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Ask Pastor John

How Does God’s Sovereignty Not Violate Our Decision-Making?

Ask Pastor John

Desiring God

John Piper, Unknown, 163859, Pastor, Ask, Theology, Desiring God, Religion & Spirituality/christianity, Christianity, Religion & Spirituality, Questions

4.83.8K Ratings

🗓️ 9 May 2018

⏱️ 13 minutes

🧾️ Download transcript

Summary

How does God’s sovereignty not make us robots? Pastor John explores the relationship between God’s sovereignty and the human will in seven steps.

Transcript

Click on a timestamp to play from that location

0:00.0

Well, how does God's sovereignty over every life not make each of us robots?

0:09.9

Where is the place for human willpower and for decision making and how does God govern

0:15.4

over all of those decisions that we make?

0:18.7

It is a great question from a listener named Max in Lincoln, Nebraska.

0:24.6

My own state, shout out to Scott Frost and the Huskers.

0:27.7

All right, here's the question from Max in Lincoln.

0:29.5

Pastor John, thank you for all your episodes over the years.

0:32.9

This podcast nourishes my soul, but I'm also thickheaded and a lot of important

0:38.5

theological points come to me very, very slowly.

0:42.1

Can you explain again how God's sovereignty over human decisions and actions

0:48.0

comes through his control over our affections such that we are not robots

0:53.7

responding moment by moment to individual commands and prompts in situations,

0:59.1

but that he is in control of our decisions as we freely choose what we want.

1:03.3

I think I'm on the verge of understanding you and Edwards and the reform tradition

1:08.3

on this, but can you make this all clear in ten minutes?

1:12.6

So Tony doesn't scold you for going long again.

1:16.7

What would you say to Max?

1:18.3

Well, the likelihood that I could put in ten minutes,

1:22.9

what two thousand years of church history has not succeeded in completely

1:28.0

clarifying for the best of minds is not very likely.

1:33.0

But there are many things more important than the sovereignty of God in our

1:38.3

personal lives and how we make choices.

...

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