God's will and Free will

Frederick Kwesi Great Agboletey

God’s Will, Free Will, Man in Time

- Contemplating the Love of God -

The love of God has enabled his grace to manifest a splendour that circumscribes existence in a warm glow of compassion. That compassion takes its source from a fundamental awareness that omnipotent divinity has by grace enabled provision for physical and spiritual existence as gift over which the recipients have no prior determinacy other than appreciation through endowed reception.

Even were these recipients to gain profound understanding of its formative constituency and primary composition elements, the impression of being passive occupants of expansive grace made manifest at multiple levels is indubitable.

The profound infinities of variations of intensity at which this prevailing glory of benevolent Creator holds creation in sustained incredulity over generations of changing scenarios in the constancy of depth and diversity of the obvious superlative knowledge of a Wonderful Father who makes abundant provision to safeguard his enabling.

The grandeur of the manifold composite constituency that incorporates creations enabled expression to human intellect is conceivable as living art of which humans are but a part. That assumed partiality defines a limitation of relevancy that applies to what is applicable to human needs defined from a higher order understanding of appropriate and applicable for a predetermined end. Which end, is itself enabled limited understanding from non-physical configurations of spirituality conceived in non-tangible faith. For the non-evolved, spiritually under-nourished mind, this is an all too often overwhelming non-physical construct that is inconceivable and in being inconceivable incapable of appreciation.

If creation were conceivable as an artistic rendition of a profound God then reality as perceived from human perception is construable as appreciation of that revealed art from limited perspectives of flexible proportions that maintains its grand contours within varying manipulable dimensions. The extent of enabled ability to interfere and impress variations in this divine art form by its imprinted subjects is girded and limited by that same express power that defines existential expression and flexibility of enhancement in primary states of rendition.

Creation’s enabled inheritance thus become from one point of appreciation a sustained viability and flexibility of adjustment that no matter how grand from human perspectives is a insignificant when set against a larger conceptualisation of what conceivable it takes to tip the scales of balance of divine order in creation. This is the basic awareness that sobers humans into obeisance. Such that in gaining the awareness that arises from structured and fortuitous knowledge therein derived in cultured intellectual engagement, divinity’s incomparable magnificence remains incontestable from a human point of conceptualisation.

Gaining insight into aspects of creation’s handiwork of the Master creator opens seeming unending vistas before man’s senses and capabilities, infinity stretches before humanity with manifold potentials of expanding potentials in limited capabilities enabled with passing time. If God were to reveal Himself to prove his existence the awesomeness of His grandeur will make improbable a comprehensive appreciation of His being, therefore, in his renditions and acclamations the wise will seek the simplicity of the joy of Godly existence that glorifies Him in His own approvable ways.

Acknowledging grandeur at one of myriad levels does not circumscribe the requirement to expedite response of requited appreciation and acknowledgement from created as predefined and made appreciable through established channels that leave no doubts as to its veracity.

Stop trusting in man,

who has but a breath in his nostrils.

Of what account is he?

Isaiah 2:22

The wonder of creation and the power of God is not redeemed and proved on the axis of logicality rendered in human terms and meanings. Human wisdom lacks tenacious constancy and that which humans extol as profound wisdom is levied in proportion to humans by a benevolence that circumscribes its adequacy to set purposes that intend to elevate the divine glory in the being. That understanding is fitted to appreciation of perceptions from the perspective of human nature and its interpretation of qualified reality enabled them.

There is an order in nature that is conspicuously random in its orderliness to defy counter-arguments of immense intellect and creativity of enormous and often incomprehensible proportions. The grace of God, unrestrictive and honoured has enabled in humans an appreciation of expanding realities of unlimited awareness that with its impression on the collective conscience press individual choice that in it's free willingness, emerging willingly from the created uplifts the sublime glory of God in creation to a full fledged illustriousness that beams forth as responsorial appreciation.

Where man in acknowledging the might of God’s incomparable might activates a rewarding divine response from a watchful God. Grace is honoured and in being acknowledged responds with blessings that exceed limited appreciation of fleshly senses capacities, yet even the senses acknowledge such. The one act is purely physical mediated approximation to give girded appreciation to a spiritual, non-physically defined immensity of prodigious proportions that can only be subsumed in renditions of His partially ascertained expressions. The latter is a spiritual reward in continuum that predefined a medium of defined meaning within which benign divinity in expressing its grace in blessings most merciful finds tailored expression.

A worthy human may acclaim thus:-

When I consider your heavens,

the work of your fingers,

the moon and the stars,

which you have set in place,

what is man that you are mindful of him,

the son of man that you care for him?

You made him a little lower than the

heavenly beings

and crowned him with glory and

honour.

For the Lord, Jehovah Himself has declared: -

"For my thoughts are not your thoughts,

neither are my ways your ways,"

declares the Lord

"As the heavens are higher than the earth,

so are my ways higher than your ways

and my thoughts than your thoughts.

As the rain and the snow

come down from heaven,

and do not return to it

without watering the earth

and making it bud and flourish,

so that it yields seed for the sower and

bread for the eater,

so is my word that goes out from my

mouth:
It will not return to me empty,

but will accomplish what I desire

and achieve the purpose for which

I sent it.

You will go out in joy

and be led forth in peace;

the mountains and hills

will burst into song before you,

and all the trees of the field

will clap their hands.

Instead of the thorn bush will grow the pine

tree,

and instead of briers the myrtle will

grow.

This will be for the Lord's renown,

for an everlasting sign,

which will not be destroyed."

Isaiah 55:8-13.

The word of the Lord is a promise going forth like nourishing springs of pristine purity, descending upon the obliging mind, bringing an awakening to the grandeur of the Holy supremacy of the abundant blessings freely gifted to created beings to cherish and freely enjoy for a while. At the same time His word is a two bladed sword that defines without ambiguity what freewill exercised outside of divine favour implies for the individual. On the one hand are the favours of pleasant grace enabled on the other are the travails that arises from a stubborn heart that aggravates itself in displeasing its Creator.

The message thus goes forth with an expectation to achieve a certain end in each individual and the purpose is programmed to meet individual assignations but meet with a common interest that puts Jehovah our God at the centre and foremost in our appreciation of His manifest beauty and sharing that love which enables that awesome creativity in diverse effusion through our loving relationship with our fellow man.

God is not a passive God, who silently allows events to proceed on their 'natural course' without interference. God is an active God, who is closely involved with His creations’ activities, seeking according to His own dictates to see who in his endowment is paying heed to his desires and fulfilling His expectations.

The seeming passivity of God is merely man's refutation of God in their ungodly existence. To that individual that is constantly communing with his or her creator God is an ever present help and worthy presence of praise and appreciation. The assumption that because righteous men perish due to the activities of unrighteous men, and thus God is passive is shortened reasoning that does not take in the full extent of considerations required to make an acceptable conclusion. The Bible, God's expression through His anointed servants is a clear indication of the close involvement of God in the affairs of men. To enable a full comprehension requires an attitude of objective consideration. Objectivity, set in the light of the accepted records of scriptural evidence, in which the non-tangibility of God's wisdom is accepted in its wholesomeness as true. Proceeding from that point of accepted evidence. One could conclude tongue in cheek, that the Bible is a recording of God's real, timely, and promised association with His creation. A patterned rendition of verity ever repeating itself in perfection expressed.

In a world described as modern, man in his ingenuity has managed to create a worldview that separates Godly awareness as a way of existence from the mundane or non-religious. The part that remains unexplained is who sets the standard of the mundane, non-religious existence realised, and to whose benefice and disadvantage, thereof is such. It is very much the case that anything that departs from biblical proscriptions of decency and Godly existence invariably departs from not only God’s desire as expressed in Biblical expositions, but invariably leads humanity closer to morally destitute behaviour with its consequences most debilitating.

"The fool says in his heart, "there is no God." They are corrupt their deeds are vile; there is no-one who does good." What these words of wisdom imply are that, those who refuse to acknowledge God are foolish in the understanding of even human ways. For their ways are vile, and good cannot be found in the midst of them.

If good and despicable are socio-physical constructs defined to be meaningful within human constructs, then even though the divine reference from which appropriateness is defined has more to do with a continuum of divine provision finding expression to complete at one level or make perfect in circumscribed definitive terms the basis of meaningful existence. What is good must have a point of reference, a source of origin that counterbalances the obvious good. Why is wrong so obvious and generically appreciated as wrong unless all without exception are designated to appreciate as such.

Continuing from this precept, humanity is offered a glimpse of God's eternal concern and closeness to His creation. Those who choose willingly to be foolish in their defiance of divine precepts and in the process becoming wicked, have a free will that is wrongly exercised.

Free will is a mind state of selective action which by itself, is unremarkable considered in behavioural response sequences and action choices. Considered from a religious point of view, free will becomes the defining departure point where the cleavage of conscience’s response mediates divine appreciation or the lack thereof from the individual set within creation.

When mind mediated action choices lead to decisions diametrically opposed to divine dictates of appropriateness then a stand has been assumed that sets the individual against the Creator. This act of disobedience is permissible but not approvable from the Creator. When a choice is made to conscientiously seek to exercise as an appreciative effort in obedient stewardship behaviour that honours the Creator, freewill thus becomes obedience that honours an appreciating worthy Creator.

Man must stand in a favoured light with God whose expressions of capabilities are so profound and grand when seen from the limited viewpoint of man to receive such great attention from such a mighty Creator of incomparable power. Greater still is man’s freewill enabled. Man could very well have been created to be obedient and unwavering in thought as to his position to God. Taken from that perspective, it must be appreciated that the light demand of obedience that wills conscience to make a choice to venerate God is a favour for unmerited rewards rather than an imposition to forced obedience.

Why, one must ask, does humans have to contemplate and be preoccupied with spirituality of divine considerations?

Why doesn’t life simple begin and stop at a physical level devoid of the deeper considerations of divinity and Creator’s expectations? The simple answer is that just as man comes into existence into a physical medium of bio-chemical earthly existence predefined to accommodate and support life and enable meaningful existence. Man is preconditioned to activate a spiritual state of mental awareness that finds definitive expression in the choice of freewill to acknowledge and pay obeisance to Creator or to choose otherwise. The choice of freewill is unconditional as it is a pre-programmed mind state response that will drive behavioural choices, it is unavoidable, whether it is a passive or active pre-occupation of behavioural response elicited thereof consequent on the choice made. It will be made in everyone that finds expression in creation.

If that is a given then it becomes a question of what choice we make with our given freewill and why.

In the midst of all humans, God has given His word as a guide, defining within its scope the principles for "Actual Human Existence." He then looks down from Heaven on the sons of men to see if there are any who understand, any who seek God." God looks into the affairs of men, yes, He surely does, for He says through His anointed servants, "Even if you do not have faith to believe, to accept, God is faithful, so that let God be true and every man a liar." There we have it, there is a God who looks even into the place of darkest sin, how else will He have recognised the depth of depravity of Sodom and Gomorra; and how else would He have identified Lot; a lone soul aggravated by all the wickedness around him.

There is implied a choice element of what God deems desirable to employ as featured guides His instructive manual of orderly existence that girds not only spiritual life but also social coherence configured from that same source of desired and appropriate instruction. To give meaning and relevance within a larger construct, relevance implies that choice premeditates establishing relevance of meaning from a divine ordained source. In which sense it cannot be considered relevant to one who has made free will’s decision not to be bothered by scriptures and divine impositions and directive to seek from therein meaning. Meaning is circumscribed by action choices realised at higher mental state of conscience decision making.

The word of discernment here is that, though you might see so much evil, depravity and abomination, that you might think God has forsaken a place, a people and an era, remember, He is there, He has given all of us a free hand to make life defining choice, and many choose to oppose Him, without the least effort to stay on the course of righteousness. That is a choice that defines the individual and the society at large.

Again, how can one know there is a course of righteousness, which when found will lead one in the expected direction of divine appreciation that in reverse improves the individual quality of existence. Being as it were the appropriate medium within which life approximates its most enlightened and rewarding state. That is a choice response premeditated on free will’s choice, which energises a search to find that course of righteousness from its source. Simply put in God’s word. God’s word is only of relevance to those who believe in God as the creator who has established a purpose in a universe of unlimited possibilities.

Unless one seeks to find what that course of life, so to say is, where its directions lead and how one could keep on the track, its impacts or relevance thereof becomes inconsequential to the individual and the society at large. That is why again Psalm 8 enquires, "Will evildoers never learn-?" If only they will learn, then they would know. But this is taken out of context. For those seeking to please God, who is worthy to be sort to be pleased, do so because "The earth is the Lord’s, and everything it, the world and all who live in it; for He founded it upon the seas and established it upon the waters." (There is nothing wrong in seeking to exercise one's brains by a fuller understanding of the grandness of creation, but there is everything wrong with refusing to acknowledge that God is in charge of His creation. What kind of knowledge is it that denies its source of origin in seeking to understand its context of expression?)

The divergence that is unrewarding and unworthy of pursuit is why do some seek to find their path to Godly existence and others don’t? What is of more relevance is that given that everyone has a divine predisposition orientation in built, it becomes a more worthwhile preoccupation to think in terms of how to enable all to access that divinity in free will’s choice as to what orientation to assume as regards life.

VII

Many who have turned to God find all of a sudden a new world, they begin to gain a deeper understanding, the constrictions of the bands of meaningless fear banding their mind are loosened by the power of the Holy Spirit at work in them. For the Scriptures unconditionally proclaim, "Whoever proclaims Christ Jesus as Lord, do it not by their own power but by the Spirit of God." This Spirit opens them to a greater appreciation of their heritage in Christ. No matter how many the plans that are made to thwart the righteous, whose righteousness cometh by grace. The grace of God, wherein by accepting the Lord Jesus Christ as their Lord and Saviour, being baptised in water and cleansed with His Blood, they are together with all the saints co-hosts with Christ as inheritors of a righteousness that is by grace and not by works.

The works of attempted frustration are futile for "God is present in the company of the righteous." and though "(you) evildoers frustrate the plans of the poor, (but) the LORD is their refuge." God's people by choice are not materially poor neither are they spiritually emptied out. The Psalmist praises God saying:

Lord, you have assigned me my portion

and my cup;

you have made my lot secure.

The boundary lines have fallen for me in

pleasant places;

surely I have a delightful inheritance."

The righteous one who by a simple act of faith receives the fullness of grace’s work has an expanded appreciation of earthly existence that those who come into later in their physical life often regret not having bought into earlier.

Some allow themselves to chosen courses with undesirable ends and even when God's messengers come knocking to remind them there is an alternative, from their store of never ending lame excuses, such, human always find one other reason why they do want peaceful and pleasant earthly existence within the defined constructs of divine dictates. But the righteous who exercises faith in receiving grace can always share the mindset of the Psalmist who contentedly prays: -

Keep me safe, O God,

for in you I take refuge.

I said to Jehovah Almighty, "You are my LORD;

apart from you I have no good thing."

As for the saints who are in the land,

they are the glorious ones in whom is all

my delight.

The sorrows of those will increase

who run after other god.

I will not pour out their libations of blood

or take their names on my lips.

One often wishes for the clarity of perspective of inspired writers, to have that same sense of depth of appreciation, understanding and insight. Yet, just when one would want to use that as an excuse of limitation. It is clearly pointed out to all that exceptional characteristic doesn’t matter before the Creator. For as said, "Elisha was a man just like you and me, yet when he prayed it did not rain for three years and when he prayed it rained again." The Bible writers constantly want to assure us that the power of God is a manifest reality, yet at the same time emphasise that God is not selective.

What He has granted to one is available for all to take, what He has given the individual is for the common good and the goodness thereof outlives any single life. We are all enabled to be miracle workers in Christ, yet to those who believe and exercise their faith in attaining the truly miraculous there is no denial. And to those who by refusal not exercise that gift, it is not available. If a person seeks in true faith a miracle, it is a miracle whether it cometh by the hands of that person or another.

The prayer of righteous man availed much. If the believing man's prayer does so much, as to earn an answer from God, there is likewise a warning in the scriptures for all humans who persist in their wickedness. Far too many are willing participants of wickedness against other humans. They may be active or passive participants in the activities of others wicked plans. They may be like the proverbial priest in Jesus' parable of the Good Samaritan, who is way too busy with some self-declared important activity to response to the call of the afflicted stranger(s) on the pathways of the world.

VIII

If God has designated a person to be a leader, nothing will deny that person the position of great responsibility, whether it is an office attained to enable the un-abled, is very much a free willed choice. Yet of all humans, the Word of God again says:

You have made him ruler over the works of

your hands;

you put everything under his feet;

all flocks and herds,

and the beasts of the field,

the birds of the air,

and the fish of the sea,

and all that swim the paths of the seas.

O Lord, our Lord,

how majestic is your name in all the

earth!

From very creation Humans were set in a position of unique ruler ship over the earth. Such that if in many people's experience leadership is totally negative, again it is a choice of freewill wrongly exercised.

The people in the midst of woes and tribulations should retain their faith and those stupefied by the coarseness of inhumanity they are experiencing from poorly exercised choice by those set over them, should turn towards the waiting arms of a loving Father. They should pray in acknowledgement of God's beguiling presence: praying: -

My shield is God Most High,

who saves the upright in heart.

God is a righteous judge,

Yet no human is in leadership by chance, God in His manifest wisdom has set us in places to be of use to other humans, if we so choose. All things God has created, He did with good intentions, the things that are ever so ready to capitalise on our weaknesses we need to turn to our strengths. When we feel we are disposed to be opposed to persons that are Christians, one only needs to recall the wisdom displayed by King Darius, who was a King over a pagan nation, whose god Daniel will not worship, but he saw the substance of the man Daniel and acknowledged that only the true God could so endowed a man such as Daniel, a refugee with such incredible knowledge and understanding; the wisdom is a given, for only the truly wise seek recourse regularly to God Almighty and His words.

Many no doubt wonder:-

Why, O Lord, do you stand far off?

Why do you hide yourself in times of

trouble?

But, God is not far off,

God is near to all who call on him,

to all who call in truth and faith.

Prayer as an active engagement of individual effort directed to communicate with his Creator through the Lord Jesus Christ is a self-affirmatory exercise that expresses at individual level a universal awareness of divinity’s grandeur and incomprehensible possibilities.

Indeed, Jesus Christ is the only way to the Father and in His and the writings of the Apostles presented the fundamental framework for individual self-expression as reasoning creature within the approved Godlike social organisation. If Jesus' existence on earth were to prove one thing, in terms of how one could live a decent Christian existence in a world gone astray (at some levels of social organisation) it would be worthwhile to note that, He lived in a time where righteousness outside the law had not been defined and established, yet, He lived an active live of proactive social integration and the filth never rubbed on Him.

In the midst of the spiritual darkness He designated a task for His followers, a task in which He fulfilled His part and the rest continues to this day and the foreseeable future.

To that time when in His preordained time, the task that He had set His disciples and as Apostle John, notes to those yet unborn and to worlds yet undiscovered, to the very ends of time, the earth and humanity is fulfilled. From this endpoint, Christ, the Messiah's earthly existence, and to the beginning of His Heavenly existence when He had been enthroned and empowered, sending forth His Holy Spirit upon the believers, man takes his beginning, seeking to understand, the fullness of God's power in answer to human needs and gratification through mercy fulfilled in grace through the beloved son.

The present times may be difficult to deal with, but the former times were no less easy. Just as now, with simplicity of belief that is unconquerable righteous men and women devoted their existence to glorifying God in all ways both large and small. In their daily existence, they lived among societies that were idolatrous, they had kith and kin that were freely engaged with the intricacies of a deplorable worldly life, yet when they reached out to Christ, the waiting arms of the beloved received them in truth and faithfulness and being marked in the spirit by the Holy Spirit, they found strength, sustenance and nurturance in the Scriptures.

The same Scriptures unchanged and working as equally effective is at the disposal of all of humanity, even today as in the days of yore. And this same words shall as long the world exists, serve the same miraculous, powerful and prophetic fulfilment as in every other time, era and society. For the word of God stands established on one singular proclamation "..though heaven and earth may pass away my word shall remain." At no place in the Bible is there any indication given that those words of the Scriptures are in any way rendered less relevant with time and the so called modernisation of man. Just as the Lord Jesus Christ continually enquired of those coming for healing "do you believe?" "Where is your faith?" etc. His words are a constant reminder that we are capable of receiving as much of the freely offered grace of God, depending on ourselves. Depending on how strong our faith is. How much of God's Spirit our will enables to operate. When one depend less on oneself and finds greater direction from God's knowledge and guidance, His Holy Words, that endures through generations upon generations to generations yet unborn, we begin to let the fullness of God's Spirit assume greater control, and by so doing allowing His Spirit to bear witness with our human spirit.

The worldly life that stands in opposition to God's word is a dreary place of unwholesome pre-occupations. Distractive impositions of self-willed torment that blinds those caught in it to a self-degradation of imponderable proportions. Yet as Paul humbly reminds us "We were all part of that worldly existence once, until the Grace of God and the love of salvation enabled us in the Blood of the Lord Jesus Christ redeemed us from ourselves." That precious Blood is a worthy, redemptive wealth willed unto us, every single human being, to present as proof of freedom from the wily manipulators that imprison humans in a frail cage of deceptive fear.

When a person turns to the Messiah, the Saviour of the World, who in truest love gave of Himself once, so that all humans are capable of claiming redemption. The great and assuring beauty of Christ's salvation, freely offered is His assurance "...come onto me, all ye who are burdened and I will give you rest. For my yoke is easy and my burden is light upon your shoulders." For a humanity deceived into severe impositions, tormented and driven to distraction, it is not totally unusual for persons in such conditions and under such severe impositions to think (albeit wrongly) that any form of redemption will require much more of them, more than they can be able to give; or are capable of sustaining. Given that if their crossover to Christ does not work, they may have to go back to an undesirable suppression that will be greater than what they are seeking escape from; yet, how much clearer the “Wisdom” personified in Christ Jesus speaking words of assurance.

Whatever you have encountered in Non-Christ conforming existence, that which awaits you in Christ is pure bliss, a blessing light upon one’s shoulders. The demands God, who created all things makes on each of us as humans living in the light of His salvation, is not demanding of us, neither is it to be a considered burden, but it is an alleviation that elevates the self into a state of actual human existence, where one comes to accept the awesome grandeur of one's being and in this self appreciation to turn in acknowledging its Maker, while putting its unfolding capabilities in task of loving existence that ennobles others and glorifies God.

God is the epitome of love, and it is only when love is demonstrated undemandingly, just like when we were not worthy of it, He gave His beloved and Only begotten Son who sacrificed Himself in great obedience, that we are given the carte blanche to walk out of the constrictions of wickedly imposed conditionality that occasion the non-existent peace sought outside Christ.

The Word came in Human form, and the Word was God's Son, and He said "there is but one way to the Father and that is through me, the Son of God." And the words that He spoke, he confirms, "they are spirit, and they are true." In accepting the fullness of those words, only then can one truly become identified with the promise that waits to be self-administered in simple, faithful reception. In whatever humans conceive, there is one fundamental truth that should be of great encouragement. "The earth and the fullness thereof are of Jehovah." Therefore the deception that lures the poor in spirit from the Lord cannot be resolved away from God. And true peace is in God and in abiding by his words, in His words can those who seek peace and joy from God find it.