The Two Pillars: Free Will and Predestination

DANIEL SHELLEY | Formerly a Member of the World Wide Church of God |

Recently I had an exchange with a friend of mine—I’ll call him Mike. He asked me how I would respond to another friend’s questions about God’s predetermination and man’s free will. What about, for instance, Judas, Esau, or the Pharaoh of Egypt? Did Pharaoh harden his own heart, or did God? And what about Esau? Did he know what he was getting into when he sold his birthright to Jacob? Did Judas have free will or did God’s prophecies about Judas force him into betraying Jesus? 

These questions probably plague most of us at one time or another, and I would like to share how I am approaching these difficult but essential, universal questions. Even if I don’t have comprehensive answers—because we can’t, after all—our faith in God and His word and our simple willingness to believe what He has written without forcing a “formula” is really helpful.

Seeking Wisdom

After my friend talked to me about these things, I turned to a ministry in Dallas, Texas—Precept Austin—and requested help. I sent an email asking how they would approach these apparently contradictory ideas, and they confirmed what I already sensed but hadn’t articulated fully. In short, we can know what Scripture tells us: Pharaoh hardened his heart, but God cemented his decision. In other words, God didn’t initiate Pharaoh’s unbelief, but He confirmed the monarch’s obstinacy and hardened his decision. 

We probably won’t ever completely understand this apparent contradiction until Christ returns or until God explains it to us when we die and go to Him, but from His perspective, these things are not in opposition.

We probably won’t ever completely understand this apparent contradiction until Christ returns or until God explains it to us when we die and go to Him, but from His perspective, these things are not in opposition. I like the analogy that there are two pillars that extend far above our heads. One pillar is man’s freedom to choose, and the other is God’s predestination. Both ascend to heaven unhindered, and we can’t see them meet in eternity in the way we see railroad tracks appear to merge in the distance. Yet God does supply the crosspiece at the top of the structure.

Just because we can’t harmonize these two facts from our position inside time doesn’t mean they don’t harmonize. In fact, what we are looking at is a paradox instead of a contradiction. These only appear to be in contradiction because we can’t see all of reality. Eternity is outside our time-bound lives on earth, and reality is much bigger than we can see. We cannot call these seemingly opposed facts a contradiction unless we have all the information, and God has not granted us all the information yet. For now, we live by faith, and we trust God and His word. 

Making It Personal

I lost two brothers and a cousin. I don’t know, really, whether or not they were saved. Yet I can trust God to have the clarity and perfect knowledge of all the facts to take care of them with justice and mercy. I know that my Uncle Norm and another relative wrestled for years to get my cousin onto the right track, but we never saw him come to faith. 

I am not thinking about this question from an ivory tower. A biblical worldview has shoe leather on the road, and we live by bringing our experiences and thoughts under the authority of Scripture and the One who wrote it. Paul and Peter both teach that God has foreknowledge about both me and my brothers and my cousin. Even though I do not have access to all the information about them or about myself, I do know that God does, and I can trust Him. 

I admit that I keep turning these thoughts over in my mind knowing that some day in the future, we will know fully, just as now we are known by Him (1 Cor. 13:12). 

Insight from Moses

I just read Psalm 90 which was, perhaps surprisingly, written by Moses. Moses told us something that calms me—but might cause others to be upset: God is aware of every single one of my iniquities. What we on this side of the cross know, however, is that God attributes every one of them to Jesus on the cross, and when I believe in His atonement for my sin, He attributes Christ’s righteousness to me! 

Psalm 90 specifically—and then Psalmbook in general—calls our attention to God’s omniscience and sovereignty. He doesn’t ask us if it’s OK that He does this or that. Some people resent His “interference”. Other people celebrate His grace and loving kindness. Some people have experienced both that resentment and also the celebration of His sovereign interventions. Yet Psalm 90 tells me that I had better be ready to deal with a God who is mightier and wiser than I am.

Like a little bug, I am free to fly around and choose whom I would like to sting—like a bee. Yet God is so big that if He sneezed, He would blow me away—and He is capable of carrying a mighty big fly swatter! 

Some people may wish they could push God around or avoid Him altogether. Or they may wish God didn’t have any rules or knowledge of us and our thoughts. Yet who is able to thwart His might?

Some people may wish they could push God around or avoid Him altogether. Or they may wish God didn’t have any rules or knowledge of us and our thoughts. Yet who is able to thwart His might?

I remember the movie based on Rudyard Kipling’s The Jungle Book. Mowgli was a boy raised in the jungle by wolves. At one point Mowgli encountered Baloo the bear, and Baloo held Mowgli down in the water while the boy paddled furiously at Baloo with both hands, trying to escape. The bear just laughed at the small boy whose most intense efforts could never push the bear away. The bear pitied the boy and released him—but what consideration did the big bear need to give to the little wimp?

The bear dealt with the little boy in love, although his might and size were far superior. Like that bear, God deals with us out of compassion, and to characterize God as malicious, capricious or whimsical is to miss several of God’s traits which are clearly delineated and are exemplified about God in the Bible.

Yet Moses reassures me of both God’s power and kind intentions. God gave Esau and Pharaoh the freedom to act voluntarily and to respond to Him or not, to go down the path of belief and trust or to go down the path of self-will. He even gave the Midianite false prophet Balaam some freedom to act independently. Yet God placed limits on Balaam; he was not allowed to curse Israel but uttered blessings three times. God also placed limits on Esau and Pharaoh. They were not allowed to perform all the evil they harbored in their hearts.

Can we say God was wrong to interfere with Pharaoh’s imposition of slavery on His people Israel? Can we call God wrong for interfering with Esau’s me-first attitude and smoldering, selfish resentment? Or can we say God did wrong to interfere with Balaam’s incantations and struggles against Him?

Those whom the evil powers attempted to destroy perceived God’s mercy and justice as their enemies experienced God’s boundaries that stopped their sin. 

God is aware of mankind’s objections and struggles against Him, yet He is still easily able to decide how much pressure and how much interference to wield against our resistance. He sees and knows all the data. Reality is centered in Him, and in Him is perfect justice, mercy, and love.

With Moses, we can sing to the Lord:

Return, O Yahweh; how long [will it be]? And be sorry for Your slaves. O satisfy us in the morning with Your lovingkindness, That we may sing for joy and be glad all our days. Make us glad according to the days You have afflicted us, [And] the years we have seen evil. Let Your work appear to Your slaves And Your majesty to their sons. Let the favor of the Lord our God be upon us; And establish for us the work of our hands; Establish the work of our hands.—Psalm 90:13–17 LSB

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Daniel Shelley spent many years in the Worldwide Church of God (WWCG) founded by the late Herbert W. Armstrong. A seventh-day Sabbatarian organization, it officially disbanded in the mid-90s when the second-generation leaders began to study evangelical theology and learned about the biblical covenants. Daniel, who is blind, worships by Zoom with others who left the WWCG. He also participates in the weekly FAF Bible studies on Friday evenings. He has a degree in German and has spent time in the Bartimaeus Bible Alliance and the Gospel Association of the Blind. His study of Scripture has led him to shed ten key doctrines from Herbert Armstrong’s writings that had kept him from comprehending what salvation is.