Meaningful Choice and Divine Sovereignty

Today I will share excerpts from chapters 24-26 of Randy Alcorn’s book If God Is Good. These three chapters focus on Meaningful Choice and Divine Sovereignty working together.

As a reminder, you can find posts of previous chapters under the heading Bible Studies in the menu above. I would be most honored if you would leave your respectful thoughts, comments, or prayer needs below. Unless otherwise noted, the Scriptures used are from the NKJV.

Chapter 24 – The World’s Structure is Necessary for Meaningful Choice

Randy Alcorn begins chapter 24 with the statement that in a universe where God is the creator and judge we ought to keep in mind that, doing good is always smart while doing evil is always stupid.

Deuteronomy 28 pronounces God’s blessing on good choices and his curse on bad ones. In Proverbs, we find many verses where we are exhorted to distinguish between wise and foolish choices. Generally, wise choices bring positive consequences while foolish choices bring negative consequences.

While at times wrongdoing appears to offer benefits and doing right may seem to bring serious disadvantages, we must keep in mind that in the long run, often in this life and always in the afterlife, God rewards right choices and confers consequences for wrong ones.

• “Do not be deceived, God is not mocked; for whatever a man sows, that he will also reap.” – Gal 6:7
• “Some men’s sins are clearly evident, preceding them to judgment, but those of some men follow later.” – 1 Tim 5:24

Cause and Effect

Meaningful choice requires a cause-and-effect system in which choices generate consequences. Some people argue that a good and all-powerful God should miraculously intervene every time someone intends to do harm. But a world of freedom requires cause and effect.

For a choice to be real, it must be effectual and for it to be effectual it must have structure and predictability. Miracles must be the exception, not the rule. Otherwise, our choices would have no real consequences.

Those Quickest To Condemn

Ironically those who most value the freedom to choose are the quickest to condemn God for allowing evil and suffering. Critics of a God who allows evil and suffering may feel deeply that they should have the freedom to smoke or drive at the speed they wish, or not to wear seat belts. Then when they get injured or inflict injury on others they question God’s goodness, unwilling to take responsibility for the consequences of the choices they so value.

Freedom to do good which brings good consequences cannot exist without corresponding freedom to do evil which brings suffering.

Something Needs to Happen to Us

God could not make human beings while eliminating the process by which humans mature; He could create us innocent, but we must become righteous. We don’t enter the world as 30-year-olds. For God to fast forward our lives to an eternity in Heaven would be to bypass the life experiences that define us.

Even Adam and Eve, though created innocent they weren’t created as wise. They needed to grow in understanding.

Scripture teaches a continuity of our identity from this life to the next.[1]  For us to become the best people we can be for eternity; something needs to happen in us while we live here. As we move through a world of choice and consequences, we need to come to see God for who he is and his goodness for what he is.

God has allowed moral evil in this world to show its ugliness so that we might forever know the difference between good and evil and the cherished goodness he purchased for us at Calvary.

This world under the curse will be made into a new world. Meanwhile, God is not only preparing a place for us; He is, through our suffering and character growth preparing for us that place (see 2 Peter 3: 11-14).

Meaningful Choice Must Exist for Love to Exist.

Human freedom is a good that justifies the reality of a temporary evil; to argue that God should not permit evil, or suffering is to argue against not only human choice but love. In other words, a world without the choice to hate would be one without the choice to love. C. S. Lewis said,

“Why, then, did God give them free will? Because free will, though it makes evil possible, is also the only thing that makes possible any love or goodness or joy worth having. A world of automata-of creatures that work like machines-would hardly be worth creating.” [2]

Chapter 25 – God’s Influence on Our Wills

God invites us and sovereignly empowers us to choose to come to him. God’s invitation to come to him assumes the possibility of a real and meaningful choice to accept it.

• Matt 11:28 – “Come to Me, all you who labor and are heavy laden, and I will give you rest.”
• Rev 22:17 – “And the Spirit and the bride say, “Come!” And let him who hears say, “Come!” And let him who thirsts come. Whoever desires, let him take the water of life freely.”

Jesus states in the book of John:

“All that the Father gives Me will come to Me, andthe one who comes to Me I willby no means cast out.”- Jn 6:37

Then Jesus goes on to say, “No one can come to Me unless the Father who sent Me draws him, and I will raise him up at the last day.”–  Jn 6:44

Further on in the same chapter Jesus tells us, “No one can come to Me unless it has been granted to him by My Father.”- Jn 6:65

Apparently, we freely choose Christ only because he empowers us to do so. That may not make sense to us, but when we compare all Scriptures discarding none, that seems to be the truth. People genuinely respond to God, yet God first opens their hearts.

A Woman Named Lydia

“Now a certain woman named Lydia heard us. She was a seller of purple from the city of Thyatira, who worshiped God. The Lord opened her heart to heed the things spoken by Paul.” – Acts 16:14

God calls us spiritually dead without Christ (see Eph 2:1 ). We did not by acts of our will make ourselves alive on our own. Rather “And you, being dead in your trespasses and the uncircumcision of your flesh, He has made alive together with Him, having forgiven you all trespasses.” – Col 2:13

Lazarus, Four Days in the Tomb

Lazarus serves as an illustration of what it means to be dead, then made alive. “Now when He had said these things, He [Jesus]cried with a loud voice, “Lazarus, come forth!”- Jn 11:43

The dead man lacked the capacity to obey until Jesus made him alive. Who’s more helpless than a dead man?

Consider the Following Scriptures

Jesus said in John 12:32: “And I, when I am lifted up from the earth, will draw all people to myself.” (NIV)

All people is a broad and inclusive statement. The book’s larger context shows that not all will be saved, yet when Jesus speaks of dying for the world and drawing all men to himself, he seems to be deliberately casting his net wide.

Sometimes Christians assume we have a full capacity to respond to God. But this doesn’t square with any number of Christ Scriptures, including this one: “For as the Father raises the dead and gives life to them,even so the Son gives life to whom He will.” – John 5:21 (NIV)

It appears that a person doesn’t simply choose life; Jesus gives it to him. Notice carefully what Paul wrote about repentance,

“Opponents must be gently instructed, in the hope that God will grant them repentance leading them to a knowledge of the truth, and that they will come to their senses and escape from the trap of the devil, who has taken them captive to do his will.” –  2 Tim 2:25-26 (NIV)

Sinners should choose to repent, yet only God grants saving repentance. God calls us not only to surrender and lay down our arms but to switch sides. We need his empowerment to do this.

Our Nature Doesn’t Desire to Please God

Without Christ we have freedom to act upon our desires, but by nature we do not desire to please God and cannot fully obey him. “The mind governed by the flesh is hostile to God; it does not submit to God’s law, nor can it do so.” – Rom 8:7 (NIV)

People who lack the spirit cannot begin to understand spiritual things: “The person without the Spirit does not accept the things that come from the Spirit of God but considers them foolishness and cannot understand them because they are discerned only through the Spirit.” – 1 Cor 2:14 (NIV)

Our problem is both unwillingness to understand and our incapacity to turn our wheels towards God. Once we grasp the depths of this problem, we will fully appreciate the wonders of his grace. Without that insight we might imagine ourselves in heaven congratulating one another that we had the savvy and strength of will, to turn to Christ. But God leaves no room for such boasting.

• “For by grace you have been saved through faith, and that not of yourselves; it is the gift of God,not of works, lest anyone should boast.” – Eph 2:8-9
• “Not by works of righteousness which we have done, but according to His mercy He saved us, through the washing of regeneration and renewing of the Holy Spirit,” – Titus 3:5

Moreover, God’s Amazing Grace doesn’t end at our conversion. Even the regenerated human depends upon the divine will to live as it should. The verse below, corrects both those who understate and those who overstate the role of human will.

“Therefore, my beloved, as you have always obeyed, not as in my presence only, but now much more in my absence, work out your own salvation with fear and trembling;for it is God who works in you both to will and to do for His good pleasure.” – Phil 2:12-13

Sovereignty and Human Choice

Because God wills things in two different senses, God’s will does not always get done, yet his will is never frustrated.

I’ve heard people say, “God’s will cannot be thwarted.” If by God’s will we mean his ultimate decreed purpose, then yes, that is true, since Ephesians 1:11 says that God’s “works out everything in conformity with the purpose of his will.” But if we mean that God’s moral laws and stated desires cannot be violated that is clearly wrong.

Wherever evil exists, we see a violation of God’s moral will. The prayer “thy will be done in earth, as it is in heaven” (Matt 6:10 KJV) assumes that God’s will often is not presently done on earth.

Question: If everything on earth takes place as God wills it, then why would he have agonized over the human will that moved him to judge the earth with the flood? Why did Jesus, weep over the death of Lazarus? Is it God’s will that sexual predators rape women and enslave children?

Answer: No!

Jeremiah says of God “For he does not willingly bring affliction or grief to anyone.” – Lam 3:33 NIV

And yet the prophet writes in the context of the God ordained destruction of Jerusalem by Babylon. Other passages show how God does indeed bring affliction, but with reluctance. No father enjoys seeing his child in pain.

Scripture says that the omnipotent God desires many things that don’t happen; For instance, he “desires all people to be saved and to come to the knowledge of the truth.” – 1 Tim 2:4 ESV

Taking these words at face value, since not all people will be saved, then God’s desire will go unfulfilled. He wants people to repent of sin, to love him and love their neighbor, but often they don’t.

Jesus wept over Jerusalem when he wanted one thing and Jerusalem wanted another (see Matthew 23:37). As God’s son, Jesus could have overpowered the will of Jerusalem’s people and forced them to accept him. But he sovereignly chose not to do so.

One day Jesus will reign over the New Jerusalem, filled with people who love him and willingly and eagerly bow to his lordship. So, Christ will shall ultimately prevail even though he permitted it to be immediately resisted.

The Doctrine of Fatalism

Scripture does not teach that God wills everything, in the sense that he forces everything or is pleased with everything that happens in this fallen world.

• Fatalism holds that everything including evil, and suffering happens in a predetermined and inevitable way, with human beings powerless to affect change.
• It results in an attitude of acquiescence.
• Fatalism predominates among many, though not all, Hindus, and Muslims.
• Unfortunately, some Christians also think like fatalists.

Question: Where does that logic take us? If God permits racism, slavery, and child sex trafficking, then why should we battle them?

Answer: Here’s why: the bible speaks much about God’s sovereignty, yet constantly calls upon people to act and to speak up for and help the poor and needy (see for example Pro 31:8-9), this is the polar opposite of fatalism. Albert Einstein said,

“The world is too dangerous to live in, not because of the people who do evil but because of the people who sit and let it happen.” [3]

Some of that problem stems from indifference, and some from fatalism.

Question: Since God can use evil for his glory, if I abstain from a sin to try to stop a sin am I in danger of trying to thwart God’s will?

Answer: No, because God commands us to intervene to stop injustice, so that his moral will is done. Why? Because his moral will is not currently being done.

Determinism, Libertarianism, and Compatibilism

Determinism, libertarianism, and compatibilism offer differing views on the relationship between God’s sovereignty and human choice. Below is a very brief synopsis of each.

Determinism

• Determinism affirms that “acts of the will” occurrences in nature, or social or psychological phenomena are casually determined by preceding events or natural laws.[4] Simply put everything happens because it must.
  • Some who follow astrology and horoscopes believe in determinism .
  • Some Christian determinists believe God orchestrates in advance each reality including every demonic and human choice.

Hard Determinism

• Non-theistic hard determinists may believe that hereditary, environment, unconscious impulses, defense mechanisms, and other influences absolutely determine how people will act.
• Theistic hard determinists believe that God determines how people will act.
  • Among Christians a hard determinist would be what Spurgeon, a Calvinist and compatibilist called a “hyper-Calvinist.”

The hard determinist believes that God orchestrates every single choice, good or evil. If a woman is raped or a child is beaten it’s because God wills it. This seems to deny meaningful choice, and our genuine capacity to love, hate, learn, rebel, or follow.

It violates countless scriptures that assume we can and do make meaningful decisions daily. Essentially the hard determinist believes that freedom is an illusion. Hard determination is incompatible with meaningful human choice.

Soft Determinism

• Many Christian compatibilists think of themselves as soft determinists.
• They are determinists in the sense that they believe God is absolutely sovereign and that nothing occurs that he cannot use to fulfill his plan and further his glory.
• They don’t accept the notion that life is random or that one’s destiny can be in the hands of demons and other people.
• Their determinism is soft as opposed to hard, because compatibilists fully affirm the reality and consequences of voluntary evil choices demons and humans make.
  • They do not ascribe these choices to God. These creatures do wrong, acting in accordance with their desires which stem from their fallen natures.

Compatibilism

• Compatibilism holds that free will, understood as people able to make meaningful choices for which they are morally responsible can coexist with determinism, understood as God remaining completely sovereign, his decrees not being thwarted by his creature’s choices.
• Despite the paradoxical nature of sovereignty and free will, Christian compatibilists believe God reveals both ideas to be true and understands how they fit together, even if we do not.[5]

Libertarianism

• Libertarianism claims humans have free will and that free will and determinism cannot coexist.
• In philosophy (not politics), the term refers to the idea that human free will, undetermined, is necessary for moral responsibility.
  • The philosophical position of libertarianism teaches that human beings possess free will.
  • Free will is incompatible with determinism, and that determinism is false.

No definition can go much further than this because libertarians embrace a variety of beliefs. Libertarianism is not consistent with biblical teaching about God’s sovereignty.

The author states that “While Scripture teaches we make meaningful choices, I believe it also teaches that fallen people have greater limits on their freedom then libertarians suggest. As Luther pointed out to Erasmus, ‘we cannot have extensive freedom if our wicked hearts makes us slaves to sin.’”

Those who come to faith in Christ have been “set free from sin, you became slaves of righteousness.” – Rom 6:18

We now have a capacity to choose what’s right and honoring to God, yet even then, we must rely on the Holy Spirit’s empowerment to resist sin. We remain responsible before God and accountable to him because he is the Creator, and we are his creatures. He is our judge. So, our human freedom, though real, is less radical than the freedom of libertarianism.

Our real but lesser freedom fits with verses such as the following which appear incompatible with libertarianism.

• “The Lord brings the counsel of the nations to nothing; He makes the plans of the peoples of no effect. The counsel of the Lord stands forever, the plans of His heart to all generations” – Ps 33:10-11
• “But our God is in heaven; He does whatever He pleases.”- Ps 115:3
• “The Lord has made all for Himself, yes, even the wicked for the day of doom.” – Pro 16:4

Those of us who believe that humans have real choices may feel tempted to minimize these verses but their cumulative weight with similar passage throughout scripture leaves no doubt that God controls the events of human history as well as our daily lives.

We want to reconcile what seems irreconcilable –  human choice and divine sovereignty. We want to remove God from any hint of blame for injustice or suffering. But biblically, it just doesn’t work. Alcorn states:

“We shouldn’t take on the mantle of God’s public relations team. We do not need to put a spin on scripture, airbrushing the Almighty so he can win the popular vote. He doesn’t ask us to get him off the hook of public opinion, but to believe what he has told us about both are meaningful choice and his complete sovereignty.”

Chapter 26 – Further Thoughts

• Some think of human beings as automatons with no true freedom to choose. Simply mechanical men, some destined to:
  • clean decks.
  • be stuck in the engine rooms.
  • enjoy the luxury rooms.
  • steal purses and wallets.

Meaningful human choice is illusory. All is fate or as we’ve learned earlier hard determinism.

Others envision themselves as fully free to govern the course of their lives, to be captain of their own ship, capable of doing whatever they wish, taking the ship to any harbor and destiny.

The author states that the ship illustration as it is sometimes presented is misleading, but it can be helpful provided we make some important qualifications.

Passengers have true freedom to:

• walk the ship,
• choose when and where and what to eat,
• and whether or not to be friends with others.

We can act kindly or with malice, though our hearts lean toward evil; and left to ourselves we will live in bondage.

We cannot change the course of the ship, the owner (who is also the captain) makes that decision, and furthermore, unlike any human being, God controls the weather and foresees the icebergs and will bring the ship into harbor where he wants, when he wants. We are passengers, living under God’s rules.

• we can rebel,
• attempt mutiny,
• and we may appear for the moment to have our way.
  • But we will not succeed.
• We cannot take over the ship and change its course.
  • When the ship reaches its predetermined destination, we will be held accountable for our actions.

A.W. Tozer used the ship analogy and concluded:

“Both freedom and sovereignty are present here and they do not contradict each other. So it is, I believe, with man’s freedom and the sovereignty of God. The mighty liner of God’s sovereign design keeps its steady course over the sea of history. God moves undisturbed and unhindered toward the fulfillment of those eternal purposes which he purposed in Christ Jesus before the world began.” [6]

God’s purpose and glory are the life breath of the universe. Everything, including the real choices that Satan, angels, and every person makes is subordinate to God’s redemptive plan, which he carries out with deliberate purpose.

God Always Keeps His Promise

If anything in the universe can happen outside of God’s control, then ultimately, we can’t trust his promises. However, God always keeps his promise, he never fails.

God hates sin and judges it yet predetermines a plan in which he uses human evil to accomplish his purposes. God holds men accountable for the sin they choose to do but it’s not inconsistent or unjust of him to utilize their low-purposed, finite evil for his high-purposed, infinite good.

This reality should prompt us to worship him for his greatness and his ability to use even what displeases him to accomplish what will ultimately please both him and us.

Our fates do not rest with people who file lawsuits against us, or with unjust politicians, lawyers, teachers, coaches, military officers, or employers. They can do their worst against us, and God is fully capable of turning it around and using it for our best (no matter how much it hurts in the meantime).

Some imagine that God’s use of evil means that he commits it, approves of it, or fails to hate, judge, and be angered by it. This is categorically wrong.

• “Who knows the power of Your anger? For as the fear of You, so is Your wrath.” – Ps 90:11
• “I Myself will fight against you with an outstretched hand and with a strong arm, even in anger and fury and great wrath.” – Jer 21:5

However, some claim that affirming God’s sovereign grace in the context of human evil justifies evil doing. Paul refutes this erroneous thinking:

“Someone might argue, “If my falsehood enhances God’s truthfulness and so increases his glory, why am I still condemned as a sinner?”Why not say—as some slanderously claim that we say—“Let us do evil that good may result”? Their condemnation is just!” – Rom 3:7-8 NIV

God saving grace and ability to use evil doesn’t justify or minimize evil doing, it simply shows that he is infinitely superior to any evildoer and that his plan to do good to his people will not be derailed by any creature.

We are Responsible

Scripture teaches both God’s sovereignty and meaningful human choice. Many verses clearly declare God’s absolute sovereignty. God “Works out everything in conformity with the purpose of his will” – Eph 1:11 NIV

He not only assigns to us our times and places (see Acts 17:26) but takes credit for natural processes, feeding birds and caring for the grass (see Matt 6:26,30).

Here’s a passage that seems to deny libertarian freedom: “I know, Lord, that our lives are not our own. We are not able to plan our own course.” – Jer 10:23 NLT

Consider in the Scriptures that while God used the Assyrians to accomplish a divine purpose, he held them accountable for the evil of their hearts as they served that purpose (see Isaiah 10:5-7). He said that when he finished using them against Israel, “I will punish the king of Assyria for the willful pride of his heart and the haughty look in his eyes” (verse 12 NIV).

God is no puppeteer, and we are not puppets, yet he remains in charge. We choose, and we are responsible and accountable for our choices, yet God reigns. Wayne Graham states,

“However we understand God’s relationship to evil, we must never come to the point where we think that we are not responsible for the evil that we do, or that God takes pleasure in evil or is to be blamed for it. Such a conclusion is clearly contrary to Scripture.” [7]

The Bible is Our Source Not a Particular Theological Persuasion

We should seek to be consistent with the Bible, not with a particular theological persuasion. Any position that denies either God’s complete sovereignty or our meaningful choice does not stand up to Scripture.

While arguments exist against every position and not all compatibilists agree on all issues, the author considers the compatibilist position to be the most in keeping with Scripture. The Bible is God-breathed, theological systems are not. They are valid not to the extent that they are self-consistent, but to the degree that they are consistent with Scripture.

God’s sovereignty is consistent with human responsibility. We can believe in God’s sovereignty and still lock the door.

• “Through laziness, the rafters sag; because of idle hands, the house leaks.” – Ecc 10:18 NIV
• “Sluggards do not plow in season; so at harvest time they look but find nothing.” – Prov 20:4 NIV

These verses don’t simply attribute sagging rafters and leaking houses to God’s sovereignty. They lay responsibility on people to act. Students who don’t study and set the alarm to get up for class aren’t trusting God; they’re just being irresponsible.

We find the greatest example of divine sovereignty and meaningful human choice in the crucifixion:

“Fellow Israelites, listen to this: Jesus of Nazareth was a man accredited by God to you by miracles, wonders and signs, which God did among you through him, as you yourselves know.This man was handed over to you by God’s deliberate plan and foreknowledge; and you, with the help of wicked men, put him to death by nailing him to the cross.” – Acts 2:22-23 NIV

God’s set purpose brought about Christ’s atoning death. Yet, wicked men (as well as you and me) nailed him to the cross. While they committed the ultimate evil, God used their evil to accomplish the ultimate good.

How could Christ’s crucifixion, the worst event in history, also be – in concert with his resurrection – the best event? If we can begin to wrap our minds around this, we start to see that if the greatest evil in the universe could serve the greatest good, then the same God –  our God, can surely bring good out of even the darkest evil and suffering!

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• [1] C. S. Lewis, The Problem of Pain (New York: Macmillan, 1962), 33-34.
• [2] Peter van Inwagen, Ed., Christian Faith and the Problem of Evil (Grand Rapids, Michigan: Eerdmans, 2004), 71.
• [3] Steven Best and Anthony J. Nocella, eds., Terrorists or Freedom Fighters? (New York: Lantern books, 2004), 157.
• [4] Merriam-Webster online dictionary, s.v. “Determinism,” www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/determinism
• [5] A good presentation of compatibilism is D. A. Carson’s Design Sovereignty and Human Responsibility (Eugene, Oregon: Wipf and Stock, 2002 ).
• [6] A. W. Tozer, The Knowledge of the Holy (San Francisco: HarperOne, 1992 ), 174
• [7] Wayne Grudem, Systematic Theology (Grand Rapids, Michigan: Zondervan, 1994), 323.

Cruise Ship Photo by Daniele D’Andreti on Unsplash