Latest / Pastor John Piper's answers / Does Free Will Exist?

Transcript

Does Free Will Exist? · Pastor John Piper's answers

• 0:03
  Speaker 1: Welcome back to the podcast on this Monday Today. In
• 0:05
  Speaker 1: our Bible reading, how we read Jeremiah twenty three to
• 0:09
  Speaker 1: twenty five together and included a beautiful New Covenant text
• 0:12
  Speaker 1: that one listener wants you to explain more. The listener
• 0:16
  Speaker 1: is Matthew. He wrote this, Pastor John, hello to you.
• 0:19
  Speaker 1: I find myself often in debates with friends and family
• 0:22
  Speaker 1: over Calvinism and Armenianism. They're all armenian I try to
• 0:27
  Speaker 1: represent the other side with clarity and charity. One of
• 0:31
  Speaker 1: the arguments that I come back to repeatedly is about
• 0:34
  Speaker 1: free will, and what I see in Jeremiah twenty four
• 0:36
  Speaker 1: to seven quote I will give them a heart to
• 0:39
  Speaker 1: know that I am the Lord, and they shall be
• 0:42
  Speaker 1: my people, and I will be their God, for they
• 0:45
  Speaker 1: shall return to me with their whole heart end quote.
• 0:50
  Speaker 1: What I see in this text is that, of course,
• 0:51
  Speaker 1: we all have free will, the ability for our hearts
• 0:54
  Speaker 1: to do and believe what we most desire. So what
• 1:01
  Speaker 1: we need are new desires that want the right things.
• 1:05
  Speaker 1: God must add to give us new desires, or we
• 1:08
  Speaker 1: are hopeless. This is sovereign grace in the miracle of regeneration.
• 1:13
  Speaker 1: How much of your discussions over free will centers on
• 1:16
  Speaker 1: this fact that we all have free will, and we
• 1:19
  Speaker 1: all need a new heart, a new will.
• 1:23
  Speaker 2: First, let me command Matthew for defining what he means
• 1:27
  Speaker 2: by free will. That's really unusual. I appreciate it very
• 1:31
  Speaker 2: much because in most discussions people use the phrase as
• 1:35
  Speaker 2: though it were clear, when in fact, most people have
• 1:38
  Speaker 2: very different views of what free will means. So he's
• 1:42
  Speaker 2: defined it so that I can answer his question with
• 1:45
  Speaker 2: more precision. He says that free will is the ability
• 1:50
  Speaker 2: for our hearts to do and believe what we most desire.
• 1:57
  Speaker 2: That's a pretty shrewd and careful definition. Freedom of the will,
• 2:01
  Speaker 2: he says, is the freedom to do and believe what
• 2:05
  Speaker 2: we most desire. And I think that if we are
• 2:09
  Speaker 2: going to affirm the existence of free will among fallen
• 2:14
  Speaker 2: people like us, that's the definition we need to use,
• 2:19
  Speaker 2: because it answers the question how people can be free
• 2:24
  Speaker 2: whom the Bible says are dead in trespasses Visians two five,
• 2:30
  Speaker 2: Slaves of Sin Romans six twenty, Under the Dominion of
• 2:34
  Speaker 2: Sin Romans three to nine, Blind to spiritual reality, Second
• 2:39
  Speaker 2: Corintins four to four, Hardened against God Visians four eighteen,
• 2:45
  Speaker 2: and unable to submit to God Romans eight to seven. So,
• 2:51
  Speaker 2: given Matthew's definition of freedom, such dead, enslaved, dominated, blind, hard,
• 3:01
  Speaker 2: impotent people have freedom of the will because it means
• 3:08
  Speaker 2: that they are free to do and believe what they
• 3:12
  Speaker 2: most desire, namely sin. That's what they're free to do.
• 3:17
  Speaker 2: And I would agree that if we're going to maintain
• 3:21
  Speaker 2: that the will is free, that is the definition we
• 3:25
  Speaker 2: should use. So to speak a free will, then is
• 3:29
  Speaker 2: to speak of a will that is free to do
• 3:34
  Speaker 2: and believe what it most desires, but is not free
• 3:39
  Speaker 2: to desire God above all else. And what I have
• 3:44
  Speaker 2: found therefore is that most people who reject calvinistic or
• 3:51
  Speaker 2: reformed understandings of human depravity and sovereign grace that is
• 3:57
  Speaker 2: required to bring a dead, hard, blind person to saving
• 4:00
  Speaker 2: faith is that this definition of free will is not
• 4:05
  Speaker 2: acceptable to them. It's not acceptable because it still leaves
• 4:12
  Speaker 2: a person unable to provide the decisive thing that leads
• 4:17
  Speaker 2: to conversion, namely the strongest desire to trust Christ. It
• 4:22
  Speaker 2: leaves a person in the bondage of their strongest desires,
• 4:27
  Speaker 2: which are against God. So saying that a person is
• 4:31
  Speaker 2: free to do what he most desires, but he's not
• 4:35
  Speaker 2: free to create desires for God does not give the
• 4:39
  Speaker 2: Armenian what he wants. And what's that A fair definition
• 4:44
  Speaker 2: of what the Armenian requires is free will, defined as
• 4:50
  Speaker 2: the power of decisive self determination. In other words, what
• 4:57
  Speaker 2: the Armenian requires is that that at the precise point
• 5:02
  Speaker 2: of conversion where saving faith comes into being, it is
• 5:07
  Speaker 2: man and not God that at that point provides the
• 5:13
  Speaker 2: decisive and defective influence. That's what the Armenian must have
• 5:19
  Speaker 2: to make his views work. Whatever influences God may give
• 5:25
  Speaker 2: prior to that point, call them prevenient grace. That's what
• 5:29
  Speaker 2: the Arminian wants to call all the illuminating, freeing grace
• 5:36
  Speaker 2: of God prior to that point. Whatever influences God may
• 5:40
  Speaker 2: give prior to that point, the Armenian insists that the
• 5:46
  Speaker 2: final decisive creation of the strongest effective desire for Christ
• 5:54
  Speaker 2: must be self determined, human determined, not God determined. So
• 6:01
  Speaker 2: Matthew asks me, how much of your discussions over free
• 6:05
  Speaker 2: will centers on the fact that we all have free
• 6:10
  Speaker 2: will and we all need a new heart and a
• 6:14
  Speaker 2: new will. And my answer now is that I don't
• 6:19
  Speaker 2: usually start with Matthew's definition of free will. It may
• 6:23
  Speaker 2: be helpful in some discussions to define free will that way,
• 6:28
  Speaker 2: but I find that it is most illuminating, most convicting,
• 6:34
  Speaker 2: most clarifying to start with the definition of free will
• 6:39
  Speaker 2: that Armenions really do need in order for their views
• 6:43
  Speaker 2: to make sense, namely, the definition that free will is
• 6:49
  Speaker 2: the power of decisive self determination or I sometimes use
• 6:54
  Speaker 2: the phrase ultimate self determination with this definition, and then
• 7:00
  Speaker 2: it appears that Armenians believe in such free will and
• 7:05
  Speaker 2: Calvinists do not believe in such free will. I certainly
• 7:10
  Speaker 2: do not believe there is such a thing as human
• 7:14
  Speaker 2: free will defined as decisive self determination. At this point
• 7:22
  Speaker 2: in my conversations, what proves to be most clarifying is
• 7:26
  Speaker 2: two things. First is the abundance of Biblical texts that
• 7:33
  Speaker 2: describe the bondage of the will and the necessity of
• 7:37
  Speaker 2: sovereign grace to bring a person out of spiritual deadness
• 7:42
  Speaker 2: into life and faith. For example, in Ephesians two five following,
• 7:49
  Speaker 2: Paul does not say that when we were spiritually dead,
• 7:55
  Speaker 2: God gave us a kind of half way regeneration, where
• 8:00
  Speaker 2: we now, in that new halfway state of life, provide
• 8:05
  Speaker 2: ourselves the decisive self determining act of faith, act of
• 8:13
  Speaker 2: producing the strongest desire for Jesus, which pushes us over
• 8:18
  Speaker 2: the line to believe what he says. What Paul says
• 8:22
  Speaker 2: is that while we were dead, God not only made
• 8:26
  Speaker 2: us alive, but also raised us up with Christ and
• 8:33
  Speaker 2: sat Us with Him in the heavenly places in Christ Jesus.
• 8:37
  Speaker 2: In other words, God's action is decisive all the way
• 8:42
  Speaker 2: from death through spiritual resurrection to our firm saved position
• 8:50
  Speaker 2: in the presence of God in Christ. And there are
• 8:54
  Speaker 2: many texts that teach the same thing concerning or in grace.
• 9:01
  Speaker 2: That's the first thing. The other thing that I find
• 9:04
  Speaker 2: clarifying and helpful in conversations with folks is to point
• 9:08
  Speaker 2: out that free will, understood as the power of ultimate
• 9:15
  Speaker 2: or decisive self determination, is not taught anywhere in the Bible.
• 9:22
  Speaker 2: Not a single verse, not a single text, teaches that
• 9:29
  Speaker 2: there is such a thing as the power of ultimate
• 9:33
  Speaker 2: human self determination. So where does that idea come from
• 9:38
  Speaker 2: that we must have ultimate self determination. It comes from
• 9:43
  Speaker 2: a philosophical presupposition that people bring to the Bible. The
• 9:49
  Speaker 2: philosophical presupposition is that if we don't have ultimate self determination,
• 9:57
  Speaker 2: we cannot be held accountable for our own beliefs and
• 10:02
  Speaker 2: actions before God. Well, the Bible simply does not affirm
• 10:08
  Speaker 2: that presupposition. The Bible teaches that God has ways we
• 10:14
  Speaker 2: do not understand, and that He knows how to govern
• 10:19
  Speaker 2: all things, including the human will, in such a way
• 10:24
  Speaker 2: that we are truly responsible, truly accountable, and He, at
• 10:30
  Speaker 2: the same time is truly sovereign. And oh, we should
• 10:36
  Speaker 2: be thankful for this sovereign grace, because without it we
• 10:41
  Speaker 2: would be utterly hopeless in the bondage of our spiritually
• 10:46
  Speaker 2: dead hearts. So if you find yourself I'm speaking to
• 10:52
  Speaker 2: those of you who are listening right now, if you
• 10:55
  Speaker 2: find yourself unable to love God, able to trust Christ,
• 11:02
  Speaker 2: don't despair, Jesus said, with man it is impossible, but
• 11:08
  Speaker 2: with God, all things are possible. Resolved to seek Him,
• 11:13
  Speaker 2: come to Him, look to his suffering for the worst
• 11:17
  Speaker 2: of sinners, and ask God for the grace to see
• 11:22
  Speaker 2: and savor Christ.
• 11:25
  Speaker 1: Free to do what we most desire, but not free
• 11:27
  Speaker 1: to create desires for God. Amen, that's the grace. We
• 11:31
  Speaker 1: owe everything to the miracle of sovereign grace to give
• 11:35
  Speaker 1: us those new desires for God. To thank you Pastor
• 11:38
  Speaker 1: John that is a theology of seign grace that makes
• 11:42
  Speaker 1: the heart want to sing, ohow so good and if
• 11:44
  Speaker 1: you have more on this hot debate over free will
• 11:47
  Speaker 1: and includes the most asked about Bible text we have
• 11:50
  Speaker 1: ever gotten questions about here on this podcast, I'm Speaking
• 11:53
  Speaker 1: of Romans nine twenty two. Check out the text, and
• 11:55
  Speaker 1: then check out the episode that we released this spring
• 11:58
  Speaker 1: ABJA twenty twenty eight titled You're Most Asked About Bible Verse.
• 12:04
  Speaker 1: You're Most Asked About Bible Verse ABJ twenty twenty eight.
• 12:08
  Speaker 1: You can find it at askpastor John dot com. Thank
• 12:11
  Speaker 1: you for listening and for making good use of the archive.
• 12:14
  Speaker 1: I am Tony Rank. We'll see you on Monday.