Free Will: What Men's Doctrines Miss

Theology
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Ask yourself brethren in Christ, just when did Christ’s apostles choose to follow Lord Jesus? When did they see Jesus, and say to themselves, “I think I’ll get up from fishing and go follow that man preaching over there”? When did apostle Paul choose to follow Jesus, as it certainly was not when Saul (Paul as a Pharisee) was on his way to hunt down Christians and bring them back to Jerusalem for trial?

In Lord Jesus’ prayer of John 17, He revealed that The Father had previously owned His apostles, and that The Father gave them to Jesus, and not only that, but that His apostles, like Jesus, were not of this world. They were ‘sent’, which is the meaning of the Greek word for apostle. But most of all, they were ‘chosen’ by Christ, which makes that ownership unmistakable.

Then with the examples Jesus gave of those who are not chosen, but reveal a certain level of Faith, we see much of Paul’s Epistles and even Lord Jesus giving warning to not fall away, but to make one’s ‘calling’ sure. This then points to those who are ‘called’ only, but are not ‘chosen’ sent ones like Christ’s apostles. This distinction is also covered in Lord Jesus’ prayer of John 17 (See John 17:6-21).

What then can one say about the free will of Christ’s ‘chosen’ ones? It’s actually very simple per the Bible Scripture examples. If they stray, Jesus will intervene with them to get them back on track of their duty they were chosen for. Apostle Paul is one of the greatest Scripture examples of this. Jonah is another. Jonah even went to the extreme of trying to use his own free will to commit suicide to keep from carrying out the duty God had assigned him to go preach to the city Nineveh. And when Jonah did obey God and preached to them, he sat on a hill overlooking the city of Nineveh in anger, because God saved the city by Jonah’s preaching God’s Word to them.

With apostle Paul, Lord Jesus directly intervened striking Paul blind on his way to Damascus to hunt down Christians. Jesus said Paul was His “chosen vessel” (Acts 9).

But the ‘called’ only, can… use their free will and fall away from the Faith IF… they so choose. The ‘called’ are here in this world to make their ‘choice’ using their free will. Only when they choose The Father and The Son will He intervene in their lives, as they become joined with His ‘chosen’ elect.

This also means, and it is specifically a danger for the times we are in now, being so close to the end of this present world, is the falling away to the coming pseudo-Christ or false-Messiah that God is allowing to appear in today’s Jerusalem working great signs and wonders with playing The Christ. (See 2 Thessalonians 2, and Matthew 24:23-24). That will be the main deception coming upon the whole world for the coming time of “great tribulation”. And we, Christ’s Church, will be here through it all.

Now the question of just ‘when’ God chose His sent apostles is another subject that one will go around in circles with if they don’t stay in the written Word of God, but stray to men’s theology.

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What is “free will”?

We should start by learning the standard terminology associated with the “free will” debate.

  1. “Will” means the function of choosing.

  2. Constraining causes force people to act against their will. For example, a person being robbed at gunpoint is constrained in this sense. Non-constraining causes do not force people to act against their will but are sufficient to cause an action. For example, if you have a fear of heights, you probably will not want to walk on the edge of a tall building’s roof; that fear is a non-constraining cause.

  3. Indeterminism holds that genuinely free acts are not causally determined. Determinism holds that everything is causally determined (i.e., that prior events and conditions necessitate every event).

  4. Incompatibilism holds that determinism and human freedom are incompatible; it rejects determinism and affirms human freedom. Compatibilism holds that determinism and human freedom are compatible.

  5. Libertarian free will is the ability either to do something or not. Free agency is the ability to do whatever a person wants to do (apart from constraining causes). This difference is not a small one. For example, do non-Christians have the inherent ability either to choose to trust Christ or not? Is such a decision ultimately dependent on their will?

  6. God’s general sovereignty holds that God is in charge of everything without controlling everything. God’s specific sovereignty holds that God ordains everything and that he controls everything to accomplish his purposes.

J.

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From what I understand back in them days, Rabbi’s had some sort of special walk and you could tell that they were a Rabbi from a distance by how they walked. And anyone back then it was a high honor to have a rabbi speak to you, let alone call you over. So it was an easy quick decision to, leave the boat, let’s go! So when Jesus walked by and said to them, follow me…it’s like, no one would say no to that.

That’s all I know about rabbi’s.

If Jesus was just starting his ministry, then he was now coming out of the silent years and most scholars conjecture that Jesus had Rabbi training.

It is said that the rabbi’s would yoke their students to them and they had to walk beind him and learn His steps to learn to walk just as he does.

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No, that idea does not work, and is not written in God’s Word about Lord Jesus Christ. Here is what Lord Jesus said about His Apostles that He chose…

John 15:16
16 Ye have not chosen Me, but I have chosen you, and ordained you, that ye should go and bring forth fruit, and that your fruit should remain: that whatsoever ye shall ask of the Father in My name, He may give it you.
KJV

John 15:19
19 If ye were of the world, the world would love his own: but because ye are not of the world, but I have chosen you out of the world, therefore the world hateth you.
KJV
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Lord Jesus brings up the chosen vs. called subject several times in His Word at His 1st coming. One of the metaphors He uses is about one who has been given ‘eyes to see, and ears to hear’, pointing to understanding by The Spirit.

In His parable of the vineyard, (Matt.20), Jesus compared those workers who worked only one hour at the end of the day got paid the same as the workers who worked all day. And those who worked all day for the same pay as those who worked only one hour murmured and complained. Jesus said the last shall be first, and the first shall be last.

I interpret this also to be pointing to the very end of this world for the time of “great tribulation” that His Church must go through. Because it will be a time on earth that has never been the likes before, the “hour” of temptation I see as what Jesus was pointing to with those workers who worked only “one hour” being put first, for like He showed in Mark 13, some of us will be delivered up to give a Testimony for Jesus against the beast with allowing The Holy Spirit to speak through us. I believe those will only involve His ‘chosen’ elect, and not so much the called only.

In Matthew 13, Jesus’ disciples asked Him why He spoke to the multitude in parables. Jesus said His disciples were blessed, as they were given to know the mysteries of the Kingdom of Heaven, but to the multitudes, it was not given. This again is Lord Jesus making a distinction between His chosen vs. the called only.

For one who is ‘called’ only, (which I deem for myself), we must be very, very, very careful to stay in the actual written Bible Scriptures, and not get trapped into Satan’s host of taken over doctrines of men.

In Jesus’ miracle of the loaves and fishes, many baskets of fragments were gathered up after the feeding, much more than the amount that went out to the multitudes. Per Matthew 16, Jesus showed those baskets of fragments represent men’s doctrines added… to the pure Loaf of Bread in the whole state that went out. Those fragments are just pieces of God’s Word with added doctrines from men as influenced by Satan’s host that operate secretly behind the scenes. Jesus called those workers the “synagogue of Satan”, and Apostle John called them the “many antichrists” that were already at work.

So if you allow yourself to be influenced by your flesh, seeing how well a preacher dresses, walks and talks, etc., and you put that above the simplicity of The Word of God, then your soul may be in grave danger, especially when the coming false-Messiah arrives first in our near future in Jerusalem to play our Lord Jesus Christ.