Many people deny that there is any such thing as free will.
It’s easily argued we don’t have free will about everything- For instance, we certainly didn’t choose where or who we were born to. We didn’t choose the time period we were born into either.
We can’t sit at our office desk and conjure up something ludicrous like:
“I’m going to eat a purple hippopotamus named Frank right now” and then proceed to magically eat some of Frank (Kind of reminds me of that episode from City Slickers!….pass the Phil!)
It’s clear your range of possibilities and choices are somewhat limited; there aren’t an INFINITE amount of choices you can make at any given point in time. You also can’t go back in time and stop me from writing this, much to your dismay.
So, let’s go with this idea that we don’t have 100% free will (Understand, 100% doesn’t mean there isn’t ANY).
Determinism:
One viewpoint of our world is what’s called determinism. Many atheists and even Christians take this view of the world.
With determinism, what is happening now and what has already happened determines your future. Life is like a stream of dominoes you can’t get out of and the chips are falling where they are falling. Hopelessly chained to a life of cause and effect. I don’t know about you, but that seems like a bleak future.
If we take determinism to it’s extreme, it leads to a society of no accountability:
If someone steals an old ladies purse, well, they couldn’t help it. They were brought up in a bad environment, this caused X, Y, and Z to happen in their brains and that led to this. It was out of their control. In such a world, how could there be justice? How could anyone be blamed for their actions? They had no real decision in the matter.
Another extreme viewpoint is fatalism. Most of us have heard people say “It was fate”. Imagine if that is all that life is. Fate pushed you along to your destination. It’s kind of like backwards determinism; it is the FUTURE that determines your PRESENT.
Probabilistic World
Another viewpoint that one can take is Probabilistic. I was exposed to this in my Physical Chemistry courses as an undergraduate as we got to talking about things on a quantum level.
In a probabilistic world there are MANY possible outcomes (not as simple as X leads to Y). You can only know the chances of something happening, not whether it will actually happen or not. Within a probabilistic system, there is this lovely thing called randomness as well that comes along and messes up predictions. Randomness can affect an outcome, but it’s you that’s still doing the deciding of these multiple pathways. Your ability to choose hasn’t been taken away from you. However, it is still not 100% free will as described initially.
Escaping The Past
Despite my run of definitions, I’m not here to really argue about whether any of these are true. You can decide for yourself (or can you??? Hmmmm). I’m going to assume one or more of these is true to make my point.
I’m here to declare: There is a way to break free from the past in this system of the world.
There is a way to prevent your life falling like a set of dominoes. Did a bad choice 20 years ago put you on a collision course with this exact point in time? If so, it can be escaped. This process can be nullified.
How can you possibly escape the consequences of time? How can you erase the past that goes on affecting your present? You can’t, no human can escape their past. Humans are bound to physical laws.
Christ – The Great Eraser
However, there is one that can erase your past and there is one beyond the laws of physics.
Christ had no beginning and no end. There was no point at which there was some cause that went on effecting him. He is outside the physical laws of this universe. He is not beholden to the games of this world.
Likewise, when Christ remakes us, when we allow Christ to come in and live within us, we can indeed break free of these horrible chain of reactions.
The chain of events that’s plagued us for all of our lives can be stopped. Me, I absolutely love the word NEW CREATURE! The new creature has a new life, one in which the past is capoooey. One in which, past sins are cleansed and you get a new slate on life. One in which Jesus Christ of Nazareth is your new life.
If you truly reside in Christ, then this game of cause and effect cannot go on affecting your entire being. You are HIDDEN with Christ IN God.
You becoming more and more like Christ is not only your ticket to eternal life, but it is a ticket to a NEW LIFE here on earth. The more you become like Christ, the less power your past holds on you. It is Christ that resides in you and it is Christ that is holds your NEW FUTURE.
No, Christ can’t swoop down and change the makeup of your physical world, that’s not what I’m talking about. I’m talking your MENTAL WORLD. However, the mental world has a great ability to change your physical world as world.
As stated earlier, we can’t change our parents or what environment we were brought up in. The remnants of the mess we created may still be there, the physical scars can’t be removed, but the INTERNAL and MENTAL ANGUISH can certainly be removed through the power of the Holy Spirit.
The old man filled with a horrible past and bad decisions? They are TOAST. Seek for them to die more and more each day and become more like Christ. Christ that had no beginning and has no end.
If you are IN Christ, then embrace this Truth-Christ is your CAUSE and Christ is your EFFECT.
Yes, repeat that again- Christ is your cause and Christ is your effect.