How Does God Foreknow Free Choices?

I have been listening to and reading a lot of your material over the last year, and have been learning a lot - not least from the Defenders podcast. I've been searching in your material for the answer to a specific question, but haven't found it - and therefore I write you now.

I'm trying to sort out the matter of free will and God's foreknowledge, and I've come to understand that there is no contradiction between God's foreknowing a free choice, and that choice being truly free. Foreknowing doesn't equal determining.

But - here is my question: How? How does God foreknow what I would freely choose? I can see how he could foresee my choices if I was determined to make a specific choice, based on my genetics/upbringing/situation. But then the will isn't free - is it?

If God knows the position and speed of every particle in the universe - then he could foresee every future event, where the cause/effect is within the realm of materia. But our free choice isn't.

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I’ve addressed this question, Paulus, in Part 3 of my book The Only Wise God (rep.ed.: Eugene, Ore.: Wipf & Stock, 2000). I refer you to the discussion there.

Your question presupposes that God exists in time, as we do. But if God exists timelessly, He does not have literal foreknowledge. For what is future for us is not future for Him. So He knows what is future for us, but He does not foreknow it. Defenders of divine timelessness, then, have no difficulty with your question, since it presupposes a temporal deity.

But suppose we think, as I do, that God does exist at every time that there is and so does literally foreknow the future. As you rightly point out, foreknowledge of free choices cannot be based upon inference from present causes, for that would imply determinism and annihilate free choice. So God must know future free choices in some other way.

In getting at this question, it is useful to distinguish two models of divine cognition: a perceptualist model and a conceptualist model. The perceptualist model thinks of God’s cognition on the analogy of sense perception. This model is implicitly presupposed when people talk, as you do, of God’s “foreseeing future events.” He somehow looks ahead in time and “sees” what is there. The language is metaphorical, but I can think of at least two ways to make a perceptualist model of divine foreknowledge work, though they both involve ontological commitments which I am not willing to make.

One way would be to adopt a tenseless theory of time, according to which all events, past, present, and future, are equally real and temporal becoming is just a subjective illusion of human consciousness. The perceptualist model runs into trouble only if time is tensed, for then there is nothing in the future to see. But if all events in time are equally existent, then there is something there for God to perceive. He can just look and see what actually lies ahead.

Another way would be to hold that there are abstract objects (propositions) which bear the values true or false. On a realist view of such objects, there is no need for God to look into the future in order to know what will happen. Rather He can know the future simply by inspecting future-tense propositions (or tenseless propositions about future events) which presently exist and bear the properties true or false. An omniscient God cannot be ignorant of the properties which presently inhere in things. If we are reluctant, as I am, to ascribe reality to abstract objects like propositions, perhaps we could substitute for propositions God’s own belief states or thoughts and the truth values inhering in them.

But there is no reason to adopt a perceptualist model of divine cognition, which is a terribly anthropomorphic way of thinking of God’s cognition—God certainly doesn’t know mathematical or ethical truths, for example, on the basis of anything like sense perception. Rather we can adopt a conceptualist model, which thinks of God’s knowledge more on the analogy of innate ideas. Plato thought that human knowledge is innate and that education consists in simply helping us to recollect the knowledge that we have forgotten. However implausible such a model might be for human cognition, it seems perfectly suited to divine cognition. As an essentially omniscient being God has the property of believing only and all truths. He didn’t get this knowledge from anywhere; He just has it innately. Compare other divine attributes like omnipotence. It makes no sense to ask how God is omnipotent. Exercise? Practice? No, God simply has the essential property of being omnipotent. In the same way He simply has the essential attribute of being omniscient. But then it follows that He must know all future-tense truths, which gives Him complete knowledge of the future.

I am perfectly satisfied with such a simple conceptualist model of divine cognition, but we can push the analysis a notch further. For if God has what theologians call “middle knowledge,” then foreknowledge immediately follows as a consequence. By His middle knowledge God knows what every free person He could have created would freely do in any set of circumstances in which God might place him. So by creating certain persons and placing them in certain circumstances, God knows exactly what they will do, and that without abridging their freedom in any way. God knows the future simply on the basis of His middle knowledge and His knowledge of His choice of which persons and circumstances to create, without any sort of perception of the world.

Of course, this raises the question of the basis of God’s middle knowledge, and here the same sort of answers will be replayed. For example, if individual essences exist (e.g., your essential properties), then God can simply inspect them to see what contingent counterfactual properties inhere in them concerning what the relevant persons would do in various circumstances, were those essences to be instantiated. I’m inclined to regard God’s middle knowledge simply as innate knowledge, which is His in virtue of being an omniscient being.

What's strange about the question and answer is that there are no scriptural references whatsoever. No actual delving into the verses to see what they say, and what they say is that God both "foreknows" and "determines" what will come to pass. For God is not a Creator who refuses to govern His creation, but, in fact, rules over everything, even the smallest action or the life and death of the smallest animal. This is one of the strongest doctrines in all of scripture.

God rules over all matters of "chance," such as the casting of lots:

Pro_16:33 The lot is cast into the lap; but the whole disposing thereof is of the LORD.

This includes even the "chance" actions of men that results in a loss of life, despite their not planning to kill (see Deut 19:5 for an example of an "accidental" killing):

"He that smiteth a man, so that he die, shall be surely put to death. And if a man lie not in wait, but God deliver him into his hand; then I will appoint thee a place whither he shall flee." (Exo 21:12-13)

Or the "chance" doings of evil men, such as invading at the best moment to rescue David:

1Sa 23:27 But there came a messenger unto Saul, saying, Haste thee, and come; for the Philistines have invaded the land.

God moves the heart of the King however He desires:

Pro_21:1 The king's heart is in the hand of the LORD, as the rivers of water: he turneth it whithersoever he will.

Even the words from our lips cannot utter forth but by God's permission:

“The preparations of the heart in man, and the answer of the tongue, is from the Lord,” (Prov. 16:1)

The man does not determine His own steps, but it is God who directs him:

"O LORD, I know that the way of man is not in himself: it is not in man that walketh to direct his steps." (Jer 10:23)

"Man's goings are of the LORD; how can a man then understand his own way?" (Pro 20:24)

Man's life is not his own in any way, but it is God who has absolutely established the time of his birth and death:

Job_14:5 Seeing his days are determined, the number of his months are with thee, thou hast appointed his bounds that he cannot pass;

We are God's hirelings, our life is in His hands:

"Is there not an appointed time to man upon earth? are not his days also like the days of an hireling?" (Job 7:1)

This is true even of the smallest and most insignificant animals:

Mat_10:29 Are not two sparrows sold for a farthing? and one of them shall not fall on the ground without your Father.

He grants food to all flesh, and determines when it shall rain or when it will not, when the grass shall grow and when it will not; the withholding of it is His doing:

"Who covereth the heaven with clouds, who prepareth rain for the earth, who maketh grass to grow upon the mountains. He giveth to the beast his food, and to the young ravens which cry." (Psa 147:8-9)

"There go the ships: there is that leviathan, whom thou hast made to play therein. These wait all upon thee; that thou mayest give them their meat in due season. That thou givest them they gather: thou openest thine hand, they are filled with good. Thou hidest thy face, they are troubled: thou takest away their breath, they die, and return to their dust. Thou sendest forth thy spirit, they are created: and thou renewest the face of the earth." (Psa 104:26-30)

The same is true of men, for whom no good thing can come unless it is granted from heaven:

Joh_3:27 John answered and said, A man can receive nothing, except it be given him from heaven.

He determines who will be promoted and who will not, who will be rich and who will be poor:

“Promotion cometh neither from the east, nor from the west, nor from the south. But God is the judge: he putteth down ones and setteth up another,” (Ps. 75:6, 7)

Good and "evil" things come from the Lord. The loss of our jobs, our spouses, tragedies (upon first glance) on friends and family, all these things are from the Lord, though what seems evil to us is really for God's own good purpose.

For example, the selling of Joseph into slavery by his brothers:

Gen_50:20 But as for you, ye thought evil against me; but God meant it unto good, to bring to pass, as it is this day, to save much people alive.

The tragedies that befell Job:

Job_1:21 And said, Naked came I out of my mother's womb, and naked shall I return thither: the LORD gave, and the LORD hath taken away; blessed be the name of the LORD.

The evil acts of spirits ordained by God. Compare these two verses:

1Ch_21:1 And Satan stood up against Israel, and provoked David to number Israel./2Sa 24:1 And again the anger of the LORD was kindled against Israel, and he moved David against them to say, Go, number Israel and Judah.

Another example:

"And the LORD said, Who shall persuade Ahab, that he may go up and fall at Ramothgilead? And one said on this manner, and another said on that manner. And there came forth a spirit, and stood before the LORD, and said, I will persuade him. And the LORD said unto him, Wherewith? And he said, I will go forth, and I will be a lying spirit in the mouth of all his prophets. And he said, Thou shalt persuade him, and prevail also: go forth, and do so." (1Ki 22:20-22)

How does God remain clean of the evil deeds of evil spirits and of men, and yet be the first cause of it? Because what they mean for evil, God does for righteous and holy ends. It is a question of motivations. For example, 1) The devil wants to destroy, and thus he tempts wicked men; 2) men do evil, perhaps, because of jealousy and wickedness, and thus they willingly go forth when pricked; 3) but God works all for holy ends. Thus the former remain dead in their guilt, but God reigns supreme over all acts. Hence we read that the men who crucified Christ did so as they were both "foreknown" and "ordained" to do so, and yet are counted as "wicked":

Act_2:23 Him, being delivered by the determinate counsel and foreknowledge of God, ye have taken, and by wicked hands have crucified and slain:

"For of a truth against thy holy child Jesus, whom thou hast anointed, both Herod, and Pontius Pilate, with the Gentiles, and the people of Israel, were gathered together, For to do whatsoever thy hand and thy counsel determined before to be done." (Act 4:27-28)

I like the way Augustine explains this also. From Chapter 33 of his book On the Predestination of the Saints, the chapter is titled "It is in the Power of Evil Men to Sin; But to Do This or That by Means of that Wickedness is in God's Power Alone."

"What is the meaning of, as concerning the gospel, indeed, they are enemies for your sake, but that their enmity wherewith they put Christ to death was, without doubt, as we see, an advantage to the gospel? And he shows that this came about by God's ordering, who knew how to make a good use even of evil things; not that the vessels of wrath might be of advantage to Him, but that by His own good use of them they might be of advantage to the vessels of mercy. For what could be said more plainly than what is actually said, As concerning the gospel, indeed, they are enemies for your sakes? It is, therefore, in the power of the wicked to sin; but that in sinning they should do this or that by that wickedness is not in their power, but in God's, who divides the darkness and regulates it; so that hence even what they do contrary to God's will is not fulfilled except it be God's will. We read in the Acts of the Apostles that when the apostles had been sent away by the Jews, and had come to their own friends, and shown them what great things the priests and elders said to them, they all with one consent lifted up their voices to the Lord and said, Lord, you are God, which hast made heaven, and earth, and the sea, and all things that are therein; who, by the mouth of our father David, your holy servant, hast said, Why did the heathen rage, and the peoples imagine vain things? The kings of the earth stood up, and the princes were gathered together against the Lord, and against His Christ. For in truth, there have assembled together in this city against Your holy child Jesus, whom You have anointed, Herod and Pilate, and the people of Israel, to do whatever Your hand and counsel predestinated to be done. See what is said: As concerning the gospel, indeed, they are enemies for your sakes. Because God's hand and counsel predestinated such things to be done by the hostile Jews as were necessary for the gospel, for our sakes."

All events, therefore, are for "our sakes," since they are under the control of God in order to work together for the good of God's elect. If any events are random, then, so also is their consequence, but the scripture dismisses this:

Rom_8:28 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.

Even the good actions of men come from the Lord, of which many examples abound in scripture, but I will focus on the most important of all: Conversion! And not because He foreknew we would believe if given the chance, but because salvation is impossible for us who are dead in sin, and thus God must give us life so that we may believe in the first place:

Eph_2:1 And you hath he quickened, who were dead in trespasses and sins;

Joh_8:34 Jesus answered them, Verily, verily, I say unto you, Whosoever committeth sin is the servant of sin.

God grants us a new heart and moves us to obey His commandments:

"And I will put my spirit within you, and cause you to walk in my statutes, and ye shall keep my judgments, and do them." (Eze 36:27)

Joh_15:16 Ye have not chosen me, but I have chosen you, and ordained you, that ye should go and bring forth fruit, and that your fruit should remain: that whatsoever ye shall ask of the Father in my name, he may give it you.

Php_2:13 For it is God which worketh in you both to will and to do of his good pleasure.

Eph_2:10 For we are his workmanship, created in Christ Jesus unto good works, which God hath before ordained that we should walk in them.

Unless the Father gives you to the Son, you cannot believe or be saved:

Joh_6:37 All that the Father giveth me shall come to me; and him that cometh to me I will in no wise cast out.

Joh 6:44 No man can come to me, except the Father which hath sent me draw him: and I will raise him up at the last day.

"'But there are some of you who do not believe.' (For Jesus knew from the beginning who those were who did not believe, and who it was who would betray him.) And he said, 'This is why I told you that no one can come to me unless it is granted him by the Father.' (Joh 6:64-65)

Note that in verse 64-65, Christ is explaining the unbelief of the Jews. He does not explain to them "because you refused," or "because you are so evil," but "Some of you do not believe. THAT is why I told you, no man can come to me unless it is granted him by the Father." The reason for their unbelief is that it was not given to them to believe.

Hence Augustine concludes upon reading this:

"Noble excellence of grace! No man comes unless drawn. There is whom He draws, and there is whom He draws not; why He draws one and draws not another, do not desire to judge, if you desire not to err.” (Augustine, Tractate 26)

More verses:

1Co_12:3 Wherefore I give you to understand, that no man speaking by the Spirit of God calleth Jesus accursed: and that no man can say that Jesus is the Lord, but by the Holy Ghost.

Mat_16:17 And Jesus answered and said unto him, Blessed art thou, Simon Barjona: for flesh and blood hath not revealed it unto thee, but my Father which is in heaven.

Thus salvation is entirely of the LORD, and not by our own willing and working:

Rom_9:16 So then it is not of him that willeth, nor of him that runneth, but of God that sheweth mercy.

Why does God choose one over another to save? It is His business, not yours:

"Thou wilt say then unto me, Why doth he yet find fault? For who hath resisted his will? Nay but, O man, who art thou that repliest against God? Shall the thing formed say to him that formed it, Why hast thou made me thus? Hath not the potter power over the clay, of the same lump to make one vessel unto honour, and another unto dishonour?" (Rom 9:19-21)

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