We run our website the way we wished the whole internet worked: we provide high quality original content with no ads. We are funded solely by your direct support. Please consider supporting this project.

How do you respond to Acts 4:27–28?
“[B]oth Herod and Pontius Pilate, with the Gentiles and the peoples of Israel, gathered together against your holy servant Jesus, whom you anointed, to do whatever your hand and your plan had predestined to take place.”
This passage is very close in content to Acts 2:23 (see How do you respond to Acts 2:23?). While it clearly teaches that the event of the crucifixion was predestined, it does not teach or suggest that the individuals who carried out this event were predestined to do so. God’s infinite intelligence and wise providence is demonstrated precisely in the ingenious way he balances his predetermined goals with the open-ended decisions of free agents. The magnitude of divine intelligence required to carry out this feat throughout history is incomprehensible. And this, I suggest, is one of the reasons why many find it easier to simply attribute exhaustively definite foreknowledge and/or an omni-controlling will to God. To preserve the unsurpassably exalted nature of God’s sovereignty, however, I believe we must resist this tendency and acknowledge that he faces a partly open future.
Category: Q&A
Tags: Open Theism, Q&A
Topics: Open Theism
Verse: Acts 4
Related Reading

How do you respond to Romans 9?
The Deterministic Interpretation of Romans 9 Many people believe that Romans 9 demonstrates that God has the right and power to save whichever individuals he wants to save and damn whichever individuals he wants to damn. I’ll call this the “deterministic” reading of Romans 9, for it holds that God determines who will be saved…

The (Spiritual) War on Terror
Jesus’ ministry was a ministry not of resignation but of revolt. He was about revolting against the cruel tyranny of a world ruler (Satan) that was oppressing God’s people. He was about seeking to give back to people, and to win back for his Father, what the enemy had stolen and destroyed. He was about…

Single and an Open Theist—Help! (podcast)
Greg, Dan, and Barbara talk about looking for love in a chaotic world. Episode 515 http://traffic.libsyn.com/askgregboyd/Episode_0515.mp3

Last Minute Preparations
We’re all busy here at ReKnew making last minute preparations for the Open2013 conference here in St. Paul, MN. It’s our first ever event of this kind and there’s a nervous energy and anticipation. I wonder if you’ll hold this up in prayer if you weren’t able to join us? We have a last minute…

What are the main principles of the warfare worldview?
In my book God At War (IVP, 1997) I flesh out what I call the “warfare worldview” of the Bible. This is the view that the world is a battle ground between God and good angels, on the one hand, and Satan and fallen angels, on the other. In my book Satan and the Problem…

What is the Gospel?
Our friend Roger Olson raised this question in response to accusations by Calvinists that those who espouse Arminianism do not “preach the gospel.” The same argument has been made about Open Theists. Olson writes: The complete gospel is communicated in Ephesians 2:8-9: “For it is by grace that you have been saved through faith and that not…