W. E. Best, 1977, Baker Book House
http://www.webbmt.org/books-pdf/Free_Grace_Versus_Free_Will.pdf
An uncommitted will has never occurred within human consciousness. In any event, it is unnecessary to assume absolute indifference to holiness and sin to account for Adam's fall.
Innocence does not sufficiently describe Adam's condition of uprightness. Original uprightness consisted of positive qualities. Adam's positive intellectual and moral qualities before the fall were manifested in his ability to name the animals (Genesis 2:20) and in his fellowship with the Creator (Genesis 2:15-25). Some knowledge of the animals' characteristics was necessary to name them. Furthermore, positive uprightness was necessary to enjoy positive fellowship with God.
The fact that God created Adam upright means that Adam had knowledge of God. This is explained as follows: The three faculties or powers in the human soul are (in this order) understanding [intellect], affection [emotion], and will. The order cannot be reversed. Eve's sin verifies the order of the powers of the soul. She gained knowledge of the forbidden fruit by seeing it. Her affection went out to the fruit of which she had gained knowledge. She then exercised her will by taking the fruit. Therefore, since Adam was created with an understanding of God, an uncommitted will was impossible. Consciousness always reports an inclined will, not an indifferent will. This is why Adam's uprightness was beyond mere innocence.
Uprightness includes several characteristics. Adam was created upright, an adult, a spirit and with a will. He did not come into the world as all others have. The first man was created mature, without the necessity for physical and mental growth and development. The idea that Adam had advancing stages in growth and learning contradicts the thought of created maturity. Adam's maturity proves that he had an inclined will. He was not in a state of equipoise, but his will was inclined toward God, his Creator.
In created maturity, Adam's intellectual faculties contained innate ideas and patterns. Therefore, his maturity enabled him to not only name the animals but commune with God. Adam was created a spirit (Genesis 2:7). The creation of a finite mind, or spirit, implies the creation of uprightness. Spirit must be distinguished from matter. Furniture is matter and must be moved by force. Adam was self-determined from within. His ability to move from within signifies his freedom. He was self-motivated and not moved by external force. Self-motion is self-determination, and self-determination is the act of the will.
Adam's will was a [so-called] free will because it was [i.e., only to the extent] self-determined. That which is not forced from without is free--but not absolutely. Adam was responsible to God. He was free in the sense that he was unconscious of any necessity imposed upon him. God's freedom is immutable, but Adam's freedom was mutable self-determination.
By the creative act, Adam's will was inclined to God--and that before it made any choice. He was created a spirit, and was self-determined the instant he was created. His self-determination was created with his will. Adam could not have been created un-inclined. Adam's holy creation in original righteousness (or uprightness) was both created and self-determined. Viewed with reference to God, it was created. Viewed with reference to Adam, it was self-determining, self-ruling, and unforced from without.
Adam came into the world inclined toward God. That holy inclination was at once the Creator's product and the creature's activity. Adam did not find himself in a position to choose either the Creator or the creature as an ultimate end. He was inclined toward the Creator. His very uprightness was God-given, and did not proceed from his own ability. In fact, Adam's mutable self-determination led to his fall, and after the fall his will was enslaved to sin.
[Bracket comments mine.] Dan Smedra
In philosophy and theology, the terms free will and volition are often NOT used synonymously, but do convey related ideas. Unless misused, the term free will communicates a sense of absolute, autonomous, 'libertarian' or unbounded freedom, whereas volition simply implies power of choice.
For example, a prisoner locked in a 8' x 8' concrete cell would not be considered to be free by most standards, but could still exercise the choice to either lie down, sit, or stand, etc. The prisoner has certainly lost a large portion of his freedom, but has not been stripped of his volition, as demonstrated by his power of choice, albeit bounded.
Consider a second example. A citizen of some particular country is detained at customs and not allowed to travel outside that nation's borders. Is the citizen free or not? Freedom is not black or white; it must always be compared to some benchmark. The citizen is certainly free compared to the prisoner, but may not enjoy the freedom(s) extended to some other citizen of another nation who is allowed passage to several adjacent countries or even to roam planet Earth at will.
So, the concept of "freedom" is always relative to what it's being compared to. We always need to keep in mind that there are degrees of freedom. Again, it's never black or white. It is erroneous to characterize the issue in terms of either having free will or being a "puppet". It is this need to recognize degrees that has led philosophers and theologians to differentiate free will from volition.
The conjunction of the words free with will is actually very misleading--albeit intentionally so. The notion of free will suggests a state of ontological being which has never existed...in God, in angels, nor in man. As John Darby clearly stated, "I believe we ought to hold to the Word; but, philosophically and morally speaking, free-will is a false and absurd theory. Biblically speaking, free-will is a state of sin [i.e. rebellion]."
The creature's will or volition is always subject to the propensity (aka: bent, nature, etc.) of the creature's ontological being. While God is omnipotent, His will remains consistent (bounded) by His essence--who He is in all His full-orbed attributes. For example, He cannot will to be unjust or unloving. He cannot will to act or be unlike Himself--a self-referential contradiction, philosophically speaking.
The Christian church has suffered much confusion and possibly unnecessary division due to those, who through ignorance or other questionable motive, seek to use the terms free will and volition interchangeably. An awareness of the difference between these terms is an essential prerequisite for correctly interpreting and understanding Holy Scripture--the Bible. If one approaches Scripture with the fictitious concept of the creature's unbounded free will, the true meaning of the verse, the chapter, or the entire Bible is altered and a pseudo-version of Christianity is spawned. https://withchrist.org/volition.htm
Q. If men have no free will then why do you even bother to think or get up in the morning? Wait a minute, even that is determined too. Basically, there is no point to anything if we don't have free will.
Answer. The nature and tone of [this question] suggests a fundamental misunderstanding. The Bible does not teach that man is without volition (power of choice); rather, that the exercise of volition is limited or constrained (i.e. not absolutely free) due to the Fall. When pressed, most believers will admit to this fact. Historically, the disagreement is over the degree of limitation. We concur with the information God's has revealed on the matter.
Q. If men have no free will, it is impossible to be "saved" ever by any act of your own. I realize your doctrine states by grace, by God alone. But then how is this grace attained?
Answer. Excellent observation and question! Grace is God acting toward us with unmerited favor. Keep in mind the Christian redemptive process does not preclude man as an active (volitional) participant. The Bible states that salvation is “by grace through faith”. Grace is the cause, faith the means. Grace (unmerited favor) is the inherent attitude of the Giver and substantive nature of any true gift. By contrast, if we somehow merit, earn, or labor to receive something, that ‘thing’ can no longer be considered a gift.
“Now to him who works, the wages are not counted as grace (gift) but as debt (obligation). But to him who does not work but believes on Him who justifies the ungodly, his faith is accounted for righteousness…” "Therefore [salvation] is of faith that it might be according to grace..." Romans 4:4,5,16.
Q. Surely, if men have no free will, either:
1) no one can be saved since they cannot have true faith, as they can make no choice whether or not to believe; or,
Answer. Your so-called "true faith" is a gift from God. (See Insert below. Salvation is the gift of God, not faith. -Jerry Teets] Are you treating the concepts of 'free will' and 'volition' synonymous again? Any so-called “true faith” will be a ‘faith’ as portrayed and described in the Bible.
Insert:
Acts 16:31 is very clear. God must do the saving; man must do the believing. The saving is something that God alone must do. The believing is something that the sinner must do. God does not do the believing for man. Even William Hendriksen (who is Reformed in his theology and who believes that faith is the gift of God in Ephesians 2:8) says, "both the responsibility of believing and also its activity are ours, for God does not believe for us." Another illustration would be the account of the deadly serpents in the wilderness in Numbers 21. Should we say that the Israelites had no part in their deliverance from the deadly snakes? Of course not! Their part was to LOOK; God's part was to HEAL. They did the looking and God did the healing.
Faith is when the sinner humbly recognizes his desperate need and acknowledges that God must do all the saving. Salvation is wholly the work of God; faith is wholly the responsibility of man. Man does not contribute to his own salvation. It is the work of God. God alone must do the saving; man must do the believing (Acts 16:31). Those who are saved have only God to thank; those who are lost have only themselves to blame. God gets all the credit for man's salvation; the unsaved man must take full blame and responsibility for his eternal damnation. The saved person thankfully says, "I'm in heaven because of God!" The lost person must truthfully say, "I'm in hell because of me." His damnation is based, not on God's rejection of him, but upon his rejection of God (Mark 16:16; 2 Thess. 2:10,12; John 5:40).
No one will ever stand before God and say, "I am condemned because God never gave me the gift of faith." No such excuse will ever be uttered. All men are responsible to believe. All men are commanded to believe and to repent (1 John 3:23 and Acts 17:30). God says, "Look unto Me [that's faith!] and be ye saved all the ends of the earth" (Isaiah 45:22). According to 1 Timothy 2:4, God desires ALL MEN to COME unto Himself (and coming to Christ is equated with believing on Him--John 6:35). Men are responsible to believe and to come and to repent. Men are condemned eternally for their failure to do this (John 8:24; 3:18; etc.).
WHAT IS THE "GIFT OF GOD"?
http://www.middletownbiblechurch.org/reformed/godgift.htm
2) everyone is saved since God is just and wouldn't condemn anyone through no fault of his own, i.e. this impossibility of having faith; or,
Answer. Unfortunately, you make assertions, which cannot be support by Scripture. I would recommend that you explore what God’s Word has to say on the subject of our “condemnation”. Since we believe this subject is key to a proper understanding of the entire contents of the Bible, we have included several resource articles and even MS PowerPoint presentations for our readers. Please see the specific article -- OUR HISTORY IN THE FIRST ADAM.
3) Salvation is capricious and the saints are selected by their environment and are thus completely detached from any other possibility.
Answer. Neither God, nor His salvation, are “capricious”. That is simply a false charge. Granted, there is a degree of mystery associated with God's elective purposes. 1 Corinthians 1: 18-31 gives us insight into some of the God's workings in election of "saints". While He has spoken, He has also chosen to limit information on various subjects according to His own wisdom.
Q. We can all be in sin from Adam and still have free will.
An. Unfortunately, your statement is in serious error, if by the term “free” you negate any of the effects of the Fall and our personal inheritance therein. While all possess volition, neither God nor any creature (angelic or mankind) possesses your so-called “free will”. God’s will is subject to His nature and thus is not absolutely "free"—e.g., God cannot act contrary to His essence. By definition, that which is contrary to the will of God is SIN. Likewise, each creature’s volition is inexorably linked to that creature’s essence or nature. Again, I recommend that you become familiar with OUR HISTORY IN THE FIRST AND LAST ADAM.https://withchrist.org/SFW.htm
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