MY OWN FREE WILL WHICH GOD CREATED ME WITH
Sakkie Parsons
Translated from the Afrikaans Version: My wil waarmee God my geskape het
Translator: Lynda Botha
Someone wrote to me the following:
My question is: God knew in advance that humans would be sinful – Why did He still create humankind? I hope you can help me with this.
One could rephrase your question a little bit by also asking why our Lord gave satan existence in the first place and why He didn’t destroy him before our Lord started with the creation?
I will share my view on this matter with you a little bit later in this letter as per the guidance I have received and the way I understand it.
There are many things in the Word of God to which we do not have all the answers for and even in some cases no answers at all, but what we do know is that we will completely understand everything once we reunite with our Lord, how wonderful:
1 COR 13:12 “Now we see things imperfectly, like puzzling reflections in a mirror, but then we will see everything with perfect clarity. All that I know now is partial and incomplete, but then I will know everything completely, just as God now knows me completely.”
So, I would like to share with you the very small miniscule part of what, I believe, I understand.
First, I think one of the reasons why our Lord did not destroy satan before He started with the creation is the following: remember this is just a thought and I do not have the Scripture for it –
Our Lord created us in His image and remind yourself throughout this letter to this reality:
GEN 1:27 “So God created human beings in His own Image. In the image of God He created them; male and female He created them.”
Because we are made in His own image we also, to put it this way, have the characteristics of His image formed within us.
So, let me quickly share with you two examples of the characteristics that can be found within you that came from God since the beginning. These characteristics will also be found in someone who does not even believe in God:
Our Lord is immortal, and He existed from eternity:
PSALM 90:2-4
2 “Before the mountains were born, before You gave birth to the earth and the world, from beginning to end, you are God.”
3 “You turn people back to dust, saying, “Return to dust, you mortals!”
4 “For You, a thousand years are as a passing day, as brief as a few night hours.”
Therefore, because we are created in God's image, one of our characteristics is that we cannot die – just like our Lord.
We will sooner or later leave this body, but we are not going to die.
We would either be eternally with our Lord:
2 COR 5:1 “For we know that when this earthly tent we live in is taken down (that is, when we die and leave this earthly body), we will have a house in heaven, an eternal body made for us by God Himself and not by human hands.”
1 COR 2:9 “That is what the Scriptures mean when they say, “No eye has seen, no ear has heard, and no mind has imagined what God has prepared for those who love Him.”
Or, if you arrive without Jesus on the other side of the grave, you are going to die a terrible eternal death, though never actually die, since you are created in God's image and you are therefore also immortal.
REV 20:15 “And anyone whose name was not found recorded in the Book of Life was thrown into the lake of fire.”
LUKE 16:22-25
22 “…The rich man also died and was buried.”
23 “and he went to the place of the dead. There, in torment, he saw Abraham in the far distance with Lazarus at his side.”
24 “The rich man shouted, “Father Abraham, have some pity! Send Lazarus over here to dip the tip of his finger in water and cool my tongue. I am in anguish in these flames.”
25 “But Abraham said to him, “Son, remember that during your lifetime you had everything you wanted, and Lazarus had nothing. So now he is here being comforted, and you are in anguish.”MAT 25:30 “Now throw this useless servant into outer darkness, where there will (for all eternity) be weeping and gnashing of teeth.”
The second characteristic of God which also form part of our humanity, is that God has a will of His own.
We also have a will of our own.
God has not created us as puppets.
He wants every person He created, to live by honouring and glorifying Him in order to be reunited with Him one day.
When we create something, and this is of course another one of our Lord's characteristics within us, we create something to please us but unlike our creations God created us with our own free will.
We make our own decisions – I either want to please God or alternatively please satan – and God respects our decisions, just as He wants us to respect His decisions.
Just as He respected the decisions made by Adam and Eve at the beginning.
Therefore, it seems to me, satan was allowed in the garden since the beginning of time. For this is surely a fact, satan was there because he was allowed to be there.
Now I just want to clarify this again: We do not know why our Lord allowed satan, who was one of God’s wonderful creations, to rebel against Him, and when satan rebelled, why he was not destroyed thereafter. Our Lord does not specify in His Word why He allows things to happen the way it did.
However, one thing I know for sure is that there is a very, very good reason, because our Lord will never let or allow something happen otherwise.
Now mentioning my thoughts regarding this matter:
I'm just wondering, if our Lord has not allowed satan to be rebellious and if Adam and Eve didn’t listen to him in the first place, if they and all of us today, still would have experienced the wonderful feelings or emotions like: love, compassion, sympathy, mercy, empathy etc. And here I only concentrated on the good and beautiful emotions. The arrows of bad emotions are immediately fired down by satan towards humankind. The first emotion I read about that humankind experienced was fear, and humankind experienced this towards God whom they should actually love.
All I know for sure is that there is a wonderful reason why our Lord in His sovereign omniscience has allowed it to happen.
I've heard about people who said that they have all the answers but I am not one of them, and in my 46 years of preaching the Gospel, I have not met a true Christian who thought that he or she knew all the answers.
But God respected humankind’s own free will which He created them with when satan misleads them. For every person that He ever created as they reach the age of accountability, He says in their lives in one form or another just like He said to Israel before they went into the Promised Land:
DEUT 30:19 “Today I have given you the choice between life and death, between blessings and curses. Now I call on heaven and earth to witness the choice you make. Oh, that you would choose life, so that you and your descendants might live!”
DEUT 30:20 “You can make this choice by loving the Lord your God, obeying Him, and committing yourself firmly to Him. This is the key to your life. And if you love and obey the Lord, you will live long in the land the Lord swore to give your ancestors Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob.”
Satan attempts his best to get us into hell, but God who created us to His honour and glory to be before Him, has gone much further and did so much more.
He sent His Son to die as a martyr on a cross to take the punishment for all our sins onto Himself and then conquered death by walking out of the grave. Yes He killed death, so that we, who He created with own free will like Himself, can make the choice: Either I'm going to obey Him and live eternally with Him, or like Adam and Eve at the beginning I’m going to listen to satan and die a terrible eternal death to never actually die.
I have said that our Lord wants every person who He created with Him, because He created us to honour and glorify Him:
JOHN 3:16-21
16 “For this is how God loved the world (meaning all humankind): He gave His one and only Son, so that everyone who believes in Him will not perish but have eternal life.”
17 “God sent His Son into the world not to judge the world, but to save the world (meaning all humankind) through Him.”
18 “There is no judgment against anyone who believes in Him. (this is our choices with the own free will which He created us with) But anyone who does not believe in Him (this is our choices with the own free will which He created us with) has already been judged for not believing in God’s one and only Son.”
19 “And the judgment is based on this fact: God’s light came into the world, but people loved the darkness more than the light (this was and remains our own free will which He created us with), for their actions were evil.”
20 “All who do evil (who live out their free will in this manner) hate the light and refuse to go near it for fear their sins will be exposed.”
21 “But those who do what is right (who live out their free will in this manner) come to the light so others can see that they are doing what God wants.”
So the reality of the matter the way I see it is like this:
Satan was there at the beginning with Adam and Eve and they had their own free will which formed part of their image inherited by God.
They were not puppets, and therefore God respected their own free will, just as He wants us to respect His will. Within their hearts they heard this in one form or another:
DEUT 30:19 “Today I have given you the choice between life and death, between blessings and curses. Now I call on heaven and earth to witness the choice you make. Oh, that you would choose life, so that you and your descendants might live!”
DEUT 30:20 “You can make this choice by loving the Lord your God, obeying Him, and committing yourself firmly to Him. This is the key to your life…”
So –
Why did our Lord still create Adam and Eve?
For me, the answer is really not complicated, actually it is quite easy.
Because He loves all of us who adopted Jesus as their Saviour, as well as all the millions of saints already with Him, with a love that only the Almighty Omniscient Sovereign God can love.
An all-encompassing love for us that was there long, long before He even began with the creation:
EPH 1:4 “Even before He made the world, God loved us and chose us in Christ to be holy and without fault in His eyes.”
EPH 1:5 “God decided in advance to adopt us into His own family by bringing us to Himself through Jesus Christ. This is what He wanted to do, and it gave Him great pleasure.”
I conclude with the following Scripture which Jesus reminds us of, that He asked Martha and that we should also ask ourselves:
JOHN 11:25-26
25 “Jesus told her, “I am the resurrection and the life. Anyone who believes in Me will live, even after dying.”
26 “Everyone who lives in Me and believes in Me will never ever die. Do you believe this, Martha?”
What I must ask myself regularly – even today:
In obedience towards who – our Lord or satan – do I live out my own free will that forms part of my image of our Lord?
Greetings,
Sakkie