Of Premises and Practices

There are many Bible beliefs and practices that are based upon human conceived premises.

The one I want to address is the idea that “God will not violate our freewill”. By the way I could not find any scripture that states or infers this and google could not either.

Here are some questions to consider…

Can Satan violate freewill? Obviously yes. Satan empowered his demons to possess and manipulate the speech and actions of his human victims. Would God allow Satan to do something that he himself would not do?

Did God violate man’s freewill when he told his prophets or tongue speakers to say things that sometimes they didn’t even sometimes understand?

Did God take away Balaam’s donkey’s freewill when he caused the donkey to speak and reason with Balaam?

A plain and clear statement found in the Bible is that “God hardened Pharaoh’s heart” Seems pretty simple right? Sometimes Pharaoh hardened his own heart and sometimes God did. However, if we are married to the premise that “God cannot violate anyone’s freewill” (not found in the scriptures) then to make this passage fit that premise we have to massage it a little bit and explain away how God might have done this without really doing it.

A similar thing would be the question… “Did Judas have a choice?” Could he have changed his mind about the betrayal? I think not.

In Romans 9:21-22…

“Does not the potter have the right to make out of the same lump of clay some pottery for special purposes and some for common use? What if God, although choosing to show his wrath and make his power known, bore with great patience the objects of his wrath—prepared for destruction?”

In my opinion God (as a potter) prepared special pots (Pharaoh and Judas) to accomplish his purpose. What if men like Pharaoh and Judas were already condemned (because of their own actions) and destined for the fires of Hell and God merely used them for his purposes before they reached their final destination?

Thanks for thinking with me.