The Freedom of Choice of Man

Well, just to remind you that our study on Wednesday evenings is a study basically of two major Bible doctrines or topics, but they're inextricably tied together. They're very much go together. And that is what the Bible teaches about man and what the Bible teaches about sin. We've been looking at a lot of different facets of the nature of man and what we're made of and the soul and spirit and all the other parts of us and where the soul comes from and all of those things. We're going to deal with one more topic that is specifically related to what the Bible teaches about man and then we will turn a corner and talk more about what the Bible teaches about sin. The topic we're going to deal with tonight, Freedom of Choice, is one of those topics that is hotly debated. It is of huge interest to most people and that is what the Bible teaches about how much freedom of choice do we actually have. I want to kind of warn you of a couple of things in regard to the study tonight. Number one is we're going to be dealing with a lot of terms and a lot of ideas, all of which kind of form a big picture. And it's important that we see all of that information and then be able to bring it all together and come to a good, balanced, biblical conclusion. So this is a topic that is debated not only in theology, the study of the Bible, but also in philosophy. And so we're just going to introduce a few of those ideas so that we can understand where people come from when they talk about this. But I trust that you'll be patient enough to recognize that the conclusions will come more toward the end. Secondly, we're not going to get done with this study tonight. I know that. And so please try to be here next week so that you can hear how it all comes together. We will anticipate some of that tonight. But this study I think will only really become clear in our minds if hopefully it does at all when we get all the information and put it together. So I trust you'll indulge a little bit of intricate wordplay in the beginning tonight and then we'll begin to pull it all together and understand what the Bible teaches and what those terms mean. Okay? So stick with us for the next couple of weeks. This is a very debatable topic. And I'll say right off the top of our study tonight too that not everybody is going to be satisfied with the conclusions that are drawn that I think are biblical. I'm going to explain extremes and then I'm going to pull it back to a more biblical balance. And as I'm explaining one extreme, there are going to be some of you say, well, that sounds right. And then I'll explain the other extreme and there'll be others of you saying, oh, I guess what I believe. And both of you are going to be disappointed because we're going to find what I think to be the more biblical position in the middle somewhere, a middle ground, all right? Balance, good, biblical balance. Okay. The question we're dealing with is, is mankind free to make choices in life? And if so, and I think we would all say, yes, to some degree at least, how free are we? And there are two issues that intersect with that that that calls us to debate how free we are, how much personal freedom human beings have. And those two issues are, first of all, bondage to sin. How does the fall and being slaves to sin as Roman six talks about? How does our bondage to sin affect our freedom? And the other issue, and this is the one that most of you will want very clear answers to and you will be disappointed probably at the tensions that we're going to leave in this area, the other one is predestination. And how does God's predestination, which is not a dirty word, it's a word clearly used in the Bible, it is a biblical concept. So we just need to understand what the Bible means by that, what it teaches, but how does God's predestination affect our freedom as well, our freedom to make choices. So the whole concept of human freedom is heavily influenced by how we view, first of all, our bondage to sin, and secondly, God's predestination. So we're going to kind of come, we're going to hit some large areas first and then try to bring it all together as we get into the study. Okay, anybody have any questions about where we're headed, kind of what we're talking about? Okay, you're with me so far. We're going to begin by talking about some basic views of human freedom and then we will talk about if we have time tonight, some basic views of predestination, going to kind of give you different ways of looking at it, different views that have been held down through the centuries and try to bring some biblical balance to those topics. I don't think we will get, in fact, I know tonight we will not get to the bearing of the fall on our human freedom, the bearing of having a sin nature and being in slavery to sin, what bearing that has, we'll get to that probably next week. And then we'll get to the conclusion next week too, where we kind of bring it all together. But we're going to start with basic views of human freedom. And there are three basic views, the first two are the extremes and then the third one is what I believe to be more of the biblical balance. The first one we're going to talk about is determinism. The second one is indeterminism and the third one is self-determination and I am determined to do my best to explain all three of them. So determinism, what do we mean by that? I've gone ahead and put the definition on your notes so that, I think it's on your notes, I know it's on the screen, so that you can kind of have that before you. Determinism teaches that people's actions and decisions are fully determined by an outside source or sources. So in other words, there is real no human freedom to make decisions or to will something or choose something. Determinism teaches that all of our actions, all of our decisions are totally determined by outside sources. And I'm being very general here with outside sources because there is a naturalistic determinism basically has nothing to do with the Bible or with God, it's philosophy. And then there is a theistic determinism which has to do with God. So let's look at both of those. First of all, the naturalistic determinism, that's basically a philosophical view or a view found in psychology. The person who really popularized this the most was the psychiatrist, B.F. Skinner. A B.F. Skinner taught basically that the environment and your heredity are the determining causes for all human decisions and actions. So you understand what we're talking about here that either your heredity or your environment determine everything you do and everything you decide. Now you can see that Skinnerism is very, very popular in psychological and psychiatric treatments today. But we really are not responsible for our own actions or our own decisions because everything is determined by either our environment or our heredity. That's a very popular view in psychology, it's a very popular view in philosophy and it basically strips man of responsibility for his actions. It's very common in the legal system, the judicial system to argue on this kind of a basis. So basically what Skinner taught and what is taught by naturalistic determinism is that everything happens for everything that does happen, there are conditions that make that act the only thing you could have done. And that's why a lot of times in the courtroom you'll find people being excused of responsibility for behavior because their environment or their heredity locked them into something that they couldn't help. It was determined that they would do that and they were not responsible for their own actions. That's Skinnerism, that's what I like to call it, that's Skinner's naturalistic determinism. Okay, before we move on to a theistic determinism, any question about that, you understand where we're talking about there. Okay. If no questions then let me explain the theistic determinism and this is somewhat of a similar view except it brings God into the picture. Martin Luther pretty much taught this, Jonathan Edwards pretty much taught this and basically what they taught was instead of impersonal conditions that determine what you do, it is God who predetermines or for ordains all things and the extreme form of this, by the way what I just said, there's a lot of truth to as we'll see in scripture. God does predetermine and for ordained things but the extreme view of this basically says that God is the cause of all things and you're not really responsible for your behavior because it's God caused it all. That's a very extreme form. Luther and Edwards would not have gone quite that far but some people accused them of going that far. So those who argue against the extreme form of theistic determinism say, well it fails to allow sufficiently for human personality, it does not explain human responsibility, it does not take into account the freedom of will and choice that God has made us to have. And so for that reason most Bible scholars would shy away from the very extreme form of theistic determinism, that everything is determined and we have no responsibility for what we do. Questions, comments there? Yeah, especially with the naturalistic there's no guilt involved. With the theistic, I don't want to paint Edwards and men like him. Edwards was a great preacher and theologian. I don't want to paint him as saying man would not be guilty because he was very strong on that too. But there are some who would interpret what Edwards would say to be strong enough to preclude any guilt on our part. Edwards would not say that though. Let me move on to end determinism then. End determinism is the other extreme. It's swinging the pendulum all the way to the other side. Basically as you see from your definition it says this, actions are not at all determined by an outside source. Man is totally free. There is nothing that really influences him or determines what he will say or do or anything like that at all. Man is totally free. Now there is a naturalistic kind of end determinism which basically was promoted by the philosopher William James. If you've ever done any study in philosophy, if you had a philosophy course in college or high school you'll recognize his name as being the father of pragmatism and he was a philosopher that basically taught that and also this view. That human acts are totally uncaused. Any human act could have been otherwise. There is no real outside calls. We are totally free from any influences to make our own choices. Again, that's a pretty extreme swing the other direction. But there is also a theistic view of that which tries to take God in the Bible into account. And theologians do introduce God into this picture of end determinism. It's called theistic end determinism. The most famous proponent of it was a man by the name of James Arminius, a theologian in Europe in the 1600s. And basically he taught that God has limited his sovereignty to the extent that human beings are totally free. That God really has no determining influence on us. Arminius would have taught that we can be influenced by outside sources even by God but that God does not determine any actions or anything that happens. Man is totally free and really God is just kind of hands off. It's a little bit of an overstatement of it but you get the point. So those are the two extremes of human freedom. Either everything is determined by an outside source or nothing is determined by an outside source and that's kind of the two extremes. Any question, I think you can see where we're headed next. Any question though about those two extremes. I believe a more biblical position and we'll look at the, that's why I actually have a little patience with me. We'll look at the biblical passages here in just a moment. But I think a more biblical balance is a position called self-determination. It is something of a middle ground that finds strains of both of the views I've just talked about. Strings of both of them in the scriptures. Theologian by the name of Thomas Aquinas was one of the first ones to really articulate this very well. C.S. Lewis was another well-known proponent of self-determination and here's an explanation of what we're talking about here. Self-determination says a person's acts are caused by himself or herself. We cause our own acts. Now factors like heredity, environment and God obviously can influence us but not necessarily determine what our actions will be. And here's the reason why since we are created in God's image we can actually exercise a will that God has created us with and we can actually make choices in that sense we are self-determining. God has created us with a will that is capable of choosing and we are created in his image. Part of that means the will, the freedom to choose, although that's been marred by the fall and we'll see how much it's been affected later may not get to that tonight. We still retain the image of God which means we have volition. We have the ability to choose. We have a will. Now our decisions are certainly heavily influenced. I'm going to say at this point describe it a little bit more next week. Heavily influenced by a simple nature but we still have the capability to choose. We still are able to determine our actions that is still there. That's not been obliterated by the fall. Severely damaged but it is still there. So that's an explanation of what we're talking about but let me hasten to talk a little bit about self-determination and predestination because that's where the struggle really comes in. Self-determination basically says that we are created in God's image. We have a will. We have the freedom to choose. Our acts are caused, determined by our own choices. We are responsible for our own actions and our own choices. Those are not determined by something beyond our control but we're also not totally free. There are some constraints because of the sin nature and also because of predestination. Self-determination is not incompatible with what the Bible teaches about predestination. In fact the Bible teaches both. The Bible teaches both the will of man capable of choosing and God's predestination of all things. Now what we're going to talk about now we're going to see both of them in the scriptures and then we're going to try to bring them together a little bit. The problem is logically you cannot bring those two truths together. If you try to logically figure out how God's predestination and man's responsibility fit together logically you'll blow circuits. Smoke will start rolling out your ears because it's just not possible to logically put those two together. And that frustrates some people. They can't handle that because they feel like I've got to be able to figure this out logically and so typically they will water down one or the other to make them fit together. I still love the illustration that Charles hadn't spurged in use to use and Spurgeon was a very strong Calvinist, a word that we'll describe a little bit later. But he said man's responsibility and God's sovereignty are like the two rails of a railroad track. They run parallel to each other in the scriptures. If you try to bring them together you're going to wreck the train. They're not designed to be brought together. They're designed to be understood each in their own right and let God figure out how they go together. But then he made another astute observation. He would say if you stand at a place where the railroad track is on level ground and you look way out into the future it looks like they're coming together out on the horizon. And he said once we get to heaven then we'll understand how they fit with each other. But you try to put them together now, bring them together now, you're going to ruin the track and wreck the train. I think that's a pretty good explanation of the balance between these two things. Now let's look at both of them in the scriptures. First of all we're going to look at man's will. The Bible teaches that we have a will and we can choose and we are responsible for our own choices. We are clearly responsible for our own choices. So let's talk about the passages that highlight man's will and I put them all on the screen for you. The first one is in Matthew 22 verse 37 where Jesus is lamenting the hardness of the heart of the Jewish people. He says Jerusalem, Jerusalem, you who killed the prophets and stone those sent to you. How often I have longed to gather your children together as a hen gathers her chicks under her wings and you were not willing. Now Jesus says I've longed to bring you to myself to offer you the protection of salvation. And the reason why that has not happened is you were not willing. You exercised your will, your freedom of choice to reject me. And that's exactly what Israel had done. It's just a very clear, powerful statement of the freedom we have to either accept or reject Jesus and what He offers to us. The next verse is very similar to that, John 7 verse 17. Jesus said anyone who chooses to do the will of God will find out whether my teaching comes from God or whether I speak on my own. And notice Jesus puts the emphasis on our choice to either obey or disobey the will of God. Jesus teaching. We are faced with Jesus teaching. We either choose to obey or we choose not to obey. And the one who chooses to do the will of God finds out an experience that what Jesus said was true. But the choice is up to us. Jesus is not saying it is predetermined and you're forced into a certain group or position that you can't help. He said, no, no, you choose whether or not you're going to reject or listen to his teaching. Again, very strong passage on the will. Look at Romans 7, 18. Paul says, I know that good itself does not dwell in me, that is in my sinful nature. For I have the desire to do what is good, but I cannot carry it out. Now this passage really shows the influence of the sinful nature on our will. But it does very clearly state that we have a will that can choose that has a desire to do something. It's just that desire, that will, that want to do something to please God, to live for him is so hindered and dragged down by our sinful nature that we often find ourselves as Romans 7 describes and explains even more clearly. We often find ourselves saying, I just can't seem to get it right. I can't seem to get my act together. I can't seem to do what I know I want to do. What my will is desiring to do. I just find myself not doing what I should be doing and often doing what I shouldn't be doing. The battle between the will that desires to do the will of God, Paul says in the interman, I delight to do the will of God in that same chapter. But I find another law warring in my members. That's the sinful nature fighting against that desire, that will to obey God. But the reality of the will is clearly seen there in Romans 7. There's something else fighting against that and that's our sinful nature. I had another passage. First Corinthians 9.17, both these last two passages have to do with serving God and particularly Paul as a preacher here. He says, if I preach voluntarily, I have a reward. If not voluntarily, I am simply discharging the trust committed to me. Now notice God has committed a trust to Paul. He's given him something that he is responsible to respond to. And Paul admits the fact I can do this voluntarily or I can do it involuntarily. I can fight against it or I can willingly choose to do what God wants me to do. If I willingly choose to do it voluntarily, then I'll be rewarded for that because my heart's in it. My will is in the right place. If I kick and scream, I still have a responsibility given to me by God and there won't be any reward, but I've chosen not to submit my will to God's will. He's very clear distinction between willingly, voluntarily, choosing with joy to do what God wants us to do and fighting against it. And then the last passage is one that Peter gives us. First Peter 5, 2. Peter challenges the elders that he's, the pastors that he's speaking to in First Peter 5, he says, be shepherds of God's flock that is under your care, watching over them, not because you must, but because you are willing, as God wants you to be, not pursuing this on us gain, but eager to serve. So he's saying don't fulfill your ministry of leading the flock of God, feeling that you're under duress. You must do this willingly, do it with a free heart and a good will to serve the Lord. So those are passages that stress the fact that we are responsible to choose what we're going to do and how we're going to do it. We have that responsibility and God leads those choices up to us. But on the other hand, there are passages which very strongly teach predestination. And that is that God makes certain all events in his purpose and plan. One of those passages is Ephesians 1-11. And I've got that for you on the screen too. Notice how strong this is. In him we were also chosen. In other words, if you go back and read the whole passage, I've got it up in front of me. How much light up here? So let me get into this little light. Praise be to the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ who has blessed us in the heavenly realms with every spiritual blessing in Christ. Where he chose us in him before the creation of the world. To be holy and blameless in his sight and love, he predestined us. I mean, this is through this whole passage. And he kind of summarizes it in verse 11 with these strong words in him. We were also chosen. Having been predestined, predestined means marked out the head of time. So God marked out ahead of time according to the plan of him who works out everything in conformity with the purpose of his will. Now, that is such a strong statement of God's sovereignty almost in every word he talks about God chose us. God marked us out ahead of time, predestined us for being to the praise of his glory as the purpose of this passage. All of that is according to his plan. So God has an overall plan for human history and the universe. And this plan is made by the one who works out everything, not just some things, not just most things, works out everything in conformity with the purpose of his will. His will is his plan. And that plan has a definite purpose and he works out all things to reach that purpose. So this is a very strong passage on the other side of God's sovereignty. Let me give you one other and there are many other passages that we won't get into tonight. Romans 9, 2nd Thessalonians 2, 13, 1st Peter 1, 1, 2, lots of other passages. But Romans 8 is one you're familiar with. And we know that in all things God works for the good of those who love Him, who have been called according to his purpose. Now what is God's purpose? What is his overall plan for the believer? It's this. For those God for new. And what we're going to find here is a five step, what some people call the orthosolutus is the Latin term, the order of salvation, a five step plan that reaches back an eternity past and goes to eternity future of what God does in our salvation. Now what will we do? What He does. For those God for new, He also predestined, for knowledge has to, and we'll get into this when we get to the doctrine of salvation someday, for knowledge has to do with God setting His love on people. For those whom He for new, He also predestined, marked out ahead of time, planned ahead of time, to be conformed to the image of His Son. Now that's His purpose for every believer. Every believer eventually look like Christ, be like Christ, be conformed to the image of His Son. That He Christ might be the first born among many brothers and sisters. In other words, a family resemblance there. Christ, we are to look like Him, act like Him, be like Him. It's like we're His brother and sister in that way. So He fornew us, He predestined us, then those He predestined, He also called, and that's that effectual work of conviction that He does in our hearts, everyone sitting here tonight who is saved, who knows Christ, has had that work of the Spirit, convicting you of your sin, and convincing you of your need of Christ. That's the calling that He mentions there. And then those He called, fourth step, He justified. That's the point at which you get saved. And you are declared righteous in God's sight. Because He justified, here's the last step, He also glorified. Now that's reaching out into eternity future, but notice it's in the past tense. Because all of this is already done in God's mind, in His plan, in His purpose, all the way from foreknowledge to glorification is already certain in God's mind. Again, that's a pretty strong statement of God's sovereignty, of what God does in our salvation. It doesn't rule out what we've already seen in the other scriptures that we reject or accept, we have a responsibility of will to choose. And here's where a lot of people get into trouble. They say, well, no, wait a second, if one of these is true, the other can't be true. But we see both of them in the scriptures. Right? Now people who feel like, I've got to figure this out, I've got to make this fit my logical way of thinking, which by the way is the ultimate arrogance. How do we come all thinking that I've got to figure God out? And I've got to figure His plan and purpose out so that it fits my little puny brain. When you're thinking of God's infinite wisdom, shouldn't we just say, you know, the Bible teaches I have human responsibility, I can accept or reject the gospel. The Bible also teaches God is in complete control of everything that happens in the universe and is active from eternity past to eternity future in my salvation. Why can't we just say, you know, the Bible teaches both and I can't really figure out how they fit together, but that's because I've got a finite human mind. I'm not God. So I'm going to let God figure that out. I'm just going to believe both. I personally believe that's the place where you have to land on this. I was reading today commentary on 1 Timothy. I was studying a little bit this morning for Sunday morning. And we're going to deal with a couple of these kind of passages Sunday morning also in 1 Timothy 2. John MacArthur, who is a strong Calvinist, had a beautiful explanation or description of this balance between the two. Because 1 Timothy 2 says, God wants all men to be saved. Well, obviously not all men are going to be saved. And the Bible also teaches election and predestination and so forth. So how do you put those two together? And he basically said this is an unexplainable mystery, a seeming paradox that must simply be accepted. Period. End of thought. And friends, that's exactly right. If you try to figure this out logically and make it fit in your way of thinking, you're going to be constantly frustrated. You're going to be thinking, wait a second, if God sovereign and he chose and predestined and elected in all those heavy theological terms, then I don't have any choice, right? Wrong. You do have a choice because there are plenty of scriptures that describe you have a choice. So wait a second. If I have a choice, then it can't be determined by God, right? Wrong. It is determined by God. You have to make sense, right? It doesn't make sense. But does all of what God knows have to make sense to us? That's where the arrogance comes in. God I've got to bring you down to my level and explain everything you do in a way that I can understand. Who are we to believe that? Who are we to say that? Please just believe what God says and if we can't quite figure it out to our satisfaction, let's just say, Lord, your thoughts are so much higher than my thoughts, your ways are so much higher than my ways. And I hope you'll explain it to me when I get to heaven, but I'm content to wait till then to figure this out. Here's what I think is important and I'm jumping ahead a little bit to basic views on predestination but let me give you kind of the conclusion that I think you have to come to biblically. God in His sovereignty makes certain all things. He is in control of everything that happens in the universe and it will all certainly come to His intended conclusion. But God is not the cause of evil. God is not the cause of all things. He renders certain everything in His plan but He's not the cause of people's rejection of Christ. He's not the cause of evil in the world. He's not the cause of people being in hell. God's not responsible for that. People are responsible for that. We are responsible for our own unbelief, our own rejection, our own lack of willingness to trust Christ and the consequences of hell that result from that. We're responsible for that. Yes. It's somewhat like that. I think the best way I can feebly try to understand it is that God's sovereignty is much bigger than what I'm able to conceive of. It is the big picture within that big picture where God makes certain all things will fit into His plan. There's a lot of wiggle room within that big picture. There's a lot of freedom for me to choose this or that or the other. But ultimately it will all work out for His purpose. And He's in control of the end of things. Although in the big picture of things He gives me a lot of freedom to make choices. So that's very similar to what you're saying. Yes. It's very similar, Angel. It's one way to explain it. But I think that's the, that's kind of where you have to come to. I mean, God is ultimately in control. He is sovereign. He is on His throne. Everything in human history is going to eventually work out to fulfill His purpose. But God in His plan and purpose in a way that I can't fully understand not only is in control of the means or the end, but He also allows various means within that plan to fulfill His end. And some of those means to the end are my choice. And I'm responsible for them. God will ultimately be glorified in all that happens though. Ultimately in history is in. Tommy? And to piggyback on that just a little bit, Tommy, if I can, we ought to be grateful that we live in a time where God's revelation, His Word is complete so that we know more fully what the consequences of our choices and actions are because it's fully revealed in His Word. And we also know how God's plan and purpose is going to end up. So we have that in the Bible and what'll be grateful that we live in time for what we have His full revelation, which helps us to live with some of the tension of not being able to figure it all out because we know that in the end it all works out for His glory and His purpose is going to be accomplished. And we can rest in that even if we can't figure out all of how it fits together on the way. We know it's going to end up for His glory. Richard? That's a great question and it's another vague one. It's a difficult one to answer specifically. Richard in case some of you may not have heard is asking, we are responsible for our actions, but at what age do we become responsible? How does that tie into the age of accountability? And I think there is a tie. There is a point at which we become responsible when we become aware of sin, when we become aware of abstract ideas like God and His love for us and that He sent His Son. But that specific age I think may differ widely from child to child. I don't think there is certainly there's not in the Bible any specific age given to us when that occurs. I think some children grasp those concepts very early and understand them. Other children don't until later. So I think what we typically call the age of accountability is probably different for each child. But I do think there is that concept in the Scriptures. I think. Bill? Yeah, I think I mentioned some of them. Romans 9 is a very strong, probably the strongest in all the Bible. Romans 9, which talks about God being the power of being the clay, God loving Jacob hating Esau. He has the right to choose who He will and reject who He will and we can't say a thing about it. I mean, it's a very strong passage in Romans 9. Another is, I think I mentioned 2nd Thessalonians 2, 13, which has to do with the election. The first Peter 1, 2, which also has to do with the election, but there are lots of others as well. If you get a Bible concordance and just run the passages on predestination or election, you'll find others. But those are some of the basic ones. And really some of this, we're not going to be able to get into in depth. If we're able to get to the doctrine of salvation, which will be the next one after a man and sin, the doctrine of salvation, then we'll be able to take more time to flesh out some of these scriptures on these topics. We'll spend a good part of a whole lesson probably on foreknowledge and what that means. Because it does not just mean that God knows ahead what we're going to do. So he makes his decisions on that basis. That is full blown Arminianism. And we'll talk about that a little bit next week. That's not a biblical position. I mean, I'm not in charge. God doesn't respond because he looks down at these. Well, John's going to do this. So, okay, I'll make my plans accordingly. That's putting me in control and God responding to my whims. That's not a biblical position. So that's not what foreknowledge is talking about. We don't have time to get into all that tonight and see all those passages. I wish we had time for more questions. We don't. It's already after 8 o'clock. So if you'll come back next week and maybe the next two weeks, we'll get into this a little bit more. Okay. Let's pray.