The nature of human free will

PREDESTINATION seems to cast a shadow on the very heart of human freedom. If God has decided our destinies from all eternity, that strongly suggests that our free choices are but charades, empty exercises in predetermined playacting. It is as though God wrote the script for us in concrete and we are merely carrying out his scenario.

To get a handle on the puzzling relationship between predestination and free will, we must first define free will. That definition itself is a matter of great debate. Probably the most common definition says free will is the ability to make choices without any prior prejudice, inclination, or disposition. For the will to be free it must act from a posture of neutrality, with absolutely no bias.

On the surface this is very appealing. There are no elements of coercion, either internal or external, to be found in it. Below the surface, however, lurk two serious problems. On the one hand, if we make our choices strictly from a neutral posture, with no prior inclination, then we make choices for no reason. If we have no reason for our choices, if our choices are utterly spontaneous, then our choices have no moral significance. If a choice just happens—it just pops out, with no rhyme or reason for it—then it cannot be judged good or bad. When God evaluates our choices, he is concerned about our motives.

Consider the case of Joseph and his brothers. When Joseph was sold into slavery by his brothers, God’s providence was at work. Years later, when Joseph was reunited with his brothers in Egypt, he declared to them, “You meant evil against me; but God meant it for good” (Gen. 50:20). Here the motive was the decisive factor determining whether the act was good or evil. God’s involvement in Joseph’s dilemma was good; the brothers’ involvement was evil. There was a reason why Joseph’s brothers sold him into slavery. They had an evil motivation. Their decision was neither spontaneous nor neutral. They were jealous of their brother. Their choice to sell him was prompted by their evil desires.

The second problem this popular view faces is not so much moral as it is rational. If there is no prior inclination, desire, or bent, no prior motivation or reason for a choice, how can a choice even be made? If the will is totally neutral, why would it choose the right or the left? It is something like the problem encountered by Alice in Wonderland when she came to a fork in the road. She did not know which way to turn. She saw the grinning Cheshire cat in the tree. She asked the cat, “Which way should I turn?” The cat replied, “Where are you going?” Alice answered, “I don’t know.” “Then,” replied the Cheshire cat, “it doesn’t matter.”

Consider Alice’s dilemma. Actually she had four options from which to choose. She could have taken the left fork or the right fork. She also could have chosen to return the way she had come. Or she could have stood fixed at the spot of indecision until she died there. For her to take a step in any direction, she would need some motivation or inclination to do so. Without any motivation, any prior inclination, her only real option would be to stand there and perish.

Another famous illustration of the same problem is found in the story of the neutral-willed mule. The mule had no prior desires, or equal desires in two directions. His owner put a basket of oats to his left and a basket of wheat on his right. If the mule had no desire whatsoever for either oats or wheat he would choose neither and starve. If he had an exactly equal disposition toward oats as he had toward wheat he would still starve. His equal disposition would leave him paralyzed. There would be no motive. Without motive there would be no choice. Without choice there would be no food. Without food soon there would be no mule.

We must reject the neutral-will theory not only because it is irrational but because, as we shall see, it is radically unbiblical.

Christian thinkers have given us two very important definitions of free will. We will consider first the definition offered by Jonathan Edwards in his classic work, On the Freedom of the Will.

Edwards defined the will as “the mind choosing.” Before we ever can make moral choices we must first have some idea of what it is we are choosing. Our selection is then based upon what the mind approves or rejects. Our understanding of values has a crucial role to play in our decision-making. My inclinations and motives as well as my actual choices are shaped by my mind. Again, if the mind is not involved, then the choice is made for no reason and with no reason. It is then an arbitrary and morally meaningless act. Instinct and choice are two different things.

A second definition of free will is “the ability to choose what we want.” This rests on the important foundation of human desire. To have free will is to be able to choose according to our desires. Here desire plays the vital role of providing a motivation or a reason for making a choice.

Now for the tricky part. According to Edwards a human being is not only free to choose what he desires but he must choose what he desires to be able to choose at all. What I call Edwards Law of Choice is this: “The will always chooses according to its strongest inclination at the moment.” This means that every choice is free and every choice is determined.

I said it was tricky. This sounds like a blatant contradiction to say that every choice is free and yet every choice is determined. But “determined” here does not mean that some external force coerces the will. Rather it refers to one’s internal motivation or desire. In shorthand the law is this: Our choices are determined by our desires. They remain our choices because they are motivated by our own desires. This is what we call self-determination, which is the essence of freedom.

Think for a minute about your own choices. How and why are they made? At this very instant you are reading the pages of this book. Why? Did you pick up this book because you have an interest in the subject of predestination, a desire to learn more about this complex subject? Perhaps. Maybe this book has been given to you to read as an assignment. Perhaps you are thinking, “I have no desire to read this whatsoever. I have to read it, and I am grimly wading through it to fulfill somebody else’s desire that I read it. All things being equal I would never choose to read this book.”

But all things are not equal, are they? If you are reading this out of some kind of duty or to fulfill a requirement, you still had to make a decision about fulfilling the requirement or not fulfilling the requirement. You obviously decided that it was better or more desirable for you to read this than to leave it unread. Of that much I am sure, or you would not be reading it right now.

Every decision you make is made for a reason. The next time you go into a public place and choose a seat (in a theater, a classroom, a church building), ask yourself why you are sitting where you are sitting. Perhaps it is the only seat available and you prefer to sit rather than to stand. Perhaps you discover that there is an almost unconscious pattern emerging in your seating decisions. Maybe you discover that whenever possible you sit toward the front of the room or toward the rear. Why? Maybe it has something to do with your eyesight. Perhaps you are shy or gregarious. You may think that you sit where you sit for no reason, but the seat that you choose will always be chosen by the strongest inclination you have at the moment of decision. That inclination may merely be that the seat closest to you is free and that you don’t like to walk long distances to find a place to sit down.

Decision-making is a complex matter because the options we encounter are often varied and many. Add to that that we are creatures with many and varied desires. We have different, often even conflicting, motivations.

Consider the matter of ice cream cones. Oh, do I have trouble with ice cream cones and ice cream sundaes. I love ice cream. If it is possible to be addicted to ice cream then I must be classified as an ice cream addict. I am at least fifteen pounds overweight, and I am sure that at least twenty of the pounds that make up my body are there because of ice cream. Ice cream proves the adage to me, “A second on the lips; a lifetime on the hips.” And, “Those who indulge bulge.” Because of ice cream I have to buy my shirts with a bump in them.

Now, all things being equal, I would like to have a slim, trim body. I don’t like squeezing into my suits and having little old ladies pat me on the tummy. Tummy-patting seems to be an irresistible temptation for some folks. I know what I have to do to get rid of those excess pounds. I have to stop eating ice cream. So I go on a diet. I go on the diet because I want to go on the diet. I want to lose weight. I desire to look better. Everything is fine until someone invites me to Swenson’s. Swenson’s makes the greatest “Super Sundaes” in the world. I know I shouldn’t go to Swenson’s. But I like to go to Swenson’s. When the moment of decision comes I am faced with conflicting desires. I have a desire to be thin and I have a desire for a Super Sundae. Whichever desire is greater at the time of decision is the desire I will choose. It’s that simple.

Now consider my wife. As we prepare to celebrate our silver wedding anniversary I am aware that she is exactly the same weight as she was the day we were married. Her wedding gown still fits her perfectly. She has no great problem with ice cream. Most eating establishments only carry vanilla, chocolate, and strawberry. Any of those make my mouth water, but they offer no enticement to my wife. Aha! But there is Baskin Robbins. They have pralines and cream ice cream. When we go to the mall and pass a Baskin Robbins my wife goes through a strange transformation. Her pace decelerates, her hands get clammy, and I can almost detect the beginning of salivation. (That’s salivation, not salvation.) Now she experiences the conflict of desires that assaults me daily.

We always choose according to our strongest inclination at the moment. Even external acts of coercion cannot totally take away our freedom. Coercion involves acting with some kind of force, imposing choices upon people that, if left to themselves, they would not choose. I certainly have no desire to pay the kind of income taxes that the government makes me pay. I can refuse to pay them, but the consequences are less desirable than paying them. By threatening me with jail the government is able to impose its will upon me to pay taxes.

Or consider the case of armed robbery. A gunman steps up to me and says, “Your money or your life.” He has just restricted my options to two. All things being equal I have no desire to donate my money to him. There are far more worthy charities than he. But suddenly my desires have changed as a result of his act of external coercion. He is using force to provoke certain desires within me. Now I must choose between my desire to live and my desire to give him my money. I might as well give him the money because if he kills me he will take my money anyway. Some people might choose to refuse, saying, “I would rather die than choose to hand this gunman my money. He’ll have to take it from my dead body.”

In either case, a choice is made. And it is made according to the strongest inclination at the moment. Think, if you can, of any choice you have ever made that was not according to the strongest inclination you had at the moment of decision. What about sin? Every Christian has some desire in his heart to obey Christ. We love Christ and we want to please him. Yet every Christian sins. The hard truth is that at the moment of our sin we desire the sin more strongly than we desire to obey Christ. If we always desired to obey Christ more than we desired to sin, we would never sin.

Does not the Apostle Paul teach otherwise? Does he not recount for us a situation in which he acts against his desires? He says in Romans, “The good that I would, I do not, and that which I would not, that I do” (Rom. 7:19, KJV). Here it sounds as if, under the inspiration of God the Holy Spirit, Paul is teaching clearly that there are times in which he acts against his strongest inclination.

It is extremely unlikely that the apostle is here giving us a revelation about the technical operation of the will. Rather, he is stating plainly what every one of us has experienced. We all have a desire to flee from sin. The “all things being equal” syndrome is in view here. All things being equal, I would like to be perfect. I would like to be rid of sin, just as I would like to be rid of my excess weight. But my desires do not remain constant. They fluctuate. When my stomach is full it is easy to go on a diet. When my stomach is empty my desire level changes. Temptations arise with the changing of my desires and appetites. Then I do things that, all things being equal, I would not want to do.

Paul sets before us the very real conflict of human desires, desires that yield evil choices. The Christian lives within a battlefield of conflicting desires. Christian growth involves the strengthening of desires to please Christ accompanied by the weakening of desires to sin. Paul called it the warfare between the flesh and the Spirit.

To say that we always choose according to our strongest inclination at the moment is to say that we always choose what we want. At every point of choice we are free and self-determined. To be self-determined is not the same thing as determinism. Determinism means that we are forced or coerced to do things by external forces. External forces can, as we have seen, severely limit our options, but they cannot destroy choice altogether. They cannot impose delight in things we hate. When that happens, when hatred turns to delight, it is a matter of persuasion, not coercion. I cannot be forced to do what I take delight in doing already.

The neutral view of free will is impossible. It involves choice without desire. That is like having an effect without a cause. It is something from nothing, which is irrational. The Bible makes it clear that we choose out of our desires. A wicked desire produces wicked choices and wicked actions. A godly desire produces godly deeds. Jesus spoke in terms of corrupt trees producing corrupt fruit. A fig tree does not yield apples and an apple tree produces no figs. So righteous desires produce righteous choices and evil desires produce evil choices.

Saying that God makes man sin is like saying that because you allowed your teenage son to drive the car, and he has an accident, that you caused him to wreck the car; or, because you allowed your daughter to go out on a date, and she has sex and gets pregnant, that you caused her pregnancy.

And you know the response I get back from the Calvinists here?

Could I have stopped the wreck? After all, I could've prevented him from driving the car, couldn't I?

So I must've wanted him to have the wreck and must've wanted the daughter to get pregnant.

Right?

Wrong!! Here's the answer you get from this Calvinist (assuming that i have correctly understood the post):

i'm sorry, you were offered a faulty example, my deepest apologies.

Unlike the parents given in the above example, (in blue text), God knows all future events. The parents in the example have no idea or future knowlege of the decisions and actions that their children will make, and the contingencies made by the rest of the "environment" that they will come into contact with. In short good fellow, man is finite, limited in knowlege. There is no way that this situation should have been presented as an anology to the actions and knowlege of an infinite, All-knowing, and all powerful God.

What we are dancing around is the question of the origin of Evil and Sin. All should agree that it did not start with man. Satan rebelled before the Earth was created according to most theologies.

The argument of choice of the creature gets us ABSOLUTELY NOWHERE! How does the creature choose what does not yet exist in the Universe?

This argument of the origin of Evil/sin is the most solid argument AGAINST the existence of one God...it is also the greatest argument for the existence of one God. Of course, to avoid being accused of contradiction, let me state that the two arguments are different relationships.

If God exists, it does not follow that evil must exist, but if evil does exist, THEN God MUST exist! As for how it got here, i don't know, and neither do you. When we walk into That arena, we end up "killing off each other", because it is the fatal flaw to any Monotheistic system.

You blame the entire Calvinist theology for the stupid actions of one idiot who never should have been put into the ministry.

No. That's just one example. And I've discussed it with other Calvinists here. That church had many other issues and has since in the five years we left had a major split. But it does address an attitude I've seen from some Calvinists. Not all.

If you want to engage in serious discussion, with a view to truly understanding, I am happy to oblige, as well as many others.

I've been serious about everything I've said. Nothing anyone has said here has convinced me to change my view of Calvinism. In fact, it's been reenforced.

The truth always wins out in the end.

Of that we can be certain.

But I cannot get beyond the point that Calvinism tells me that God wanted Satan to rebel. I'm told He could have stopped it if He wanted to, but He didn't.

i am not certain that Calvinism tells you so much as the bible tells you that. i'm not even certain that Satan's fall is even so much of an Arminian/Calvinist discussion. We do know from the revelation of scripture that Angels do not have the same opportunity for redemption as mankind. In that sense, the Attonement of Christ IS truly limited, i don't think that there is any dispute about that matter.

Now to address your question.

There are a good many things in our own physical world that we don't understand and can't understand. ftD refers with contempt to a 'secret will' of God, and in a sense, he is quite correct. We see (on the monitors) a lot of nonsense written about decreeitive will, salvific will, permissive will, etc. This is nonsense, there is ONLY the Will of God. That God has a will is a matter of revelation to man. The EXTENT of that will is also a matter of revelation. This question goes beyond Arminianism/Calvinism too. An honest examination of scripture determines that there are and will continue to be matters of God that we cannot know, and will not know. We will not, for example, know the exact time that Christ will return until it happens, and Jesus explicitly stated that it was not for us to know. Do a search on the words 'secret' and mystery, (same word in the Greek), and you will see this.

For that matter, we don't even know if Satan's fall was even a matter of 'will' of either God or Satan...i will not proceed any further on this line of thought as it leads into docetic gnosticism. i don't know that we can know. One is looking at a situation that deals with the mind of an infinite God. Even in my glorified body and redeemed soul/spirit, i do not expect that i will ever know. We build our theological models on what is revealed. i do know that

1)God is holy and will not tolerate sin
2)Sin did enter the creation
3)Sin is not part of God's nature
4)God limits the extent of sin, and it is compelled to do nothing more or less than serve His purpose
5)Sin will be done away with

It is the How and Why questions that we cannot get a complete answer to. IMHO, the only alternative is atheism, and that is self-refuting.

i am sorry that i cannot provide a better answer, but i am stuck with my limits

"If God exists, it does not follow that evil must exist, but if evil does exist, THEN God MUST exist!"

Evil, which opposes the direct will of God, cannot exist without the direct will of God. For without the direct will of God, nothing can be!

I originally had heard the above quoted of Calvin, but I have not been able to verify that.

Similarly, Luther said, "Even the devil is God's devil!"

Jean

But I cannot get beyond the point that Calvinism tells me that God wanted Satan to rebel. I'm told He could have stopped it if He wanted to, but He didn't.

It stands to reason then that since God allowed Satan to rebel, God must have planned to use sin as a tool to further His Glory. While we may not see how that can be, it is not necessary for us to understand that in order for it to be true. God did not cause sin, He is not sinful in any way, but He can and has used sin in His creation as a tool. I'm inclined to think that no one can really understand how Holy and Righteous God is unless they have something to compare it to: Sin, which is the exact opposite of what God is. A study in contrasts, a graphic example, if you will.

For whatever reason, God has allowed, controlled, and directed sin in order to Glorify Himself, and to make known the riches of His Glory to those whom He has chosen to share it with. In this lifetime, we will probably never be able to answer why. It is certain that sin neither took Him by surprise, or caused Him a moment of consternation over its appearance. He knew it before it happened, and was in control of it, even then. As truly as God meant the sin of Joseph's brothers for Joseph's (and God's) good, the appearance of sin in God's creation was, and is, turned to God's good.

God created beings with the potential and capability of sinning, even though it wasn't initially in their nature to sin, nor was it God's desire that they sin, but sin they did, as God knew they would. Knowing that, He could turn what would be destructive into something that would ultimately benefit not only Him, but His chosen people as well. The end result is greater than if sin had never entered the world.

i'm sorry, you were offered a faulty example, my deepest apologies.

I never intended to try to hold up this example as a perfect illustration. It was to illustrate the faulty reasoning that was being employed to say that since God gave man the ability to choose (Pre-Fall), that since man chose poorly, God caused him to do so (set him up, so to speak). The analogy was to address that faulty reasoning, by giving an example that employed the same faulty reasoning to show how faulty it was. It was analogous to a parent allowing a child to do something, the child getting into trouble, and then saying that the parent CAUSED the trouble the child got into. There is a direct line of reasoning between the two that I was attempting to refute.

Sorry you didn't see it that way...

Again, you sound very Arminian to me.

I think it comes from your confusing of desire, will, and nature on man's part, and those same things when in reference to God. Arminians tend to view God in human terms, i.e. as just a bigger version of ourselves, rather than understanding that He is totally other than what we are. We were created in His image, but that doesn't mean that we are like Him or He like us. That is proven by the fact that God, in the person of His Son, Jesus, had to become a human in order to redeem us.

Any time a Calvinist says that sin is a part of God's Plan, Arminians immediately say that we are saying God created sin, and is the author of sin. That is a red herring they draw out to deflect the truth. Their man-centered, Gnostic view is that man screwed up God's Plan, so God has had to do all sorts of things to try to win man back to Him. They put man at the center, and man's will as the deciding factor, and make God a reactionary Being, reacting to man's decisions, man's desires. It all would have been so much better if man hadn't sinned....They've got God doing damage control.

The truth of the matter is that if God is Omnipotent, Omniscient, and Omnipresent, then anything that happens (has happened, will happen) in His creation is foreknown, fore-planned, and fore-ordained. How could it not be, given God's obvious attributes?

3)Sin is not part of God's nature 4)God limits the extent of sin, and it is compelled to do nothing more or less than serve His purpose</font color>

This is what Arminians have a hard time with IMHO..God is the restrainer of Sin...without His intervenbtion the world would be a place no mon would be safe in.

. Rom 1:29   Being filled with all unrighteousness, fornication, wickedness, covetousness, maliciousness; full of envy, murder, debate, deceit, malignity; whisperers,
Rom 1:30   Backbiters, haters of God, despiteful, proud, boasters, inventors of evil things, disobedient to parents,
Rom 1:31   Without understanding, covenantbreakers, without natural affection, implacable, unmerciful:
   Rom 1:32   Who knowing the judgment of God, that they which commit such things are worthy of death, not only do the same, but have pleasure in them that do them.

They think man is "good" and some outside force has to make them do evil. it is not what the word of God teaches..

There is alot of posting that we calvinists believe God is the author of sin..That implies you believe sin is a self will choice..that unregenerate man has a choice to sin or not. I do not think most Calvinists would agree with that..Man will always do what his nature is..

Exactly right! Unregenerate man has the choice to decide what KIND of sin he will commit, but he cannot of his own volition choose NOT to sin, seeing that he is by nature a sinful being. His very existence is sinful, being born in sin, and helpless to do anything BUT sin. Even breathing is a sin, because he draws breath in defiance of God, even though God graciously allows him to draw breath. Arminians can't handle the implications of that.

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