Predestination vs Free Will

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One of the most damaging philosophical perspectives I’ve ever encountered is that of predestination. I say that because of predestination’s affect on people when they try to internalize it and it begins to change how they live.

What is free will?

I’ve heard free will defined in various ways. Some people believe that unless a choice is made without the outcome of that choice being known beforehand, that choice is predetermined and thus there is no free will involved.

To me, that seems simplistic, because God must necessarily be outside of time. (or no creator may exist, which I reject as an article of faith–note, that ideology also has negative consequences in the lives and societies of anyone who accepts it).

If God creates time and is not subject to it, then trying to understand how a choice could exist whose outcome is not known to God, who created the time in which it exists is not conducive to sanity.

Maybe a perspective shift is in order?

From our perspective, if God is creating each moment of time as we experience it, and we are able to make choices, then we have to think about this a different way, more in line with ourselves than an attempt at a big-picture perspective.

God gives us free will by enabling us to choose as we make each choice. From our perspective, free will is composed of making choices that have consequences (and frankly, common sense should be applied here).

Try asking a mentally handicapped person whether free will is real. Go ahead and do it in the simplest terms you can think of. Without getting lost in the intellectual weeds, you can’t do it, and they won’t understand it because it’s a stupid question, and to be clear, the point isn’t that it requires great intellect to understand lofty ideas.

The point is that the question of free will from the perspective of someone with a simple, direct connection with reality becomes a tautology. “Of course I am making choices right now that have consequences. What are you? Daft? If I smack you in the face, will that illustrate the point?”

Get your head around it if you can.

I can somewhat successfully complete the mental gyrations necessary to understand that a God who is not subject to time creating people who are able to make choices is a miracle in and of itself (possibly the second-most astounding thing God did).

I can also understand why some physicists and theologians believe that everything that happens is scripted. (From outside of time, how do you understand choice? Choice requires time. Otherwise all you have is being.)

The upshot is that to exist in this world, created by a God not subject to time, choice must be enabled by God in the act of creation.

If you can’t get your head around it, it doesn’t matter anyway.

If you take one thing away from this, let it be the following:

From a human perspective, we must always look at life as if every choice we make MATTERS.

The perspective is the key. If something tempts you to believe that your actions don’t matter, reject it instantly. If you can sort out the intellectual idea of predestination and why it doesn’t matter subjectively to you, that’s great, but don’t let it bother you, because it’s really not material to how you act.

The only possible human reaction to predestination is a bad one.

Because people are designed to take responsibility for their actions and hopefully to make positive choices that have positive consequences, any intellectual gymnastics that distract from that must have negative consequences.

The great danger of predestination is that it tempts us to forfeit responsibility for our actions (and eventually to despair, because something very basic in each of us hungers for responsibility.)

Your beliefs and the actions you take as a result of them matter.

Reality Is in the Eye of the Beholder

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English has past tense (he did, he was), present tense (he does, he is) and future tense (he will do, he will be). I’ve often thought that in order to describe God and his creation, we need an “always” tense. Something like “He do, He exist” would be more appropriate than anything we use, and along with that comes a way of seeing the world that we’re not capable of experiencing and barely able to think about.

God exists outside of time.

A great illustration of this is the way most people think of God, which I think may be an extension of the way deists see God. It might be stated as follows: “He set the world with all its laws in motion and now leaves it to its own devices.”

This unintentionally makes God subject to time. God *did create* something in the past is not the same thing as an act of creation that spans the entirety of time and encompasses the whole act. It also creates too distinct a separation between God and His creation. It might be more correct to say (using, of course, “always” tense) “God create the world.” If you can really wrap your head around that and imagine experiencing it, you’re doing better than I am.

The point I’m making is that God didn’t simply create the world and leave it to go its own way. He is involved in every aspect of His creation. Every atom in every instant of being is under His inspection and is being created, just as every other atom of every instant of being. In God’s experience, there is no difference between beginning and end. They are part of the same act of creation that “exist” (“always” tense).

“He is before all things, and in him all things hold together.” – Colossians 1:16

As I said, we can’t really describe or understand it, but we do have to think about it in some way. I like to see it as a song that God is singing, and every now, every instant of everything every person does is enabled by the fact that God is currently “singing” him doing it.

This is not and CANNOT be thought of as an act of predestination.

That concept is vile and incompatible with reality. Properly used, predestination is simply another attempt at trying to understand God’s perspective, which is dangerous, if it affects our perspective and how we act.

In essence, God’s creation of everything is not something set in motion and abandoned, but of a piece, created and being created, and God is an intimate part of every moment.

Thus, it is in God and through God that everything exists. He is the reference through which it all holds together. In a sense, He is the nexus that pulls everything into perspective.

Reality is not what you perceive it to be. Nor is it what you want it to be. Reality is what it is because that is what it was created to be. It is what He said it is.

Walk a Mile in Your Shoes?

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We’re all familiar with the expression “Walk a mile in his shoes before you criticize, then you may understand him.” (And, of course, the corollary, “Walk a mile in his shoes, then when you criticize, you’ll be a mile away and have his shoes.”)

I’ve been musing for awhile on that notion, but I have to take it a step further to really get a grasp on it myself. How about stepping out of your skin and into someone else’s? What would it feel like to BE him?

The other day, I shared some hard cider with my dad. He said, “This is something you might drink instead of a beer. Not what comes to mind when you think of cider.” I nodded, didn’t think much of it, then tonight I drank another hard cider and realized, “Wait a minute, he means that beer is good and cider is bad because it’s too sweet. This isn’t just a case of ‘every beverage in its place.'”

I have a sweet tooth. For me, beer is …well… it’s ok. Take it or leave it, but cider is good, unless I’m in the right mood for a beer, but that’s rare. It wasn’t a big thing, but it sort of turned the world on its head for a minute because I realized that, living in my dad’s skin, sweet really isn’t a GOOD thing.

I can’t believe I’m the only one who’s ever realized, “That’s a part of what it must be like to be him.” I would think (I would hope) that just about everybody else on earth has had that experience at least once… but do we really stop and think, most of the time, what it’s actually like to be other people?

Now, take off your worldview for a second…

Take this a step further and imagine yourself being in another person’s skin who believes in an entirely different set of values from yourself.

A great example of this was an article that a cousin brought to my attention awhile back about a NPR executive who did exactly that.

https://townhall.com/tipsheet/timothymeads/2017/10/22/former-npr-ceo-actually-talks-to-conservatives-makes-shocking-discoveries-n2398782

Short version: Typical lefty discovers that “evangelical Christians” aren’t actually a bunch of hateful cultists and comes to see that the world looks really really different when you operate from a different set of preconceptions.

On the other side of that coin, I often have conservative friends suggest to me that “the media” is actually run by people who are in collusion and have an agenda to destroy America.

I have direct, personal experience with people from the national media. They believe VERY differently from me, but I went to college with a bunch of them. I spent two years in company with people who think that NPR has a middle-of-the-road view of the world. (Granted NPR tries to be non-political, but that’s not the same thing.)

During that time, I came to realize that “the media” is mostly just a sub-society that doesn’t mix much with other parts of society as a whole. They actually believe what they say and say what they believe, the same as the rest of us do, and they are PASSIONATE about it!

(This leaves aside the discussion about reporting the truth vs changing the world, but that’s for another day.)

NOBODY is the bad guy in his own eyes.

Imagine that you’re drinking and driving.

If you’re reading this, then you probably don’t do that as a rule. (If you do, you should have your license revoked for life… but moving on.)

I can imagine myself drinking and driving. It’s not even hard. It’s exactly the same decision as eating that extra piece of candy or having that extra scoop of ice cream when you KNOW that you shouldn’t. All that’s required is a slightly higher disregard for the consequences… just a little bit less forethought and care for others, a little more self focus… (Yeah, I said a little. In the scope of my life experience I can say that definitively. SUBJECTIVELY, it’s very little. All it takes is a particularly bad night and a bit of judgment lapse. You’re really not THAT drunk after all.)

Every one of us plays the odds every day in SOME way, and I’m willing to bet that anybody who’s willing to undergo any significant self-examination can see somewhere in their life where they aren’t that considerate of others. Driving is a great example because most of us do it and it’s dangerous (also granted, drunken driving is probably the most common, inexcusably reckless action people take in our society), but there are any number of parallels where a serious look at our own behavior can yield a parallel.

Now take the most extreme example you can think of and put yourself in that person’s skin. If we’re honest, none of us is very different from any other.

If you’re interested in a REALLY serious look at this, check out the book Ordinary Men by Christopher Browning. Did you know that the Nazi death squads weren’t specially recruited or trained for killing Jews? They were just ordinary people who were put in the wrong set of circumstances. Only a few percent objected.

I can put myself in their shoes too. I can imagine living in their skin.

So… Perspective

The only difference between us at a base level, any of us, is perspective. A little perspective shift and you stand just a little way from where you are now. A little more, and a little more, and a little more and you’re sitting across the table from yourself with a totally different view of life.

That makes perspective the defining characteristic behind how we live. It’s IMPORTANT, and the most important part of perspective is not the facts which define life. It’s the importance we place on the facts. Two people may have the same set of facts and come away with very different views of the world because of what they hold to be important.

(It’s also worth making the point “But for the grace of God, there go I.” Judge not.)