Christians today, myself included, talk about “free will” as if it were the first article in some spiritual Bill of Rights, a document protecting sinners from unwarranted interference in their lives. But the Bible doesn’t speak in terms of man’s freedom from God. Instead, Scripture describes man’s will as fallen, not free. It is in bondage to sin. None are righteous and no unregenerate man seeks after God. Left to his own devices, sinful man will never choose God’s salvation because he is at enmity with Christ and the Father who sent Him.
The only freedom is the freedom of obedience to God’s commandments, which is only possible following the regeneration of the Holy Spirit. The work of salvation was foreordained before the founding of the world and finished at the cross. In one sense, you were saved before you were born. You chose Christ because He first chose you. How else can you account for the fact that some repent and believe while others remain hard and unrepentant? Is it merit that frees one man to choose Christ while another continues on the path to destruction? Scripture says it is grace—i.e., God’s mercy.
Foreknowledge
In Romans 8, Paul tells us that “whom he [God] 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.” This is a problem passage if you’re arguing for man’s freedom from God. Paul places justification in the middle of a chain of events, each of which is attributed to God’s agency. And the chain begins before the foundation of the world with God’s foreknowledge.
Some people interp ...