I recently began carrying around a movie prop on my keychain. It serves as a conversation starter as well as an analogy for God’s foreknowledge and influence in our world which is seemingly full of causality resulting from independent choices. In the fourth Harry Potter movie, The Prisoner of Azkaban, one of the characters is given a small device called a “time turner” so that she can attend multiple classes simultaneously. My analogy imagines the use of a time turning device during a theological chess match;
I am certain that if I am playing chess, having more than a basic knowledge of the game, I could beat any grandmaster with the simple use of this time-turner. I would have the advantage of seeing how my opponent would react to every move I might make and I could adjust my strategy accordingly. With patience, I could not lose. If this were an analogy of God versus Satan it would still be enough to convey God’s non-linear existence, but the game isn’t between God and Satan. Rather imagine yourself in the game against Satan with Yahweh sitting beside the table as the moderator. Though Satan is far more experienced and has seen far more success than any human being, if God is officiating with this time turner and if he wants me to win, AS LONG AS I KEEP PLAYING THE GAME, I cannot lose. God may see me make the same wrong move 1000 times but at some point he will be able to distract me, change my train of thought, or even whisper into my ear to change my decision when he needs to. He can see my end from my beginning and he can interject for my best possible result all throughout the game. We struggle with Satan but with God watching over us, we cannot lose. This would be a sufficient analogy for the relationship between God and man in regard to our choices and his foreknowledge in itself, but it falls short with regard to the incarnation. For spiritual reality to really be represented accurately, Jesus would need to do more than officiate.
I like to spend time at half-priced books here in downtown Dallas. It is their flagship store and larger than any other mainstream bookstore I have ever seen. They have a huge selection of new and used games and being a fan of board games I often sort through them finding old gems and expensive games at great discounts. One day I was struck when I found a used game that has been postulated in several tv shows and science fiction, a version of chess that is played between three players on a round board. There are black and white pieces, and grey pieces constitute a third force. The paths which the pieces take are circular and often pass through a center spot as they move around the board. This three-player version of chess does a better job of completing the analogy with Christ’s incarnation in view.
The game is not God versus Satan. The game is not simply us versus Satan. The game puts the elect, you and I, in strategic competition against the enemy and God Himself has descended into the realm where this game is taking place. His first move was to sacrifice his King with our victory over Satan in mind as His primary goal (in our individual lives). Now, God is able to see the end from the beginning and He is able with his own pieces moving in our game to prompt our moves and to attack Satan before our eyes. God is eternally patient with His chosen ones and those who are chosen are those of us who are determined to keep playing. If we choose to stop moving, God will not force us to move. If we choose to give ourselves over to Satan and allow Him to win, God will persist to give us the opportunity to repent but ultimately, if we continue to intentionally lose, there becomes no outcome which may result in our victory over the devil, but if we simply persist, Satan WILL BE DEFEATED.
God exists outside of time and He is in control over our lives. Every choice we make is exactly that, a choice we make. God lovingly influences our moves to give His people the best possible eternal outcome but our choices are still our own. His sovereign will for the world will not be interfered with, but being made as the Imago Dei, the image of God, we must be given the choice to follow God and believe Him because without faith expressed in both belief and obedience simultaneously, there is no relationship between God and man.
Both foreknown preordained election, and free will of man are not only able to co-exist but it is necessary for them to coexist in God’s economy of relationship, salvation, sovereignty, and omniscience.
A more scholarly exploration of this weighty topic is appropriate.
The theological and philosophical debates concerning the seemingly incompatible doctrines of man’s ability to exercise sovereign free will in all matters of his life and God’s perfect foreknowledge are indeed reconcilable in the mystery of God. Just as Christ was totally man and yet, totally God, so is man’s predicament to live in the image of his creator exercising dominion[1] in his own free will while still subject to Gods predestination. God’s omniscience and thus, His foreknowledge, is secured outside of man’s time domain[2] and does not necessarily intrude on man’s free will without the willful submission of an individual. A Man may choose to surrender his will to God’s will but is not forced to comply to it if he chooses to live his life without regard to God’s will. The free will of Man to choose his own eternal destiny amidst a creation that is subject to an omniscient God with perfect foreknowledge of man’s doings yesterday, today, and tomorrow, is one of the great mysteries of God that bears witness to His glory.
Proverbs 25:2 It is the glory of God to conceal a thing: but the honor of kings is to search out a matter.
The philosophy of man’s free will to make independent decisions and choices is not exclusive to Christian thought and theology but is a foundational element of Greek philosophy rooted in, for example, Plato’s search for “the causes of everything, why each thing comes into being and why it perishes and why it exists.”[3] A philosophical interest in causality led Aristotle to develop a determinist philosophy that establishes four types of causes that explain why and how things and events come to be.[4] This secular philosophy eliminates the possibility of independence choices without contending with the perfect foreknowledge of an omniscient God. The Greeks also believed in fate with respect to the free will of man. Greek fatalism found its way into Christian thought as the doctrine of divine providence which substituted the sinister power which governs the tragic vision of life with a power that liberates man to accomplish the divine purpose in his life.[5] There is no wonder then how theologians and Christian philosophers come to develop the various doctrines of determinism and providence in relation to the Christian God.
Determinism is the belief that “human actions are the result of antecedent causes”,[6] and can be expressed in secular terms or theologically. Theologically, determinism encroaches upon the free will of man. Scripture teaches that man can make choices that oppose the will of God. Joshua 24:15 clearly explains that man has a choice of whom he will serve, and in Matthew 23:37 Jesus, who is the Creator God in the flesh, is clearly prevented for exercising his sovereign will by the choices of the people of Jerusalem. Scripture also teaches however, that God intervenes continually in His creation, especially in the lives of those who follow Him. Ephesians 2:8-9 explains that Christians do nothing to gain salvation but find grace through faith. Galatians 5:16-17 teaches that the Holy Spirit intervenes to keep Christians from doing those things that the flesh wants to do.
The Bible portrays a God who is omniscient and sees the past as clear and real as the future. In John 8:58 Jesus says “before Moses was, I AM”, indicating that He is not restrained by time in such as way as man is. But the Bible also portrays mankind as constantly making decisions that are contrary to the will of God. This paradox has been the subject of an often raging debate that has continued from the time of the Apostolic Church until today. Those who hold a belief in strict predestination are forced to worship a God who preordained evil and sends the majority of
His children to hell for eternal death, and those who argue that man has total freedom in his choices without influence by their creator decisively serve a God who separates Himself from His creation and lets the schemes of man unravel until the end of his days. Neither of these extremes can be exclusively supported in a whole-scripture context, but human reason limits their ability to be reconciled to each other. Fortunately for Man, as well as the entirely of God’s creation, these two theological concepts apply to a God who transcends human reason and because He is omniscient and sovereign both can be equally true at the same time.
The Theology of God’s Foreknowledge
“Foreknowledge is an aspect of God’s omniscience.”[7] To be omniscient is to know all things at all times. In His omniscience God knows all things outward and inward. Psalm 139 addresses God’s foreknowledge by teaching that God knows us as we are before we were made. Proverbs 15:3 teaches that at any given moment God’s eyes are on all things. Job 42:2 teaches that God knows all of the thoughts of man, and Acts 1:24 teaches that God knows not only the thoughts of man, but the hearts of man. Finally, 1 John 3:20 teaches that God simply knows all things. God’s omniscience establishes God’s ability to know and understand the future just as He knows and understands the past and present.
God’s foreknowledge is not limited by time and human causality. The eternal timeline in relation to man is a present state to God. This does not necessarily mean that everything is preordained but that everything is foreseen. Preordination and predestination are doctrines that have been established based on the theology of God’s foreknowledge but both have been strongly disputed (though not debunked) for many centuries by arguments that are rooted in scripture as clearly as the doctrines they would dispute. Since foreknowledge pertains to understanding and observation it does not necessarily establish God’s intervention in causality within the time domain. Much is predestined, such as Satan’s demise in Revelation 20 and the new heaven and the new earth in Revelation 21, but in regard to fallen man’s individual decisions, scripture does not necessarily suggest that all is pre-ordained.
Biblical prophecy is indicative of God’s foreknowledge and is certainly the strongest evidence of the divine inspiration of the scriptures. In order for God’s foreknowledge to be established through biblical prophecy those scriptures which tell of future events must be fulfilled. The evidence of foreknowledge is found when “rather unlikely occurrences predicted in the distance past eventually came to pass. These events…could not have been predicted on the basis of unaided human insight or foresight. Consequently, God must have revealed them.”[8] Only a being with at least some foreknowledge could predict the future in details as precise as the first name of a future King as in Isaiah 44:28. Prophecy is one of the strongest arguments for God’s foreknowledge as His prophesies must come true regardless of the choices that man makes of his own free will.
The Theology of the Free Will of Man
If it is true that man ultimately exercises free will in his own life, then the doctrine of God’s constancy[9] becomes paramount in man’s relationship to eternity. The heavens and the earth will pass away but God’s word and His salvation last forever,[10] and the Lord never changes,[11] He is the one constant thing in the universe. This principal suggests that no matter how many wrong and harmful decisions that man makes, the end result remains anchored in an unchanging God. In the book of Jonah, Nineveh’s fate was defined in terms of God’s response to their decision. Nineveh’s choice to repent apparently had bearing on God’s decision to withhold judgment. In Genesis 6:6 God regrets, or repents, having created man because of the evil in their hearts. How literal these types of scriptures should be taken has been a primary source of contention throughout church history. Few suggest that the happenings on earth did not unfold as He expected, rather the word “repented” is taken as an anthropomorphism or anthropropathism, meaning to apply human form or human attributes to God. Conversely, a reading of Genesis chapters 3-6 suggest that although God may have foreseen the events leading to the flood, such as the fall of man and the perversion of the bloodlines by the “sons of God,” these events seem to have occurred contrary to the will of God.
One perspective on God’s constancy suggests that His omniscience is limited only by the things in the universe that are not yet knowable. This implies that God does not have perfect foreknowledge because human decisions are freely made within man’s time domain. Erickson investigates the suggestion that God’s omniscience “means that at every moment of the divine life of God knows all that is knowable at that given moment.”[12] He draws the conclusion that this definition of omniscience contradicts the doctrine of divine sovereignty, suggesting that man should not be viewed as taking part in determining the future. [13] Although the bible does not seem to teach that man has any part in determining the future, mainly because the future is already written in scripture, it does suggest that humans have a bearing on their individual lives and their future in eternity. Paul teaches Timothy that Jesus desires that all people come to the knowledge of the truth,[14] but all people do not come to this knowledge.
The extremity of this theology is indeterminism. In contrast to the various brands of determinism which seek to explain causality, indeterminism expresses a complete lack of causality. Indeterminism suggests that “there are no antecedent or simultaneous causes of man’s actions. Hence, all of man’s acts are uncaused; any given human act could have been otherwise.”[15] For the Christian, indeterminism is impossible because he freely submits to God’s will and in failing, repents or receives chastisement.[16] For the heathen, or secular man, indeterminism is highly improbable due to, at a minimum, relational causality.[17] Humans are easily motivated by relational praise or criticism. It is more likely that non-Christians would hold to the principal of self-determinism in which a man is surrounded by measurable causality but ultimately the choices a man makes are not determined by his external influencers, but his inner desire to control his own behavior.[18]
This principal of self-determinism is apparent is Genesis 3 at the fall of man. Adam sinned and God held him accountable although he was quick to blame others. Adam was guilty of putting the blame not only on Eve but on God himself when he said “the woman You put here with me-she gave me some of the fruit of the tree and I ate it.”[19] Arguably, Adam’s decision was encouraged by an external cause but God still held Adam accountable for his own decision and caused a curse to be placed on himself and all of creation because of his rebellion. Eve blamed the serpent and was cursed with pain in child birth and with the rule of man over her. Finally, the serpent is held accountable for his deception and cursed to crawl on his belly, and in verse 15 of Genesis chapter 3, the serpent’s is cursed to be at odds with mankind until his demise when Eve’s offspring crushes his head. Of course, being held accountable is not evidence of free-will, but notice that everyone who was blamed for sin in chapter 3 was cursed, even God. Galatians 3:13 says that Jesus was made a curse. God does not sin,[20] nor does His part in the formation of the circumstance make Him culpable. If man did not have free will in Genesis chapter 3 then God would have been guilty of sin. This argument suggests that anyone who teaches absolute predestination or preordination must also teach that God brought sin into the world, not man, and therefore God is guilty too.
History of the Foreknowledge versus Free Will Debate
Much of the teaching of the early church was framed in Greek thought. Many of the New Testament books are written to gentile churches, though most of the New Testament is written from a Jewish perspective, as such, the scriptures were often studied using Greek thought. Clement of Alexandria wrote that “it may be, indeed, that philosophy was given to the Greeks immediately and primarily, until the Lord should call the Greeks. For philosophy was a schoolmaster to bring the Greek mind to Christ, as the Law brought the Hebrews. Thus philosophy was a preparation, paving the way towards perfection in Christ.” Greek philosophy had much ado about fate. “In classical Greek though fate was believed to be superior to the gods, since even they were unable to defy its all-encompassing power. Fate is not chance, which may be defined as the absence of laws, but instead a cosmic determinism that has no ultimate meaning or purpose.”[21] Accepting that God was ultimately responsible for fate is not in opposition to this thought once a sinner accepts Jesus, rather the principal that all is preordained by God becomes a presupposition that has led to strict doctrines like the teachings of St. Augustine, Martin Luther, and John Calvin.
Probably the most notable early traces of the predestination versus free will debate come from Pelagius and Augustine of Hippo in the fifth century. In 404 A.D Augustine published his Confessions, which taught, among other doctrines, predestination. A rival theologian named Pelagius in response published a statement entitled On Free Will.[22] Both teach divine causality in all of man’s ways, but while Pelagius attributes “ability” to God, he attributes volition and actuality to man’s will rather than God’s predetermined purpose.[23] Pelagius was not so much aligned with Jacob Arminius’ free will. Pelagius teaches that even if man can choose, it is God who provides the various posse, or possibilities so man does not really have free will of choice. He teaches “He it is that bestowed this posse on us, and there is no occasion for praising the human agent when we are treating of God alone; for the question is not about the velle (choice) or the esse (existence), but solely about the possible.”[24] Pelagius is more well known for denying original sin. He argues against the sinful nature of man and expresses that it has no impact on the volition of man. This is what led to his famous debates with Augustine and ultimately resulted in his excommunication as a heretic at the counsel of Carthage in 418. Though his teachings resulted in excommunication his free-will theology did not compare to what would later be introduced by Jacobus Arminius and later followed and taught by John Wesley.
Augustine taught preordination with the same extremes that are later found in the teaching of John Calvin. Augustine teaches on predestination: “will any man presume to say that God did not foreknow those to whom He would grant belief?”[25] and of the men of Tyre and Sidon whose hearts were hardened that “their capacity for belief availed them nothing, because they were not so predestinated by him whose judgements are inscrutable and whose ways past finding out.”[26] Augustine is clear in the doctrine of the elect, that those who will be saved are preordained to do so and that there is nothing that someone who is not preordained to accept Christ can do to change his predicament and find himself saved from perdition.
1000 years after Augustine taught pre-ordination, Martin Luther began his studies at the Augustinian priory monastery.[27] Martin Luther is famous for sparking the protestant revolution with his 95 Treatise against the sale of indulgences which was common practice in the Catholic Church. Luther’s teachings on preordination and free will echo the teachings of Augustine of Hippo. “By about 1516, Luther was clear that the primary source of Christian theology was not the scholastic tradition, still less the philosophy of Aristotle. It was the Bible, especially as interpreted through the writings of the early Christian theologian Augustine of Hippo.”[28] Luther particularly opposed the teachings of Greek philosophy in regards to determinism and preached Augustinian predestination while opposing the earlier free-will perspectives of Justin Martyr and Ignatius.
Calvinism and Arminianism
Shortly after Martin Luther entered the monastery, John Calvin was born in Noyon, France. “Without any doubt, the most important systematizer of Protestant theology in the sixteenth century was John Calvin. While Luther was the daring trailblazer of the movement, Calvin was the careful thinker…”[29] John Calvin’s doctrine on predestination has become a fundamental element of the faith for many Christian denominations. The theology of predestination and preordination is often referred to as “Calvinism” and this theology encompasses the extreme lack of free will among men, bringing every decision and event within a man’s life into subordination to God’s plan established before the foundations of the earth. During Calvin’s lifetime, the crux of his theology was the presence of Christ in communion. Martin Luther and the Swiss reformer Huldrych Zwinglidis were in disagreement with each other and with the Catholic Church, but John Calvin was able to resolve this important theological dispute in such a way to bring Protestants together on the issue.[30] Calvin was one of the great theologians, but his theology is primarily used to refer to predestination with little consideration to his many other contributions to Christian theology. From his studies Calvin determined that God chooses those whom He will redeem and “to those who are God’s chosen ones the Holy Spirit is sent, not only to enlighten them to understand the gospel set forth in the Scriptures but to enable them to accept God’s promise of forgiveness.”[31] To Calvin, and to those who today would consider themselves to be “Calvinists,” man does not have the ability to accept God’s forgiveness unless he is chosen to receive it by God Himself.
The opposing view to modern Calvinism is often recognized as Arminianism. Stemming from a Netherlands reformer Jacobus Arminius, Arminianism teaches free will and acceptance of salvation similar to early Church fathers like Justin Martyr and Ignatius. Various views on free will doctrine fill the spectrum between the two sides but Arminianism should not be viewed as the extreme polar opposite of Calvinism. Within the philosophical spectrum Indeterminism suggest the extreme polar opposite of Divine pre-ordination. Indeterminism suggests that every human behavior is completely uncaused and that any decision made by man could have been made otherwise. In the theological spectrum, self-determinism opposes Calvinism to a greater extent than Arminianism. Self-determinism suggests that human actions and decisions can be caused by the self or by other humans, but not by inanimate objects or by the actions themselves.[32] Arminianism, like Calvinism teaches pre-destination and Scripture only, “but it understands that this predecision on God’s part is to save the ones who repent and believe. Thus its view is called conditional predestination, since the predetermination of the destiny of individuals is based on God’s foreknowledge of the way in which they will either freely reject Christ or freely accept Him.”[33] Arminianism teaches that the choices a man makes lead him to salvation or otherwise, to condemnation. While God may foresee the decisions a man will make in his own future, nothing assures a man’s eternal home other than his own choices.
God’s Omniscience and the 4th Dimension
The resolution to what seems to two opposing theologies lies in time dilation and special relativity. God’s position in time is by no means able to be comprehended by mankind but the insight into the timeless universe provided by Einstein in the early 20th century[34] is enough for a Christian to begin to comprehend how little time imposes itself on the sovereign God. C. S. Lewis in his 1938 fictional work “Out of the Silent Planet” is a wonderful example of limited man beginning to understand the immeasurable chasm between the heights of God’s ways and the limitations of man’s. Lewis’ fictional Oyarsa is an angelic being said to have a body but not appearing to have one. He moves so fast his body is not apparent. The logical conclusion is that if one moves at infinite speed then one is everywhere at once, which is a purely scientific idea that helps man to understand God’s omniscience.[35]
In John 8:58 Jesus tells the Pharisees that “before Abraham was born, I am. God created time but exists outside of it. Considering the debate of what impact God’s foreknowledge has on either our freedom to choose of His omniscience, it does not. God’s foreknowledge is not really foreknowledge! It is an understanding of the future rooted in the fact that He is already there. He is experiencing it in the present and reflects on the future as if it is the past. This also does not mean that God does not move within the constraints of time. Time is one of the four dimensions of His physical creation, just like the three special dimensions. God creates time in Genesis1:1 when He establishes a beginning. “God knows the whole of history at once, simultaneously because not limited by time and succession, but God also knows what part of history is past today and what is future, for time is not unreal or unimportant to God.”[36] It is because God recognizes time in his dealings with His creation, that man confuses God’s acknowledgement of time with God’s subjection to it. Neither does God have memory of the past because He is still there. The one exception is from Isaiah 43:25 when God chooses to completely forget the transgressions of those whom He redeems.
The Mysteries of God
The mystery of the elect is surely no mystery. In Romans 8 Paul explains that God’s foreknowledge indeed does result in his preordination.[37] In chapter 9 God’s election is depicted using His choices in developing Israel, specifically Sarah’s miraculous conception and delivery of Isaac. Isaac’s election over Ishmael, and Jacob’s selection over Esau. These passages in verse 9 no doubt speak of corporate election of Israel but are used by Paul to illustrate God’s individual election under the New Covenant. “Although it is true that Paul is at least speaking of corporate election in chapter 9, this would give no comfort to the believers in Rome about their own salvation unless he were also speaking of individual election. A Christian in Rome would not be assured of his or her salvation if they thought that Paul was only speaking of corporate election because this tells them nothing about their own fate.”[38] God surely intervenes at every point in daily lives of human beings, specifically those who He foreknew to be His children. This clear doctrine of predestination does not, however, have to be mutually exclusive to man’s free will. It is God’s nature that allows both to coexist, not man’s nature, nor man’s pursuit of God, nor the Imago Dei. That God sees all of history and future as the present is mystery enough, yet how He lets man freely choose to serve Him or to ignore His free gift of salvation knowing full and well what the end result of every human’s daily decisions will be, and still He does not intervene in such a way to force a decision, is a great mystery of God. He has what theologians call perfect foreknowledge and yet is able to allow man prefect freedom of choice in his relationship to God.
Being free to choose God allows man freedom of will but does not suggest freedom of existence. The Apostle Paul in Romans 6:6 suggests that if man has not chosen to subject his will to the will of God then he is in bondage to sin. “The New Testament sees man as basically unfree (Rom 6:20, 2 Pet 2:19, Jn 8:39). It denies him all the possibility of being able to free himself and order his life, as if he were not in bondage. Man’s perennial efforts to take himself in hand, however he attempts it, lead to the greatest bondage in which man misses what he was meant to be…Man’s true freedom lies in life with God, lived as it was originally intended by God for man.”[39] Although man may flounder in his own schemes, Christians are to submit to God’s will. With an understanding of His foreknowledge, His children should be that much more trusting, knowing that He knows every detail of the future and works everything for good for those who love Him.[40] Jesus’ discourse in Matthew 6:25-34 demonstrates the perfect freedom that Christians receive through submission to Him. His children seek His kingdom first and need not to be concerned with tomorrow. As Christians our will should be submitted to God and He will provide all that we need. Finally, concerning the free will of Christians, Galatians 5:16-17 says all that there is to say: “So I say, walk by the Spirit, and you will not gratify the desires of the flesh. For the flesh desires what is contrary to the Spirit, and the Spirit what is contrary to the flesh. They are in conflict with each other, so that you are not to do whatever you want.”
Conclusion
It is the honor of kings to search out mysteries and the Glory of God to conceal many difficult things. Just as Christ had two natures, fully God and fully man, God has perfect foresight and man has freedom of will. God is not restrained by the logic of man nor should man’s faith be restrained by philosophy. A Christian’s faith should not stand in the wisdom of men, but in the power of God.[41] Seeking God through human reason is not unacceptable; to the contrary man should not believe things which are factually contradicted, this is one of the great strengths of the Christian faith and the Word of God. The inerrancy of scripture is a theological field of its own and those who work in the field are rewarded with new insight to the Glory of God. The debate between divine sovereignty and human free will continues philosophically and theologically until Christ’s return and the mystery of God is complete.[42]
Footnotes
[1] Erickson,Millard J. Christian Theology, second edition (Grand Rapids, Baker Academic, 1998) 528.
[2] Missler, Chuck. 66/40: K-House Radio Broadcast Introduction.
[3] Plato. Phaedo 96a. Plato. Plato in Twelve Volumes, Vol. 1 translated by Harold North Fowler; Introduction by W.R.M. Lamb. Cambridge, MA, Harvard University Press; London, William Heinemann Ltd. 1966.
[4] Falcon, Andrea, “Aristotle on Causality”, The Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy (Winter 2012 Edition), Edward N. Zalta (ed.)
[5] Bloesch, D. G. Fate, Fatalism, from the Evangelical Dictionary of Theology, second edition. Edited by Walter A Elwell. (Grand Rapids, Baker Academic2001) 439.
[6] Frei, H. W. Freedom, Free Will, and Determinism in the Evangelical Dictionary of Theology, second edition. Edited by Walter A. Elwell. 2001. 467
[7] Bromley, G. W. Foreknowledge, from the Evangelical Dictionary of Theology, second edition. Edited by Walter A Elwell. (Grand Rapids, Baker Academic 2001) 458.
[8] Erickson,Millard J. Christian Theology, second edition (Grand Rapids, Baker Academic, 1998), 273.
[9] Note that it is the doctrine that is questioned, not God’s constancy or omniscience.
[10] Isaiah 51:6, Psalm 102, Matthew 24:35
[11] Malachi 3:6, James 1:17
[12] Erickson,Millard J. Christian Theology, second edition (Grand Rapids, Baker Academic, 1998), 306.
[13] Ibid, 306.
[14] 1 Tim 2:3-4
[15] Geisler, N. L. Freedom, Free Will, and Determinism, from the Evangelical Dictionary of Theology, second edition. Edited by Walter A Elwell. (Grand Rapids, Baker Academic, 2001) 469.
[16] Hebrews 12:6
[17] Geisler, N. L. Freedom, Free Will, and Determinism, from the Evangelical Dictionary of Theology, second edition. Edited by Walter A Elwell. (Grand Rapids, Baker Academic, 2001) 469.
[18] Ibid, 469
[19] Genesis 3:12
[20] Numbers 23:19, 1 John 3:4 and Exodus 20.
[21] Bloesch, D. G. Fate, Fatalism, from the Evangelical Dictionary of Theology, second edition. Edited by Walter A Elwell. (Grand Rapids, Baker Academic, 2001) 439.
[22] Originally published as De libero arbitrio
[23] Pelagius, On Free Will.
[24] Pelagius. Pelagius on Human Freedom (418) from Documents of the Christian Church, fourth edition. Edited by Henry Bettenson and Christ Maunder (Oxford, Oxford Press, 2011), 56.
[25] Augustine. Augustine on Predestination (418) from Documents of the Christian Church, fourth edition. Edited by Henry Bettenson and Christ Maunder (Oxford, Oxford Press, 2011),60.
[26] Ibid, 60.
[27] McGrath, Allister. Christianity’s Dangerous Idea: The Protestant Revolution-A History from the Sixteenth Century to the Twenty-First. (New York, Harper Collins,2007), 38.
[28] Ibid, 42.
[29] Gonzalez, Justo L. The Story of Christianty, Vol II: The Reformation to the Present Day. (New York, Harper Collins, 2010) 77.
[30] Gonzalez, Justo. 85
[31] Reid, W. S. Calvinism, from the Evangelical Dictionary of Theology, second edition. Edited by Walter A Elwell. (Grand Rapids, Baker Academic2001), 201.
[32] Geisler, N. L. Freedom, Free Will, and Determinism from the Evangelical Dictionary of Theology.
[33] Grider, J. K. Armenianism from the Evangelical Dictionary of Theology, 97.
[34] Einstein, A. The Principle of Relativity: Original Papers by A. Einstein and H. Minkowski, University of Calcutta, 1920.
[35] Lewis, C. S. (Clive Staples). Out of the Silent Planet: New York: Collier Books, 1965. Originally published 1938. In the conversation between the Sorn and Ransom, the Sorn attempts to explain to Ransom what the Oyarsa is: “How do you mean?’ ‘If movement is faster, then that which moves is more, nearly in two places at once.’ ‘That is true.’ ‘But if the movement were faster still — it is difficult, for you do not know many words — you see that if you made it faster and faster, in the end the moving thing would be in all places at once, Small One.’ ‘I think see that.’ ‘Well, then, that is the thing at the top of all bodies — so fast that it is at rest, so truly body that it has ceased being body at all. But we will not talk of that. Start from where we are, Small One. The swiftest thing that touches our senses is light. We do not truly see light, we only see slower things lit by it, so that for us light is on the edge — the last thing we know before things become too swift for us.”, 80.
[36] Lewis, G. R. Relativism, from the Evangelical Dictionary of Theology, second edition. Edited by Walter A Elwell. (Grand Rapids, Baker Academic2001), 1005.
[37] Romans 8:28-30
[38] Wallace, D. B. Romans 9.1–29: Has God Gone Back on His Promises to Israel? (Part 1: Rom 9.1–5). Course notes from NT105, Dallas Theological Seminary. Unpublished, 2018.
[39] Blunk, J. Freedom, from The New International Dictionary of New Testament Theology, Vol. 1 Edited by Colin Brown. (Grand Rapids, Zondervan, 1975), 718.
[40] Romans 8:28
[41] 1 Corinthians 2:5
[42] Revelation 10:7, Daniel 12:7-9.
Bibliography
Bettenson & Maunder. Documents of the Christian Church, fourth edition. New York, NY. Oxford University Press, 2011
Brown, Colin. The New International Dictionary of New Testament Theology, Vol. 1. GrandRapids, Zondervan, 1975.
Einstein, A. The Principle of Relativity: Original Papers by A. Einstein and H. Minkowski, University of Calcutta, 1920.
Elwell, Walter A. Evangelical Dictionary of Theology, second edition. Grand Rapids, MI. Baker Academic, 2001.
Erickson, Millard J. Christian Theology. Grand Rapids, MI. Baker Academic, 1998.
Eusebius of Caesarea (263-339 A.D.) Preparation for the Gospel.
Falcon, Andrea, “Aristotle on Causality”, The Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy. Winter 2012 Edition
Edward N. Zalta (ed.).
Gonzalez, Justo L. The Story of Christianity Volume II: The Reformation to the Present Day. New York. Harper Collins 2010.
Ignatius, Bishop of Antioch. The Epistle of Ignatius to the Magnesians.
Lewis, Clive Staples. Out of the Silent Planet: New York: Collier Books, 1965. Originally published 1938.
McGrath, Allister. Christianity’s Dangerous Idea: The Protestant Revolution-A History from the Sixteenth Century to the Twenty-First. New York, Harper Collins, 2007.
Plato. Phaedo 96a. Plato in Twelve Volumes, Vol. 1 translated by Harold North Fowler Cambridge, MA, Harvard University Press; London, William Heinemann Ltd. 1966.
Pruss, Alexander R. “The Essential Divine-Perfection Objection to the Free-Will Defense.” Religious Studies 44. 4 (Dec 2008): 433-444.
Wallace, D. B. Romans 9.1–29: Has God Gone Back on His Promises to Israel? (Part 1: Rom 9.1–5). Course notes from NT105, Dallas Theological Seminary. Unpublished, 2018.
Camp of the Bride 