Does God know what we are going to do or is it free will?

Question

Predestination: Does God know what we are going to do?
If he does than how can you say we have free will?
He didn't know that Adam and Eve was going to sin.
Anymore than he knew the coverning cherb sent to take care of them would sin.
He told them if you eat of the fruit of the tree of knowledge of good and bad you will die.
Satan said, "No you won't really die at all" Well, we know they did die.
What about other cases where God chose people. Such as Saul the first king of Isreal.
1Samuel 8:16,17 God chose him to rule. 1Samuel 16:1 Where God rejects him as king.
then there was Solomon, 1Kings 3:3 they loved each other by 1Kings 11:9 he rejects him.
Matthew 24:13But he that has endured to the end is the one that will be saved.
So anytime during that time for bad conduct you can be not saved.

Some say that God knows what we are going to do before we do it.
That doesn't seem right to me what do you think?

Answer 1

I totally agree with you. Predestination is not a biblical teaching.
That would cancel out the wonderful gift humans have of free will.
I am sure that God knew that it was a possibility, and he could probably know if he so chose, but since he did give us free will, he has allowed us to make the choice...he has suppied us with accurate information if we chose to look for it, and he is not far off from any of us who chose to look for him as well. But just as stated at ...

James 4: 8 "Draw close to God, and he will draw close to YOU. Cleanse YOUR hands, YOU sinners, and purify YOUR hearts, YOU indecisive ones."

it is up to us to make the first move...we draw close and God will draw close, we make the decision and get off the fence, and God is there for us with open arms!!!!

Answer 2

You can see how askmrreligion takes the Arminian road and mibandibee takes the Calvinist road. John 3:18 has a ready answer to the "world" of John 3:16. If "he who does not believe is condemned already" then the world does indeed get a little smaller, i.e. we have support for an Elect in this manner.

I'm just trying to tell you that with a Calvinist view point, it does not matter whether God knows what we are going to do or not. We can have all the free will we want, but if we do not have the ability to look to God for salvation, then none of what we decide will merit heaven. In fact, it's the opposite, man is guilty and stands condemned before the Lord anyway, and it is out of his mercy and grace that we are saved by faith, which is itself a gift. So yes, God does know what we are going to do and we do have free will, but that free will is not a desirable trait at all the way Arminians would have you believe.

Answer 3

First of all you must think of God as existing outside of Time. Imagine a line in space. The line is time. It has a segment that is the past. It has another segment which is the future. And for us there is a point called the present that exists right at the point where the past the future meet. So imagine this line. Now imagine God looking at this line from a distance away, seeing it all at one time, the whole line. Without getting into the possibility of thousands of dimensions, this is God point of view. Where He exists.

Yes God knows exactly what we will do in the future. Yes he knows the decisions we will make. This doesn't stop us from exercising freewill. Freewill means we decide our path. We write our story. It just means that God already knows the freewill choices we will make. Yes God knew that Adam and Eve would break his rule about the tree of life. This doesn't mean that everything is already determined for us. We do that ourselves. It just means that God is so powerful that he knows the future. Remember he said we were chosen before we even existed.

This is the mistake that Calvinist made. They think that just because God knows the future, that means that all we would do is already determined and it cannot be changed. This can be hard to understand. We write the future by our choices. We decide. We have freewill. Now just separate that from the fact that God (and only God as a matter of fact) knows all things, even the future. And in knowing that he knows - some of the things he does may be a puzzlement to us. BIG BUT - remember that he has a plan and a reason for everything he does. And remember while it may seem strange to us He has an infinite intelligence, greater than we can even imaging. He says he loves us too.

While it is nice to understand predetermination. It isn't critical that it be understood.

A more interesting questions is in knowing that God knows where we will make bad descisions, not just bad ones but ones fatal to our souls, wouldn't he intervene and save us. I mean take my freewill from me.I would give up my freewill rather than spend eternity apart from God. But for reasons I do not understand this is not the way God wants it. It is essential to Gods plan that we have freewill and out of that decide to love him all on our own. It does seem like that's the only love worth having.

Answer 4

Yes God does know the future, time is of no consequence to God, all is now. God did know what would happen in the garden, it was no surprise to Him. God knew that man, in his flesh, will naturally go towards rebellion and evil.
Rev 13:8 And all those dwelling in the earth will worship it, those of whom the names had not been written in the Book of Life of the Lamb having been slain from the foundation of the world.

Why would Christ be, in the mind of the Father, slain from the foundation of the world if there would not be a need for a savior? He allow man to fall so that we would see that we cannot achieve spiritual life on our own, and therefore, we get the glory. God gets the glory for providing a way of salvation. It was so He could demonstrate His grace on a fallen people. There was no "coverning cherb" in the garden, it was Satan, who was allowed by God to tempt them to sin. They did die, spiritually, the day they rebelled.
God did not choose Saul, the people did. The people demanded a king like all the other nations, God was offended by that and gave them what they wanted. It brought suffering and turmoil to the Israelite nation. The king God chose was David.
Matthew 24 was spoken to a Jewish audience and has nothing to do with the Church. Salvation by grace alone, through faith alone, in Christ alone. It is not based on our works or sin.

Answer 5

PREDESTINATION
All possible actions we can undertake at any point in our lives have been worked out. For example, just before you got out of bed this morning, there were a million things you could do: continue to stay in bed, phone a friend, go to the bathroom, go to the kitchen, kiss a spouse etc. So, in a way, you can say God knows what we are going to do because all the choices have been worked out.

FREE WILL
However, He allows the freedom of choice through free will, which is a learning tool really. Because of free will, we make less than perfect choices, and then have to go over the lessons we got wrong.

Answer 6

Uh, Saul, of the new testament, was persecuting the followers of Jesus. Then, God blinded him on his way to another city. Told him he was doing wrong and Saul changed, with his change, his name was changed to Paul. Being blinded doesn't sound like free will to me. And Yes, God knows what you are going to do. Yes, he did know what Adam and Eve were going to do. The plan to send Jesus as a sacrafice was made before he created man. God is not "flying by the seat of his pants" and never has. He knew what was going to happen and already had a plan of redemption in place. How else could it all be foretold?! We have two choices, obey God or not. God knows what we will choose.

Answer 7

Your question overlooks the fact that God exists outside of time. Knowing what we "are going to do" indicates future tense. But for God there is no future not past nor present. God sees the fullness of time all at once, for all eternity. Right now (from our perspective in linear time - there is no "now" for God) God is seeing the creation of the universe. He is seeing Jesus dying on the cross. He is seeing the birth and death of George Washington, my own birth and death, the births and deaths of my descendants in the 30th century, and the Secong Coming of Christ. Because God sees the fullness of time simultaneously, He is seeing the choices of free will which for you, but not for Him, are in the future. However, seeing someone make a choice doesn't limit the freedom of that choice. If I saw you make a choice, my seeing you do it would not make that choice any less free. Therefore God's seeing and therefore knowing all the choices of your life doesn't make those choices any less free either.

Answer 8

Does it really matter if "God" knows what we are going to do? It would still be freewill regardless. Its not like God knows what we are going to do ahead of time and changes some thought process in our brain so we pick a different action. Whether he knows or not, we all have freewill and have to be held accountable for the choices we make.

Answer 9

I observed this play and that i bear in thoughts the "verdict" from the three "judges" discovered God to blame of breaking his covenant with Israel. They concluded that the God of Abraham had made a clean covenant and that their God became now no longer solely the God of Abraham and of Israel. to respond to your question, how would Hitler fare if he became in God's courtroom being judged by God's guidelines? If I were area of the jury, i'd be compelled to usher in a verdict of to blame depending on the very truth he dedicated genocide (to the track on some 6.5 million human beings) and, because you factor out the ten Commandments, broke all of them besides. notwithstanding, none individuals are acceptable. all of us sin. it really is in simple terms that some individuals comprehend it at the same time as some thing are in denial. lack of expertise is not at all an excuse. Ever tried telling a site visitors cop that you probably did not comprehend you've been in a 30 miles in line with hour constrained section once you've been clocked doing 40? Like, you probably did not see the line lights or the advisory % reduce indications earlier you got here into the equipped up section? that you've been in a rush and your employer became extra significant than the life of someone you would kill? the fact is we refuse to take duty for our movements - in my opinion and jointly. because lack of expertise of the regulation is not at all a defensible excuse, perhaps we ought to continually be paying extra interest to God's guidelines earlier we locate ourselves answering to God for our movements.

Answer 10

It would be ok to know what we were going to do as long as god didnt interfere otherwise what we did would change - god doesnt exist but time is a frozen river so i can see what you're getting at.

The future being fixed doesnt negate my free will. Decisions I will make in the future are still mine.