This is about Calvinist declaring man having freewill would imperil God's sovereignty post-fall but NOT imperil God's sovereignty pre-fall. I don't know how to make it any clearer than this.
raying:
Let's revisit the issue of Adam pre-fall, because I think the discussion somehow got sidetracked.
First, did God create Adam with a free will? Yes. But to what extent did Adam have free will? Adam's free will was confined to his moral choices. He could not use his free will to exceed those choices. For instance, Adam could not freely choose to create a new species or a new galaxy. Those things would exceed Adam's ability since he was a finite human being with limited capabilities. Adam had what theologians refer to as
moral free agency. Moral free agency allowed Adam to choose between obeying or disobeying God, without a predisposition towards sin.
Let me expand on the above paragraph a bit more. In his pre-fall state, here is how Adam's human nature would be defined:
Pre-Fall
able to sin, able not to sin.
posse peccare, posse non peccare. (Latin terminology)
This is the moral free agency I was referring to previously. All of this was within the sphere of God's sovereignty.
When Adam sinned, by disobeying God's command (Gen. 3:6), his human nature immediately changed. He was no longer a moral free agent. His nature was now organically altered, changed. This is what's referred to as The Fall. Adam now had a predisposition towards sin, whereas he did not have that predisposition previously. Post-fall here is what happened to Adam's human nature:
Post-Fall
not able not to sin.
non posse no peccare.
I believe scripture teaches that Adam was forgiven for his sin by God killing an animal to make clothes for Adam and Eve (Gen. 3:21). This act of grace was not just to provide clothes. The killing of the animal is the first instance of blood being shed. This is a picture of Christ's eventual atonement for sin on the cross by the shedding of His blood. But prior to God killing the animal Adam could no longer choose to obey God. Adam lacked the ability to choose not to sin, because he was now in a state of sin. Therefore, no matter what he did, it was the product of sin. This is a hard thing for some Christians to accept. Is it a good thing to feed the hungry and provide shelter to the homeless? Certainly. Those things are beneficial to the hungry and homeless persons, as well as to society in general. But if they are not done in the Lord they are not considered a "good work" by the person doing them. Eph. 2:10 states that Christ saved us because "we are His workmanship, created in Christ Jesus for good works, which God prepared beforehand that we should walk in them." God did not create unbelievers for good works, although He certainly uses all people for His sovereign purpose.
So, I've established that Adam was created as a moral free agent with the ability to either obey or disobey God. After Adam sinned he ceased to be a moral free agent. His nature was now fallen and he was pre-disposed towards sin. None of his works could please God because they proceeded forth from a person who was in a state sin. God, in His mercy and grace, forgave Adam for his sin, in Christ, through the shedding of an animal's blood, much like the later sacrificial system would accomplish.
Now that Adam was forgiven his nature would once again revert back to his pre-fall state in that he could choose to sin and choose not to sin. However, Adam's body and mind would continue to experience the results of sin. Adam would battle with sin for the rest of his life. Eventually he would die. Prior to The Fall, Adam did not have a predisposition towards sin. Once he sinned he had a predisposition towards sin. Paul eloquently writes about this internal conflict in Romans 7. Paul states in Rom. 7:21, "I find then the principle that evil is present in me, the one who wants to do good." So, we see that even a forgiven sinner, a Christian, will fight a battle against temptation and sin for the remainder of their life. They will have final victory when they enter the presence of the Lord.
But back to the person who is in a state of sin. Do they have the same type of free will (moral free agency) that Adam possessed? I believe the overwhelming evidence of scripture answers that question in the negative. In fact, we see the answer to the question right in the creation narrative of Genesis 2:
Genesis 2:16, 17 The Lord God commanded the man, saying, "From any tree of the garden you may eat freely; but from the tree of the knowledge of good and evil you shall not eat, for in the day that you eat from it you will surely die."
The Lord God did not warn Adam that if he ate of the tree of the knowledge of good and evil that he would merely become sick or impaired. The Hebrew word for die (
mûṯ) means physical death. But in Adam's case
mûṯ meant more than just physical death. Adam was driven from the garden because he was now sinful. The garden represented the holiness of God, and Adam could no longer remain there. Adam's fall was complete and total in regards to his human nature. It was only restored in its ability to choose between sin and righteousness by God shedding the blood of an animal to atone for Adam's sin.
Today sinners are in the same condition as Adam before God atoned for his sin. Sinners are "strangers to the covenants of promise, having no hope and without God in the world" (Eph. 2:13). The human race, closer to Adam's time than ours, was described this way by God:
Genesis 6:5 Then the Lord saw that the wickedness of man was great on the earth, and that every intent of the thoughts of his heart was only evil continually.
We do not read of sinful man exercising his free will to believe in God. Indeed, God decided to rescue only Noah's immediately family, leaving the rest of mankind to perish. Sin begets death, so God was justified in His actions.
Those of the Arminian or Semi-Pelagian persuasion dismiss Rom. 8:7; 1 Cor. 2:14; and Eph. 2:1 as scriptural evidence that man is not only totally fallen, but totally unable to exercise faith in God without God first making man able to do so. But it is not just the New Testament that teaches this, it is also the Old Testament as revealed in The Fall narrative.
So, back to free will. The unregenerate sinner does not posses free will. He possesses an enslaved will; a will under bondage. Even the good that the sinner does is considered sinful because it proceeds forth from a sinful nature. The sinner is no different than a pig that rolls in the mud. You can give the pig a bath and send it to obedience school, but once it goes back in the sty it will roll in the mud. Why? It's the pig's nature. The sinner can do nothing else than sin because he is a sinner. Left to his own devices he would never seek God. He does not possess the freedom of the will unless someone changes the status quo. That someone is the Lord God Almighty.
