When it comes to the relationship between God’s will and human will we are diving into a profound mystery that cannot be fully understood. The question cannot be completely answered because it is not clearly answered in Scripture. In order to answer this question we would have to understand how God’s will operates inside the depths of God which we cannot do because God’s nature is so far beyond our nature. We would also have to understand the details of how God relates to time and the nature of time itself. We cannot do this either. Even human will is a mystery to us. Considering how much we don’t know is it really possible to make assertions on this matter that are not clearly stated in Scripture? If we venture beyond Scripture, then we will find ourselves clinging to shaky speculations.
What we can do is embrace what God has told us about the relationship between God’s will and human will. We know that we “have been chosen according to the foreknowledge of God” (1 Pet. 1:2, NIV) and that” those he foreknew he also predestined” to be like Christ (Rom. 8:29, NIV). Reviewing Scripture in general, we also know that God does not want humans to be puppets. He created them in his image and they have great dignity even before their new birth in Christ. He consistently directs people in Scripture to make good choices and some do and some don’t. We are not following a script for every decision in our life, written by God ahead of time.
We honor all these truths whether or not we understand the details about how they fit together. We do not reject anything just because we cannot understand it. The good news is that we have more than enough clarity in Scripture to forge ahead with confidence. It may be a mystery but that doesn’t stop us from living it out.
We have a very interesting description from the Apostle Paul that explains how we can walk in the mystery. In Colossians 1:28-29 Paul describes how he joins his will to God’s: “Him [Christ] we proclaim, warning everyone and teaching everyone with all wisdom, that we may present everyone mature in Christ. For this I toil, struggling with all his energy that he powerfully works within me” (ESV). As Paul lives out his calling to bring believers to maturity he toils together with God’s energy.
In our day-to-day life we sometimes find ourselves in the quandary of not knowing how much we should activate our will. I often ask myself whether I am trying too hard to grow spiritually or whether I am not trying hard enough. Am I crowding out the Spirit by trying to do too much on my own, or on the other hand, am I not activating my will and thus expecting God to change me without my cooperation? Am I erring on one side or the other? In other words, am I doing my part according to Scripture?
I have erred on both sides for long periods in my life. When I was a younger Christian I beleive I underactivated my will in my external life and overactivated my will in my internal spiritual life. As I became more attuned to the Spirit I realized that I needed to depend more on the Spirit in my internal life so I adopted a better balance. Faults in my external behaviour became less of a problem. When the Spirit was strong it was easy to be properly passive to God.
But when dryness came I first tried to overactivate my will. Even when I decided to be more passive my mind kept trying to produce change. Eventually, my mind gave up and then I alternated between a reasonable balance and being too passive. After an extended period of years of internal suffering and physical pain I was worn down and my will became weary and weak so that looking back I was clearly too passive. Later, as my strength recovered, I developed a better balance as well as a deeper ability to allow my will to be pliable in God’s hands. I still keep myself aware of how my will is interacting with God’s and I still have to make adjustments.
This probably sounds like a roller coaster, but it is a summary of about forty years of my Christian life so changes actually came quite slowly. The point is that it is important to remain aware and teachable and to accept the fact that you will be continuously learning and changing. Also, it would be helpful to find a spiritual counselor who has experience with this challenge.
