Questions on Christianity

The first way God is involved in our lives is how he places us on this world.  By the simple act of placing us in this world with a particular genetic makeup, in a particular family, and in a particular culture, God controls much of what happens to us.  Our lives will be much different if we are born in a mansion instead of the slums, in the jungles of New Guinea instead of the streets of New York, in the Stone Age instead of the Space Age, with genetics that gives us the potential to be a world class athlete instead of some disabling disease.  God has trapped us in this space and time for a reason.

The second manner in which God is involved in our world is through miracles.  The best example of this is the birth and resurrection of Jesus.  However, C. S. Lewis states that miracles are rare [1] and this is demonstrated by the fact that most of us will not see a miracle in our lives.  Yes, there are people who see a miracle in every day living but if we use the dictionary definition of the word (an effect or extraordinary event in the physical world that surpasses all known human and natural powers and is ascribed to a supernatural cause), miracles are exceedingly rare.  We must take miracles on faith because as C. S. Lewis states our senses and history cannot prove a miracle occurred. [2]  The human condition tells us that our senses are easily fooled and our knowledge of history is limited.  So miracles are of limited use in teaching us about God’s involvement in this world.  What miracles do teach is us that since God makes rare use of them, he is mainly working through the existing structure of our world (the natural world) to accomplish his purposes.  We like to talk about miracles because they are so unique and spectacular but to place undue emphasis on them interferes with our correct understanding of how God deals with us.

The Indian mystic Gopi Krishna states the purpose of miracles is not to extricate people from their difficulties.  God’s purpose for our life is to face problem and address them, not escape from them via miraculous means.  God does not give prophets and seers the ability to perform miracles whenever they want.  The gifts bestowed upon the prophets and seers are “not intended to supplant but rather to aid the rational faculty in the management of temporal affairs rigidly ruled by temporal laws.” [3]  God has structured our existence so the efforts of scientists to understand the natural biological laws have healed many more people than the miracles performed by prophets and seers ever have. [4]

The third way God is involved in our lives is through his Spirit.  The Holy Spirit is convicting every person in the world of sin, righteousness, and judgment (John 16:7-8).  Romans 8:16 tells us the Holy Spirit communicates with our spirit.  Precisely how God does this, he does not say, but we conclude that God is actively working with every person right now to persuade them to adopt his values.  C. S. Lewis maintains that objective values (what he refers to as the Tao) exist and that it is not one of many possible systems of value, it is the sole source of value. [5]  It is the moral code everyone in the world possesses.

The fourth method God uses is the various religions of the world.  The religions of the world codify the experiences of the ages, codify the Tao, codify how God related to previous generations.  Many Christians will object to God speaking through religions other than Christianity but we addressed that in the blog dated May 22, 2011.

The fifth method God uses is our experiences.  Because God has given us free will, he does not determine what all our experiences shall be.  He uses the experiences that chance, the actions of others, and our own actions bring our way to teach us the lessons we need to learn.  God lets us experience the results of not following his values and he called this failure sin.  Sometimes we experience the consequences of our sins.  Timothy McVeigh paid the ultimate price for his crime in the Oklahoma City bombing.  “Sooner or later we all eat at the table of consequences” [6] is a lesson he learned late.  Other times we experience the consequences of the sins of others.  The entire world and particularly the Jewish people experienced the consequences of the sins of Hitler and the Nazis.

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[1]   C. S. Lewis, Miracles (New York:  Macmillian Publishing Company, Inc., 1947), p. 104.

[2]   Ibid., pp. 7-8.

[3]   Gopi Krishna, Living with Kundalini (Boston:  Shambhala Publications, Inc., 1993), p. 327.

[4]   Ibid., p. 328.

[5]   C. S. Lewis, The Abolition of Man (New York:  Macmillian Publishing Company, Inc., 1947), p. 56.

[5]   Harold M. Schulweis,  For Those Who Can’t Believe (New York:  HarperPerennial, 1994), p. 72.

We are investigating how God is involved in our world and in our lives.  One aspect of this investigation is the question of whether we have free will or if God controls our every action.  The Stoic’s believed that reason tells us plainly we have free will in certain instances and not in others.  We do not totally control our life in regards to our health, wealth, friends, and time of death because the genetics we inherit, and the culture and family into which were born greatly influence these aspects of our lives.  What we do control is our will, our judgment, and our moral choices. [1]  The early Christians were of the belief that humans have free will and human effort is required in addition to God’s actions.  Augustine, in his Sermon 169, 11.13 states:  “He who created you without your help does not justify you without your help.”  David W. Bercot states:

. . .the early Christians never taught that humans are incapable of doing good or overcoming sin in their lives. . .At the same time, the early Christians didn’t believe that they could overcome all of their weaknesses and remain obedient to God day after day simply on their own strength. . .They believed that our walk with God is a joint project. As Origen explained, “He makes Himself known to those who, after doing all that their powers will allow, confess that they need help from Him.” [2]

Our free will is not absolute; it is limited.  Because of the limits of the human condition, we will never in this life know precisely what God does and what we do.  However, the knowledge we have of ourselves and God lead us to believe our life on earth is a cooperative venture with God.  Erasmus has noted this partnership when he stated that Christians say God saved a ship in a storm but was the crew on the ship totally inactive?  Christians say God brings a farmer a harvest but did not the farmer plant, cultivate, and harvest? [3]  When we face the temptation to do evil, should we wait for God to deliver us from the temptation or should we flee the temptation as Joseph did (Genesis 39)?  The way God has constructed our world is that we must take action if God is to work in our lives.  To teach differently is not Biblical.

So precisely how is God involved in our lives and world?  That topic is for next week.

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[1]   Marcus Aurelius, Meditations (New York:  Penguin Books, 1964), p. 17.

[2]   David W. Bercot, Will the Real Heretics Please Stand Up (Tyler, TX:  Scroll Publishing Company, 1989), p. 53.

[3]   Ernst F. Winter, ed. and trans,  Discourse on Free Will (New York:  Frederick Ungar Publishing Co., Inc., 1961), p. 69.

To answer the question of why evil exists in our world, we must first define evil.  Webster’s defines it as:  “morally wrong, harmful, injurious, misfortune, and suffering”.  This definition has two aspects:  a moral component and a suffering component.

If we are talking about the suffering aspect, we must ask if all suffering is evil.  It is not from our own experiences.  Good parents do not inflict evil on their children but they do allow their children to suffer pain.  One example is a medical procedure that is painful but beneficial to the child in the long run.  A second example is parents allowing a child to fail at a task to teach the child independence and that effort is required in life but that effort alone does not guarantee success.  A third example is parents allowing a child to play and in playing that child hurts himself.  Do we consider the parent responsible for all this suffering?  No.  Children will suffer because of the characteristics of the material world in which we live and because parents cannot control every action of their children.  So when we adults suffer, why do we blame God?

So we must redefine evil as causing or allowing pain, trouble, suffering, or misfortune with no purpose of the betterment of the individual affected.  This is the moral component in the definition of evil.  However this definition is still insufficient.  If it were sufficient, the Inquisition would not be considered evil because the perpetrators of this human event had only the future good of the individuals they tortured and killed in mind: the eternal salvation of their soul.  What we are still lacking in our definition of evil is free will.  Evil causes suffering with no purpose of the betterment of the individual and with no view of that individual as a unique creation of God with the right to make their own decisions.

We have learned that our material world, Satan, and we humans all produce the evil and suffering in this world.  The only way God is responsible is that he allows the continued existence of this material world, of Satan, and of us humans.  However, God does have a purpose of bettering our lives and, just like parents, God allows us to suffer because it is the best way to teach free agents how to live their lives.  Personal experience touches our soul in a way that other types of knowledge cannot.  If we make our own choices, we will make mistakes and those mistakes will cause suffering.  If we cannot make our own choices, we will never learn.

While at times our suffering might seem severe and unnecessary, Huston Smith sees it from a different perspective:

If a two-year old drops her ice-cream cone, that tragedy is the end of the world for her.  Her mother knows that this is not the case.  Can there be an understanding of life so staggering in its immensity that, in comparison to it, even gulags and the Holocaust seem like dropped ice-cream cones? [1]

Lance Armstrong asserts that his struggle with cancer made him a better person and that it takes a crisis for us humans to realize our full potential.

What if I relapsed and the cancer came back?  I still believe I would have gained something in the struggle, because in what time I had left, I would have been a more complete, compassionate, and intelligent man, and therefore more alive.  The one thing the illness has convinced me of beyond all doubt—more than any experience I’ve had as an athlete—is that we are much better than we know.  We have unrealized capacities that sometimes only emerge in crisis. [2]

Christianity teaches that God has a purpose that transcends all the suffering that occurs.  God allows evil and suffering to exist in our world because he respects our free will.  He allows us to make mistakes and learn the consequences of those mistakes.  He used the mistakes others make to provide more opportunities for us to learn.  He uses the actions of Satan and the sometimes destructive nature of our material world to teach us lessons about ourselves like he taught Job.

We humans desire a life of ease but if we are to learn, if we are to grow, if we are to learn of our true capabilities, then we must face difficult times.

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[1]   Huston Smith, Why Religion Matters (San Francisco:  HarperCollins, 2001), p. 254.

[2]   Lance Armstrong, It’s Not about the Bike (New York:  Berkley Books, 2001), p. 267.

As we mentioned in an earlier blog, the existence of evil and suffering in our world is one of the most important evidences against the existence of an all-powerful and all-good God. [1]  Because of this fact, all religions attempt to address this problem in some fashion.  Understanding why evil and suffering exist in our world can teach us much about God and how he deals with us.

Sources of Evil

Who is responsible for the evil in our world?  The Christian religion places much of the blame on Satan who rebelled against God and then persuaded Adam and Eve to follow him.  In the book of Job, Satan causes all the disasters that fall upon Job but only with God’s permission.  While the people of that time blamed God for some of the disasters (Job 1:16), the book makes it clear that Satan was the responsible party (Job 1:12 and 2:6).  God was content with Job as he was but Satan wanted to inflict pain not for Job’s benefit but for a selfish reason, namely to win an argument with God.  Paul talks about his thorn in the flesh tormenting him and attributes it to Satan (II Corinthians 12:7).  John tells us the Satan will cause Christians to be persecuted (Revelation 2:10).  Therefore, we must ask:  If Satan is responsible for evil then why does God permit him to exist?  If God would end his reign over this earth now as opposed to later, humans would be spared much suffering.  So God still ends up responsible for evil because he could prevent it by defeating Satan now.

The Bible also gives another source for evil, namely us humans (see Romans 3:10-12, Isaiah 64:6, and Jeremiah 17:9).  We humans have an enormous responsibility for the evil that exists in this world because we are the ones who inflict so much of it upon each other.  Of all the parties responsible for evil in our world, the evil we human cause each other greatly exceeds the evil cause by all the other parties.  We murder each other, we enjoy all manner of luxuries while others starve, we start wars that kill millions, we do not follow the example of the Good Samaritan (Luke 10:30-35) when others are hurting, we torture and kill each other sometimes even for what we perceive to be a good cause (the Inquisition, September 11th).

Much of the evil in this world is because we seek to deny free will to others.  We want others to do things our way and not the way they choose.  The 170 million people killed by their own governments in the 20^th century are a prime example.  These governments were attempting to socially reengineer their country and the desires of their people were secondary. [2]  Much of the crime committed is an attempt to force someone to do something they do not choose to do.  Robbery, battery, assault, and rape are all methods of forcing or of attempts to force someone to do something against their will.  Even when evil is caused by Satan or nature or other humans, we could alleviate much of the suffering in our world if we wanted.

The Jewish physician and philosopher Maimonides maintained the causes of evil and suffering were three.  First, we exist in a material sphere.  Second, people cause each other pain.  Third, we bring suffering on ourselves and this is the greatest cause. [3]  The Stoics agreed that almost all suffering, except for physical pain, is self-inflicted.  What makes life hard is not the event but our response to the event.  “Nothing but the value that we place on things gives them any power to harm us spiritually or emotionally.” [4]  That is why many of the world’s great religions advise us to give up our attachment to this world.

In the next blog, we will determine why God permits evil.

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[1]   Roy Weatherford, The Implications of Determinism (New York:  Routledge, 1991), p. 10.

[2]   See R. J. Rummel, Death by Government (New Brunswick, NJ:  Transaction Publishers, 2007).

[3]   Jacob Needleman, Money and the Meaning of Life (New York:  Currency Doubleday, 1991), p. 217.

[4]   Weatherford, p. 29.

Some believe we have no free will because we are so corrupt we can do nothing good without God’s help; it is our natural inclination to always do evil.  However, the Bible tells about two individuals who were not part of the nation of Israel whose goodness attracted God’s attention.  Job was “blameless and upright (Job 1:1) and God brought this to Satan’s attention (Job 1:6-8).  The book of Acts tells us of:  “. . .a man named Cornelius, a centurion in what was known as the Italian Regiment.  He and all his family were devout and God-fearing; he gave generously to those in need and prayed to God regularly” (Acts 10:1-2).  If we are incapable of doing good, how did Job and Cornelius manage to do good?  The most common explanation is the actions of Job and Cornelius were the result of the common grace God extends to humans.  However, if these are two examples of God’s common grace, then why does not God extend more common grace?  To choose to extend this grace to some and not to others or to limit the amount of grace he extends makes God rather arbitrary and unfair.  A more logical explanation is that humans do have the innate ability to choose good as well as evil.

Luther believed that we do not have free will; that if we could move toward good, we would have no need of God’s grace. [1]  Grace is defined as:  “a disposition to grant something freely; favor; goodwill; mercy; clemency”.  What is it that God grants us?  The Bible associates grace with whatever God gives us: wisdom (Luke 2:40), truth (John 1:14), power (Acts 6:8), salvation (Ephesians 2:5), abilities (Romans 12:6), and assistance (Hebrews 4:16).  But how does God’s grace operate?  Is it forced on certain individuals or does each of us have the free will to accept or reject God’s grace.  If God forces his grace only on certain individuals, then he is responsible for the actions of those upon whom he did not force his grace; if he had forced his grace on them, they would have changed.  If God grants his grace to each of us and we have the ability to respond to God’s grace or not, then we have free will.  The very definition of grace implies free will!  How can God grant or give us something unless we are in the position to accept or reject what he is giving?  If we have no choice in the matter, if we are incapable of responding to God, then God should have used the word “imposed” or “dictated” instead of grace.

In the next blog, we will examine what suffering and evil tell us about free will.

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[1]   Ernst F. Winter, ed., Discourse on Free Will (New York:  Frederick Ungar Publishing Company, Inc., 1961), 123.

As we have seen in previous blogs, there are many problems with God controlling all aspects of our natural world and personal lives.  While the Bible teaches God is all-powerful, does it mean he must control every event on earth because he can do so?  Some believe that God must or he would not be God.  However, God could do many things but he does not.  God would be justified in sending each one of us to hell for our sins but he chose instead to send his son to die for our sins.

Granting humans free will does not mean that God is not in control of events on our world.  Parents do not control every event in their children’s lives but if they are good parents, they exert control over their children.  Managers do not control all of what their subordinates do but if they are good managers they do have control of the organization.  God, in order to accomplish his purposes in our lives, also limits himself.  Being all-powerful means God can accomplish his purposes even if he gives us free will. [1]

If God must deny us free will to accomplish his purposes, then he is not all powerful.  It would mean he needs to stack the deck in his favor to win.  Is this God we read about in the Bible?  We humans are so limited we think God controlling all of our actions would be the only way to guarantee a particular outcome.  But God is bigger than our idea of him.  Even we humans do not always attempt to control all aspects of the lives of those for whom we are responsible.  Good parents and managers exert less control over their children or subordinates than they could.  They do this for a reason:  to develop the abilities of their children and subordinates.  Are we smarter than God?

We have learned that just because God is omnipotent, omniscient, and sovereign it does not mean God controls everything and we have no free will.  But some argue that we have no free will because we are so corrupt that we can do nothing good without God’s help; it is our natural inclination to always do evil.  While the sinful nature of humans is part of almost every Christian doctrinal statement, is it true we have absolutely no ability to do good without God?  We will determine that next week.

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[1]   Gregory A. Boyd, God of the Possible (Grand Rapids, MI:  Baker Books, 2000), pp. 68-69.

Those who believe God controls all events on this world partially base this belief on the fact the Bible teaches that God is all-knowing.  If God knows exactly what decision each of us will make, then we must make that decision.  However, our experiences tell us differently.  As our science advances, scientists are able to predict what will happen in nature from the scientific laws they have determined from their experiments.  They are able to predict the motion of the planets, comets, and asteroids in our solar system with great precision that enables us to send spacecraft to investigate them.  Because of this knowledge, do we say the scientists control the motion of the planets?  There is a difference between knowing and controlling.

While there is a great difference between knowing the course of planets and the course of people, we would expect that God, given his complete knowledge, would know that if humans take certain actions, a particular result would follow and will incline them to make certain other choices and decisions.  We humans do the same although on a much limited scale.  The FBI employs individuals who are called profilers.  They take the evidence from a crime scene and from that evidence construct a profile of the person responsible which permits them to predict certain aspects of the criminal’s behavior.  The profiles they construct are amazingly accurate.  If we humans are able to do this, how much more would God know the results a particular decision we make will bring.  Parents know from their own experience that their children, because of their curiosity, will take certain actions such as touching a hot stove even when they are warned against such actions.  Does that mean the parents forced their children to take such action?  Having knowledge of what actions we will be inclined to take does not mean that God controls those actions any more than a profiler is responsible for the crime committed or a parent is responsible for each action of their children.

William James makes an analogy about God’s omniscience and human free will by comparing God and us humans with an expert and a novice chess player.  The moves of the novice chess player will be unpredictable to the expert chess player but because of his/her superior knowledge of the game, the expert chess player will win every time. [1]  In the same way, God has a superior knowledge of us and our tendencies which enables him to give us free will and still accomplish his ends.

Another way to look at God’s foreknowledge is to acknowledge that God is outside of space and time.  To him foreknowledge is based upon observation, not prediction.  Because we are trapped in space and time, this concept is difficult for us to grasp and accept.  But if we truly believe God is who he says he is we must accept this as a possibility.

Does God know all of our future actions?  I think this point is debatable.  While God might know our pattern of behavior and the results that behavior brings, he would of necessity not know every decision we would make if we have free will.  There are passages in the Bible that state God is limited (self-limited) in certain aspects.  Gregory A. Boyd in his book God of the Possible lists multiple passages in the Bible which indicate that God changes his mind, does not know what humans will do, and desires an outcome that is different from what occurred. [2]  Why are all these passages in the Bible?  God must be trying to communicate something about himself to us.

Some Christians think God would be diminished if he did not know everything we will ever do; that God would not be God if he were limited in knowing.  But are parents diminished if they do not use their entire intellectual capabilities when dealing with their children?   Parents make a decision to limit themselves; parents give up much, in order to properly raise their children.  It is not the most intellectually challenging task to change a diaper or feed a child or teach a child the alphabet.  A parent could earn a greater income, learn more about our world, or enjoy more of the good life if they did not choose to properly raise their children.  But parents choose to limit what they can accomplish because of their love for their children.  Is God any different?

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[1]   William James as quoted in Alburey Castell and Donald M. Borchert, An Introduction to Modern Philosophy:  Examining the Human Condition (New York:  Macmillan Publishing Co., Inc., 1983), p. 131.

[2]   Gregory A. Boyd, God of the Possible (Grand Rapids, MI:  Baker Books, 2000) pp. 53-87.

We are discussing the nature of God’s involvement in our world.  To help us understand that involvement, we will examine what the Bible says about God’s sovereignty.

There is no question the Bible teaches that God is sovereign and that he controls certain events in nature and in our lives.  In Genesis 45:4-8 Joseph expresses the belief that God was involved in sending him to Egypt.  The prayer of Hannah, the mother of Samuel, states that God send poverty and wealth; God humbles and exalts (I Samuel 2:6-7).  After Job’s trials, the Bible tells us that God “made him prosperous again and gave him twice as much as he had before (Job 42:10).  Lamentations 3:37 states that nothing can happen unless God decrees it.  In Matthew 10, Jesus is talking about the persecution that will befall his disciples.  He notes that a sparrow does not fall to the ground without it being God’s will and that even the hairs on our head are numbered.  In Matthew 6:25-34 Jesus instructs us not to worry about clothes or what we will eat because God knows we have need of those things.  Romans 9:17-21 states that none of us has the right to complain what God does with our lives because He made us.  Paul tells us God gives us specific talents and abilities (Romans 12:3-8).  Philippians 4:19 tells us God will meet all our needs.

However, the Bible also teaches we have free will.  While the Bible does not explicitly state that humans have free will, it is difficult to come to any other conclusion if we consider what the entire Bible has to say about the subject.  The first chapter of Genesis tells us that God made humans the ruler of all creation.  Humans must have free will if they have control or dominion over the rest of creation.  If we are preprogrammed by God to act a certain way, then we have no control over creation and God is lying to us when he tells us we do.

When the Bible talks about God interacting with humans, God acts and talks like we were equals.  When God came to earth to investigate the evil of Sodom and Gomorrah, Abraham bargained with God in an ultimately futile attempt to spare these cities but God did not criticize him for doing so but bargained with Abraham as an equal (Genesis 18).  Was God just toying with Abraham by bargaining with him and had no intention following Abraham’s suggestion?

After Israel built and worshipped the golden calf while Moses was on Mt. Sinai receiving the Law from God, God wanted to destroy the entire nation of Israel and raise up a great nation through Moses.  But Moses intervened and changed God’s mind (Exodus 32:9-14).  Now if most Christians had been Moses, they would not have dared to question God; they would have told God that if God would excuse him, he and his wife would get working on raising up a great nation right away.  Unlike most Christians, Moses challenged God and changed God’s mind.  Why did God put this incident in the Bible—a situation where he actually acquiesced to a human?

Another example from Moses is the advice his father-in-law, Jethro, gave him.  Jethro saw the toll it was taking on Moses to act as judge for all the people of Israel and recommended that Moses appoint leaders to assist him (Exodus 18).  Now God was talking to Moses all the time since Israel left Egypt so why did not God make this suggestion to Moses when he saw the load under which Moses was operating?  Some might say that God operated through Jethro but that would mean that God leaves some thing up to us instead of taking care of them himself.

Why could not Jesus, who Christians believe was God in human form, convince the people of his day of his validity?  Why could not the creator of the universe, the most powerful person in the universe convince people of his identity?  Either Jesus is not all-powerful and therefore not God, or God is controlling us like puppets and has decided for some perverse reason that some of us will not believe in him and will, therefore, spend eternity in hell, or we do have a free will that we can exercise even to the extent of opposing God’s will.

Romans 1:20 through 32 tells us God gives people over to the sinful desires of their heart when they persist in doing evil.  If God has predetermined that certain people would follow the sinful desires of their heart, there would be no reason for God to cease to work with them to change them.  The only way these verses make sense is if people do have the free will to do good or evil.

Paul tells is in Philippians 2:12 to work out our “salvation with fear and trembling”.  How can we do anything about our salvation if we do not have free will?  Why would God command us to do something we cannot do?  All of the above examples demonstrate the Bible teaches that humans exert some control over what occurs here on earth.  God is not just acting unilaterally.

The Bible teaches that God is sovereign but it also teaches we have free will.  Any belief about God’s involvement in our lives and our world must accommodate both.

Science and religion seem to agree that humans have no free will.  But this idea raises many questions about what religion, and particularly the Bible tells us.  If God has already decided what we will do with our lives, why does he need to have us act out this charade we call human existence?  What is the purpose of all the human suffering if we are all just puppets in God’s show?  If God already knows whether we will be saved or not, why not just send us to heaven or condemn us to hell before we are born?  Having us live out our lives will not change anything.  If God has already decided whether we will be saved or lost, then how, as Erasmus asks, can we love a God who punishes people for his own doings? [1]

Why did God give us the Bible?  If we are preprogrammed by God to live a certain way, what is the purpose of giving us his word?  The Bible is to teach us how to live our lives but if we are preprogrammed then nothing the Bible says can change our programming.  The Bible tells us over and over that we will be judged on our actions.  God constantly tells us what our conduct should be like.  Erasmus states that there are over 600 verses in the Bible where God requires something of us.  If we have no free will, if God controls everything that occurs on this earth, why does he give us these requirements? [2]

How can we be judged and how can we obey God in terms of our conduct unless we are free to make our own decisions?  Erasmus states the obvious that a married woman who is raped is not guilty of adultery. [3]  The Bible and our civil law are in agreement on this because even though the physical act is identical, one involves an act of the will and the other does not.  Our legal system acknowledges that if someone is coerced, they are not responsible for their actions.  Are we more just than God?

Why should we try to convert others to the Christian religion if God has already decided who will be saved and who will be lost?  If God has decided that someone will not be saved, then our efforts to convert that person is contrary to God’s will.  Is that not evil? [4]  Some might say we do not know what God has planned for that individual and that God commands us to share our faith.  Then why does God command us to do something that could potentially be against his will; that potentially could be evil?

All the above questions lead us to doubt the idea that God controls all events in our world.

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[1]   Ernst F. Winter, ed., Discourse on Free Will (New York:  Frederick Ungar Publishing Company, Inc., 1961), pp. 11-12.

[2]   Ibid., p. 59.

[3]   Ibid., pp. 25-26.

[4]   Ray Weatherford, The Implications of Determinism (New York:  Routledge, 1991), p. 43.

In the past blog, we have seen how science can help us understand how God is involved in our natural world.  In this blog, we will again use science but in a different way.

Science is materialistic.  Webster’s defines materialism as a philosophical view “that regards matter and its motions as constituting the universe, and all phenomena, including those of mind, as due to material agencies.”  In other words, the material world is all that exists.  If the material world is all that exists, there is no room for God.

Materialism is also deterministic.  Determinism believes that every event is caused or necessitated by all other events that make up the system.  All change is determined by previous actions; the immediate cause of our actions is a chain of events stretching into the remote past.  The universe, and that includes us, is like a clock.  All the gears, springs, and hands and how all the parts are assembled determine how the clock functions.  One who knows how the clock is made and assembled can predict the appearance of the clock in the future.  Likewise, a mind that knows everything about how our universe is constructed could predict our every action.

Most religious people are firmly opposed to materialism.  However, most believe that God controls all aspects of our lives.  They reason that since God is all-powerful and sovereign he must control all the events on this earth.  They reason that since God is all knowing he knows what choices we will make and therefore we must make those choices.  Some even believe that God brings about our sinful behavior but he has a good reason for doing this. [1]  Such a view is also deterministic and is no different from the materialists.  The end result is the same:  we humans are puppets to either God or to the impersonal forces of the natural world.

So science and religion both seem to assert we humans have no free will.  Where did this idea come from that we have free will?

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[1]   John M. Frame, No Other God (Phillipsburg, NJ:  P & R Publishing, 2001), pp. 67-74.