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we begin to realize that all is according to His plan and what we thought in the shadows was our free will was really God working out His plan...

It makes a difference if God makes our decisions or if we make our decisions according to His plan. In the former, we are robots; in the latter He knew from all eternity what our decisions would be. The latter makes us free and yet God's plan is certain and sovereign. In the former, it's God pulling the strings and we are just dummies.

The former is void of responsibility and accountability; the latter makes us accountable to God; and responsible for what we do. Sin is our burden, born out of our decisions, not God's.

God created man capable of being a moral being; capable is the operant term here. We are capable of immortality (by following God). We are capable of goodness (with God's help). But it has to come from our heart to come to Him. He knock but He doesn't compel.

If we are not free to give back freely what He gave us freely, there is no love in it.

The former paradigm breaks down because love is lacking. The latter has a potential because we are free to love God, if we so choose. If He created us such that we reject him then our rejection of Him is not our doing and there is no sin and no penalty due in rejecting God. It was predestined and unavoidable.

While what you say about the Plato's cave sounds very true, it is equally true that God breathed a human soul in each and every one of us and made us in His image — rational and free.

What you say about the people rather having "the rocks fall on them than to bow down to or acknowledge the authority of God" is precisely the source of our sin, the arrogance and pride for which there is only one cure: sincere humility.

Only the proud and the arrogant will not bow before God. God offends them. God insults their pride and their arrogance. God is the obstacle to their love of the world, self-importance, and material goods. But that's their choice, not God's.

Then there are those who use God to boost their pride; to boast of righteousness; the spiritual pride of those who are "high on God." The only "high" is their self-illusion. That is certainly not from God, but from them.

There is evil because God does not compel. But He is also our Light that illuminates our Way to reach the Truth. Let's not forget that "strait is the gate, and narrow is the way, which leadeth unto life, and few there be that find it."

One does not 'find' anything if he is predestined to get there, BD.

I think the LOVE issue IS a critical issue regarding "free will" vs "hyper predestination."

Scripture includes evidence of BOTH. Calvinists--particularly hyper Calvinists--seem loathe to treat the "free will" verses on their own merit as merely that. They seem compelled to bend them in some way to conform to hyper predestination.

I don't pretend to have it all figured out and am sure I won't this side of Heaven.

I don't know if God COULD have made it clearer to mere mortals. Perhaps such mysteries are beyond our finiteness.

I still like Walter Martin's computer as large as the universe analogy. At the level of the individual actor, there's a strong robust measure of free will. But the programmer also has free will to adjust things for His desired outcome.

I do know, that for authentic Love, there must be a REAL measure of REAL, authentic FREE WILL with applicable consequences. Nothing else makes sense, to me.

We are not totally free will creatures, clearly. Neither can we be total robots and share in and return a robust sort and degree of Love with Almighty God.

"It makes a difference if God makes our decisions or if we make our decisions according to His plan. In the former, we are robots; in the latter He knew from all eternity what our decisions would be. The latter makes us free and yet God's plan is certain and sovereign. In the former, it's God pulling the strings and we are just dummies."

If God's plan is "certain and sovereign" then the details are just as "certain and sovereign". Otherwise, you have "open theism" where God just sits there amazed at how things are turning out and "wow" it is similar to what He planned. The question still remains, if you don't know, or are not sure, that all things are planned and executed according to God's sovereign plan, and you make decisions based on your genes, heritage, education, experience, accidents etc., what difference does it make to you? Don't you still think or act on the basis that you are making decisions based on your free will or "free will" as informed by and dictated by all of life's contingencies? The only people who had "free will" were Adam and Eve; every one else's decisions were based on the negative influences of sin, from their parents to the fallen and cursed creation. Adam and Eve's education and experience, up until the time of the fall, came from their relationship with the Creator and His perfect creation. Every one after the fall, including Adam and Eve, learned from sin and the consequences of sin.

"The former paradigm breaks down because love is lacking."

Where is love lacking? God provided the satisfaction for sin before the creation. He chose those He wanted to spend eternity with and brings things about to make sure they are with Him. (Rom. 8:28-33) "And we know that all things work together for good to them that love God, to them who are the called according to his purpose. For whom he did foreknow, he also did predestinate to be conformed to the image of his Son, that he might be the firstborn among many brethren. Moreover whom he did predestinate, them he also called: and whom he called, them he also justified: and whom he justified, them he also glorified. What shall we then say to these things? If God be for us, who can be against us? He that spared not his own Son, but delivered him up for us all, how shall he not with him also freely give us all things? Who shall lay any thing to the charge of God's elect?"

In His sovereignty, He chose some vessels for honor and some for dishonor, however, those chosen for dishonor will never say His election is unjust because they see themselves as autonomous from Him and gods in their own right, able to make eternal decisions without His input, which they do to their own destruction. They get what they want, separation from God.

The mystery is how God can plan and execute down to the minutest detail (look at the lilies of the field) and yet create man, such, that his decisions are seemingly autonomous. That's why when we evangelize we ask for a response, because we don't know, and are just "fishers of men".