I read your entire post, but am very interested in the request for you to provide a passage where man’s choices are free from God’s influence. The passage about the “freewill” offerings (notice one word), and the dozen or so other uses of this in the OT are in regard to the sacrafice called, “The freewill offering”. It was called such because there was no written or verbal (from another authority figure) which mandated the giving. A man could give it, if he chose to. The question you must answer, however, is what would cause him to choose? Is the man’s choices unaffected (or perhaps more biblically, “uneffected”) by God?
Your claim that love “...not freely given,” (the old CS Lewis argument) is not biblically supported. You were compelled to use a computer analogy. Please give us a biblical reference to the “philosophical” perspective you claim derives from Scripture. You may have needs to be loved. God does not have that need. What He desires is to display His glory to all of creation. That is its purpose...not to return love to Him. Love existed adequately within the Triune Godhead long before creation.
Additionally, you must deal with
Job 37 – 41
Job 42:2
Jer. 32:17
Prov. 16:9
Is. 45:1
Prov. 16:4
Eccl. 3:1-14
Prov. 21:1
Dan 4:35
Prov. 20:24
Job 14:5
Phil 3:12
Eph. 2:10
Ex 4:11
Ex. 35:35
James 4:13-15
Lam. 3:37-38
Is. 53:10
Acts 4:27-28
I Kings 22:19-23
I Sam 16:14-23,
I Sam 18:10
I Sam 19:9
II Sam 24:1
(1 Chronicles 21:1)
I Cor. 14:33
Ex 14:24
Ex 23:27
Deut 7:23
Deut 28:20
II Thess 2:11
Rom 11:8
II Chron 34:24
Is 37:26,
Amos 3:5,
John 6:44
John 6:65
Isaiah 43:6-7
Rom 14:4
Jude 24, 25
Ephesians 1:11-12
Jeremiah 31:34ff
Phil 1:6
and lot of others making the same claims. God fashioned creation ex nihilo...out of nothing (John 1:1ff). The origin of evil and everything else is obviously from Him. Why does that bother you? He has determined not to use it unfettered, the way you think He must if He created it. Why is that? Because it comports with your categories? Because the philosophers say so, (Bertrand Russell, Epicurus, et al). God has determined to restrain its effects and use after the counsel of His own will...the only “free will” in existence. This is at least one reason to “fear” God. He can do anything He wishes.
And, of course Adam and Eve were created with the propensity to sin. That is what James 1 describes. The extant lust (appetite) was on board at creation. When the opportunity for it to express itself arose (Satan: Has God really said...), it was carried away, conceived and gave birth to sin. Please tell us where the Scriptures say Adam had “free will”? James is dealing with God not “tempting” by dangling a thing in front of you and watching what you will do? It is planned, orchestrated, executed in every man. At least that is what the text says.
I say again, the “calls” for a man to choose (as Joshua said, “Choose this day whom you will serve...” are conditioned upon God directing the man to choose (or not). That is why the prophets would cry, “Why have you caused us to rebel?” and other such tragic truths. If you notice a man “choosing”, you are seeing the operation of God upon His creation. Check Vincent Cheung’s work on the origin of evil.
You may not like it, you may dislike its philosophical implications, you may not even “feel” the effect of God performing His amazing work...that does not change what the text says about man being managed by God. Again, please tell us where the Scriptures teach that man is free from God’s influence.
Never did I claim, or even hint at, man being free from God's influence.
I fully believe that if God "recalled his spirit" from mankind we would cease to live; that is actually irrelevant to free will though.
God fashioned creation ex nihilo...out of nothing (John 1:1ff). The origin of evil and everything else is obviously from Him. Why does that bother you? He has determined not to use it unfettered, the way you think He must if He created it.
And evil must have the good already present to exist. A lie is meaningless without the Truth; rottenness is meaningless without the fruit; a rust-hole cannot exist independent of the thing rusted.
But to say that God created evil is quite akin to the unforgivable sin: to attribute to God's Holy Spirit the work/evil of Satan.
Your claim that love “...not freely given,” (the old CS Lewis argument) is not biblically supported. You were compelled to use a computer analogy.
Because I happen to be a Computer Scientist; Jesus himself recognized we speak of the things we know.
You may have needs to be loved. God does not have that need.
I never said that God had that need; I said that our love would be utterly worthless if not given freely.