As I was teaching today about free will being part of the Christian worldview, I received an interesting objection. The objection was stated that if God exists and has planned our lives, then we don’t have free will. Does God have a plan for our lives? I believe that he does. But does God’s plan override our free will? I don’t think so. Here’s why.
God’s plan is not in ultimate control of our lives and actions. He did not create a plan and force His plan upon us. If that’s what God does, we would not have free will. Instead, God created a great plan for our lives and invites us to participate in His plan. Think of it like this. You friend has created a plan for you to join them for an evening of fun and games at their house. You are included in this plan. Are you forced to participate in this plan against your will? No, you have two options. You can choose to accept the plan they made for you and go to their house, or you can choose to reject the plan and spend your night doing something else.
This is how God’s plan works for us. I am convinced that God has a plan for ever person’s life. It includes us being in a relationship with Him now and spending eternity with Him. This is where our free will comes into play. We can freely accept His plan and be in an eternal relationship with Him, or we can freely reject His plan and be in eternal separation from Him. The FREE choice is yours!
think-well.org 
December 23, 2015 at 2:22 pm
Christians,
You say ….”So, yes, we are free to do our own will. God created us with free will… “.
It is incredible to see how many, if not all, Christians (of all denominations) believe that God gave man free will.
….that the One Creator God would have said to man that He gives him the freedom to do according to one’s own will, one’s own interests, to worship the gods of one’s choice, to establish for oneself what it good or evil.
If a master gives freedom to a servant, the servant is no longer under obligation to the master’s ways and , being “free”, is no longer subject to the master’s corrections or punishments….since the servant is now “free” to do his own will.
In God’s Word, in the scriptures of the Bible, it is clearly repeated many times, in both the Old Testament and in the New, that man is commanded to do the Will of the One God. This means that God does not give “free” will to man but instead commands obedience to His Word, which, if not followed, will result in death.
God commanded Adam and Eve not to take of the tree of knowledge of good and evil.
In other words , He did not give them the freedom to take of this tree, nor to establish what is right in their eyes…their will.
God did give them the freedom to take of the trees that God established, according only to His Will, that were good for food.
…it is clear here that man is given freedom by God only for that which God establishes to be good.
It is Satan that deceived man to desire to be free from the Will of God, so that man would be free to do his own will.
Man , and Satan, have redefined this DISOBEDIENCE to the Will of the One God as “freedom” for one’s own will, justifying one’s self desires and interests….including even the choice of religions (christianity included).
Today, this disobedience of God’s Way is relabelled and advanced as the belief in “freedom of rights”, human rights, religious freedoms, sexuality freedoms, speech freedoms, etc
…….which President Obama is professing to be the “human spirit”, the “mark of liberty”, the “light of freedom”….the XES.
I hope that you will not be put off by the extremism of this truth but take a look at the signs with a mind of reference that Christ is the Only Way of Life and that The One Creator God is the Only reference point, whom we are to serve.
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December 23, 2015 at 6:09 pm
John, thanks for the comment. I agree with you that Christ is the only way and that God is the only reference point. However, I think you have misunderstood the Christian view of “free will”. When I argued in this blog that Christians have free will, I was not arguing that Christians have freedom to do whatever they want without consequence. The Christian view of free will is that people have the freedom to obey or disobey God’s commands.
Your example of Adam and Eve shows exactly what I meant by free will. God commanded that they should not eat of the tree, yet they had the freedom to disobey God and eat from the tree. They were punished for their disobedience, but they had the freedom to disobey. If God didn’t give them freedom to eat from the tree, then they wouldn’t have been able to do it.
Your example of a master and his slave is a different definition of freedom and that is not what Christians mean by free will. It’s not a freedom from all commands, but instead a freedom to obey or disobey commands. I agree with you that God has commanded us to obey His word, but people can make the choice to disobey and receive punishment. If people didn’t have free will, then we would only be able to do what God commands, and thus, there would be no sin or evil in this world.
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