Why do Christians support free-will if it is evil?

Question

I was told I have 2 choices by ministers.

God or Satan.

So I said, what if I don't choose either, just do things myself. They have told me, doing what you want is following Satan. The same lie he got Eve with, it's ok to do your own thing. You know better than God.

This brings up 2 contradictions. If doing what you want, is really doing what Satan wants, then free will is evil.

Supporting free will is supporting Satan, so all believers in free will advocates from Satan.

Secondly, it means we never had free will in the first place, but are mere pawns on a cosmic chess board.

Check mate!

Why do Christians destroy their religion with contradictions like this? Haven't they studied any?

I don't see why they will tell you "free" will is so important cause "God doesn't want robots" if we never really had it & it is Satanic in the first place.

Why do they do this, pls?

Answer 1

Religion was not constructed to be rational or logical, and definitely not to encourage free will or personal choices.

It was developed to explain the world at a time when human populations knew little about science or physical laws, and it was easier to ascribe natural disasters to god.

The point is not religion is false or contradicts its own philosophy. It's that people continue to believe in it, and vouch for faith in the absence of reason. I see little that is redeeming about religion, contradicting or not.

Answer 2

First, "free will" is not an accurate way to describe what we as humans have. What we have is more an ability to choose--not anything but some things. If I fall off the Empire State Building in NYC, I can yell on the way down, "Hey, I have free will, and I don't want to die." I can choose to learn to fly during my descent. But does my so called "free will" empower me to escape death or learn to fly? No. Free will is an erroneous concept. Personal power of choice is real.

So: "This brings up 2 contradictions. If doing what you want, is really doing what Satan wants, then free will is evil." There is some truth implied in your conclusion, in that the Bible paints a picture of a reality in which there is no neutrality. But going your own way does not guarantee that every step of your way is evil. Nor does it guarantee that what you will do is good or neutral. But what do you make of this verse, Christ speaking "For he who is not against us is for us" (Mark 9:40)?

And, "Secondly, it means we never had free will in the first place, but are mere pawns on a cosmic chess board. " It is certainly true that this life seems like this at times. And, what we call "free will" is certainly limited in some important ways. We don't have unlimited choices, as I have tried to illustrate above. I do not think we are "mere pawns" but we certainly seem like soldiers in a cosmic battle between good and evil.

On the other hand, I would suggest to you that if you really want to investigate the Bible and Christianity, that you go about it more thoroughly and not just react with emotion and logic to fight against superficial explanations given you by well-meaning preachers.

And, as to your question: "Why do they do this, pls?" I would guess (since I cannot get inside their minds) that they were trying to answer your objections, just not doing so with enough care and depth.

Answer 3

Sorry, but that wasn't check mate. You seem to have forgotten that you have the option of choosing God. If you choose God, which many people do, then that makes free will worth while. Think of it this way; if we all just followed God like robots as you said, then we would all be boring and the same. God let's us choose. If we choose to follow him, then we are glorifying him. If we choose to rebel against him and then come back to him, then it is like the prodigal son returning. If you don't follow him, then you made the wrong choice. Now I know it sounds like a contradiction, it sounds like God wants some people to go to Hell, but that's not true. God didn't intend Hell for people, he intended it for Satan and the fallen angels, but Satan pulled people into the mess, and so humans became sinful. God allowed it, and free will came onto the scene. Now I have to say, I don't understand why God allowed evil, the only reason that I can think of is back to the robot thing, it means a lot to God when you choose him if you have two options. So to be honest, I don't know everything, but God has a plan, and I want to follow it and convince other people to follow it. You see, it all comes back to glorifying God, that's what we're here for. If you don't want to glorify him during this life, that's your choice, but every knee will bow and every tongue will confess that God is the Lord of all.
Check mate back 'atcha, and thanks for reading. God bless.

Answer 4

Sometimes what feels like a contradiction is actually just a complicated concept. Many complicated religions have this theme. If you study Buddhisms or Zen for example there will be many concepts that seem to contradict, but that is just on the surface, if you push past that you might start making sense of a deeper truth.

I see that you feel that it contradicts for god to make you "free" to choose, but punish you for choosing wrong.

When christians discuss free will they are just telling you the nature of your existence. That is, that god created you to be a creature that has the ability to choose one path over another.

Now, at the same time god established a moral code in which he wants all humans to follow and failure to follow it will cause you suffering.
For example, he wants you not to steal, but you have free will in that he will not stop you from stealing if you choose to anyway and he will not stop the consequences (hell).

So why did god create you to be a person that can choose to disobey his rules?
I have no clue :), and I don't think any human on this earth can explain it either. Since we are not god we can not really understand the mysteries of god.

But what does seem clear to me in my daily life that these principles are true, even if I don't understand them.
I can see that each moment I am choosing to do good or bad, or something in between. (free will)
I also think that I am aware that there is a univeral moral code, that I know when a behavior is good or bad, even if I disobey it.
We often choose to do something that is not right, because of greed or fear, selfishness, and we are fully aware that we should live up to a higher standard.
I think if you consider your own life you'll see it's true.

Answer 5

Free-will is a lesser of two evils but necessary. Without it, we would be robots. Free-will is essential for humans to arrive at the place in his or her individual life to see them self as being part of the problem. It is only then, that humans will want to become part of the Solution [ Christian] when presented with the opportunity by God, the Father. This is the "why", we are given the "right to be wrong". We walk in darkness and when the light shines - we see clearly where to go. Satan is the instigator - not free-will. Remember; SELF-WILL is not God's Will, therefore, the sin lays in SELF-will not the free-will. You have free-will to choose SELF-will . The concept of free-will is for people to do their own thing apart from God's, get in trouble eventually (because it isn't God's Will), then, when God decides to draw a person to Him through Jesus for a relationship, that individual becomes AWARE of God's Will for him or her, then the relationship strengthens. Free-will serves the purpose for CONTRAST of God's Will verses SELF-will in the realm of free-will. Satan is evil - free will is not !

Answer 6

Who said free will can't be free will to do good things? If it's a persons free will to steal a car and it's another persons free will to pay for a car, who's free will was good/right and who's was bad/wrong? They both had equal choices, neither was made or forced to make the decision they made, but their decisions differed greatly. They both knew right from wrong, they both know stealing is against the law (not to mention, against a commandment) one made the right and one made the wrong choice. And, they made their choice out of their own free will. If a person wants to do Gods will or learns to desire to do Gods will would mean that that persons free will coincides with Gods will. It's not forced, but it's desired.Do you think someone like Billy Graham is doing what he wants to do by his own free will? Sure he is. Is what he's doing the will of the devil? No. No way. Free will and being a Christian are not necessary opposites. It was my free will to write what I just wrote and I feel it was a Christian answer. It may be another persons free will to cut down my answer because it's a Christian answer. It's an equal, not forced, free will.

Answer 7

If you consider Man as having the ability to choose God, then you are correct, and those are two ways to consider this whole Christianity thing. However there is another option that you may not have considered, and that's Calvinism which throws all of mankind into Hell (it's not a predestination to Heaven AND Hell as you may have heard). If you decide to look at this one, it does provide an alternative. God saves, but it's His choice not ours -- where predestination logically follows for His selection to Heaven going directly against our selection to Hell. He's gotta love us a lot to do this, because we do deserve eternal punishment, Adam really really screwed up.

This "God doesn't want robots" is a strawman fallacy because we are robots for Satan, it's God and only God who can open our eyes to this.

Anyway take a look at it, www.reformed.org, before you completely throw Christianity out the window.

Answer 8

First off, I don't "support" free will any more than I "support" gravity. It exists, whether I like it or not.

Second, the fact that you have a choice is neither good nor evil. The choice you make certainly can be.

Third - "doing what you want is following Satan"? Well, possibly. Possibly not. Don't believe everything you're told, especially if there's abundant evidence it's wrong.

Answer 9

We have free will but not the freedom from the responsibility of our choices. We either chose to seek righteousness or to live in self-righteousness, to be good according to the secular law of man or also to be good according to the law of God. "Choice" in itself isn't evil, what COULD be evil is what choices we make. For instance tonight I chose to shave my head bald for the first time in my life. Nothing wrong with that because it is not between good vs. evil. But there are more important choices, concerning our spiritual nature, that can put us down a wrong road.

Answer 10

People ask this over and over again here at YA, and I always give them the same answer. There is a difference in free will and free moral agency.
If you really want to know more about this go here: http://www.monergism.com/directory/link_category/Free-Will/
It answers every objection your raise and then some.
Will you go there and read it? Or was your quesiton just an attempt to refute Christianity?