Current draft:
On the debate between Free Will and Predestination: (My unofficial master's thesis on the nature of human suffering)
On the debate between Free Will and Predestination:
Let's conceive of all of physical reality as a single four-dimensional object. In Mere Christianity, C.S. Lewis articulated a thought experiment visualizing the Big Bang, which is to say, creation, as if it were a table. We will be building upon this foundation. Three dimensional objects cast two dimensional shadows. Four dimensional objects cast three dimensional shadows. This is known from physics and mathematics. In essence, we live in the shadow of a four dimensional object. We experience life in three dimensions, so we perceive the four dimensional object as a constant flow of events, when it is in fact a single four dimensional object. The Lord experiences the physical world as a four dimensional object. He can view and take in all of physical spacetime in a single thought, the way a human can perceive a sphere as a ball in a single thought. To us, life is a series of events. To the Lord, all life is less than a single event, merely an understood thought.
Who created the Heavens and the Earth? The Lord created the Heavens and the Earth. When did he do that? Was it 13.6 billion years ago? One could argue that, to us, since the world hasn’t ended yet, the act of creation is on-going. The Lord is outside of time, therefore he witnesses creation in its fullness. If the Lord answers a prayer, when and how does he answer it? With the exception of his life as Jesus Christ, the Lord only is present outside of time, in the eternal present, as is his completed creation. Therefore, the Lord answers prayers from the eternal present. He is not a divine watchmaker, winding up the universe and walking away. He is a creator, redeemer, and sustainer. To him, since all times are now, he answers prayers now. For us, we see the answers to our prayers as if through a looking glass dimly. When we reach the finality of creation, we will see him answer our prayers face to face.
The Lord experiences the completeness of physical reality simultaneously, thus experiencing our actions as complete, but he understands both that we do not and that our nature requires his intervention. To be clear, while we may perceive prayers to be answered after we pray for them, the Lord answers prayers from outside of time, thus, when the Lord answers prayers, he does so from his position of perceiving the four dimensional object, not from within the confines of the three dimensional space. From his perspective, the Lord doesn't answer our prayers from Tuesday on Wednesday because the Lord is outside of the confines of time. We, on the other hand, perceive time linearly.
The Lord entrusts us with, as Lewis terms it, The Intolerable Compliment: we choose to believe in him, we chose our actions; we choose to pray for rain during the dry times, we choose to be faithful to promises. We choose to ignore stop signs.
Let's say that the four dimensional object that is all physical reality is a painting. Paintings are made by applying coats of paint to a surface. Even if the starting surface is two dimensional, the finished work is three dimensional as it is composed of layers of varying thickness. The layers cannot be removed. In our lives, the past cannot be changed because the layers of paint cannot be removed. Only new layers can be added to the top of the painting, not between the layers and the old layers cannot be changed. We can reform, say lose a bunch of weight, but we cannot undo the fact that we once were obese. Even for the perception of the Lord, the nature of the reality he has created is that past events remain unchanged. Only the future is alterable. This is confirmed by the astrophysics of spacetime and the mathematics of the Speed of Light. We experience this concept continually in our lived lives because we can do things which cannot be undone. We can make paintings, we can crash cars into stationary objects, we cannot change what we ate for breakfast.
How does the Lord answer prayer? He answers prayers by the same mechanism which humans act, through direct agency to the canvas. This is the work of the Holy Spirit. The Holy Spirit is the mechanism by which the Lord modifies the human present from the divine eternal present.
We, as humans experiencing reality in three dimensions, yet with self-awareness and sentience, bare the burden of actually experiencing life and making choices. We feel pain, but we also possess the higher level functionality of understanding cause and effect. We have system one and two faculties. Therefore, we are responsible for our actions. We, in essence perceive free will. The stove is hot. We touch the stove and it hurts. We know the stove will be hot, and we are careful not to touch it. The Lord perceives our actions in the four dimensional object of spacetime. He understands that we perceive reality in three dimensions, and that he perceives in more, so he instructs us to ask him for help. The Lord can change the direction of the painting, but he does not change the layers. He can bring rain when dry times are a burden. He can make sure that you and your wife meet, despite that event being of an extremely low likelihood. He answers prayers by modifying the four dimensional object. He can do that because he understands the four dimensional object perfectly and instantly, despite our understanding of that object as a constant fluid series of events. We can perceive free will in time while the Lord perceives the completeness of time and space. The difference is a matter of perspective. Our perspective is free will. His is perfect completeness. They are both true.
It is impossible for there to be a myriad of dimensions, in the sense used by Star Trek and Dr. Strange, because of the nature of the solidity of the human soul. Each human person is the vessel of a human soul. There is only one soul in a person, therefore that soul cannot simultaneously experience life in an infinite series of iterations based upon the potential outcome of every decision made by every person. Each person is only one soul. The same person doesn't get two lives, one where they are a confirmed Christian and one where there are simultaneously a strident atheist because of some insignificant variation of events. This, when examined, is patently intellectually inconsistent with a thorough understanding of lived reality. There is never a moment when our experience of the world indicates this as a possibility beyond imagination. We only experience people having single bodies, we should assume single persons have single souls. If every decision creates a separate person, the persons had, at one time, a single root person, and a single root soul. As people grow into alternate dimensions, they do not sprout new souls. There is one soul and one body per one person.
There is a distinct possibility that, while our human history and personal history is deeply flawed, that we are presented with the best possible outcome of all the potential outcomes which could have resulted from the fluid dynamics of spacetime.
But what about the problem of pain. How could the very best of all possibilities have resulted in the Holocaust of the Jews?
Let's go back to the “hot stove” analogy. We have to perceive hot stoves as a threat. We have to experience pain. There is no way that sentient life can develop without the perception of pain as a warning sign. How can a person learn without painful stimulus? They cannot. People can learn through imagining painful events, or observing them in others, but this still requires a thorough understanding of what pain means. We are granted free will as a commission. Within that commission, it is implied that we can, if we are reckless or cruel or careless, we can harm or injure ourselves or others. The Lord sees all things, there is a potentiality that injuries and tragedies may be necessary for the best possible outcome to reach its result. Either way, we can't exist in a world where hot stoves don't cause burns and burns are not painful. Free will with only the limited bridle of imperfect knowledge will inevitably result in pain. When we choose to face away from the Lord, it must be painful. That being said, the Lord rejoices when we do not choose the hardest path. I have a child with a very strong will. He would rather be wrong and hurt than take advice from anyone. This is the nature of the sin of Pride. He would rather choose painful independence than listen to anothers voice of experience. I, as his father, cannot stop him from making those decisions, I can only try to mitigate the worst effects of those decisions through incentives: carrots and sticks. The Intolerable Compliment functions in the same way. The Lord desires for us to ask him for help, but he will not force us to do the right thing. One thing we can understand upon reflecting on the atrocities of human history is that fallenness scales with power: the larger the power of a bad actor, the greater the detrimental nature of their fallenness. As humans unlock larger and larger scales of power, be it political or technological, the greater the risk of their fallenness infecting their actions. Solzhenitsyn tells us that, as the Gulags evolved from the early years after the revolution to the post-stalinist collapse of the system, the cycles of condemnation spiraled greater and greater. Those who denounced others would inevitably be denounced. Within the system, there was no mechanism for redemption, only deeper and deeper descent on a something akin to a logarithmic scale. The systemic descent into darkness highlights our absolute inability to rescue ourselves from the weight of our own choices, even choices made in ignorance. A life lived not pursuing the divine good is a life lost. If human fallenness is a prison, deliverance cannot come from within us. Can deliverance come within the temporal timeline at all?
How does the saving work of the Cross reflect on the painting? Did Jesus’ sacrifice on the Cross effect the nature of the surface of the painting and how will it resolve the inherent conflict within the painting upon the inevitable completion of creation?
On Grace versus Works:
The debate over the difference between the arguments for Salvation by Grace opposed by the necessity of Works is also a false dichotomy. Salvation must be freely given if it is offered to all penitent believers, but that salvation must come from the Lord. It is never the act of contrition which causes the salvation. It is neither also the act of faith alone which can spur salvation, as that itself would become a work. What it is like: It is like we are all behind doors in an infinity hotel. The Lord is perpetually and simultaneously knocking on all our doors and trying to turn the knobs. We are holding the knob from the other side of the door. Yielding to Christ is letting the Lord open the door. It is never our act, it is always his act. It is our cessation of negation which allows his entry into our hearts. Human fallenness is holding the knob. We don't need to lock the door, original sin has us automatically locking it for ourselves. It is never an act of grace on our part, simply a stopping of our rejection of HIS grace which allows redemption. Human pride reflectively grasps again for the knob. Yielding to Christ is a continual act, not a singular act.
Does this mean that all souls are saved? It does not. Souls which never let God in, in any form, will not be saved. Part of the Intolerable Compliment is that the Lord permits humans to reject him completely. Some humans will always and forever reject the Lord. They will, lamentably, not be saved. Lewis articulates this elegantly in the Great Divorce. Some will forever choose to be alone. Jesus’ grace is offered to all, Jew or Greek, Slave or Free.
Back to Jesus’ death on the Cross. How did that event impact the painting? Jesus’ sacrifice on the Cross unlocks salvation from within the confines of space time. It permits humans (in particular, but not exclusively the priesthood of all believers) to commune directly with the Lord as he exists outside of creation in the eternal present. It is the Means of Grace and the Hope of Glory. The Means of Grace include prayer, meditation, scripture, the sacraments, and the Holy Spirit calling us to repentance. The Hope of Glory includes the active repentance of sins, the privilege of having the Lord work through us that which is pleasing in his sight, the finding of our greatest joy in the love and service of the Lord, the finding in the Lord a home full of consolation, fellowship, and peace, and the promise to join the Lord in heaven.
Returning to Lewis’ original table analogy, the Lord views the entire table simultaneously. This includes the Lord viewing himself enter the table of space time, the present of the painting, as Jesus Christ. He watches as He himself as a human encounters the disciples, converts water into wine, heals the sick, expels the demons, upsets the tables in the temple, and finally, dying upon the Cross and rising again. The Lord sees all of this as he perceives the four dimensional object of space time from the eternal present. This direct communion with the three dimensional present object was then and continues to be now facilitated by the power of the Holy Spirit.
As Christ attempts to open our door, he does not wait for our response. It is a continual action. The Lord views this in the eternal present outside of the four dimensional object. He views our response simultaneously from outside the space. It is important to note that, while our doors are knocked on and our knobs are turned, the Lord never demands we open them. He never breaks the door down. He insists we yield. If grace were irresistible, the Intolerable Compliment would have no teeth. We define our role passively. The Lord defines his role actively. He alone has the means of salvation. This is the terrifying dignity of human accountability and the truly massive power of divine atonement.
-Tim Jutsum, © May 2026
