Free Will and Sovereignty: Responding to a Facebook Analogy

A friend of mine on Facebook posted a conundrum that had been shared with him (note: he disagreed with what the original poster was trying to imply, but was interested in my opinion too).  The post was simple: 

There are no tracks. There are no people. There is no trolley.

The Conductor lays the tracks, builds the trolley, and creates six androids.

He ties five of the androids to one track and one to other.

He drives the trolley and runs over the five.

He unties to sixth and says "I saved you from being run over!"

The sixth one is grateful, as he was programmed to be.

(Calvinist trolley problem)

Of course, my first reaction to this was “Great, another tired puppet metaphor dragged out by those who don’t understand anything about Calvinism.”  And it’s true.  Calvinists have been hearing variations of this for centuries.  It’s nothing but an analogy absent an argument, all intended to make you ignore what the Bible has actually said.

Furthermore, the above analogy does not represent Calvinist beliefs at all.  Calvinism does not argue that men are puppets, robots, androids, or marionettes, because the Bible does not say that.  Calvinists do say that God is sovereign over all things, because the Bible does say that.  Calvinists also typically are compatibilists (I know I am, as are most Calvinists I dialogue with), which means that we stipulate that there is compatibility between sovereignty and free will—again, because that’s what the Bible says.

Now it would be trivially easy to respond to the Arminian with another analogy.  Just take the fact that Colossians 1:16 - 17 tells us that “all things were created through” Christ, and furthermore that in Him “all things hold together.”  With that in mind: 

There are no tracks.  There are no people.  There is no trolley.

The Conductor lays the tracks, builds the trolley, and creates the people, giving them Libertarian Free Will.

One person the Conductor is holding together gets onto the trolley that the Conductor is holding together and runs it over the rails that the Conductor is holding together and runs over the other five that the Conductor is...um...no longer holding together.

The sixth one is happy that his will was not challenged.

(Arminian trolley problem)

So much for the persuasive power of analogies.  But again, that would just be an analogy minus an argument and I would never leave it at that.

The fact of the matter is that if we can show just one occurrence of God overriding the freedom of an individual without there being any moral qualms, then Libertarian Free Will has no leg to stand on.  So let me show two just from the book of Genesis. 

Look at Genesis 20, specifically verses 3-6, when Abraham lied about Sarah saying she wasn’t his wife but his sister so Abimelech took her to be his wife: 

But God came to Abimelech in a dream by night and said to him, “Behold, you are a dead man because of the woman whom you have taken, for she is a man's wife.” Now Abimelech had not approached her. So he said, “Lord, will you kill an innocent people? Did he not himself say to me, ‘She is my sister’? And she herself said, ‘He is my brother.’ In the integrity of my heart and the innocence of my hands I have done this.” Then God said to him in the dream, “Yes, I know that you have done this in the integrity of your heart, and it was I who kept you from sinning against me. Therefore I did not let you touch her.”

Notice that Abimelech’s actions are described as being from “the integrity of my heart and the innocence of my hands.”  And furthermore, God concurred by saying “Yes, I know that you have done this in the integrity of your heart.”  This is Abimelech’s genuine mental disposition, his genuine decision—this is what he chose to do.  And yet: “It was I who kept you from sinning against me” says the LORD.  “Therefore I did not let you touch her.”

God did not let Abimelech touch Sarah.  Yet Abimelech also says he did not touch her from his own integrity, and God agreed with that assessment.  Libertarian Free Will can make no sense of this statement without concluding God is simply lying.

And what of the second illustration? Later on we read Joseph’s own declaration that he was sold into slavery because of the evil of his brothers, and yet also because God intended it.  “As for you, you meant evil against me, but God meant it for good, to bring it about that many people should be kept alive, as they are today” (Genesis 50:20).

Even as clear as that statement is, there is a lot packed into it that may be unobserved.  Consider what “it” was in the statement “God meant it for good.”  This is Joseph’s being sold into slavery.  Why did the brothers hate Joseph enough to sell him into slavery?  Genesis 37 tells us that too.  Joseph had a dream that his father and brothers would bow down to him, and Genesis 37:19 tells us what they had in mind: “Here comes this dreamer.”

And we know the rest of the story: The brothers sold him into slavery, and he was brought to Egypt.  Joseph worked for Potipher.  His wife then claimed Joseph had attacked her, and Joseph was thrown into jail.  And then, Joseph interpreted the dreams for two criminals, one who was killed and the other who was restored.  Then Pharaoh had dreams and the cup-bearer who was restored told him about Joseph.  And Joseph interpreted those dreams, such that when the famine came they had plenty of food, so that Joseph’s father and brothers were forced to visit Egypt and, seeing Joseph but not recognizing him, they bowed down to him exactly as Joseph’s original dream had foretold.

But wait, there’s even more.  Why was the famine coming?  When Pharaoh had his dream, he had two dreams.  Joseph interprets it by saying: “God has revealed to Pharaoh what he is about to do. … God has shown to Pharaoh what he is about to do. …And the doubling of Pharaoh’s dream means that the thing is fixed by God, and God will shortly bring it about” (Genesis 41:25, 28, 32).

The famine itself is something that God did.  It is not a random famine that came out of nowhere.  It was God’s intention to bring about a famine.

One could obviously ask the question, then: if God sent it, then He was in control the whole time. He could decide who it would affect, when, and why. So, why did God go through the rather convoluted process of giving Joseph dreams that would cause his brothers to hate him so much that they would sell him into slavery where he would then be falsely accused of attempted rape and thrown in jail, so that he would be in the place where two officials of Egypt would be sent in order for Joseph to interpret their dreams, so that years later when Pharaoh had a dream Joseph would be brought out of prison, become the second in command of Egypt, save countless people, and finally to have his brothers and father bow down to him just as his dream had predicted at the very beginning?  I mean, have you thought about this yet?  If any single one of those items doesn't go exactly as it did, the whole thing collapses.

Yet even given all that, Joseph concludes that while his brothers meant it for evil, God meant it for good.  His brothers still intended evil—they chose to do evil.  And they knew it.  For instance, before this we read:

Then they said to one another, “In truth we are guilty concerning our brother, in that we saw the distress of his soul, when he begged us and we did not listen. That is why this distress has come upon us.” And Reuben answered them, “Did I not tell you not to sin against the boy? But you did not listen. So now there comes a reckoning for his blood.” They did not know that Joseph understood them, for there was an interpreter between them (Genesis 42:21-23).

They admit they are guilty of what they did, and Reuben goes so far as to acknowledge what they did was a sin.  They knew they were responsible for all they had done and yet Joseph would still say: 

And now do not be distressed or angry with yourselves because you sold me here, for God sent me before you to preserve life. For the famine has been in the land these two years, and there are yet five years in which there will be neither plowing nor harvest. And God sent me before you to preserve for you a remnant on earth, and to keep alive for you many survivors. So it was not you who sent me here, but God. He has made me a father to Pharaoh, and lord of all his house and ruler over all the land of Egypt (Genesis 45:5-8).

What they did in sending Joseph to Egypt was evil; yet God sent him to Egypt.  “It was not you who sent me here, but God.”  How is this possible if Libertarian Free Will is correct?  But it makes perfect sense if one is a compatibilist and recognizes that men are morally responsible for their choices even when God is sovereign over them.

The passages could be increased exponentially throughout the rest of the Bible too, from the hardening of Pharaoh’s heart to God’s actions during the trials of Job, to the statements of Paul outright saying in Romans 9:16 “So then it depends not on human will or exertion, but on God, who has mercy” illustrating that with the previously mentioned example of Pharaoh too.  The Bible is consistent and clear throughout that God is sovereign and does as He pleases even in circumstances where those who God uses for His own good purposes face moral judgment for the evil they have committed.

You might not like that that’s what the Bible says, but you’re not going to overturn those clear passages with a simplistic, inaccurate analogy.