In This Corner Human Free Will
And In The Other Corner the Perfect Will of God.
Ding Ding!
March 30, 2010
Would it not be a violation of free will for God to include those who have deliberately chosen by their will to refuse or reject God?
I could take this question in a million directions but instead I’m going to give an answer that ends before everyone’s attention span does. It might be close.
I can choose to reject God but that doesn’t mean I have the power to make God reject me. In Matthew 23:37 Jesus’ said that those who had killed the prophets and stoned those God had sent to them that but instead of rejecting them for their actions, God “longed to gather them as a hen gathers her brood under her wings.” To say that God will reject those who reject Him would be to say that human will has ultimate supremacy over God’s will. I can’t fathom that nor can I accept that the will of God could be held captive and bound to human will.
I am sure that nothing can separate us from God’s love–not life or death, not angels or spirits, not the present or the future, and not powers above or powers below. Nothing in all creation can separate us from God’s love for us in Christ Jesus our Lord! Romans 8:38-39
If nothing can separate us from the love of God then it stands to reason that even with all my self-determining mojo unleashed even I can’t separate myself from the love of God. While it’s not possible for the person rejecting God to experience the comfort and assurance of God’s love at the same time, God’s love remains there all the same, as God remains ever near.
But no one who chooses to flee from God will have God’s embrace forced on them. Heaven won’t be bursting at the seams with the unrepentant. No one will be marching into the Kingdom of God bearing placards that denounce the existence of God. No will be held captive in God’s presence who wills to be elsewhere. God will not constrain anyone against their will, and no one will be coerced to surrender their will to the will of God.
Instead what God will do is go to any lengths, travel any distance, and take all the time necessary to pursue those who have yet to return to Him. God will not force them but rather God will woo them like the lover of our soul He is even if it takes beyond this life and mortal death. Yes, even after death will continue to pursue the one who runs from God because neither human will or death will have the final word but the final word will be spoken by God calling “you are mine, you are mine, return to me.“ This is the relentless pursuit of God’s grace the English poet Francis Thompson so powerfully described in The Hound of Heaven, a pursuit that in the end beckoned him to return to the arms of God. The language of the prose can make it bulky to shift through but this introduction to the poem portrays a bit of it’s passion and the relentlessness of God’s love.
The name is strange. It startles one at first. It is so bold, so new, so fearless. It does not attract, rather the reverse. But when one reads the poem this strangeness disappears. The meaning is understood. As the hound follows the hare, never ceasing in its running, ever drawing nearer in the chase, with unhurrying and imperturbed pace, so does God follow the fleeing soul by His Divine grace. And though in sin or in human love, away from God it seeks to hide itself, Divine grace follows after, unwearyingly follows ever after, till the soul feels its pressure forcing it to turn to Him alone in that never ending pursuit. – The Neumann Press Book of Verse, 1988.
Posted in Engaging Conversation, Theology
Sweet Hope Cookies
March 30th, 2010 at 4:15 pm
I love the story Christ tells us about the father that waited for the return of his son from his days of wandering. Jesus says, the father ‘watched’ at the gate for him, and when the father saw his son in the distance the father ‘ran’ to the son and then threw a party. God waits and watches for us to return and when we do, God runs to get us back home for a party! Praise God! I am so thankful God loves me so much, that God waits for me to catch back up to God when I wander around.
March 30th, 2010 at 7:05 pm
I am so glad you quoted both Matthew and that very powerful passage in Romans. Absolutely! We can always reject God and wander away, and we do, in big and small ways. And there are those who absolutely refuse to believe, and that is their choice. But just because they don’t believe in God doesn’t mean God has stopped believing in them!
March 30th, 2010 at 7:08 pm
Maybe as we ponder, discuss, agree/disagree on whether hell is real, and whether a loving God would put one of his beloved children in eternal punishment—just maybe we’re focusing on the wrong thing? I just read this quote and it got me thinking:
Christ’s righteousness is so imputed/credited to believers that their justification is not merely the act of a sovereign dispensing with law but the act of a judge declaring the law to be satisfied.” Charles Hodge, quoted in James Buchanan, The Doctrine of Justification.
Instead of focusing on hell, (does it/doesn’t it exist) maybe we could turn our focus on the perfect & complete work of Christ, what his life, death on the cross, and resurrection/ascension accomplished for us ALL! Christ’s work on the cross was complete, failing no one. When I meditate on the One who knew no sin becoming sin so I’d be set free of sin! And the Righteous One clothing me in His righteousness; the innocent Lamb slain, the Holy One sanctifying me, then hell quickly fades out of the picture, and my attention is on the best subject of all–Jesus! God’s perfect love, perfect forgiveness, perfect justification, holiness. After all it’s grace that gives any & all of us access to the wonders of God & His love, and grace alone enables us to love & worship God in return. When you catch a bigger glimpse of God’s amazing grace—–it’s a lot easier to see how everyone is accepted at Christ’s table! I want God to enlarge my heart to be as inclusive as His REALLY is, breaking the boxes & boundaries I’ve put in place.
March 30th, 2010 at 7:45 pm
Paperskater–> Oh you! Trust me, we’re going to get there! It’s Holy Week after all so you can be sure Jesus, the cross, resurrection, salvation, righteousness….it’s ALL coming. GREAT quote by the way!