Free Will
Bible Study Time 2-18-07
Church links:
Bible Study Time 2-18-07
In Noah’s day, the LORD saw that the wickedness of man was great in the earth, and that every intent of the thoughts of his heart was only evil continually. As a result, God decided to destroy man from the face of the earth, but then, Noah found grace in the eyes of the Lord.
God told Noah to build an ark so that he and his family and a sampling of all animals and birds would be protected from the great flood that was about to come. The book of Hebrews says that Noah built the ark because he believed what God told him, and as a result, he became the heir of the righteousness which is according to faith.
When the ark was completed and it was time for them enter into the ark, the Bible says that Noah and his family and all of the animals and birds simply entered the ark. There is no mention of Noah having a big round up. Instead, it would appear that God just spoke to the animals and birds in some way, and they responded to His voice.
On December the 26th of 2004, the great tsunami swept through the Indian Ocean. As it swept across the coastline, it killed more than 150,000 people in a dozen countries. The people were caught totally off guard. Ten days later, the National Geographic News reported that before the giant waves hit the coast, eyewitnesses reported seeing unusual activity among the animals.
Elephants were seen screaming and running for higher ground. Dogs refused to go outdoors. Flamingos abandoned their low lying breeding areas. Zoo animals rushed into their shelters and could not be enticed to come back out. This confirmed for many people the rumors which have circulated for centuries that wild and domestic animals have a sixth sense which warns them about coming earthquakes.
It certainly would seem that God has a special means of communicating with animals, and it would also appear that when He speaks to them, they obey His voice. Wouldn’t it be nice if we, as human beings, would do the same?
People often ask why God allows all of the suffering and violence that we see in our world. The simple answer is that in the beginning God gave man a free will. He has the ability to choose, but he continues to make the wrong choices.
The animals were created without a free will. They have no capacity to choose whether or not they will obey God. They simply obey the voice of God. They don’t worry about right and wrong. They don’t worry about how their actions will affect their community or the future of their community. They just do what God has programmed them to do.
Man, on the other hand, does have the ability to choose. He was given the ability to plan ahead and weigh the consequences of his plan before he puts it into action. He was given the ability to anticipate and solve problems.
Just how much freedom we have in our choices has been a matter of considerable debate among theologians and philosophers since, well, probably since the beginning. For the past hundred years or so, secular psychology has been at the forefront of this debate with people like Carl Rogers and B.F. Skinner.
Carl Rogers was one of the founders of the humanist approach to clinical psychology. He believed that man has the ability to make rational choices within the scope of an intelligent interpretation of his own experiences. He developed elaborate techniques of psychotherapy to help people recall and evaluate their past experiences. To him, there was nothing more authoritative than one’s own personal experience.
Obviously, this humanist approach to life is a problem for believers because it fails to recognize the Bible as the ultimate authority. The Bible itself boldly proclaims that the heart of man is deceitful above all things and desperately wicked. Then it poses the question which is so often overlooked by human philosophy, and that is, who can know it? Who can know the human heart? David recognized his inability to accurately evaluate the issues of his own heart. He said:
Psalms 139:23-24 (NKJ)
23 Search me, O God, and know my heart; try me, and know my anxieties;
24 And see if there is any wicked way in me, and lead me in the way everlasting.
No one but God can really know what is in the heart of a man? As a result of Adam’s original sin, man’s heart became a breeding ground for lies and deception. Therefore, a man would be foolish indeed to stake his success in life upon his own evaluation and interpretation of his own experiences.
If we are to have any chance of understanding ourselves, and if we are to have any chance of living a life that is full of joy and peace, we need a relationship with the God who created us. Proverbs 3:5 and 6 says:
Proverbs 3:5-6 (NKJ)
5 Trust in the LORD with all your heart, and lean not on your own understanding;
6 In all your ways acknowledge Him, and He shall direct your paths.
Carol Rogers insisted that man could be his own guide through life, and in 1964 he was selected by the American Humanist Association as the humanist of the year.
B.F. Skinner’s philosophies stand in direct contrast to those of Carl Rogers. B.F. Skinner was a leading proponent of the behaviorist model of human behavior. He believed that man has no capacity to evaluate or interpret his own experiences and that man’s behavior will be simply the result of his conditioning. He said that man will do what feels good, and he will avoid what feels bad. He said that rational thought is not a factor in man’s behavior.
Skinner read about Pavlov’s dog, who salivated at the sound of a bell simply because he had previously been given food when the bell was rung. Skinner said that man responds to the stimuli of life in exactly the same way.
It’s ironic that B.F. Skinner spent most of his life using arguments of reason to convince the world that man has no capacity to reason. It’s also ironic that Skinner was selected as the humanist of the year by the American Humanist Association in 1972.
It would appear that the humanists considered Skinner to be a brilliant, reasoning human being. I don’t know if Skinner actually accepted that title, but if he did, one could say that his acceptance would prove Skinner’s point, that man’s actions are not based on reason, but they are based rather on positive and negative conditioning.
Well, it’s obvious from the Bible that from the beginning, man was endowed with the capacity for rational thought. Adam and Eve were very intelligent human beings, and God expected them to make choices which were based on reason.
God has no capacity to sin, but He did create Adam and Eve with the capacity to sin. They had the capacity to sin, but they had no predilection for sin. They were given one commandment: You shall not eat of the tree of the knowledge of good and evil; and they were given an absolute free will when it came to obeying this command. They had no natural inclination to either obey or disobey it.
After Adam and Eve sinned, however, they and all of us, as their descendants, fell under the curse of the sin nature. We see the sin nature so clearly in the book of Romans where Paul says:
Romans 7:14-20 (NKJ)
14 For we know that the law is spiritual, but I am carnal, sold under sin.
15 For what I am doing, I do not understand. For what I will to do, that I do not practice; but what I hate, that I do.
16 If, then, I do what I will not to do, I agree with the law that it is good.
17 But now, it is no longer I who do it, but sin that dwells in me.
18 For I know that in me (that is, in my flesh) nothing good dwells; for to will is present with me, but how to perform what is good I do not find.
19 For the good that I will to do, I do not do; but the evil I will not to do, that I practice.
20 Now if I do what I will not to do, it is no longer I who do it, but sin that dwells in me.
Even though it’s not spelled out in the book of Genesis, we can safely conclude that the sin nature came upon man at the time of the curse. This becomes apparent when we compare Romans 5 with Hebrews 2. Romans 5:12 says:
Romans 5:12 (NKJ)
12 Therefore, just as through one man sin entered the world, and death through sin, and thus death spread to all men . . .
Then, Hebrews 2 says:
Hebrews 2:14-15 (NKJ)
14 Inasmuch then as the children have partaken of flesh and blood, (Christ) Himself likewise shared in the same, that through death He might destroy him who had the power of death, that is, the devil,
15 and release those who through fear of death were all their lifetime subject to bondage.
Our bondage to sin, our proclivity for sin, is a direct result of our fear of death, and death came upon man as a result of Adam’s sin. Our sin nature, therefore, leaves us in a situation which is quite different from that of Adam and Eve before the fall. They had an absolute free will, with no inclination toward good or evil. We, on the other hand, do not have an absolute free will because we have a natural proclivity for sin.
Our love for sin is so strong that it actually takes God’s direct intervention within our hearts for us to overcome the forces of the sin nature. We can not see or understand our own sin without His help because it is impossible for us to see sin as evil when we actually see sin as beautiful.
Years ago there was a popular song which asked, how can this be wrong when it feels so right? Well, that’s the sin nature talking because the sin nature sees sin as beautiful. Our only hope to escape this deception is for God to intervene in our hearts.
Well, that sounds like a simple solution, doesn’t it? But wait a minute; it’s really not that simple because a big part of the problem is that the sin nature resists any kind of outside intervention. The sin nature values independence above all else.
When Satan tempted Eve, he tempted her with the idea that she could be as wise as God and, therefore, she could be like God. Obviously, the underlying message was that she could be independent from God and run her own life.
This sounded good to Eve even though she didn’t have a sin nature, and we can see that if Eve fell prey to this lie of the devil, just imagine how vulnerable we are with a sin nature. It takes the spiritual power of God, Himself, to break through the darkness into which we are born. Jesus said:
John 6:44-45 (NKJ)
44 "No one can come to Me unless the Father who sent Me draws him . . .
Paul said in II Corinthians 4:
2 Corinthians 4:3-4 (KJV)
3 But if our gospel be hid, it is hid to them that are lost:
4 In whom the god of this world hath blinded the minds of them which believe not, lest the light of the glorious gospel of Christ, who is the image of God, should shine unto them.
The darkness of the sin nature is fed by the devil, and it takes light from our Father in heaven to penetrate that darkness. The Gospel of John tells us that Jesus Christ is that Light. In John 1 we read:
John 1:1-9 (NKJ)
1 In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God. (The word, of course, is Jesus Christ. He was in the beginning with God, and He was God.)
2 He was in the beginning with God.
3 All things were made through Him, and without Him nothing was made that was made.
4 In Him was life, and the life was the light of men. (In the life that flows from Jesus Christ, there is light.)
5 And the light shines in the darkness, and the darkness did not comprehend it. (Men loved darkness rather then light.)
6 There was a man sent from God, whose name was John. (This is John the Baptist, and the Apostle John says that:)
7 (John the Baptist) came for a witness, to bear witness of the Light, that all through him might believe.
8 (John) was not that Light, but was sent to bear witness of that Light.
9 That (light) was the true Light which gives light to every man coming into the world.
We are born into darkness with a sin nature that loves darkness. We love darkness rather than light because our deeds are evil. But John said that Jesus Christ came as a light shining in the darkness, and he said that Jesus Christ gives light to everyone who comes into the world.
I don’t know exactly how God does it, but somehow God reveals the light of Jesus Christ to every person at some point and in some way. This revelation leaves every person without excuse in the sight of God. On the Day of Judgment, no one will be able to stand before God and say, I didn’t know about the light, or I never had access to the light. Jesus Christ is the true light who gives light to every man who comes into the world.
Those who respond to the Light are given the privilege of walking in the light, and this too is a result of God’s powerful intervention in our lives. By the power of the Holy Spirit, we are able to overcome the sin nature in our everyday lives.
The animals of Noah’s day responded to the voice of God, but they did not have a choice to make. They were created to obey the voice of God. You and I, on the other hand, were created with the ability to choose. When the sin nature came upon man, man became easy prey for the devil, but praise the Lord, Jesus Christ can take us out of the darkness and into the light. Paul said:
Colossians 1:13-14 (NKJ)
13 (God) has delivered us from the power of darkness and conveyed us into the kingdom of the Son of His love,
14 in whom we have redemption through His blood, the forgiveness of sins.
Thank you for listening to Bible Study Time. I’ll look forward to being with you again next week at this same time.
Write me at: jimjoan77@juno.com
God told Noah to build an ark so that he and his family and a sampling of all animals and birds would be protected from the great flood that was about to come. The book of Hebrews says that Noah built the ark because he believed what God told him, and as a result, he became the heir of the righteousness which is according to faith.
When the ark was completed and it was time for them enter into the ark, the Bible says that Noah and his family and all of the animals and birds simply entered the ark. There is no mention of Noah having a big round up. Instead, it would appear that God just spoke to the animals and birds in some way, and they responded to His voice.
On December the 26th of 2004, the great tsunami swept through the Indian Ocean. As it swept across the coastline, it killed more than 150,000 people in a dozen countries. The people were caught totally off guard. Ten days later, the National Geographic News reported that before the giant waves hit the coast, eyewitnesses reported seeing unusual activity among the animals.
Elephants were seen screaming and running for higher ground. Dogs refused to go outdoors. Flamingos abandoned their low lying breeding areas. Zoo animals rushed into their shelters and could not be enticed to come back out. This confirmed for many people the rumors which have circulated for centuries that wild and domestic animals have a sixth sense which warns them about coming earthquakes.
It certainly would seem that God has a special means of communicating with animals, and it would also appear that when He speaks to them, they obey His voice. Wouldn’t it be nice if we, as human beings, would do the same?
People often ask why God allows all of the suffering and violence that we see in our world. The simple answer is that in the beginning God gave man a free will. He has the ability to choose, but he continues to make the wrong choices.
The animals were created without a free will. They have no capacity to choose whether or not they will obey God. They simply obey the voice of God. They don’t worry about right and wrong. They don’t worry about how their actions will affect their community or the future of their community. They just do what God has programmed them to do.
Man, on the other hand, does have the ability to choose. He was given the ability to plan ahead and weigh the consequences of his plan before he puts it into action. He was given the ability to anticipate and solve problems.
Just how much freedom we have in our choices has been a matter of considerable debate among theologians and philosophers since, well, probably since the beginning. For the past hundred years or so, secular psychology has been at the forefront of this debate with people like Carl Rogers and B.F. Skinner.
Carl Rogers was one of the founders of the humanist approach to clinical psychology. He believed that man has the ability to make rational choices within the scope of an intelligent interpretation of his own experiences. He developed elaborate techniques of psychotherapy to help people recall and evaluate their past experiences. To him, there was nothing more authoritative than one’s own personal experience.
Obviously, this humanist approach to life is a problem for believers because it fails to recognize the Bible as the ultimate authority. The Bible itself boldly proclaims that the heart of man is deceitful above all things and desperately wicked. Then it poses the question which is so often overlooked by human philosophy, and that is, who can know it? Who can know the human heart? David recognized his inability to accurately evaluate the issues of his own heart. He said:
Psalms 139:23-24 (NKJ)
23 Search me, O God, and know my heart; try me, and know my anxieties;
24 And see if there is any wicked way in me, and lead me in the way everlasting.
No one but God can really know what is in the heart of a man? As a result of Adam’s original sin, man’s heart became a breeding ground for lies and deception. Therefore, a man would be foolish indeed to stake his success in life upon his own evaluation and interpretation of his own experiences.
If we are to have any chance of understanding ourselves, and if we are to have any chance of living a life that is full of joy and peace, we need a relationship with the God who created us. Proverbs 3:5 and 6 says:
Proverbs 3:5-6 (NKJ)
5 Trust in the LORD with all your heart, and lean not on your own understanding;
6 In all your ways acknowledge Him, and He shall direct your paths.
Carol Rogers insisted that man could be his own guide through life, and in 1964 he was selected by the American Humanist Association as the humanist of the year.
B.F. Skinner’s philosophies stand in direct contrast to those of Carl Rogers. B.F. Skinner was a leading proponent of the behaviorist model of human behavior. He believed that man has no capacity to evaluate or interpret his own experiences and that man’s behavior will be simply the result of his conditioning. He said that man will do what feels good, and he will avoid what feels bad. He said that rational thought is not a factor in man’s behavior.
Skinner read about Pavlov’s dog, who salivated at the sound of a bell simply because he had previously been given food when the bell was rung. Skinner said that man responds to the stimuli of life in exactly the same way.
It’s ironic that B.F. Skinner spent most of his life using arguments of reason to convince the world that man has no capacity to reason. It’s also ironic that Skinner was selected as the humanist of the year by the American Humanist Association in 1972.
It would appear that the humanists considered Skinner to be a brilliant, reasoning human being. I don’t know if Skinner actually accepted that title, but if he did, one could say that his acceptance would prove Skinner’s point, that man’s actions are not based on reason, but they are based rather on positive and negative conditioning.
Well, it’s obvious from the Bible that from the beginning, man was endowed with the capacity for rational thought. Adam and Eve were very intelligent human beings, and God expected them to make choices which were based on reason.
God has no capacity to sin, but He did create Adam and Eve with the capacity to sin. They had the capacity to sin, but they had no predilection for sin. They were given one commandment: You shall not eat of the tree of the knowledge of good and evil; and they were given an absolute free will when it came to obeying this command. They had no natural inclination to either obey or disobey it.
After Adam and Eve sinned, however, they and all of us, as their descendants, fell under the curse of the sin nature. We see the sin nature so clearly in the book of Romans where Paul says:
Romans 7:14-20 (NKJ)
14 For we know that the law is spiritual, but I am carnal, sold under sin.
15 For what I am doing, I do not understand. For what I will to do, that I do not practice; but what I hate, that I do.
16 If, then, I do what I will not to do, I agree with the law that it is good.
17 But now, it is no longer I who do it, but sin that dwells in me.
18 For I know that in me (that is, in my flesh) nothing good dwells; for to will is present with me, but how to perform what is good I do not find.
19 For the good that I will to do, I do not do; but the evil I will not to do, that I practice.
20 Now if I do what I will not to do, it is no longer I who do it, but sin that dwells in me.
Even though it’s not spelled out in the book of Genesis, we can safely conclude that the sin nature came upon man at the time of the curse. This becomes apparent when we compare Romans 5 with Hebrews 2. Romans 5:12 says:
Romans 5:12 (NKJ)
12 Therefore, just as through one man sin entered the world, and death through sin, and thus death spread to all men . . .
Then, Hebrews 2 says:
Hebrews 2:14-15 (NKJ)
14 Inasmuch then as the children have partaken of flesh and blood, (Christ) Himself likewise shared in the same, that through death He might destroy him who had the power of death, that is, the devil,
15 and release those who through fear of death were all their lifetime subject to bondage.
Our bondage to sin, our proclivity for sin, is a direct result of our fear of death, and death came upon man as a result of Adam’s sin. Our sin nature, therefore, leaves us in a situation which is quite different from that of Adam and Eve before the fall. They had an absolute free will, with no inclination toward good or evil. We, on the other hand, do not have an absolute free will because we have a natural proclivity for sin.
Our love for sin is so strong that it actually takes God’s direct intervention within our hearts for us to overcome the forces of the sin nature. We can not see or understand our own sin without His help because it is impossible for us to see sin as evil when we actually see sin as beautiful.
Years ago there was a popular song which asked, how can this be wrong when it feels so right? Well, that’s the sin nature talking because the sin nature sees sin as beautiful. Our only hope to escape this deception is for God to intervene in our hearts.
Well, that sounds like a simple solution, doesn’t it? But wait a minute; it’s really not that simple because a big part of the problem is that the sin nature resists any kind of outside intervention. The sin nature values independence above all else.
When Satan tempted Eve, he tempted her with the idea that she could be as wise as God and, therefore, she could be like God. Obviously, the underlying message was that she could be independent from God and run her own life.
This sounded good to Eve even though she didn’t have a sin nature, and we can see that if Eve fell prey to this lie of the devil, just imagine how vulnerable we are with a sin nature. It takes the spiritual power of God, Himself, to break through the darkness into which we are born. Jesus said:
John 6:44-45 (NKJ)
44 "No one can come to Me unless the Father who sent Me draws him . . .
Paul said in II Corinthians 4:
2 Corinthians 4:3-4 (KJV)
3 But if our gospel be hid, it is hid to them that are lost:
4 In whom the god of this world hath blinded the minds of them which believe not, lest the light of the glorious gospel of Christ, who is the image of God, should shine unto them.
The darkness of the sin nature is fed by the devil, and it takes light from our Father in heaven to penetrate that darkness. The Gospel of John tells us that Jesus Christ is that Light. In John 1 we read:
John 1:1-9 (NKJ)
1 In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God. (The word, of course, is Jesus Christ. He was in the beginning with God, and He was God.)
2 He was in the beginning with God.
3 All things were made through Him, and without Him nothing was made that was made.
4 In Him was life, and the life was the light of men. (In the life that flows from Jesus Christ, there is light.)
5 And the light shines in the darkness, and the darkness did not comprehend it. (Men loved darkness rather then light.)
6 There was a man sent from God, whose name was John. (This is John the Baptist, and the Apostle John says that:)
7 (John the Baptist) came for a witness, to bear witness of the Light, that all through him might believe.
8 (John) was not that Light, but was sent to bear witness of that Light.
9 That (light) was the true Light which gives light to every man coming into the world.
We are born into darkness with a sin nature that loves darkness. We love darkness rather than light because our deeds are evil. But John said that Jesus Christ came as a light shining in the darkness, and he said that Jesus Christ gives light to everyone who comes into the world.
I don’t know exactly how God does it, but somehow God reveals the light of Jesus Christ to every person at some point and in some way. This revelation leaves every person without excuse in the sight of God. On the Day of Judgment, no one will be able to stand before God and say, I didn’t know about the light, or I never had access to the light. Jesus Christ is the true light who gives light to every man who comes into the world.
Those who respond to the Light are given the privilege of walking in the light, and this too is a result of God’s powerful intervention in our lives. By the power of the Holy Spirit, we are able to overcome the sin nature in our everyday lives.
The animals of Noah’s day responded to the voice of God, but they did not have a choice to make. They were created to obey the voice of God. You and I, on the other hand, were created with the ability to choose. When the sin nature came upon man, man became easy prey for the devil, but praise the Lord, Jesus Christ can take us out of the darkness and into the light. Paul said:
Colossians 1:13-14 (NKJ)
13 (God) has delivered us from the power of darkness and conveyed us into the kingdom of the Son of His love,
14 in whom we have redemption through His blood, the forgiveness of sins.
Thank you for listening to Bible Study Time. I’ll look forward to being with you again next week at this same time.
Write me at: jimjoan77@juno.com
Church links:
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