Do people always have free will, or sometimes do things happen according to God's will (read extra details)

Question

God's plan was for Jesus to come to earth and be a sacrifice for our sins. In order for that to happen, certain events had to line up. Did everyone involved really have free will or were they predestined to fulfill their part in God's plan?

- Judas betrayed Jesus to the Romans. If he hadn't done this Jesus wouldn't have been crucified and God's plan would have failed. Did Judas really have free will or did God intend for him to betray Jesus from the start?

- Pilate chose to have Jesus crucified to please his subjects and let the theives go instead. He could have chosen differently, but then God's plan wouldn't have been fulfilled. Did he really have free will or was he predestined to fulfill this part of God's plan?

Do you think that God has a plan for the rest of us, and if you do, do you think we always have free will or are we sometimes predestined to do certain things that will lead to other events that God has planned for us?

Answer 1

Since God can accurately predict what will happen before it happens, mankind's free will does not stop God's plan -- rather man's free will actually plays into God's plan.

For example, if Judas did not betray Jesus, I think that it is clear from Jesus' remarks that Satan would continue going around until he found someone somewhere to betray Jesus instead. Jesus would have been betrayed, and the outcome would have been the same, even if Judas decided that he would not be the one who did it.

If Pilate decided to let Jesus go, someone else would have eventually killed Jesus, since God knew that the Devil would not give up until he succeeded in getting someone somewhere to do it. I suppose that God knew how stubborn Satan was, and he actually counted on it.

---------------------
Job 5:13 (NIV)
He catches the wise in their craftiness, and the schemes of the wily are swept away.

Matthew 26:24 (NIV)
"The Son of Man will go just as it is written about him. But woe to that man who betrays the Son of Man! It would be better for him if he had not been born."

Answer 2

Their free will was not violated, but God certainly knew how the situation would play out and put Jesus in the right place at the right time for things to work out according to plan. I believe that God manipulates things in the details...behind the scenes...to get us into the right places. Only God knows exactly what He tweaked to get Pontius Pilate to be the Governor of Judea at that time.

I guess both are kind of true...they had free will all along, but they were destined to play a role in God's big plan for the world too. I don't mean that God forced their hand, or made up their minds for them....just that He knew exactly what they would do in that situation, and so He stacked the deck with the right people.

Answer 3

WHat an awesome question. Here is how I understand the issues.

Yes, God gave every human being complete free-will to make any decision on any issue and act in whatever way they see fit. However, everything happens according to God's will and plan. God is not bound by time or space and therefore He already knows what is going to happen.

An example might help. Have you ever been interacting with someone and, before they said or did something, you knew exactly what they were going to do? Did your fore-knowledge prevent them from doing something completely different?

God has a plan for us as well as countless blessings He is waiting to bestow on us if we just follow His commandments and stay in communion with Him. His plan, though, will be fulfilled regardless.

Answer 4

You can still have free will wilst someone is manipulating you and asserting upon you some kind of lesser mind control... Watching a film with subliminal messages for example, leaves my free will completely in tact, but influences me unfairly... So they do have a loophole to fall back upon if they find it. (Of course, in this case, God is still a manipulative bastard).

There is also the case where people may have free will, but every exception to the rule isn't a real person, but an avatar of Yaweh. So Judas, Pilate, the majority of the crowd around Pilate, weren't really people, but human forms God has been controlling their entire lives... This also would let him continue to manipulate the present, through the few people he controls. The catch in this one is that this would make God a pretty horrible person (as he would be controlling, almost exclusively, horrible people to influence the world).

Both these also have the problems that they would make him a huge *** for not just convincing people that he's real through his influence such that he doesn't "have to" make them all suffer eternally.

Answer 5

We always have free will.

Just because it went down with Judas and Pilate and all that stuff doesn't mean that was the only way it could've happened.

Predestination is a heresy. There is no proof of it in the bible. Of course God has hopes and plans for us, but we are free to thwart or engage those plans however we decide.

God never violates our free will.

Answer 6

God's plan? Do you think he really put his only son on earth to see him die? If Judas hadn't betrayed jesus, he would have continued and people would still follow him. In life or death they would have because what he spoke was the truth and people will always come towards the truth in the end. As it is, he probably would have died some other way. People who put themselves out there like that usually don't live long regardless. And it would all still play out the same way, not because it was planned but because that is how people behave.

Answer 7

Yes I believe that God has a plan for each and every one of us. Free will is a part of our lives, however I am a firm believer and doer of giving my will over to HIM I put everything that I do in HIS hands and ask for HIM to show me the way before I choose a path. That is how my household runs and what I teach my son. I also think it is ironic you ask this question at work last week this was a topic of ours with Judas is mind, and that's pretty nifty...:)

Answer 8

Good question Lindsey,

The case of free will vs. predestination has everything to do with whose eyes you look through. Yes, because God dwells in eternity and sees the end from the beginning, He already knows the outcome of your decision. He looks at the earth's timeline, then chooses those who choose Him. However, to have true children and not robots, God gave us a free will to choose. We can choose to love God, we can choose to hate Him, or we can choose to exchange the concept of God for only what we can see within our puny science. If free will truly did not exist, God would provide a world with only one choice and provide tons of evidence to MAKE you believe. But He does not do that. He provides just enough evidence to allow you to think beyond the physical and into the eternal. But you must decide for yourself. But do not be surprised if God knows your decision the moment you make it.

Yes, God sees our life as a done deal. Yet, we ourselves do have free will to choose. It would be like I could go back in time, meet with George Lucas while attending USC film class. I would know everything about what he would write and the companies he would start. Does he have free will to write Star Wars? Yes. Would my knowledge change the fact that Darth Vader will be Luke Skywalker's dad? No. It's a done deal because I am not bound by time.

If Judas would have stopped in his tracks, turned to Jesus and said, "It's me, Lord, I was going to betray you, but I do not want to, I repent." The time continuum would have ripped, and the pages of prophecy would have changed within the old scrolls and Jesus would never have foretold His betrayal. Instead, the Jews would have just found Him at Gethsemane, and Judas would have been with the other disciples asleep.

Time is a physical property, but God is outside the time domain and sees time a one 3 dimensional object. Nothing will be new to Him, which what makes the Bible so fascinating to me.

Answer 9

Well if you read about near death experiences, you find that many people have left their body and saw light beings and learned about free will, but that it was predestined before they were born. So, the question is did Jesus have a NDE during His baptism, and is that how He learned of His Greatness?

http://www.near-death.com/experiences/research01.html

Answer 10

WOw!!! how thought-provoking!!! makes me think. For real!! And I thought I knew all the questions concerning contradicting the Bible and God!!! i think God may have intended for Judas to betray Jesus. i think that we have free will, but if we did, and then God has a plan for us, wouldn't that defeat the " free will" aspect? hmmmmm now you've gone and done it! made me think!!!