Free Will

After a discussion last night about free will, I got thinking about the topic and the discussion we had. One area that was interesting was the influence others (Radio and TV preachers were mentioned specifically) can have on new believers .

It was interesting that a few people thought we needed to jump in right away and rescue those who were being (wrongly) influenced or misled. Others just listened to the discussion.

What began to occur to me this morning was that some of us believe that God has given us free will to make our own choices but we may not be willing to give others that free will and let them make their own choices whether right or wrong.

I believe we have to let people make their own decisions, stumble around a little, get bruised and bloody and encourage them to seek the truth. Kind of like the prodigal son.

It’s a little like raising kids. If you do everything for your kids during their life then you are creating adults who have difficulty functioning because they don’t know how to exist on their own.

If you create a relationship based on trust with new believers you won’t have to do everything for them. You can direct and encourage them and point out what they should watch for along the journey. Hopefully we are learning all of that from God and that will help others.

We were encouraged last night to understand two views related to free will. Were we being rescued? I think we were encouraged to seek and learn and go down whatever paths we need to while seeking to get closer to God.

Maturity, strength and growth come from learning and changing after making mistakes. No one else can do it for us. After all Jesus doesn’t stop us every time we are going to sin. But he is always there for us.

He lets us out there on our own. He wants us to live for Him and become more like Him because we love Him and we want to honor and glorify Him. It should be all about God