Questions About Free Will
- Strength For Life
- Aug 11
- 8 min read
Updated: 6 days ago
The question of free will is no light matter. Philosophers have filled hundreds of pages debating whether humans can make free choices. Then again philosophers also debate things like what makes a cow different from a table when both have four legs. Free will, then, is not merely a philosophy question. Theologians have debated free will as well, and here the average church goer takes more interest. “Does Calvinism require that God override a person’s free will to save him?” Christians take seriously the answer to questions like this. The reason we take interest in questions of free will is that we are instinctively protective of our own humanness. We instinctively sense that making choices that we know are our own is central to the definition of being human.
While we are quick to defend our free will, perhaps our eagerness to defend it runs ahead of our understanding. So, then, in order to examine free will from Scripture, let’s ask several questions.
1. What is free will?
2. Why is free will a human attribute?
3. What purpose does God intend to accomplish with free will?
What Is Free Will?
In a few words (and without asking permission from the philosophers) we can say that free will is the ability to act in a way consistent with my natural way of thinking, deciding, and acting 1) without someone restricting options that appeal to my nature, and 2) without someone externally manipulating my nature.
Here is an example. A few weeks ago, my wife and I went to get ice cream for her birthday. She asked me to choose between a downtown grocery market and an ice cream parlor. I chose the grocery, and she bought blackberry ice cream. Let’s consider three alternative hypothetical situations to see if they would violate free will by our definition. In scenario 1, we arrive at the grocery and there are no flavors there she likes. Did that violate her free will? No, she asked me to choose, and we can never know the consequences of our choices ahead of time. Experiencing unpleasant consequences to a choice does not make it an unfree choice.
In scenario 2, I tell her that I will only take her to the grocery, not to the ice cream parlor. I do that because I know ahead of time that the grocery has no flavors she likes. Did that violate her free will? Yes. In that case, her free will would be violated because I would be removing choices that appeal to her nature. I would be limiting her choices to options I know she doesn’t like.
In scenario 3, I tell our son, Gabriel, that we are on our way to the grocery to get chocolate ice cream; I set his expectations for that flavor and promise him that flavor. When we arrive at the grocery, Gabriel points to the chocolate ice cream in the freezer and asks for it, expecting us to fulfill our promise. Even though my wife wanted blackberry ice cream, she feels compelled from a desire to keep our word to get chocolate for our son instead of her true favorite, blackberry. Did that violate her free will? Yes. In this case, I would be knowingly manipulating her nature to force her to make a choice that she would not otherwise have made.
To restate the definition, free will is the ability to act consistently with my natural way of thinking, deciding, and acting 1) without someone removing options that appeal to my nature, or 2) without someone manipulating my nature from the outside.
Why Do We Have Free Will?
Like with every other aspect of our humanity, we were created with the ability (and desire) to make free choices because God designed us that way. Specifically, we were made in the image of God (Genesis 1:27-28). We have free will because God has free will. God has the ability to make decisions based on His nature. In fact, God can ONLY make free will decisions. No one and nothing in creation can prevent God from acting according to His nature, or coerce Him into acting unnaturally to who He is. Consider a few verses. In Isaiah 46:9-11, God instructs Israel to “remember the former things of old: for I am God, and there is none else; I am God, and there is none like me, declaring the end from the beginning, and from ancient times the things that are not yet done, saying, My counsel shall stand, and I will do all my pleasure. Calling a ravenous bird from the east, the man that executeth my counsel from a far country: yea, I have spoken it, I will also bring it to pass; I have purposed it, I will also do it.” Whatever God desires and purposes to do, He will do.
Consider another passage of Scripture from the psalms. “Praise the Lord; for the Lord is good: sing praises unto his name; for it is pleasant. For the Lord hath chosen Jacob unto himself, and Israel for his peculiar treasure. For I know that the Lord is great, and that our Lord is above all gods. Whatsoever the Lord pleased, that did he in heaven, and in earth, in the seas, and all deep places.” What sort of things does the Lord do? we may ask. The next verses answer the question: “He causeth the vapors to ascend from the ends of the earth; he maketh lightnings for the rain; he bringeth the wind out of his treasuries. Who smote the firstborn of Egypt, both of man and beast; who sent tokens and wonders into the midst of thee, O Egypt, upon Pharaoh, and upon all his servants; who smote great nations, and slew mighty kings—Sihon king of the Amorites, and Og king of Bashan, and all the kingdoms of Canaan—and gave their land for an heritage, an heritage unto Israel his people” (Psalm 135:3-12). All those things are free will decisions by God.
God’s will is bound to His nature so completely that He cannot act in ways that violate His nature: He cannot lie; He cannot submit in worship to a created being; He cannot do evil; He cannot contradict Himself. God’s free will does not mean He can do absolutely anything. His free will is restricted to His nature. So is ours. It is important to remember that if we, like God, are acting in a way that we would naturally behave, we are making a free choice.
What Purpose Does God Accomplish With Our Free Will?
With all that said, here is the primary issue related to free will. The primary issue of free will is whether the things we do are accurate reflections of our true nature. Whether or not we have free will does not depend on whether we can do whatever we think or imagine. After all, I can imagine myself flying, but flying is not possible in this created world. Also, it is not possible for me to be the president of Spain; it is against their laws because I was not born there. It does not violate my free will that I cannot fly or be the president of Spain, because those things are impossible. Similarly, it does not violate my free will that there is a law against speeding; my decision not to speed simply indicates that my desire to stay out of jail is stronger than my desire to drive as fast as I want. Again, the question is this: do my actions accurately reflect my true nature? If they do, I am making a free choice.
Despite the insistence of unbelievers that humans are born naturally good, Scripture says otherwise. According to the Bible, man’s sinful actions are an accurate reflection of his sinful nature. Romans 8:5-8 explains the human condition this way: “For they that are after the flesh do mind the things of the flesh; but they that are after the Spirit the things of the Spirit. For to be carnally minded is death; but to be spiritually minded is life and peace. Because the carnal mind is enmity against God: for it is not subject to the law of God, neither indeed can be. So then they that are in the flesh cannot please God.”
But wait, you may ask. If that passage is right, how can a person with a sinful nature do good things? The answer is that an action is not just good if it looks good, but if it is also done for a good reason. For example, you could pay for a young man to go to a four-year university because you want him to fulfill God’s calling on his life, or because you want him to use his influence to get you powerful and famous connections. It’s difficult to tell from the outside whether or not another person’s action is truly good. Matthew 7:21-23 is perhaps the most frightening illustration of this principle. Some people who do good works will go to hell because their works only SEEMED good. Inside was a rotten heart.
Our motivations are often internal and hidden. God has made the world, however, so that our free will actions tend to reveal our true nature. It’s hard for people to hide their natural way of thinking and acting. God made the world this way from the very beginning. Consider the sin of Adam and Eve. The first two humans had an innocent yet corruptible nature. Everything about the Garden of Eden—the perfect environment, clear boundaries, fulfilling responsibilities, fellowship with God, the presence of the serpent—was designed to make Adam and Eve’s desires obvious in their actions. When Adam ate the fruit, he was making a free will decision. People have been making free will decisions ever since.
When the Lord saves us, He gives us a new, spiritual nature that we didn’t have before. Some of the things we do are different, and some are the same actions with a transformed motivation underneath them. Christians have the ability to walk after the fleshly nature, or after the Spiritual nature. One of the purposes of salvation is that the life of God, through the Spirit, might be revealed in the sons of God. Incidentally, God’s purpose in giving us free will is also the answer to why bad things happen to God’s people: to reveal what is inside us. 2 Corinthians 4:10 says it this way: “For we which live are always delivered unto death for Jesus’ sake, that the life also of Jesus might be made manifest in our mortal body.” God’s purpose in giving us free will is that, over time, our invisible nature becomes consistent with our actions. Over time, our actions bring what is inside us to the surface. This all culminates when we stand before the Lord one day, when all actions, and the nature behind them, will be fully revealed.
When people act according to their nature, one of several things will happen. If they are either dead in sin or walking after the flesh, their free will choices can be a wake-up call for them; as they recognize the sinful nature prompting those decisions, they may repent. Or, if they are unbelievers, they may bring the judgment and damnation of God on themselves. When a believer acts according to His new nature, it is an opportunity to thank the Lord for the gospel and rejoice in that new nature.
The application is simple. What nature is driving your free will actions? The life of Christ, or the corruption of sin?
The above article was written by Jonathan Kyser. He is a pastoral assistant at NorthStone Baptist Church in Pensacola, FL. To offer him your feedback, comment below or email us at strengthforlife461@gmail.com.
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