08/26/2026
Did you know that God has endowed us with free will?
Free will may seem difficult to reconcile with God’s omniscience and omnipotence. If God knows everything, how can we be in control of our lives? Simply, God’s foreknowledge does not preclude our free will. Just because God knows what we’re going to do does not preclude us from being able to freely do what we want, whether good or bad. Both things are true. God knows what we’re going to do, and he still allows us to do it.
Likewise, simply because God is in control of everything does not mean that he inhibits our free will. God creates us and sustains us, so naturally, we depend on him for everything. Dependency, however, does not preclude free will. Simply because God creates and sustains everything does not mean that we do not have free will; it simply means that the Divine Will permits us to have autonomy in our own willing.
God’s plan for every human being is salvation, but God allows us to freely determine for ourselves whether we wish to accept that salvation or not, as he himself says, “For many are called, but few are chosen” (Matthew 22:14). God calls all of us to be saved, but we are free to reject the salvation which he freely and generously dispenses unto all of us.
God gives us the free will to determine whether we wish to love him as he has loved us. Freedom is a prerequisite to love, because love, by definition, is the act of freely choosing to will good unto someone. God cannot force us to love him because anything which is not done freely is coercion, and love can never be coerced.
• • •
→ Click for your downloadable, shareable, printable DRE 1-pager: www.goarch.org/departments/religioused/didyouknow
→ Have a question you want answered for Did You Know? DM us, leave us a comment, or email us: [email protected]
DID YOU KNOW? is your go-to source for concise answers to a wide range of questions about the Greek Orthodox faith. DYK? equips Gen Z and millennials with facts they can trust and easily absorb while scrolling. Clergy, religious educators, and parents can share these nuggets of knowledge with the faithful, students, those inquiring about Orthodoxy, and loved ones.
