I was watching a movie titled "City of
Angels". In the movie, it is portrayed that there are angels who come to
take people's souls (at least that's what i think they are) as they are about
to die. One of the angels as he came to take away the soul of a patient who was
operated on but did not make it saw the female doctor who did the surgery and
eventually fell in love with her. The problem now is that for him to be able to
fully feel the effects of love, he has to become human. He is then told that as
God gave humans free will, angels were also given the same. That means that he
can become human if he chooses to. So this got me thinking: is free will
actually free?
I just decided to share my thoughts with you guys
and I'd like to read about your opinions on this matter so feel free to
comment.
Free will can simply be defined as the ability of
us as rational beings to choose a course of action from among various
alternatives. This points towards the fact that what we become and how we end
up eventually are influenced by our choices. But is this really true?
God by nature of being omniscient knows
everything. This includes our destinies. Doesn't this mean that He knows
exactly how we end up and that things have been put in motion to this effect?
If so then where does this free will of ours come into play?
Sometimes a person's decision and actions affect
someone else's future or even the course of history. For example think about
this: what would have become of christianity if Judas hadn't betrayed Jesus
Christ? So it was Judas's destiny to betray Christ. What happened to his free
will in this case?
The truth is I literarily agree with your theory. I too was carried away by this thought of yours until i probed further in my subconcious stIte. YES there is something called destiny, and ones destiny is only known by GOD. Like you said GOD is ominiscient (ie He knows everything), thus He alone knows the beginning and end of ones destiny. Humans are given the free will to make whatever choices they want to make, but the truth is even at the point of choosing between alternatives, we really dont know the end result, only GOD knows even before we choose. The concept of destiny is based on the individual choice. I believe that every individual has one BEGINING but several ENDS to choose from, now the main question is which END are you going to end up at?? The answer to this question is only determined by the choices you make. But guesss what? There is one person who knows all the ENDS no matter the choices you make, and even before you make that choice and that is GOD. If Judas dint deny JESUS, some else will have done it, because it was said that "the son of man will be betrayed, but it never said who will betray him". When the bible refers to future events (through predictions), it states clearly the event that will happen, but it never gets to state the partakers/ players in the event. E.g The bible predicted that there will be a time when nations will fight nations, but it never named the nations that will be engaged in a battle. The question of which nation engages the other in a combat, depends on the present day activities and choices of the individual nations.
ReplyDeleteCASE STUDY
Consider a situation, where there are 3 roads that lead to unizik, one leads to engineering, another to bank avenue, another to Law. But a fresher who just arrived from lagos doesnt know where each of the 3 roads lead to. So he stands looking at the 3 roads, pondering which of them to follow. He finally makes a choiceand follows one, and he finally ends up at engineering.
ANALYSIS
Each of the 3 roads represents the choices we make in life. The destinations, Law, Engineering and Bank Avenue, represent our destiny, and the fresher represents humans.
CONCLUSION
When the fresher came to awka, he was given the chance to make a choice and take either of the three roads freely. He made a choice and ended up at either of the 3 destinations (law, engineering, bank avenue). The most important point is that even though the fresher had no idea where any of the roads lead to, there happens to be a final year student in awka who knows where each of the 3 roads lead to, but he decided not to tell the fresher.. My brother, that final year student is GOD
The thought about an individual having several ends came to mind, but the fact that God knows which of those ends a person eventually meets contradicts this fact. Now applying this theory to your case study, this final year student (God), who knows everything by the way, knows that even though the first year boy has a choice, he will end up taking the road to engineering. Once again, there is a contradiction. The only way this contradiction wouldn't exist is if God wasn't omniscient but we're told otherwise. For Judas's situation, Matthew 26:25 says, "Then Judas, the one who would betray him said, "Surely not I, Rabbi?" Would means that he hasn't done it and can still make a choice not to. So if he had a choice, why didn't he choose not to? If someone tells you that you will do something very bad, won't you try your best to avoid it? The same thing applied to Peter in verse 34 and 35. So once again, where were Judas's and Peter's free will in this case?
ReplyDelete