I certainly haven’t read everything there is to read on this earth, but I’ve learned about enough about theology to have a decent understanding of most of the major doctrinal positions on this earth.
But out of all of them, free will is the most important. To my knowledge, most of the early church writers advocated strongly for the idea of free will. Augustine, Ireneaus, and Origen all held the doctrine of free will to varying degrees. It wasn’t until later thinkers that the idea of it got muddied.
My point is not to wade into those debates. There is not enough space on the entire internet to sort through it all.
What I will say about it is that, at the end of the day, free will boils down to a choice. You either choose to follow God, or you don’t. It’s that easy—and it’s that complicated at the same time.
This was the choice presented to Israel in Leviticus 26. It’s not the last time someone will bring it up; Moses himself repeats it in Deuteronomy 30:15. There, he lays it out as a choice between life and prosperity, or death and adversity. Which one will they choose?
On the surface, the choice is easy. When you look at the penalties for disobedience in Leviticus 26:14-20, the obvious answer for anyone with a sane mind is to choose God. Choose life. Choose obedience.
So why do so many people not choose Him, then? Matthew 6 describes the path away from God as “broad,” whereas the path towards Him is “narrow.” Why do people reject God when the downsides of disobedience so vastly outweigh any positives?
The truth is, I don’t think many people consciously make that choice—at least not on purpose. What we do instead is position our hearts against Him; we put what we want to do in opposition to what He says, so that the choice is essentially made for us. Our posture is selfish, so our choices then become selfish.
According to Leviticus 26:21, this type of decision is called “acting with hostility,” which, again, is a strong choice in words.
Israel wouldn’t have viewed their disobedience as “acting with hostility.” After all, they still had the Temple all throughout their history, they just had idolatry and pagan practices alongside it. In their mind, they were trying to accommodate everyone.
But God saw this decision to worship other gods alongside Jehovah as outright disobedience and hostility. Later, Moses would call them an obstinate and a stubborn people—not because they didn’t worship God, but because they rejected God’s full and total leadership.
That’s the real secret with free will, isn’t it? We think that free will encompasses the hundreds of choices we make every day. Whether to sin or not to sin, whether to talk to others about him or not, whether to hide our faith or let it shine.
In reality, only one choice matters: Whether or not we have decided to follow His Word in it’s entirety, instead of interjecting our own ideas. A lot of people will falter because they gave 95% of their heart to Him, when God is adamant that He wants it all.
