Tuesday: To Love God
Daily Lesson for Tuesday 18th of February 2025
That God is all-powerful does not mean that He can do the logically impossible. Accordingly, God cannot causally determine that someone freely love Him. If freely doing something means to do something without being determined to do it, then by definition it is impossible to make someone freely do something. In short, as we have seen, and must re-emphasize—God cannot force anyone to love Him, for the moment it’s forced, it is no longer love.
Read Matthew 22:37 and Deuteronomy 6:4-5. What do these verses teach about the reality of free will?
Image Copyright Kevin Carden Goodsalt.com
The greatest commandment, to love God, provides evidence that God does, indeed, want everyone to love Him. However, not everyone does love God. Why, then, does God simply not make everyone love Him? Again, that is because love, to be love, must be freely given.
Read Hebrews 6:17-18 and Titus 1:2. What do these texts teach about God?
According to Numbers 23:19, “ ‘God is not man, that [H]e should lie’ ” (ESV). God never lies (Titus 1:2); God always keeps His word and never breaks a promise (Hebrews 6:17-18). Accordingly, if God has promised or committed Himself to something, His future action is morally limited by that promise.
This means that, insofar as God, in most cases, grants creatures the freedom to choose otherwise than what God prefers; it is not up to God what humans choose. If God has committed Himself to granting creatures free will, humans possess the ability to exercise their freedom in ways that go against God’s ideal desires. Tragically, many people do exercise their freedom in this way, and accordingly, there are many things that occur that God wishes did not, but that are not, strictly speaking, up to God.
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What have you done that you knew God didn’t want you to do? What does this teach about the reality—and possible frightful consequences—of free will? |
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In Australia, we are commanded by law to drive on the left-hand side of the road. In fact, the booklet (or web-page these days) starts with the instruction "Keep Left". And if you come to Austalia and hire a car, usually written in a prominent place in big letters is the command, "Keep Left". There are hefty fines for not complying with this command, if you live long enough to attend your court case. Yet out on the open road, there is nothing to stop you from driving on the right-hand side. The law does not push back against you when you change sides (OK, my little Mazda 2 does push back but I am not going to let it spoil my illustration). Seriously, the only thing stopping you from driving on the right-hand side is your understanding of and respect for the law.
The greatest commandment of all is to love God. And like the "Keep Left" law it does not push back. If we want to drive on the other side we can.
My illustration breaks down because, unlike the impersonal road rule, God loves us back, In fact he loves us first. Added to that God is not capricious and always willing to forgive, even when we have been driving on the wrong side.
Do human beings have the capacity/competence/capability to love God on their own accord consistently? Are we smart enough to make the right choices on our own? Did Adam and Eve seek God’s counsel in exercising their free will? Is true freedom the ability to do whatever we want or the ability to do what is right and good? It is very evident that human beings often get it wrong while exercising their free will. The match between evil and good seems to be skewed towards evil! The choice between loving God and not loving Him is one with eternal consequences. How can we love God whom we have never seen?
Human beings are not capable of loving God or our fellow human beings without divine help. Human hearts are inherently corrupt and hence skewed towards evil (Jeremiah 17:9, Isaiah 53:6). Left on our own, it is not possible to love God let alone our next-door neighbour. In our fallen state, love does not naturally flow from us (Romans 7:18). Even when desire to love, we fail desperately (Romans 7:15). Love does not dwell in our natural state (Romans 7:18-19, 24-25). It is very unfortunate that we love things more than we love God and our fellow human beings ((2 Timothy 3:2-3, 1 John 2:15, Philippians 2:21).
Human beings, absolutely need God’s help in order to love Him and others. Love is the fruit of the spirit. Love is of God. Love belongs to God who gives it generously as long as we pursue it. We love because God loved us first (1 John 4:19). It is not possible to love without the love of God in our hearts. The Holy Spirit gives us the capacity to love (Romans 5:5). The grace of God helps us to overcome our inability to love (Ezekiel 36:26).
The choice of loving God or not loving Him (free will) can only be exercised well by divine help. Free will is a gift from God and therefore, we must return to the Giver to help us to use it wisely. It is God’s desire we love Him and others. He is ready to help us to be like Him. How can we practically grow in loving God and others?
1. Love grows in a relationship – We should spend time in prayer and worship. The more time we spend in prayer and worship, we grow in our relationship with God. Prayer and worship should be a priority in a believer’s life.
2. The Word of God is the secret heart of God – We come to know God through His Word. How can we love God if we do not know Him? The more we know God through His Word, the more we desire to love Him (Psalm 119:11).
3. Obedience to God’s commandments – Jesus said if you love me keep my commandments (John 14:15). To show love for God should be demonstrated by action. We should apply God’s Word in our lives.
4. Fellowship with another – When we fellowship with one another, our love for God grows (Hebrews 10:25).
“And this hope will not lead to disappointment. For we know how dearly God loves us, because he has given us the Holy Spirit to fill our hearts with his love” - Romans 5:5(NLT).
What a blessed assurance. Thank you for breaking down this lesson with Scripture. The Word of Godis like a 2 edged sword....I am learning so much as I continue to seek God's will through His Word.
We should not test God. But humans want experience! We need experience. May we develop the knowledge of a marvelous God who can do much more than we think! Let's give Him the chance to be in control of everything. Trust Him.
This study was very enlightening. Thank you Jesus for your grace and mercy.
The author says God has committed himself to granting creatures free will in order to love God freely, and also to be free to oppose Him.
God described the characteristics of a creature of instinct this way: “The ostriches’ wings flap joyously with the pinion and plumage of kindness, for she abandons her eggs to the earth… and she forgets that a foot may crush them, or that a wild beast may trample them. She treats her young harshly as if they were not hers; though her labor be in vain, she is unconcerned.” (Job 39:13-16) God gives the reason for the ostrich’s attitude. He did not say “I did not give her free will”. He said, “Because God has made her forget wisdom, and has not given her a share of understanding. When she lifts herself on high, she laughs at the horse and rider.” (Job 39:17,18). God is glorified when His creatures faithfully demonstrate His endowments.
God gave humans wisdom and understanding, knowledge in order to commune and communicate with us; in order to love our children and not treat them harshly; in order to love God with all our heart and mind. Adam was made in the image of God.
When God gave the law to Israel in fire, thunder, and earthquake, the people, fearing they would die, asked that Moses should speak the law to them and they swore to keep all the commandments of God. God complimented their oath but aside to Moses said, “Oh that they had such a heart in them, that they would fear Me and keep all My commandments always, that it may be well with them and with their sons forever!”(Dt 5:29). They had not the heart to keep the law without failure. Moses commented after 40 yrs leading them: “Yet to this day the Lord has not given you a heart to know, nor eyes to see nor ears to hear.” (Dt 29:4) The Lord raised their hopes saying, “The Lord Your God will circumcise your heart and the heart of of your seed, to love the Lord Your God with all your heart and with all your soul, so that you may live.” (Dt 30:6) They needed a new heart not a free will (Ezk 36:26,27). This is by the grace of God in the new birth, the new creation in Christ. We are even unable to do the good we will or choose to do (Rom 7:15-20; 9:16; Jn 7:19).
... and we listen to the call of God and make a choice to let him give is a new heart, or we choose not to accept. That is the exercise of free will.
Respectfully, Maurice - …. that is the exercise of CHOOSING freely - of having been given a choice. God gave as two choices. In order to receive the new heart we are called to make the right choice.
Without first causing us to be aware that we have the ability to choose freely, we would not exercise our will. I see our freedom coming from having been given a choice first, not from exercising our will.
Ah Brigitte, an excursion into semantics that I really wanted to avoid. For starters, the lesson author uses the expression "free will" ten times in this lesson and does not use "choosing freely" at all. Philosophically free choice is regarded an an expression or an instance of free will. Practially though, most folk use the terms interchangably without seeing them as layered with different meanings. God created us with free will and we choose either good or evil.
While animals are sentinent beings, capable of experiencing both pain and pleasure, there is nothing to indicate that they have a will. They function largely on instinct and learned responses.
Yet created things outside the human species seem to obey God better than humans. God speaks to Jonah to deliver a message of warning to the ninevites. Jonah doesn't want to deliver the message and boards a ship going the opposite direction. You know the story, it's pitiful that Jonah is so hard hearted and hard headed. When I think of the story of Jonah, there was a great fish that was stalking Jonah's getaway ship waiting to rescue him and make him the world's first underwater submariner, and three days later, which probably seemed like forever to Jonah, he became the world's first sea launched missile, as the great fish vomited him onto the beach. He then finally wanders into Nineveh to deliver the warning message. After taking one look at Jonah the Ninevhites probably thought they better heed his message or they would end up like Jonah. 🤔😆 Jonah gets upset that Nineveh repents and wants to die. He sets up on a hill hoping to see God "nuke" Nineveh. A gourd suddenly springs up and provides shade for Jonah. I recall a worm then chewed down Jonah's "sunbrella" probably at God's command.
The point I'm driving at with the illustration is that God's highest creation, made in his own image, resists God's will more than the lower created creatures. If Jonah didn't have freewill then he wouldn't have been able to resist or disobey God. The fish, the plant, and the worm all obeyed God right away, of course they had no choice in the matter. If only we loved God enough to obey right away. If only man were more like they. 😉😊
Balaam's donkey is another example.
The animals don't have a will as we do, but how do we really know what they experience. They experience the results of our sin, but they have not sinned and perhaps they obey because they trust that their creator knows best? I can't really imagine God forcing them to do things. But who knows?
A few years ago, someone snapped a picture of a polar bear that appeared to be praying by a cross. You can see the picture here https://www.nationalobserver.com/2017/03/31/news/photographer-stunned-polar-bear-prayer-front-cross
I found the picture incredibly moving. Obviously the bear was not praying as we would and Jesus didn't die for animals as such. And yet Romans 8:19-21 suggests that Jesus will liberate all creation so the cross is the future for the polar bear and all other species. Maybe it's silly, but I like to think the polar bear sensed that somehow. Or perhaps God impressed it to do that so humans would be drawn to Him.