Not puppets on a string but people with choice
Well, if it’s a true family then not only are we
dependent to a large scale upon one another, but we reap the effects to
a large degree for what other members of our family do or refrain from
doing. In other words, what we do as individual members can have the
potential to bless or blast other members. A loving mum or dad can be
heartbroken if a son or daughter goes off the rails. And, on the
contrary, if a child excels in the world then other members usually
become elated with joy. Yet none of this could ever happen if fathers
had us as robots or puppets to obey them via strings, rather than
children with freedom of choice. And by freedom of choice we mean the
ability to obey or disobey.
For myself, I’m most thankful to God that I’ve had
children who mostly, but not always, chose to obey me out of love,
rather than have daleks in their place whom I had absolute control over.
The fact being that love is the outcome of choice and, if you take away
freedom of choice then there can be no love expressed or given. Now
admittedly, free will means that a child can put his or her finger in to
the fire and reap the lethal consequences – thereby bringing pity and no
doubt heartache on to innocent family members. But such is the price of
freedom of choice that God has seen fit to bestow upon us.
As for those who disagree with me, and chose to deny that normal folk
have freedom of any kind, well their everyday attitude to the behaviour
of others appears to the contrary! This very week I’ve been watching the
Olympic Games. In it, the praise and adulation goes to the one who wins!
Well, why praise or indeed punish life if it is no more free than a
puppet on a string? Such commendation or condemnation would be
nonsensical. This is not to deny that hereditary, social and
environmental factors have influence in moulding us. To a greater or
lesser extent they do. But the fact is that – unless mentally retarded –
the rank and file possess ability to chose right from wrong and good
from evil. And, according to that light, they are not only imperfectly
judged by society here, but they will be perfectly judged – and most
appropriately sentenced for the hereafter - by a God who knows the inner
most hearts of all.