Free Subjects

The central question which I hope to finally address is the tension between the free will of man and the sovereignty of God. The friction between the free and sometimes-mitigated will of man, and the free never-mitigated will of God. Does God give us free will only to strip it of all meaning and expression by always determining the outcome of every event Himself? Does He rule as a sovereign monster, teasing us with desire but never letting us at it?

If you are hoping for me to say that God's will is not in fact unmitigated, or that somehow He provisions for men to sometimes thwart Him, then you will be disappointed. There are no checks and balances for the power of God, including men. He is not much god who bows to his creation. However, I do propose that He has chosen to exercise His sovereignty in an unexpected way, and that the expression of His sovereignty leaves room for the free will of man to have meaning. I shall now describe that mechanism, and later consider the implications and applications.

My proposed framework for understanding God's sovereignty is a simple line. Many have argued that it is one point or another. I am not creating new points, only connecting them. A line, after all, is a segment that connects two points. The primary point is God's rule by Deed. And by "Deed" I mean what He explicitly does, His actions. This is perhaps what we think of first as "sovereignty," and if you or I were gods I think it likely we would only rule in this way. God is more interesting. For out of point number one He created point number two, rule by Law. Here I broadly define "Law" as a description for the way things are. Not a script for every specific happening in the universe, but a generalized ruleset describing the behavior of happening itself. This to me seems most obvious in nature, where great complexity emerges from the interaction between simple rules. Importantly, these Laws emerge from Deed, since it was a Deed that made them. So Deed is the greater point, and Law is subject to Deed. Sometimes, incredibly, Deed even supersedes Law! (Before you raise your eyebrows at me, please understand that this is the actual definition of a miracle). So these are the two points, and God's sovereignty always works itself out somewhere along the line between them.

The question of God's sovereignty and our free wills finds resolution in this framework. The simplest thing would have been for God to directly and explicitly control everything. But in such a framework, while our wills may well have remained free, they would have lacked meaning. We would have opened the door to one cage (free will) only to find ourselves in another cage of the same size! God's sovereign decision to Rule at times by Law created a little pasture outside of the first cage. A field where we can run about and give shape and meaning to our wills. We remain subjects under God's sovereignty, both Law and Deed, but we are free subjects. When you consider how God could have ruled, this is quite stunning. It defies any notion of cruelty or monstrosity. Especially considering the ugly things we have chosen to get up to, but I am getting ahead of myself.

Before moving on to that final topic of implication and application, allow me to summarize. Every time something happens, it is certain that God reigns sovereignly over that thing. It is not always obvious to us specifically how. Sometimes it will be indirectly by Law, other times directly by Deed, and often a blend of the two! Each occurrence is the product of Law shaped by Deed, but to a degree which is not always evident to us. Deed is first and primary. But if all were Deed, then there would be no meaning for human free will, so God chose to establish Law. The two points are necessary, and drawing a connecting line between them helps to resolve their apparent differences.