When it comes to the sovereignty of God, one of the trickiest things for many people to grasp is the concept that God is absolutely sovereign but we still make choices.  Imagine my excitement when, while pondering the content of Christian Unschooling, the following occurred to me.

Most Christian unschoolers have certain things they believe are important for their children to learn.  We’ll use reading as an example, because most people I know believe their children need to learn to read at some point.  The unschooling parent shapes the child’s environment in such a way that he will want to learn to read.  Dad buys lots of books.  Mom reads lots of books — both to the child and in front of the child.  They make reading appealing, to ensure that the child will make the choice they intend for him to make — that he will decide he wants to learn to read.

The child doesn’t feel manipulated; he just feels he made a choice.  The difference in his perspective as a child, and his parents’ more experienced perspective as adults makes all the difference!  He believes he chose to learn to read, and they believe that they decided he would learn to read.  Who’s right?  They all are!

God’s sovereignty works in much the same way.  God is so much bigger and wiser than we (“For My thoughts are not your thoughts, nor are your ways My ways…”) that His perspective is completely different.  He is fully capable of manipulating our circumstances in such a way that we will make precisely the choices He intends for us to make, at precisely the times He intends for us to make them.  Meanwhile, from our perspective, we think we “just chose.”

God’s sovereignty and our ability to make decisions are not contradictory; they’re simply two different perspectives of the same process!

Who hardened Pharaoh’s heart? (Exodus 4:21; 7:3,13,14,22; 8:14,19,32; 9:7,12,34; 10:1,20,27; 11:10; Romans 9:17-18)

Who killed Saul? (1 Samuel 31:1-13; 2 Samuel 1:1-16; 1 Chronicles 10:1-14)