Fatalism or Free Will?

I believe God gives us “free will,” allowing us to choose many of the paths we take.

For centuries, Christians have debated extreme “predestination” versus “free will.”

A story goes that an older Christian believed all that happened in his life was “predestined” or “meant to be.” He rose from bed one morning, walked to his home’s staircase and fell down a long flight of steps. Hurting, he got up, looked at the staircase and said, “I’m glad that’s over."

Non-Christians also talk about “destiny.” Someone said destiny may be seen either as a fixed sequence of events that is inevitable or that an individual chooses his destiny by selecting various paths throughout his life.

I’ve heard of soldiers who say a man won’t die in battle until a “bullet has his name on it” or “until his number is up.”

Here is an old Arab tale about “destiny”:

A merchant sent his servant to market. The servant returned trembling and said, “Master, just now in the crowded marketplace I was jostled by someone, and I turned and saw it was Death that jostled me. Death looked at me and made a threatening gesture. Please, lend me your horse, and I will ride away from this city and avoid my fate. I will go to Damascus and there Death will not find me.”

The merchant lent him a horse, and the servant rode as fast as the horse could gallop. The merchant then went to the marketplace, saw Death standing in the crowd and said, “Why did you make a threatening gesture to my servant when you saw him this morning?”

“That was not a threatening gesture,” Death said. “It was only a start of surprise. I was astonished to see him here, for I have an appointment with him tonight in Damascus.”

As a child in 1956, I heard the song “Que Sera, Sera,” meaning (in French and in several “romance languages”) “Whatever Will Be, Will Be.” Singer Doris Day first recorded these lyrics to that song’s first verse:

“When I was just a little girl / I asked my mother what will I be / Will I be pretty, will I be rich / Here’s what she said to me / (chorus): Que sera, sera / Whatever will be, will be / The future’s not ours to see / Que sera, sera / What will be will be.”

The lilting melody of “Que Sera, Sera” seemed comforting to me in 1956. That song’s message seemed to be “Relax; many things – maybe all things – are beyond your control.” While some people may find solace in that song, there is also an inherent fatalism in its message.

French novelist Alphonse Karr (1808-90) is credited with saying, “The more things change, the more they stay the same.” Karr’s quote seems to convey that the more we change things, the more we tend to live out patterns that do not change. There seems to be a bit of “rearranging the chairs on the Titanic” flavor in that quotation.

In the words of the Westminster Confession of Faith (1643), God “freely and unchangeably ordained whatsoever comes to pass.”

Someone asked me, “If God knows who will be saved and who won’t, how do people have ‘free will’ to choose their destinies?”

That’s a hard question, but I believe God’s foreknowledge of how things will turn out does not exclude the free will he gives to each of us. We can only partially understand the “mind of God” – “his ways are higher than our ways” – so we trust the character of God, who is good, loving, just and merciful.

The Lord is longsuffering (patient), “not willing that any should perish, but that all should come to repentance” (2 Peter 3:9).

Christians differ over how much control each person has over his own life. Someone said that if human responsibility is overemphasized, Christianity turns into legalism, without an appreciation for God’s power acting in lives. If God’s responsibility is overemphasized, Christianity turns into fatalism, losing the emphasis on obedience to God and service to others.

I believe God gives us “free will.” Let’s decide to follow Christ, block out worldly, fatalistic thoughts and make daily God-honoring choices.

“But if serving the Lord seems undesirable to you, then choose for yourselves this day whom you will serve...But as for me and my household, we will serve the Lord" (Joshua 24:15 (NIV).