We have many good conversations about predestination. But we seldom define the degree to which predestination affects the universe and all.
At the least it appears many think God imagined the universe before he created it. Let it run its own course without his intervention. And then created what he saw. Making it unchangeable and therefore predestined to happen just as he foresaw it.
Another view, the most extreme says: God created all, including every thought and act of every creature in the universe when he created the universe. That not a grain of sand on the furthest planet shifts position without God who also created its path and movements in the appointed time.
Both extremes depend on God’s perfect knowledge. If God only energizes but doesn’t control all, he then must watch and learn what might or might not happen. And this would mean he is not all knowing as the bible says.
Other theories emerge but the Westminster Confession Chapter 3:1; God's Eternal Decree defines biblical predestination this way.
1. God, from all eternity, did—by the most wise and holy counsel of his own will—freely and unchangeably ordain whatever comes to pass. Yet he ordered all things in such a way that he is not the author of sin, nor does he force his creatures to act against their wills; neither is the liberty or contingency of second causes taken away, but rather established.
So as I understand, we freely choose for the reasons God created with us, to base our choices on. As we meet up with them at the right time in life.
This resolves free will and divine sovereignty.
While studying systematic theology on this subject, it came to my attention that the notion of supralapsarianism maintains a contradictory position with itself. It ascribes to God both a perfect and imperfect knowledge of events, in one case setting God outside of time so that he knows all things perfectly, but within the linear chronology when it comes time to disparage the idea of free will, arguing that God would have to know every possible choice and result, which, it is implied, he cannot.
Absolutely predestination, or preordination,
vis a vis the Divine Decree, at least as it is understood by the extreme position, relegates all free will to the realm of illusion. We only
think we have free will, though our free will choices are, in actual fact, the preordained choices God orchestrated for us to make. And then, when that chain of logic leads to the inevitable conclusion that preordained choices and actions ultimately excuse the choices that we didn't actually make (as they were preordained; they were our destiny, if you will), and that God is actually responsible for the sins we commit, we suddenly end up with disclaimers as shown in the quote given from the Westminster Confession: "God, from all eternity, did [...] freely and unchangeably ordain whatever comes to pass. Yet he ordered all things in such a way that he is not the author of sin, nor does he force his creatures to act against their wills." So it happens because he wills it to happen. But even though he makes it happen, it's our fault when we do what he has forced us to do. And even though he forces our choices and actions, he's not forcing our choices and actions.
We have the free will to do exactly as what he has preordained that we should do. You can take any path you choose, as long as it's the one he has chosen for you.
The conclusion I have come to is that what God predestined is the end result, whether reward or punishment. And nowhere, in my opinion, is this more conspicuous than in the garden itself, which has given rise to so much discussion over the centuries concerning whether God wanted man to fall, caused man to fall, whether man was responsible for the fall, or whether God had some responsibility due to preordination, etc., etc., etc.
What I found after careful consideration is that God's will was that man should choose for himself if he fell or not. At the same time, God, having declared the end from the beginning, being himself outside of time, knew the choice man would make. When man
made that choice, God's will was accomplished. And it was precisely due to his knowledge of what our choice would be that the Lamb was slain from the foundations of the earth.
Similarly, God, declaring the end from the beginning, being outside of time, knows each and every person who will answer his call. Knowing those who are his, and those who are not ... knowing who will repent, and who are never to be retrieved, God has fashioned some of us to be vessels of wrath and some not. Some are predestined to salvation, because that is the destiny of those whom he knew would answer the call. Others are predestined to destruction, because that is the destiny of those whom he knew would
not answer the call.
In my view, all other explanations show God to be tyrannical, hateful, spiteful, a respecter of persons, etc., deciding who will be saved and who will not, making us sin through choices we can't control, but then blaming us for the deeds, allowing some to have faith, but others to reject it. The list goes on.
The only solution I could ever find is that God willed that we should have the free will to make our own choices, and to suffer the consequences, for good or ill. And knowing the choices, he planned accordingly, providing a means of redemption for those who would hear the shepherd's voice.
Romans 8:28-30 — And we know that all things work together for good to them that love God, to them who are the called according to
his purpose. For whom he did foreknow, he also did predestinate
to be conformed to the image of his Son, that he might be the firstborn among many brethren. Moreover whom he did predestinate, them he also called: and whom he called, them he also justified: and whom he justified, them he also glorified.
Those are my thoughts on the subject.
