Many are called but few are chosen- What does free will look like in the Bible

Welcome to episode 249, In the Beginning Was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God, and the Word became flesh and dwelt among us. Spending time in the word of God is the best way to spend time with God. Welcome to No Doubt, No Fear, Only Believe podcast, where we will encourage, inspire, and empower you to live your best life in Christ. Here's Greg.

Welcome to episode 249. Grace to you and peace from God our Father and the Lord Jesus Christ. Well, I am continuing on Many Are Called But Few Are Chosen, and I want to go back to episode 248 where I was talking about God giving man free will. And the whole reason I did that specific episode is to set up this episode, because I believe that if you don't have the right perspective on what your free will means, you're going to give God characteristics in my— and I'm putting air quotes— you're going to put things on God that I don't think God wants to put on him. And I think part of what most people— and I've talked about this in the sovereignty of God, where we talk about God's controlling everything. Now here's the, here's the key or the caveat: I think God could control anything he wants to control, but God spoke his word and his word will not come back void. And God cannot lie. That's one of those characteristics of God, is that he cannot and will not lie. And the whole world is held together by his word. If God was to one day just lie, this whole world would come apart. So that's not ever going to happen. And God— if you go to Genesis 1, God gave man dominion. Now God's the creator, it's God's earth, but he gave man dominion. He made it for you and I. He made this earth for you and I and gave us dominion. Sink or swim, God said, here you go. And I believe that's where most people, you know, they see God as knowing everything. And I'm going to bring a scripture out, or a— actually, it's going to be when King David was running from King Saul And we're gonna see that God doesn't control everything. Now, God sees everything, the end from the beginning, the kingdom of God. That's God's way of doing things. Now, God can see everything that's ever gonna happen. And I believe, and I don't know how all this works, but I think he can see if you take this path, then he's gonna see where you're gonna go on that path. And he sees that if you take this path, what's gonna happen. I don't think God makes you take any path. I think if there's 8 decisions for you to take out there, I think the Bible is clear that he will be a lamp to your feet and a light to your path. Now, if you don't pray and you don't ask God, hey, which path should I take? Or you start looking in your heart and the peace of God that surpasses all understanding, the peace of God, that word is more like an umpire, they're calling balls or strikes. In your spirit man and in your heart, you kind of get, you know, a nervousness or an anxiousness is the best way that I can explain it, is if you aren't— you don't feel that peace of God when you're trying to make a decision, that's maybe the Holy Spirit calling a ball. Don't go that direction, take this direction. And you may not get an unbelievable peace or calm, but one of the decisions— say you just have two paths that you can take— one of them is horrible, you feel horrible about it, and one of them you feel less horrible about it. Well, I would take the less horrible path. So, and that's probably a horrible example. That's horrible like 8 times. But anyway, I want to get back to the sovereignty of God. I need you to see this in the context of God giving man free will. And if he gives us free will, what kind of God would then make us do things? What kind of loving God would say, "Hey, I'm gonna give you free will, but you're gonna do this, and you're gonna do that, and you're gonna go here, and you're gonna go there." And I'm telling you, I've walked through multiple times to my detriment, God kind of putting a stop sign up. And I knew that I probably shouldn't do it. And I don't know if you've ever walked through something like that where you know, "Nah, this don't feel right. I probably shouldn't do this." but I'd do it anyway because I'm not that bright. And I would go through something and know, "Gah, why did I do that?" And I don't know, maybe I'm the only one that makes mistakes like that and walks through stop signs, but I'm just telling you, God is not making you do everything that you do on a daily basis. And I just want you to just kind of get a hold of that and get a handle of that as we read this scripture. All right, the story I'm talking about is in 1 Samuel 28:1-3. 23, and, and David is running from Saul, and he saves a city called Keilah. I believe that's the pronunciation, because from the Philistines. And we're going to pick it up in verse 1, 1 Samuel 23:1. Then they told David, saying, look, the Philistines are fighting against Keilah, and they are robbing the threshing floors. Therefore David inquired of the Lord, saying, shall I go and attack these Philistines? And the Lord said to David, Go and attack the Philistines, and save Keilah. But David's men said to him, Look, we are afraid here in Judah; how much more if we go to Keilah against the armies of the Philistines? Then David inquired of the Lord once again, and the Lord answered him and said, Arise, go to Keilah, for I will deliver the Philistines into your hand. And David and his men went to Keilah, and fought with the Philistines, struck them with a mighty blow, and took away their livestock. So David saved the inhabitants of Keilah. Now it happened when Abiathar the son of Ahimelech fled to David at Keilah, that he went down with an ephod in his hand. And Saul was told that David had gone to Keilah. So Saul said, God has delivered him into my hand, for he has shut himself in by entering a town that has gates and bars. Then Saul called all the people together for war, to go down to Keilah to besiege David and his men. 2 When David knew that Saul plotted evil against him, he said to Abiathar the priest, "Bring the ephod here." 3 Then David said, "O Lord God of Israel, your servant has certainly heard that Saul seeks to come to Keilah to destroy the city for my sake. Will the men of Keilah deliver me into his hand? Will Saul come down as your servant has heard? O Lord God of Israel, I pray, tell your servant And the Lord said, he will come down. Then David said, will the men of Keilah deliver me and my men into the hand of Saul? And the Lord said, they will deliver you. So David and his men, about 600, arose and departed from Keilah and went wherever they could go. Then it was told Saul that David had escaped from Keilah, so he halted the expedition. Now I know that's a lot of reading. If you followed me, you know I have superior reading skills. It's not a big deal, and it's okay because this is a Bible podcast, so we got to get the Bible. I want to paint the picture with this backdrop that God controls everything, and I want you to picture what's going on here. David was told to go save Kyla, and he goes and saves Kyla. Now, if God told him to go and save Kyla, don't you think if God was controlling everything that he would just make it so it was unicorns and rainbows and sunshine everywhere that David went. God knows there are evil people or evil spirits. God knows that he does not control everything, so he lights paths for you and I to take. And I just want you to picture this: if you're thinking God's controlling everything, then you're going to blame God for when bad things happen, and we got to blame Satan. Comes to steal, to kill, and destroy. Jesus said, "I have come that you may have life and have it more abundantly." That's John 10:10. You're gonna have more abundant life if you follow Jesus, but that doesn't mean— there's multiple times in multiple places in the Bible that we're gonna have all of these blessings with persecutions. Life is hard, and I'm not here to tell you that it's gonna get easy just 'cause you're a Christian, but I'm here to tell you that God will light your path and he will allow you to know which one to take. And that is why we're here. But God does not control everything. Now again, when we're talking about sovereignty of God, when, when I say the word sovereign, I mean answering to no one. God can do and will do whatever he pleases, but he's not going to go against his word. It's just not going to happen. He is watching over his word to make the word come to pass. That's why you can just take comfort when you read something in the word and you read something that says, ooh, you're going to be blessed if you do this. Know that if you do that, you're going to be blessed. God's word will not come back void. But I want you to think about David, and he's asking, hey, are these men going to turn me over? God can see the end from the beginning, and he says, yes, they will. Is Saul going to come and beseech this town. Yes, he's coming. So God sees Saul, he sees David, he knows the men of Keilah, and he knows when they're besieged and Saul and all his armies are besieging this town, then David's going to be shut in and the men are going to turn David over. So what happens? David uses his free will and his 600 men that just saved this town, knowing what he knows, inquiring from God, and he used his free will to get out of town. Now, if he decided and said, you know, God's going to protect me, God's sovereign, I'm just going to stay here and see what happens— God told him what was going to happen. I believe that if David would have stayed there, that somehow, I don't know how God would have made it happen, but he would have maybe had Jonathan help him escape or whatever. God didn't have to do anything supernatural, didn't have to send an angel. Because David didn't use his common sense and his free will. And that's the whole point, is, is we're gonna— in the next episode, we're gonna talk about why many and few, why it is you, why it's gonna be held to your standard, what you determine, how you are gonna live your life. And I just want you to think about this. I want you to meditate. I want you to go and read 1 Samuel 23 for yourself. And just kind of think about if God was totally controlling everything, the sovereignty of God that's taught by some people that God controls everything, I just think that's such a lazy doctrine. I, and I'm sorry if that's how you've made your whole life based on God's in control and he controls everything. I think there's so much more freedom, so much more peace that God, he answers to no one. Father God, Jesus, the Holy Spirit. When you see demons, they bow, they, they run. They are not answering to anybody, anything. They are in total control, but they are bound by the word of God. That's why— soapbox moment, it took me a long time to get here— you need to know what this word says, and you need to understand it, and you need to ask the Holy Spirit for wisdom and how to open this up. And don't take what people say just because it's a doctrine and just because they've been talking about it for hundreds of years. They could be wrong for hundreds of years. Get with the Holy Spirit and get in this Bible and you dig it out for yourself. And that's all I'm going to say on this episode on that. I believe David had free will, and I think this shows in my common sense— and I'm putting air quotes up again— David could have stayed there. He used common sense, he used the ephod, and he asked and inquired of the Lord, and the Lord spoke and said, yes, they're going to come, and yes, they're going to turn you over. And with that knowledge, David used his free will and got his men out. I don't think it can be any simpler when you look at that and you look at God from— and when we put God up Remember, God is love. God is patient. God is kind. God is good. All of those fruits of the Spirit, that is God. So when we look at God from a standpoint of being good, we need to— even when we see something that don't look in the Bible like, "Ooh, I don't know about that," just you got to remember that God is good and there's a reason. We may not know it until we get to heaven, but there's a reason that all of these things happened. So I'm going to stop there. I looked up and saw the clock. I, I hope this is kind of taking root. I just want— when I'm starting to talk about one thing, this is a big topic, many are called and few are chosen. I think what I'm trying to combat is the fact that God has picked and chosen people that are going to hell. I don't read that from a loving God. I don't read that. Now, I do believe that God knows who is not going to make heaven. I do believe that. That's got to break his heart. I can't imagine to know everything and then the loving God to allow them to continue to live like hell. That's amazing. I— and, and it's incredible. Anyway, I'm not going to chase that rabbit. God, I thank you so much for your word. God, I thank you for this listener. I pray in Jesus' name, if there's anything that I have said that would cause them to be confused or would hurt their understanding of this word. God, help clean that up. And Holy Spirit, get them to a place where you want them. God, it's all about this listener, and it's all about you getting the glory, and it's all about them being in your word. God, we thank you, we love you. We ask it all in Jesus' name. Amen. Well, thank you for being a part of this, and I look forward to visiting with you in the next episode.

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