Why is it so important to God that we have free will?

Question

Please don't simply reiterate that he wants us to choose salvation as that wouldn't answer my question, it would merely be a restatement of the issue at hand. Yes, I know it's said that he wants us to "choose" to be saved, but WHY does he want that? Why is free will so important to him? Why would he mind that we'd be "robots" if, in the end, it meant that we could ALL avoid the torment of Hell?

Rudy, if I loved someone, I wouldn't condemn them to eternal torment just because they don't want to worship me. And who says that it wouldn't be MORE loving for him to give us arguably the "lesser of two evils", meaning a ticket straight to Heaven sans the chance to possibly screw ourselves out of getting there?

User "Seriously", I really liked your hamster analogy, why did you delete it?

So basically the way I'm understanding the responses is that God's desire to be loved, "truly" loved, by us supersedes his desire for all of us to be guaranteed entrance into Heaven.

Wouldn't that make God... selfish? Wouldn't that make God... needy?

Answer 1

If we're assuming that God exists, my guess would be he gave people free will so that he can receive true worship.

-A being created for the purpose of worshipping you only does so out of obligation.
-A being created and forced into worshipping you only does so out of fear.
-However, a being created with the ability to choose to worship you would provide pure worship.

Of course... according to Christianity if we don't accept/worship God we'll spend eternity in hell, meaning we were created *to* worship and are being feared into doing so. Rather than having free will, it's more accurate to say we have the freedom to buckle under fear, or suffer for not giving in.

Consider this - if there was no heaven or afterlife would Christians still worship God? If not, what's that say about their true "love" for God?

Answer 2

If free will means the ability to look to God for salvation, then what does that say of God? He can only sit on the sidelines and watch, knowing whether we will or won't choose Him, and toss the unbeliever that He created, into Hell for eternity. That is an illogical theology. God would have to be schizophrenic or without any mental capacity to realize the cause and effect relationship of creation vs. condemnation, unless He's very mean, or very crazy. And some will wave this lack of logic into the air and say "it's a mystery." Right. Not a mystery to me, this is nuts!

So, no free will. No capability to wake ourselves up from the dead, and just go ahead and start believing. And the Bible DOES support this. It makes predestination a CRITICAL concept to understand, it is MAN who has fallen, with sin totally corrupting his heart.

There, much better way to look at it now. With man's natural tendency to follow Satan and the ways of the world, we need rescue. Salvation. Because once Adam fell from grace, he brought a sin nature into the world that gave us free will all right. Freedom to move AWAY from God in whatever fashion our corrupt little hearts desire. God does NOT sit on the sidelines, He MUST intervene. He saves us in spite of our sin nature, not because of a perceived ability to choose Him, as if we are selecting Him from a menu. He does NOT have to love everyone, otherwise there would have been no flood, no killing of firstborn, no threats of destruction and punishment, no horrid descriptions of Hell -- from Jesus Himself. For those He DOES love, He saw them before they were born, long, long before they were born. And He loved them, and God possessed the FULL capability of predestining, saving His own from eternity to eternity.

Toss the "God has to give us free will because He has to love everybody" out the window. There should be enough Bible passages to support that He isn't some Fuzzball in the Sky. Common grace toward all, yes. Intimate love, no way. That's reserved for the sheep, not the goats.

Answer 3

DISCLAIMER: I am an agnostic. That shouldn't change the validity of my answer, but to some people it may so I think it's fair to warn them.

If God exists, I don't think anyone but it can understand its motives. Starting with, why create anything? No one knows. If God is like most humans in the sense that it would rather have company than not, than it would also probably have preferences about its company. It would probably rather have company that wants to be there than has to be there. In order to want, one has to have the ability to desire. In order for it to be able to obtain what it desires, it would have to have the ability to choose to obtain an alternative (or atleast attempt it).

What doesn't make sense is why create something that not only has the possibility of failing, but is bound to fail. It is said that man is born with sin, meaning the before anyone chooses their first action they have sinned. Why make that so? Being bound to sin is not imperative to being able to choose not to sin. Sinning is not inextricably connected to free choice because God has free choice and allegedly does not sin. By making it so that man has to sin, the playing field isn't level. It's like the games at carnivals or faires. By making it so that man has to sin, God is ensuring that man kinds only salvation (both moral and devine) is through God. If man did was not bound to sin, then theoretically a person could choose to be perfect.

But that would screw up the plan.

Answer 4

Free will is a part of the paradox created by religionists to try to trap others into their belief system. Free will and "god's will" are frequently in opposition. So, ultimately, it is the will of the preacher, not "free will."

As an atheist, I do believe in our power to make choices and in freely choosing what we will. But the "god" version of free will is an oxymoron... It means "guess what god wants or you will go to eternal torment."

Answer 5

I believe that God is very fair and just in all His ways and therefore he has given man a free will to choose right from wrong and good from evil.Further this shows that God has not strictly imposed anything on man. If man chooses to do that which is wrong, it's of his own free will and God cannot be blamed for that.God automatically remains blameless an "what you sow ,that you reap" comes into play.

Answer 6

The answer I was taught to why God gave free will and also why God created human beings was that he wanted beings who could choose to love him, rather than beings that were made to love him - like angels.

This, of course, makes less than no sense when you consider that angels apparently have plenty of choice. If they didn't, Satan and the angels that followed him wouldn't have been able to rebel.

But hey, when you try to make sense of religion, sense is the last thing you should expect.

Answer 7

Did you force your spouse or sweetheart to love you? Of course, you didn't. For the same reason, God gave us the freedom to love him or reject him. Perfect freedom is required in a loving relationship. We are free to choose a life with him or a life away from him.
God did not create a perfect world. Good exists along with evil. He created it in a "state of journeying." In his goodness, God gives us our existence and by our free will the opportunity to cooperate in his plan. He invites us to complete his work of creation. As knowing collaborators, we are "God's fellow workers" (1Cor 3:9).

Answer 8

just a term coined up to claim both sides of a coin in arguing.

if god truly want to save us , he would give us free will to choose what to believe in and still end up in heaven or place of our choice.

else , no matter how you try to convince others , it isnt really free will to us

edit:

anyway , i just want people to get the point that human intelligence compared to god is like hamster to human.

if you had a hamster in a cage with 2 opening , 1 lead to your yard , free from predator , while the other lead to a pail of acid.

lets assume you warn the hamster by electrocuting him slightly each time he goes near the 2nd opening . do note that since the bible has no real concrete evidence to back it up , so therefore this electric shock will be a slight neglible shock to match it.

now , if you really do love your hamster , why would you still place a pail of acid there ? if i really love my hamster , and i know it will do mistake due to it's lack of intelligence i would be responsible by removing the 2nd opening and the pail . or have 2 opening in which both leads to the yard.

it is irresponsible if you think you did your job by warning the hamster with small electric shocks. it is the job for the more intelligent to take care of the less intelligent , like a smart young man taking care of his senile grandma.

if you know someone is like to err , then it's your job to prevent him from making such error ESPECIALLY IF IT WILL AFFECT THEM ETERNALLY.

remember , god is omnipotent , if he do really want to save everyone , he could jus come down , say sup , and flew back to heaven.
imagine the numbers of people who will now believe in him. such simple things for someone who is omnipotent and timless.

now i know , it will sound unfair to 33% of the religious people who are christians . so it's ok if there's a rule that sound fair to 33% of the people but not 66% of the people who believe differently ?
rememeber this percentage doesnt include the 1billion atheists worldwide.

final edit :

is it more important to give free will that last a lifetime which may end up in hell for eternally

OR

is it more important to save people eternally?

i choose the 2nd one

Answer 9

We are created in His image and that means we have a free will. He could have made us like the animals, which would probably have been easier for us and Him, but He chose to create us as intelligent beings.

The free will goes with the territory. And He does want us to make the choice that will save us or condemn us.

Answer 10

Do you want to be loved by a robot (created by human, which does as programmed)

or loved by a husband/wife who can laugh, sad, caring, gentle, cry, miss?

How do you feel when someone you love feel the same way as you? Isn't it precious?

God wants your love! He loves you already.