Do We Have Free Will?

(Note: This is not meant to be an in-depth look at free will but an overview of it.)

Free will? So much of that is discussed in religious circles but is it fully understood.  Does it mean freedom?  Does it mean complete control?  What is it and do we have it?

Making our own decisions and determining our own course in life is the most common way of defining free will.  It is being the cabinet of your own ship.  Knowing that can we in all honesty say that we have free will with God in the picture?

God is all powerful and all knowing.  He can bring down the thickest and sturdiest of manmade structures.  He can control animals and have them do his bidding.  Calming the storm is child’s play to Him as He is the creator of all.  If He can do all that, does H really let us make our own decisions?

Examples abound in the Bible that many use to say that we do not have free will.  They say that God determines every course of action that we take.  In their viewpoint, we just follow along with His decisions or else pay the price of going the wrong way.

In Exodus 3 - 12, Moses approaches Pharaoh about letting the Israelites go.  The Bible says that God hardened Pharaoh’s heart so that the Chosen People would be kept in captivity.  It was God who made the decision of how Pharaoh felt and what his ruling would be.

Paul says in Romans 8:29-30, “For those God foreknew he also predestined to be conformed to the likeness of his Son, that he might be the firstborn among many brothers.  And those he predestined, he also called; those he called, he also justified; those he justified, he also glorified.” (NIV)  He also says in Ephesians 1:11 that “In him we were also chosen, having been predestined according to the plan of him who works out everything in conformity with the purpose of his will…” (NIV).  These verses interpreted to say that our destinations are determined by God and God alone.  Our choices do not come into play.

This is where free will becomes tricky.  Is free will complete control of our lives and destinies?  If so, then according to Romans and Ephesians we have no free will at all because God has already determined who will enter heaven and who will not.  Is free will the freedom to make our decisions on the route to our destinies?  Then, yes, we do.

Jonah was called to go preach to the city of Nineveh.  That was not what he had planned for that day and actually had no desire to do such an unpleasant task.  He made the choice to run.  He made the choice to get to Nineveh the hard way through the belly of a large fish.

Saul/Paul had the chance to continue on his path in Acts 9.  During his days of blindness he had the ability to keep on his own path.  Instead, he turned to the path God had laid out for him.

Free will by many is complete control of our lives.  There are too many factors in this world to interfere in that for us to say that we truly have free will in that manner.  Free will that means that our decisions do play a part in our path but not always our destination seems to be more concrete.  I have the free will to decide to go to church today.  I have the free will to make a career change.  I do not have the free will to make sure that my day goes off just the way I had planned. 

We do have free will yet it is in the end directed by ultimate wisdom.