An Essay on Free Will: Man’s Will and God’s Will, Complimentary or Contradictory

 

Dr. Paul Manuel—2020

 

 Man’s obedience advances God’s agenda, but man’s disobedience does not impede God’s agenda. While man can oppose God, by deciding to go his own way rather than going God’s way, he cannot obstruct God, preventing Him from accomplishing His will. In that endeavor, man’s efforts are futile, vain, because man cannot hinder Him in any way. God is sovereign and will accomplish His good pleasure no matter what man or anyone else (e.g., Satan) does:

The LORD Almighty has purposed, and who can thwart Him? (Isa 14:27)

No one can deliver out of My hand. When I act, who can reverse it? (Isa 43:13)

Who is like Me and who can challenge Me? (Jer 49:19; 50:44)

Despite such inevitability, God gives man freedom in this life to make many choices for himself, the most important of which is how he will spend eternity—either with God or apart from God. Nevertheless, it is not a decision man makes in a vacuum, but with the aid of prevenient grace, which mutes the influence of man’s depravity, giving him the ability to respond to God’s gracious offer of salvation:

It is by grace you have been saved, through faith—and this not from yourselves, it is the gift of God. (Eph 2:8)

Prevenient grace does not negate man’s free will; it merely allows man to decide for God without interference from man’s fallen nature (depravity). God “wants all men to be saved” (1 Tim 2:4), but that is their choice. He will not force anyone into His kingdom who chooses not go. Nevertheless, God accepts, even welcomes, those who appeal to Him in repentance and faith:

To all who received him, to those who believed in his name, he gave the right to become children of God. (John 1:12)

If you confess with your mouth, “Jesus is Lord,” and believe in your heart that God raised him from the dead, you will be saved. (Rom 10:9)

If anyone hears my voice and opens the door, I will come in and eat with him, and he with me. (Rev 3:20)

 Despite the availability of prevenient grace, some people decide to go their own way rather than God’s way. That is their choice, one God respects by granting man the consequence of his decision, which is either eternity with God or eternity apart from God. Nevertheless, it is a decision man cannot wait to make later (i.e., postmortem). Any attempt to delay that eventuality will result in the default setting, which is eternity apart from God. There is no opportunity for man to revise this decision after his passing: “Man is destined to die once, and after that to face judgment” (Heb 9:27). Death closes any possibility to change one’s eternal future. At that point, a person sets the time of his reward or retribution (his trial date) immutably.

•         The reward of the righteous stems from his free decision to serve God.

•         The retribution of the wicked stems from his free decision to oppose God.

Moreover, from that one decision flow many others, decisions that may be less consequential (i.e., non-salvific), but are yet important (e.g., career, marriage). Still, the most important decision is the one that determines man’s eternal destiny:

If anyone would come after me, he must deny himself and take up his cross and follow me. (Mark 8:34)

If anyone chooses to do God’s will, he will find out whether my teaching comes from God or whether I speak on my own. (John 7:17)

God…will not let you be tempted beyond what you can bear. But when you are tempted,

He will also provide a way out so that you can stand up under it. (1 Cor 10:13)

Man has free will, not merely to do what he wants in small matters, but to do what he wants in large matters, especially the binary decision where and how he will spend eternity.

 

 In the end, each side will be aware of the other and will know it is too late to change. Such is Jesus’ point in the story about the rich man and Lazarus:

In hell, where [the rich man] was in torment, he looked up and saw Abraham far away, with Lazarus by his side. So, he called to him, ‘Father Abraham, have pity on me and send Lazarus to dip the tip of his finger in water and cool my tongue, because I am in agony in this fire.’ …‘Between us and you a great chasm has been fixed, so that those who want to go from here to you cannot, nor can anyone cross over from there to us.’ (Luke 16:23-24, 26)

•         The righteous will be aware of the wicked but will be unconcerned for his plight, content his punishment is just.

•         Part of the comfort for the righteous will be his seeing the torment of the wicked and knowing it is something the righteous will never endure.

The lack of concern by the righteous may seem callous, out of character for one redeemed by God, who should certainly be empathetic toward another’s misery. But it will actually evince a clear-eyed recognition of God’s justice in the end.

•         The wicked will be aware of the righteous and will be envious of his comfort but will be unable to secure relief from his own suffering, forever unhappy that his plight is permanent.

•         Part of the torment for the wicked will be his seeing the comfort of the righteous and knowing it is something the wicked will never enjoy.

The lack of control by the wicked will be frustrating, but he will recognize the justice of his final situation. The wicked will know (and agree) that his plight in death is deserved and fits his behavior in life, as it contrasts with God’s righteous standard.

 

 Christians often view Paul’s description of man’s final awareness as one-sided, an awareness of good things only (i.e., eternal comfort for the righteous):

Now we see but a poor reflection as in a mirror; then we shall see face to face. Now I know in part; then I shall know fully, even as I am fully known. (1 Cor 13:12)

But Paul’s description of man’s awareness may apply to bad things as well (i.e., eternal torment for the wicked). The rich man does not claim that his punishment is unfair or undeserved, only that it is unrelenting.

 

 The last situation for the righteous and the wicked, even as they are in a different location, will be of the same duration:

Multitudes who sleep in the dust of the earth will awake: some to everlasting [MDlwøo] life, others to shame and everlasting [MDlwøo] contempt. (Dan 12:2)

[The wicked] will go away to eternal [ai˙w¿nion] punishment, but the righteous to eternal [ai˙w¿nion] life. (Matt 25:46)

The same word in both Hebrew and Greek describes the extent of the final experience for both the righteous and the wicked. There will be no end to the bliss of the righteous and no end to the torment of the wicked. Both will last forever.

 

 Some would call the fate of the wicked “cruel and unusual punishment,” a phrase in the eighth amendment of the U.S. Constitution, which guarantees citizens’ freedom from such treatment by a secular court. But the American constitution is not part of God’s kingdom. Besides, it would only be relevant, even in America, if punishment were undeserved. It is not:

All have sinned and fall short of the glory of God. (Rom 3:23)

Moreover, in God’s heavenly court, His verdict is both fair and final, not subject to review or reversal. Whatever punishment man receives in the end will be welldeserved. The standard man must meet in life, but cannot, is emulating God’s perfect character. That is the standard for all judgments in the end:

We must all appear before the judgment seat of Christ, that each one may receive what is due him for the things done while in the body, whether good or bad. (2 Cor 5:10)

There will be no exceptions, which is why God’s grace is so important. Only through God’s unmerited favor can man escape the otherwise inevitability of God’s righteous punishment of sin.

 

 Most important to remember is the answer to the rhetorical question Abraham poses: “Will not the Judge of all the earth do right?” (Gen 18:25). Yes, “God is just” (2 Thess 1:6), and what He does is always right.

You are always righteous, O LORD, when I bring a case before You. (Jer 12:1)

 

 The decision a person makes in this life, to serve his God or to serve himself, determines the destiny a person faces in the next life—either eternity with God or eternity apart from God. That choice is man’s to initiate, but it is God’s to culminate. In this way, man’s free will is either complementary or contradictory to God’s will, depending on whether he has chosen to obey God or not. In the end, though, it is always God’s will that prevails:

He stands alone, and who can oppose Him? He does whatever He pleases. (Job 23:13)

Abraham’s rhetorical question is one whose answer is both obvious and certain, even if it is one not all people admit.

 

 So, does man have free will, and is it complimentary or contradictory to God’s will? The answer depends on how man exercises his will, in obedience or disobedience to God’s will. If he chooses to obey God, then man will find himself in compliance with God’s will, doing what God wants and ordering his life in the way most advantageous for him. As a result, he will benefit, both in the present and in the future.