How involved is God?

[AncientPaths]

Originally Posted by Nitehawk013

I am an Open Theist for the most part, my good friend continually leans more towards Calvinistic Predestination. We argue about this issue quite often. I think God is sovereign and could control every aspect of our life, but that such would render "free will" a fairy tale. He thinks God absolutely writes our every path and decision, yet we are allowed "free will" to operate within what God has already predestined for us.

In the end, I think God has a plan for us, and that if we will surrender to His will He will lead us in it. If we refuse to follow His will, we have the freedom to do so. Our lives IMO are not some script where no matter what we do, we have to arrive at some predestined outcome. We choose what we will do and where we will end up. God knows everything we oculd do, and every possible outcome of every possibel choice we could make, and I believe He nudges us in the right direction. I don't believe He controls our actions or "knows" exactly what choices we will make however.

Since God is already at the end of all things, and knws how it will turn out, if He "knows' our every decision...then there is no way to change them. That means that from the very beginning we have in actuality had no real choice but to dfo what we have already done. It was already "written". If this is true, then we have not had freedom, "free will", to do anything. It was already determined what we would do before we were even a thought in our parents heads.

I prefer the Open Theist view. I could be dead wrong in the end thogh and I admit that. It isn't salvific in nature.

This is pretty much where I stand. To the original question, I believe it's more like #2, but with heavy doses of direct involvement.