, and God made man perfectly free, and freedom therefore gave rise to this evil. You see, this is what makes us moral creatures. Somebody says, ‘Why didn’t God just make us where we couldn’t sin?’ Well if God had made us where we couldn’t sin, He could have no more fellowship with me than I could have with that pulpit or that speaker. Because God made us moral creatures; love is the highest good; and God wants us to love Him. This is the first and great commandment: ‘Thou shalt love the Lord thy God with all thy heart, with all thy soul, with all thy strength, with all thy mind.’ Love is the highest good, but forced love is a contradiction in terms. Forced love is not love at all. In order to love, we must be free to love, to choose to love, and to choose to love, we have to be able to choose not to love. And so God gave us perfect choice. Adam chose in the Garden of Eden, and the sons of Adam after him, to sin, and that’s where the heart-ache, and the groan and the moan come from, as we’re going to see in a moment.” (Turning Hurts Into Hallelujahs: Romans 8:8-11, emphasis mine)
A.W. Tozer explains: “Here is my view: God sovereignly decreed that man should be free to exercise moral choice, and man from the beginning has fulfilled that decree by making his choice between good and evil. When he chooses to do evil, he does not thereby countervail the sovereign will of God but fulfills it, inasmuch as the eternal decree decided not which choice the man should make but that he should be free to make it. If in His absolute freedom God has willed to give man limited freedom, who is there to stay His hand or say, ‘What doest thou?’ Man’s will is free because God is sovereign. A God less than sovereign could not bestow moral freedom upon His creatures. He would be afraid to do so. Perhaps a homely illustration might help us to understand. An ocean liner leaves New York bound for Liverpool. Its destination has been determined by proper authorities. Nothing can change it. This is at least a faint picture of sovereignty. On board the liner are several scores of passengers. These are not in chains, neither are their activities determined for them by decree. They are completely free to move about as they will. They eat, sleep, play, lounge about on the deck, read, talk, altogether as they please; but all the while the great liner is carrying them steadily onward toward a predetermined port. Both freedom and sovereignty are present here and they do not contradict each other. So it is, I believe, with man’s freedom and the sovereignty of God. The mighty liner of God’s sovereign design keeps its steady course over the sea of history. God moves undisturbed and unhindered toward the fulfilment of those eternal purposes which He purposed in Christ Jesus before the world began. We do not know all that is included in those purposes, but enough has been disclosed to furnish us with a broad outline of things to come and to give us good hope and firm assurance of future well-being.” (The Knowledge of the Holy, emphasis mine)
Question: Why does one person respond to the grace of God, and not another?
Answer: Can you explain why did Adam & Eve choose the way that they did? If it’s not something that God made them do, then it’s something that they decided for themselves, and hence, free will. Turning the tables back upon the Calvinist, ask, “Is God powerful enough to enable an unregenerate person to receive His grace?” According to Calvinists, “no,” because “fallen man is too far gone,” even for God, and thus Irresistible Grace is the only solution for the total inability of man. Thus, Calvinists have assumed a limitation upon God.
Free Will in the the Early Church period: Augustine.
Augustine explains: “...it is written in the sacred Scriptures, ‘God hath spoken once; these two things have I heard, that power belongeth unto God. Also unto Thee, O God, belongeth mercy: for Thou wilt render unto every man according to his works.’ Now the expression, ‘Once hath He spoken,’ is to be understood as meaning ‘immovably,’ that is, unchangeably hath He spoken, inasmuch as He knows unchangeably all things which shall be, and all things which He will do. We might, then, use the word fate in the sense it bears when derived from fari, to speak, had it not already come to be understood in another sense, into which I am unwilling that the hearts of men should unconsciously slide. But it does not follow that, though there is for God a certain order of all causes, there must therefore be nothing depending on the free exercise of our own wills, for our wills themselves are included in that order of causes which is certain to God, and is embraced by His foreknowledge, for human wills are also causes of human actions; and He who foreknew all the causes of things would certainly among those causes not have been ignorant of our wills.” (The City of God, Book 5, Chapter 9, emphasis mine)
Augustine adds: “In His supreme will resides the power which acts on the wills of all created spirits, helping the good, judging the evil, controlling all, granting power to some, not granting it to others. For, as He is the creator of all natures, so also is He the bestower of all powers, not of all wills; for wicked wills are not from Him, being contrary to nature, which is from Him.” (The City of God, Book 5, Chapter 9, emphasis mine)
Augustine writes: “For one who is not prescient of all future things is not God. Wherefore our wills also have just so much power as God willed and foreknew that they should have; and therefore whatever power they have, they have it within most certain limits; and whatever they are to do, they are most assuredly to do, for He whose foreknowledge is infallible foreknew that they would have the power to do it, and would do it.” (The City of God, Book 5, Chapter 9, emphasis mine)
Augustine writes: “...when we say that it is necessary that, when we will, we will by free choice, in so saying we both affirm what is true beyond doubt, and do not still subject our wills thereby to a necessity which destroys liberty.” (The City of God, Book 5, Chapter 10, emphasis mine)
Augustine writes: “It is not the case, therefore, that because God foreknew what would be in the power of our wills, there is for that reason nothing in the power of our wills. For he who foreknew this did not foreknow nothing. Moreover, if He who foreknew what would be in the power of our wills did not foreknow nothing, but something, assuredly, even though He did foreknow, there is something in the power of our wills. Therefore we are by no means compelled, either, retaining the prescience of God, to take away the freedom of the will, or, retaining the freedom of the will, to deny that He is prescient of future things, which is impious. But we embrace both.” (The City of God, Book 5, Chapter 10)
Augustine writes: “Prayers, also, are of avail to procure those things which He foreknew that He would grant to those who offered them; and with justice have rewards been appointed for good deeds, and punishments for sins. For a man does not therefore sin because God foreknew that he would sin. Nay, it cannot be doubted but that it is the man himself who sins when he does sin, because He, whose foreknowledge is infallible, foreknew not that fate, or fortune, or something else would sin, but that the man himself would sin, who, if he wills not, sins not. But if he shall not will to sin, even this did God foreknow.” (The City of God, Book 5, Chapter 10)
Question: Two people receive the same grace to be saved, but one person repents while another rejects. What caused the difference?
Answer: The person’s own volition caused the difference. Each may be faced with different external motivations, but it’s their own volition that decides which way to go. So is there a precedence for this? Consider God. What causes His decisions? What about the angels, before 1/3 fell? What about Adam and Eve, pre-Fall? What caused their choices? The answer is either going to be Determinism or Self-Determinism. If God has a free will, and if the angels have a free will, and if Adam and Eve had a free will, then there is at least a basis to suppose that volition is a legitimate source of causation.
Free Will in the the Early Church period: Justin Martyr.
Justin Martyr writes: “...I said briefly by anticipation, that God, wishing men and angels to follow His will, resolved to create them free to do righteousness; possessing reason, that they may know by whom they are created, and through whom they, not existing formerly, do now exist; and with a law that they should be judged by Him, if they do anything contrary to right reason: and of ourselves we, men and angels, shall be convicted of having acted sinfully, unless we repent beforehand. But if the word of God foretells that some angels and men shall be certainly punished, it did so because it foreknew that they would be unchangeably [wicked], but not because God had created them so.” (The Apostolic Fathers with Justin Martyr and Irenaeus, Chapter CXLI.—Free-will in men and angels, emphasis mine)
When Calvinists think of free will, they imagine man’s will hanging over God’s will to such a degree, that man’s will challenges and defies God, so as to constitute a threat to God’s will and purpose in creation. This concept of man’s freedom in relation to God’s sovereignty could be likened to a set of balancing scales, with the weights set against each other. In this view, either God’s will is thwarted by man’s will or man’s will is thwarted by God’s will. In either case, one of the two is victor and the other vanquished.
