In the most recent The Berean Call Q&A section, someone asks the question:
“In a recent sermon, our pastor said, ‘Free will is not a biblical term.’ Is that true? Please explain.”
Hunt responds with,
Free will to obey or disobey, love or hate, submit or rebel, is not only biblical but essential to man’s relationship to God. He calls us to love, obey, serve, and worship Him and to do so by choice: “Choose you this day whom ye will serve” (Jos 24:15).
i) Notice the type of “Free Will” that Hunt is defending (Think in ancient terms). That’s right. This is the free will concept taught by Pelagius. A free will that is morally neutral, which is no free will at all—a will by definition is not neutral, but moves in a particular direction.
ii) Hunt avoids the real issue though: Yes, there is a choice before us (Hunt would have others believe that Calvinists deny this, which is not true). But the $64,000 question is, what enables us to obey our Lord, and what prevents us from obeying him? The absence of this discussion by Hunt is not by mistake. Hunt’s emphasis on his phantom “free will” does not make room for God’s efficacious grace and freedom.
iii) Hunt makes the same fallacy as Pelagius did by making a leap by assuming that a command to do something implies that the creature has the moral ability to obey.
It is the Father’s will that he use commands for his children to hear his voice. But to assume that all ears have the moral ability to listen is clearly not taught by our Lord, nor Paul.
God’s grace (and absence of grace) demonstrates the absolute dependency on God.
Are those who have stubborn ears responsible then for their actions? Yes:
“Now we know that whatever the law says, it says to those who are under the law, so that every mouth may be silenced and the whole world held accountable to God.”
(Rom 3:19)
“Therefore God has mercy on whom he wants to have mercy, and he hardens whom he wants to harden. One of you will say to me: “Then why does God still blame us? For who resists his will?” But who are you, O man, to talk back to God? “Shall what is formed say to him who formed it, ‘Why did you make me like this?’” Does not the potter have the right to make out of the same lump of clay some pottery for noble purposes and some for common use?”
(Rom 9:18-22)
Hunt continues,
God would not be glorified in any obedience, worship, or love that did not come willingly from the heart.
Notice that Hunt suggests that the “willingly” originates in man. This is a fundamental error of his. Any righteous acts of the creature are enabled by undeserving grace that originates from God.
For why should God be glorified if the willingness is the cause of man?
The unregenrate man cannot choose God because it wills not that desire:
“The mind of sinful man is death, but the mind controlled by the Spirit is life and peace; the sinful mind is hostile to God. It does not submit to God’s law, nor can it do so. ”
(Rom 8:6-7).
Jesus did not come to affirm a free will—but to set it free:
“Jesus replied, “I tell you the truth, everyone who sins is a slave to sin. Now a slave has no permanent place in the family, but a son belongs to it forever. So if the Son sets you free, you will be free indeed.”
(John 8:34-37)
When the person asked Dave Hunt whether “free will” was a Biblical term or concept, did Hunt appeal to the above mentioned words of our Lord Jesus regarding man’s slavery, or Paul’s treatise on the bondage and moral inability to choose God? Nope.
Truly, this is indicative of Hunt’s tradition-encrusted synergism that he is silent on these germane teachings from Christ and Paul.
So what does Hunt appeal to in defending libertarian free will?
He writes,
But that concept [free will] appears 17 times in the Bible! The same meaning is expressed in other words. “Free offerings” is found twice (Ex 36:3; Am 4:5), as is “a voluntary offering” (Lv 7:16). All are to be brought “voluntarily unto the LORD” (Ezk 46:12). The first offering in Leviticus (a pattern for all) was to be brought by the worshiper “of his own voluntary will” (Lv 1:3,4). The many “freewill” offerings were to be given by the individual “willingly with his heart” (Ex 25:2).
Yes, you read that correctly. Hunt makes a catergorical blunder.
He attempts to fuse the category of “Law” and “Metaphysical Human Nature” together. “Free will offerings” is only relative to the Law and does not intend to instruct us into the nature of the will.
This is on the blunderous par when Ergun Caner asserted, “I am not a Calvinist, I am a Baptist.”
That would be like saying, “I am not a Trinitarian, I am an Arminian.” No logical connection.
To respond to “free will offerings” is a desperate attempt to find libertarian “free will” in Scripture.
John Samson posts the following from the comments section of his instructive article on free will.
Concerning the question about “free will offerings” here’s something on this from Vincent Cheung:
Against a statement like, “Nowhere does the Bible say that man has free will,” there are people who answer by saying that the Bible mentions “freewill offerings” in a number of places, and from this observation they assert that the Bible therefore teaches free will or that man has free will. (In the NIV, see: Exodus 35:29, 36:3; Leviticus 7:16, 22:18, 21, 23, 23:38; Numbers 15:3, 29:39; Deuteronomy 12:6, 17, 16:10; 2 Chronicles 31:14; Ezra 1:4, 6, 2:68, 3:5, 7:16, 8:28; Psalms 54:6; Ezekiel 46:12; Amos 4:5.)
This is one of the strangest objections against the denial of free will, and although I have known about it for years, I have never given a written response to it. This is because it is so silly that I feel embarrassed to even mention it, and to take it seriously enough to write about it. Nevertheless, I am occasionally asked about this by Christians who do not know how best to answer the objection, and I have responded in private to them…
The objection seizes upon the common English term, but here ends the similarity between the topic (of divine sovereignty and human freedom) and the verses usually cited. The term is not always rendered “freewill offerings,” but in places where the NIV and NASB offer such a translation, the KJV sometimes says “free offerings,” “voluntary offerings,” and “willing offerings.”
Freedom is relative — you are free from something. We say that man has no free will because in discussing divine sovereignty and human freedom, we are discussing the metaphysical relationship between God and man. To be specific, the question is the manner and extent that God exercises control over man’s thoughts and actions. Thus in such a context, when we ask whether man has free will, we are asking whether man is free from God or from God’s control in any sense. Since the biblical teaching is that God exercises constant and comprehensive control over all of man’s thoughts and actions, the necessary conclusion is that man has no free will. He has zero freedom relative to God.
The “freewill offering” is “free” because the Law does not require it as it does the other regular and occasion offerings, so the freedom is relative to the Law, and the freedom related to this offering exists only in this sense. The people are “free” to give or not give the offering from a legal or ceremonial perspective. These verses do not address the metaphysical perspective, so that they can neither establish nor refute metaphysical human freedom. But when referring to “free will” in the context of divine sovereignty and human freedom, we are talking about whether we are free from God — and this is about metaphysics. We are talking about whether God has complete control over man’s thoughts, actions, and circumstances — he does, and therefore man has no free will, no freedom relative to God. In one instance, we are talking about man’s relationship (of moral obligation) with the Law, in the other, about man’s relationship (of cause and effect) with God. Only the English term happens to be the same, and not even all the time in the English versions, but they are in fact two different subjects of discussion.
There are passages that teach the same relative freedom but do not use the term. Here is one example: “Whiles it remained, was it not thine own? and after it was sold, was it not in thine own power? why hast thou conceived this thing in thine heart? thou hast not lied unto men, but unto God” (Acts 5:4, KJV). When Peter says that the property was “thine own,” and that the money was “in thine own power,” he is referring to property ownership relative to Peter himself and the other Christians — that is, Ananias did not have to sell the property or give the money to them. But this relative ownership or freedom has nothing to do with divine determinism — they are two different subjects. Peter is not saying that Ananias had ownership of the property or money relative to God, but only that he had the right, or the freedom if you must, to withhold the property or the money from other people, and that from a legal or moral perspective, not a metaphysical one. Peter is certainly not saying that Ananias could have kept the property or money from God in a metaphysical sense! But metaphysics is what we are talking about when we discuss divine determinism.
Another verse sometimes cited is Philemon 1:14. In the NASB, it reads, “…but without your consent I did not want to do anything, that your goodness should not be as it were by compulsion, but of your own free will.” Aha! Paul says that Philemon has free will! But this verse is even more obviously irrelevant than the others, since those involved are explicitly mentioned. Paul says that “I” (Paul) did not want to do anything without “your” (Philemon’s) consent. He did not want Philemon to act out of “compulsion,” but this compulsion is relative to Paul, and thus also the so-called “free will.” The freedom is relative to Paul. The verse refers to the social relationship between two creatures, Paul and Philemon, but it says nothing about the metaphysical relationship between God and Philemon.
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