God's Timeline

By: Michael Flournoy

I had an unusual experience this past month. A couple of times a week I watch some kids at an after school program and one night I dreamt I was there and I happened to look out the window only to see a terrible storm brewing. I ran outside and there were tornados everywhere, they were not moving and none of them had a bottom tip. I went to the after school program the day after having this dream, only to find out that the children were preparing to put on the play “The Wizard of Oz” and what was their activity for the day? Painting a tornado. What was more, the paper twister had no bottom tip. Shortly after this incident I read a blog from an acquaintance in which he expressed having a similar experience, only he dreamt of a conversation he would end up hearing word for word the next day.

Reading his story reminded me of my own and I wondered how the future could possibly be seen. I remembered that with divine help, many prophets in the Bible had seen far beyond one day, prophesying in some cases of future events thousands of years away. In a way, it’s exciting to think that God can allow someone to see ahead in time, but at the same time it’s terrifying: especially with my strong views in support of free will. The first Evangelical Christians I encountered were strong Calvinists, who believed the future was every bit as unchangeable as the past. They believed God knew everything which would happen, and that humans were powerless to go against it. I had always thought to some degree that since people have freedom to choose, there could be no certain future, only a vast sea of possibilities. So what of the gift of prophecy, does it disprove the notion of free agency?

As a Latter-day Saint I have been raised to reject all 5 points of Calvinism. Our most vital doctrines hinge on free agency, since we believe Christ died for all men and it is up to us whether or not to accept his sacrifice. We also believe one of the greatest gifts God has given us is our freedom to choose. Certainly, there is a lot of good that gets thrown out by the Calvinist view. If there is predestination, then there are no true chances, no risks, no choices, no freedom, no liberty, and no hope. All those who are doomed for damnation cannot break free of their bondage, and those who are elected for grace are equally enslaved in that they cannot change their fate.

While contemplating how free agency can coexist with a known future, whether known by man or God, I had a few inspirational thoughts.

1. God knows us. Not only did he create us, His children, but we lived with him in the pre-mortal existence (see Ecclesiastes 12:7). Does a parent not know how his children will react to different situations, and wouldn’t a parent who’s omniscient? In Genesis 18:18 the Lord foretells that Abraham will become a great nation and bless all other nations. Then in verse 19 God says, “For I know him, that he will command his children and his household after him, and they shall keep the way of the Lord, to do justice and judgment; that the Lord may bring upon Abraham that which he hath spoken of him.” God’s knowledge about Abraham’s future generations apparently did not come from an ability to see an unalterable timeline, but because God knew Abraham and of the benefit to instruction within a family.

2. God has a great plan. I cannot tell you what will happen tomorrow, I am no seer or prophet, but I do have a plan. Tomorrow I’m supposed to work both of my jobs all day. Without the gift of prophecy I could describe exactly what I’m going to do at work and how I would respond to certain conversations and circumstances. And God knows us even better than we know ourselves! He knows everyone’s life goals, intents, and abilities. He has a plan too, concerning the immortality and eternal life of man, and he has dictated when we would come to earth and with whom we would share it. As the apostle James once said, “Known unto God are all his works from the beginning of the world.” For these reasons, it is perfectly logical to suppose God’s plans will succeed.

3. God in omnipotent. He has the power to ensure that all his purposes are fulfilled, even despite our freedom to choose. Jonah for instance, chose to flee when God commanded him to preach at Ninevah, but the Lord prepared a great whale to swallow him up and bring him there nonetheless. Lot tarried at Sodom when he had been commanded to flee, and the angels took him and his family out. The Lord even told the prophet Joseph Smith that if he was unrighteous he would replace him, revealing that free agency does exist, but it cannot slow down the work of God.

The Bible is full of evidence that free will exists. To Cain God said, “If thou doest well shalt thou not be accepted? But if thou doest not well, sin lieth at the door, and unto thee shall be his desire, and thou shalt rule over him.” When teaching in the synagogue Christ said, “The Spirit of the Lord is upon me, because he hath anointed me to preach the gospel to the poor; he hath sent me to heal the broken hearted, to preach deliverance to the captives, and recovering of sight to the blind, to set at liberty them that are bruised, to preach the acceptable year of the Lord.” I believe that Christ was truly sent to deliver the captives and set us at liberty, rather than deliver us from one bondage to another.

At times free-will is dismissed from the Christian community, because according to our depraved human logic God cannot know everything if we can do anything. But I testify of a God who is more glorious than that, one who knows every possibility and what to do in every instance to ensure his wonderful work progresses. He loves us enough to set us at liberty, true liberty, where every knee shall bow before him; not because every knee is forced to, but because every knee chooses to. Finally, Nephi in The Book of Mormon proclaims, “Wherefore, men are free according to the flesh; and all things are given them which are expedient unto men. And they are free to choose liberty and eternal life, through the great Mediator of all men, or to choose captivity and death, according to the power and captivity of the devil; for he seeketh that all men might be miserable like unto himself. (2 Nephi 2:27).”