See, I can't resist answering you. :-)
So when God tells humankind "Chose this day who you will serve," he is really a liar?
But let us consider the passages proposed to "prove" human free-will. First we have the words of Moses to Israel (Deut.30:19):
"I call to testify against you today the heavens and the earth. Life and death do I put before you, the blessing and the slighting. And you choose in life that you may live, you and your seed."
Israel Chose Jehovah with their Lips yet they Rejected Him
in their Hearts We have all made the false inference that, when God gave Israel the law, He expected them to keep it. On the contrary, He intended them to break it, for by the law is the recognition of sin (Rom. 3:20). So we are tempted to think that, if God puts before men a choice, they must be free to accept or reject. We simply cannot realize that He is God, and He wishes to bless men, not by choosing right, but by choosing wrong. In this case there cannot be the slightest question that the choice was not free, for the previous verses (Deut.30:17,18), distinctly state that they would choose wrong in their hearts, no matter how they talked with their lips.
The same thought is emphasized in the next citation (Joshua 24:15):"And should it be evil in your eyes to serve Jehovah, choose for yourselves today whom you will serve."
But we must not take a single verse without its context. Of course the people chose to serve Jehovah -- with their lips. Joshua knew their hearts, so he said to them, "You cannot serve Jehovah ..." (19). Then, later, "You are witnesses against yourselves that you have chosen for yourselves Jehovah, to serve Him" (22). Here we have the man of God who tells them plainly that they will not do what they "choose." The people, in ignorance of their own hearts, think they "choose." As a matter of fact everyone seeks to deceive himself by "choosing" what is contrary to his real heart, in order to cloak its evil with a religious robe. Here, as elsewhere, God is locking them up to stubbornness, as the events so sadly proved.
Probably another waste of time, but... |
