The Future Is Whatever You Make It. (and other half-truths.)

The classic movie, Back To The Future III ends with this advice from “doc” the professor, “The future is whatever you make it. So make it a good one!” And endless commencement speeches end with similar sentiments. It sounds so American, so entrepreneurial, but is it biblical?

"In him we were also chosen, having been predestined according to the plan of him who works out everything in conformity with the purpose of his will, in order that we, who were the first to put our hope in Christ, might be for the praise of his glory. And you also were included in Christ when you heard the message of truth, the gospel of your salvation. When you believed, you were marked in him with a seal, the promised Holy Spirit" Ephesians 1:11-13

"For we are God’s handiwork, created in Christ Jesus to do good works, which God prepared in advance for us to do." Ephesians 2:10

Calvinists lean on heavily on these verses and others to prove the doctrine of “election,” that God is the one who chooses who will be saved and who will not. That’s a discussion for another blog. However, even if Calvin was right these verses also talk about God’s role in the life of every believer. What are these verses telling us about who makes our future in this life?  

1. Does God have a plan for every event of our life and is he working that plan out the way he wants and there’s not a single thing we can do to mess it up, or change it? (There’s an old joke about a Calvinist who fell down a long stairway. He picked himself up slowly and thought to himself, “I’m glad that’s over.”) Does God plan every aspect of our lives from what we eat to the accidents we have? 

2. Or, does God have a general idea of how he wants our lives to turn out but it’s up to us to make the future?

3. Or, is God actively orchestrating people and events in our lives in combination with us exercising our own free will?

None are completely true, but I believe the last statement comes closest to discribing how God’s will and our’s mesh to accomplish God’s plan for our life on earth.

I’ve had lots of people ask me if God has a will for their life. “Yes, he does,” I answer confidently. “He wants you to love him more than anything, or anyone else, love others more than you love yourself and to obey everything Jesus has commanded his followers to do.” But that’s not what they want to hear. 

What they really want to know is this; “Does God have a “script” for my life, and if he does can I get a peek at it ahead of time so that I can know what is coming and therefore be in and stay in his perfect will?” “Maybe, and no you cannot.” I answer. So what do I mean by that seemingly confusing answer? Theologians generally agree that the Bible speaks of at least two ways we should think of God’s will.

1. God’s Sovereign Will

There are certain things God wants accomplished that he will make sure get done regardless of any decisions made by humans or Satan. In other words, there is no force on earth or heaven that can prevent his sovereign will from being accomplished. Examples; Israel's exodus from Egypt, David’s kingship, Solomon’s temple being build, Christ’s sacrifice on the cross, his resurrection and his future return. However it could and likely does include thousands, perhaps millions of other things from the fate of nations, to our personal salvation, or even who we might marry, the children we have and our ministries and vocations.

But unless God has declared his sovereign will in the Bible I’m not sure Christians can know with certainty whether what happens to them is the result of his sovereign will, or our “permissive will,” 

2. God’s Permissive Will

God, primarily through scripture has instructed humans how he wants us to live in relationship with him, each other and with his created world. Unlike God’s sovereign will which cannot be thwarted, God in his sovereignty chose to give humans free-will which means he “permits” us to obey, or disobey him. Now here’s the tricky part; the Bible makes clear that God occasionally over-rides our free will in order to accomplish his sovereign will.

For instance, Pharaoh had free will but the Bible says, “God hardened Pharaoh’s heart.”  Judas possessed free will, but God had appointed him to betray Jesus. On the other hand God chose Saul to be the first king of Israel, but Saul chose by his free will to disobey God. And God may be doing similar things in your life and mine. He may be orchestrating things in your life by over-riding a bad decision you were about to make, or causing other people to make choices that affect you either for your good, or for the benefit of the Kingdom of God. So while humans have free-will, God does not always allow us the exercise it.

I run into people all the time who believe God chose their spouse for them. That’s completely possible, but there’s no way we can know that with certainty. I’m not aware of anything in the Bible that teaches that, other than a few stories like when God apparently led Abraham’s servant to find Rebekah for Isaac. Here’s what we can know; God describes in Scripture his general requirements for the kind of person believers ought to marry. They should love God, love their spouse more than they love themselves and be committed to life-long marriage to someone of the opposite sex. If that’s “God’s will” for marriage, there might be 100 million men a spiritual woman could marry and still be in the will of God. 

So, here’s the larger point I want to make. We are not responsible for our future. God is. We are only responsible for our behavior. Does our behavior affect the future? Of course. But it is God and God alone who ultimately orchestrates our lives to accomplish his will. And may God forgive us when we embarrass him, or grieve the Holy Spirit by our sinful, or negligent behavior.

So, my counsel is this: Study Scripture so devoutly and commit yourself to obeying it faithfully so that regardless of what happens in your life you can be confident you are living out the will of God. And don’t worry about the future. That’s God’s business.