The Role of Sovereignty & Free Choice

My pastor, Steve, has been preaching through the first chapter of Romans the past few Sundays as part of his latest sermon series and yesterday he arrived a a most-disturbing section of the text, verses 18-32. In these verses is, in my opinion, an explanation of the evil we see happening all around us and a thesis on why so many people refuse to accept the truths of God as laid out in creation and in the Bible. I know of so many who are crying out these days because of the evil they see in the world and many of those same individuals are, for reasons I cannot understand, blaming God for seemingly doing nothing to stop it. Here's the reason Paul gave for the evil: sovereign free choice.

From 1:24-29 —

"Therefore God gave them over in the lusts of their hearts to impurity, so that their bodies would be dishonored among them..."
"God gave them over to degrading passions; for their women exchanged the natural function for that which is unnatural, and in the same way also the men..."
"God gave them over to a depraved mind, to do those things which are not proper, being filled with all unrighteousness, wickedness, greed, evil..."

God let us have our own way, which is what we wanted in the first place, right? After all, who wants a God pulling strings and taking away our free will to run our lives the way we want?

Our God is not like that. Yet He is sovereign over all things. This is mystery — how a sovereign God could have a handle on all things yet leave room for our choices. I'm not sure I can explain it satisfactorily for you. The answer to sovereignty and free will is "yes" and "yes." So there! Scripture gives a prominent role to both, with sovereignty taking the overseeing role in all human events and bringing about the will of God in whatever manner He sees fit.

It's interesting to me, when studying Romans 1, how the interaction of sovereignty and free choice plays out in human behavior. We all have suppressed the truth about God — from unreached people groups to the Vatican. Creation declares both the might and the intimacy of God. His blessings and His curses. No one can say to God, "I did not know you existed. No one ever told me!" because every person knows that God exists and has had to make decisions based on that knowledge. And all have suppressed Him in some way to some degree. All are guilty, Paul would go on to point out in chapter 3. Even worse, we ignored the Creator and started worshiping created things, including our own selves! Humanism is our idol here in America. "I love mesa-me!" We worship ourselves and mankind in general. In other parts of the world, carved idols still exist. One trip to India will show you that.

So God said, "You want to go your own way? Fine!" His sovereignty looked on our free choices and let us wander further astray. But He did not leave His throne while mankind wandered. He continually reached down to us, revealing Himself and His holiness, calling us to fellowship, bestowing His grace, and, finally, His eternal forgiveness in His Son. We chose but God still won.

As Rich Mullins coined it: "You can argue with your Maker but you know you cannot win." The act of arguing is free will, the winning is sovereignty.

There's so much more to say but I'll stop with this: The cause of the evil and degradation in our culture and our world is God's causing only in that He let us, out of His sovereignty, have our own way. Which is what we wanted. And still want. But He never left us on our own. He gave his Son to take our wandering evil upon Himself, die as punishment to satisfy divine wrath, and become righteousness for all who choose to believe in the Son. Even as you and I continue to suppress truth and do wrong out of our choice (hopefully much less now than before we believed!), we have the righteousness of Christ to continually cleanse us and keep us in right standing with God. We choose but God wins.

I'm relieved to know that!

Be God's,

— John