Reading Time: 4 minutesQuestion 02047 The word “sovereignty” appears frequently in Christian conversation, but it carries theological freight that is worth examining carefully. Depending on which tradition uses it, it can mean quite different things — things that have profound consequences for how we understand human freedom, moral responsibility, and the character of God. Before asking what the…
Reading Time: 4 minutesQuestion 02057 Molinism is a theological framework developed to explain how God can exercise complete providential control over history while human beings retain genuine freedom of choice. It has attracted considerable attention among evangelical theologians over recent decades and deserves both a fair explanation and a careful assessment. It asks genuinely important questions, though the…
Reading Time: 4 minutesQuestion 02058 Middle knowledge — Latin scientia media — is the theological concept at the centre of Molinism. It refers to God’s knowledge of what any free creature would do in any possible set of circumstances, including circumstances that never actually occur. Understanding it carefully is necessary before forming a view on whether it is…
Reading Time: 4 minutesQuestion 2065 Could God have created a world where genuine human freedom existed but evil never entered? The question is one of the most serious in all of theology, and it deserves more than a quick answer. It touches on the nature of freedom itself, on why God chose to create at all, and on…
Reading Time: 3 minutesQuestion 2079 The hardening of Pharaoh’s heart is one of the most theologically contested passages in the Old Testament, and it has been pressed into service in support of Calvinist determinism for centuries. If God hardened Pharaoh’s heart, was Pharaoh responsible for resisting? Did God create Pharaoh as a vessel for destruction and then hold…
Reading Time: 3 minutesQuestion 2073 The question touches something every thoughtful believer wrestles with. If God knows the end from the beginning and his purposes are fixed, what does prayer actually accomplish? And if he already knows what we are going to ask, and has already decided how he will respond, does the whole exercise amount to little…
Reading Time: 4 minutesQuestion 02085 The term “common grace” describes the benefits God extends to all people regardless of whether they are in a saving relationship with Him. It is distinguished from saving grace, which transforms the soul and brings about new birth, and it raises a genuine question: can someone who has never trusted Christ still perceive…
Reading Time: 3 minutesQuestion 2003 Scripture presents what appears to be a genuine tension. God “desires all people to be saved and to come to the knowledge of the truth” (1 Timothy 2:4), yet plainly not all people are saved. He tells Israel through Ezekiel that He takes “no pleasure in the death of the wicked, but that…
Reading Time: 3 minutesQuestion 2004 Open theism is a theological position that has attracted academic attention over recent decades, particularly through writers such as Greg Boyd, John Sanders, and Clark Pinnock. It takes its name from the idea that the future is “open” — not yet determined — and that God, though omniscient in every other respect, does…
Reading Time: 3 minutesQuestion 2005 The question of how much control God exercises over events in the world is one of the most practically significant in theology. It has direct bearing on how we think about suffering, prayer, human responsibility, and what we can honestly say about God when evil occurs. The position sometimes called “meticulous providence” —…