Free Will Or Human Responsibility

Scripture

O Jerusalem, Jerusalem, the city that kills the prophets and stones those sent to her! How often I wanted to gather your children together, just as a hen gathersher brood under her wings, and you did not want it! 

~Luke 13:34, LSB

Quote

“Free will, though it makes evil possible, is also the only thing that makes possible any love or goodness or joy worth having.”

~C.S. Lewis

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Adam and Eve had a choice (Genesis 2:16, Yahweh God commanded the man, saying, “From any tree of the garden you may surely eat; but from the tree of the knowledge of good and evil, you shall not eat from it; for in the day that you eat from it you will surely die.” The Israelites had a choice ( Deut. 30:19…“I have set before you life and death… therefore choose life”... Joshua 24:15 “Choose this day whom you will serve”). God created man in His own image for a reason. I believe He created us not only to worship Him but to commune with Him or fellowship with Him. We are created for His pleasure. God is sovereign and that is not up for debate: we all recognize that God is ultimately in charge. The fact that God is sovereign means that He can do whatever He pleases [Psalm 115:3]. He has no insecurities, no fear of allowing man to make choices.

There are differences of opinions among the Reforms just as there are among Baptist. Many Reforms believe in ‘free will’ but they refuse to call it ‘free will’; they refer to it as human responsibility. I have discovered that many of the good writers are reform and I enjoy reading them. They understand fully that salvation is man’s response to God’s initiative and that all men are not going to respond in a positive way. Jesus came to be the KING of the Jews but they rejected Him as their king. Jesus was not pleased with this: He wept over Jerusalem. He lamented her demise.

Does God know everything? Yes, He lives in eternity. It would be impossible for Him not to know. He sees everything from beginning to end so to speak but that does not effect your choice. So can you reconcile God’s omniscience with man’s free will? No, it is a mystery. Can you reconcile predistination with a personal relationship or intimate fellowship with Jesus? No! You cannot. So it doesn’t matter which way you go, there is a mystery. Are we puppets or persons? Are robots or rebels. Can a puppet or a robot sin? Can they bring joy and pleasure to their creator with a free interchange of conversation. Can a puppet or robot love? The answer to all is NO. We sin but robots and puppets do as they are programed to do. Their creator can mess up but they can’t. They are things, not persons.

Misunderstanding our election can lead to arrogance. Israel’s election was for the purpose of being a light to the nations; to reflect God’s love, mercy and grace to the world, but they refused to obey and the end result was contempt for the world. Thy just lumped us all in one basket {goy, Gentiles} and despised us all. It upset them for Jesus to even speak to a Gentile. What blatant arrogance! So they violated the two things that God loves most: {1} Humility {2} love for people. There are exceptions, but I can spot a Reform wearing the Baptist label from a mile away. They reek with arrogance.

Sorry I am late again. I thought the blog was ready to post and it wasn’t and you will probably find mistakes in this one, but I hope it makes sense.

God bless you and thanks for reading the blog.

Mens Breakfast coming up Saturday week at the POINT. That is July 11 at 8:00 am.