NICHOLS: I love these easy questions on Saturday mornings. So, we can go to John 6 and we can go
to Jesus and the disciples. It certainly looks like Matthew stood up and put down his accounting
ledger and followed after Jesus. And "You did not choose Me, but I chose you." It's very clear.
If you want a nice place to read in Augustine, it's actually at the end of The City of God.
Augustine says, "Let's think about this. Freedom of the will is really not about choice; it's about
being." So, who is the God or who is the being? I just gave the answer. Who is the being with
the most freedom? And it's God. But God can't be not God. And then he says, "When do you have the
most freedom?" And the answer is "When we are in heaven." But in heaven we can't choose to sin. So,
freedom is more about being then it is about choice, and so, a sinner has freedom,
but they're free to be a sinner, and they can't choose God. And so, that will is bound. They are
not able not to sin as Augustine says. And so, we put that positively and they're bound to sin.
And it takes a work of God alone, monergism, (here is the word we use) the work of God alone
to regenerate (so regeneration precedes faith) to regenerate a dead soul, a dead person.
And then on top of that, the faith that that dead person professes is a gift. So, we need to see
that. But there's something about being Americans; we like choice. In fact, I remember seeing an old
Billy Sunday gospel tract, like it was a voting ballot and it had "For" and "Against." And this
is about you. And so, God is one column, and there is a check mark in the "For." So,
God has voted for you. And then it has the devil, and there is a check mark in the "Against" column.
So, Satan has voted against you. But guess who gets to cast the deciding vote? You do.
So, the final column is "You" and a question mark. Are you going to choose God or not choose God?
Well, either Jesus' work on the cross is finished or it's not.
And I think those are some of the issues that we need to think about as we perennially bump
into this freedom of the will question. I think we can think better about it,
and I think we have some biblical texts that can help us do that. As I mentioned, John 6,
I think being exhibit A, among Romans 9 to 11 as well, etc.
GODFREY: On the other hand, and, you know, I agree obviously with everything you said,
Augustine early in his career wrote a little treatise on the freedom of the will,
and in that what he's really arguing is human beings have a will and they make choices.
And, I think, psychologically it's important for us to recognize that reality so people feel free
to choose. But, I think, he goes, if I remember rightly which I may not, he goes on then to
explain how one freely exercises one's will in accordance with one's nature.
So, the will is not self-determining; it acts, it makes choices following its nature. And as long as
our nature is dead in trespasses and sin, all of our willing is going to be following that nature.
So, we don't want to act ... you know, Calvinists are sometimes accused of teaching that human
beings are just automatons or stocks and blocks, as they said in the Canons of Dort. That's
not true. We have wills. We make choices. We're responsible for the will and the choices we make,
but it flows out of our nature. Until our nature is renewed, we never will have real freedom.
you