Does God know every detail of the future — or is Open Theism actually the most honest reading of Scripture?

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  Theo5d ago

  okay but can someone explain to me why it's supposedly more comforting that God watched every abuse I would suffer before I was born and chose to create me anyway? like which version of God is actually scarier here because classical theism hasn't answered that for me in 34 years of being in the church

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  Drew 924d ago

  I was an Open Theist for about six years. What moved me back to classical theism wasn't an argument — it was suffering. When my daughter was in the ICU for three weeks, I did not want a God who was doing His best and hoping it worked out. I wanted a God who was sovereign. Even if I can't fully explain that sovereignty, I needed it to be real. Theology isn't just intellectual. It has to hold in a hospital room.

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• AL

  Alex L.5d ago

  my grandma prayed for my uncle to come back to God for forty years. he died in his sleep two months after he finally gave his life to Christ at 71. you want to tell me God didn't know that was coming? that prayer was just her sending thoughts into an uncertain cosmos? no. God knew. He ordained it. that story isn't possible with an 'open' God who's winging it.

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  Morgan5d ago

  Open Theism is heresy and I'm tired of people dressing it up in compassionate-sounding language. The moment you say God doesn't know the future you've just described an idol. Isaiah 46:10 — 'declaring the end from the beginning' — that's not a God who's guessing. That's a God who holds all of time in His hand. Full stop.

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  Iris3d ago

  nobody in this comments section is going to resolve what Augustine and Arminius couldn't but I'll say this: the God I want to spend eternity with is one who looked at my whole broken life and said 'yes, her' — not one who shrugged and said 'well let's see how she does.' call that Calvinist if you want. it's just what I need to be true.

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  Sam4d ago

  Genuinely asking, not trolling: if God foreknew with certainty that Judas would betray Jesus, did Judas have a real choice? And if he didn't have a real choice, why does Jesus say 'woe to that man by whom the Son of Man is betrayed'? Woe implies moral guilt. Moral guilt implies real choice. Real choice implies the outcome wasn't locked in. Someone walk me through this because I've been stuck on it for years.

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  Riley3d ago

  this thread is why i left evangelicalism. not because the questions are wrong — the questions are RIGHT — but because everyone's so certain they've got God figured out that there's no room to just sit with the mystery. Jesus didn't hand out a systematic theology. He told stories. maybe that means something.

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  Leo5d ago

  I came out of a Calvinist context and Open Theism was genuinely the thing that kept me from walking away from faith entirely. I'm not saying it's perfect theology. But the God who grieves in Genesis 6, who relents after Moses argues with Him in Exodus 32, who says 'I did not command this, nor did it come into My heart' in Jeremiah 19 — that God feels real to me in a way the divine timepiece never did.

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• T9

  Theo 923d ago

  Classical theism produces Calvinism which produces double predestination which produces the idea that God created most of humanity for the express purpose of damning them to hell to glorify Himself. If that's where total divine foreknowledge and sovereignty leads, then count me out and I'll take the Open God who's actually trying to save everyone.

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  Riley5d ago

  I appreciate the passion in the comment above but that's not an argument, that's just vibes-based dismissal. Greg Boyd has written thousands of pages of serious biblical and philosophical argument for the Open view. You don't have to agree but pretending it's just emotional wish fulfillment is intellectually dishonest.

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  Elena S.3d ago

  If you genuinely believe Open Theism is true, you should be deeply uncomfortable with how you talk about answered prayer. Either God answered it because He's sovereign over outcomes, or the outcome was just a confluence of free choices that happened to go well. 'God answered my prayer' means something fundamentally different under Open Theism and most Open Theists talk like classical theists the moment they walk into church. Make it make sense.

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  Riley4d ago

  I hear you and I respect your story deeply. But I'd push back gently — other people have been in that same hospital room and found Open Theism MORE comforting because a God who suffers with us and genuinely doesn't want this is more bearable than a God who planned it. There's no neutral ground here. Both views have pastoral costs.

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  Riley5d ago

  The problem with Open Theism isn't just philosophical, it's pastoral. If God doesn't know the future, then every prophecy in Scripture becomes either a lucky guess or a predetermined railroad. How do you explain Cyrus being named in Isaiah 45 a hundred and fifty years before he was born if God is 'open' to the future? You can't. The exegesis doesn't hold.

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  Theo4d ago

  Foreknowledge doesn't equal causation. I know the sun will rise tomorrow. That doesn't mean I'm causing it. God knowing what Judas would freely choose doesn't remove Judas's freedom any more than my knowing my kid will pick the cookie removes his choice. This is Philosophy 101 stuff.

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  Jordan3d ago

  You just described one particular brand of Calvinism and called it 'classical theism.' Arminians, Wesleyans, Eastern Orthodox, and most Catholics hold exhaustive divine foreknowledge without double predestination. That's a strawman and it's the most common one in this conversation.

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  Quinn5d ago

  That's a beautiful story and I don't want to be dismissive of it. But Open Theists would say your grandma's forty years of faithful prayer is exactly what CAUSED God to act — her free, persistent, genuine love moved a God who genuinely responds to prayer. Under classical theism, God already had it scripted. Which story actually honors her faithfulness more?

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  Alex 923d ago

  Open Theists pray because God is genuinely responsive — your prayer actually matters and might change what happens, rather than just 'releasing' something God already decided. Many Open Theists would say THEIR prayer is more meaningful, not less. If the outcome is already fixed, what exactly is your prayer doing?

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• MR

  Morgan R.5d ago

  Both sides in this debate act like they have it locked down and both sides are reading the same 66 books and coming to opposite conclusions. Maybe — just maybe — this is one of those mysteries that should produce humility instead of someone getting kicked out of their denomination.

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• YT

  Yuki T.5d ago

  Molinism just pushes the problem back a step. If God chose to actualize THIS world knowing exactly what would happen in it, including every rape, every Holocaust, every child dying of cancer, then He's still directly responsible for all of it. Calling it 'middle knowledge' is just Classical Theism with extra steps and a fancier name.

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  Jamie B.4d ago

  The cookie analogy fails because you're a creature in time who acquired knowledge. God in classical theism isn't learning about Judas from outside time — He's timelessly willing all things. The 'foreknowledge doesn't cause' move only works if God is just a really good predictor, which is basically Open Theism with extra steps anyway.

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• L9

  Liam 923d ago

  Respectfully, 'we can't know' is not a position. It's an exit. The church has always done theology precisely because what we believe about God shapes everything about how we live, pray, evangelize, and handle evil. If you can't be bothered to think carefully about the character of the God you worship, that's on you.

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  Casey4d ago

  The word 'foreknowledge' in Romans 8:29 is doing a LOT of heavy lifting for classical theism and most people have never actually looked at what the Greek word means in its relational/covenantal context. It doesn't mean 'pre-cognition of data.' It means relational knowing. The classical view imports Aristotle's 'Unmoved Mover' and calls it Paul.

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  Diego5d ago

  Here's what nobody wants to say: Molinism is the actual answer and it renders this entire debate unnecessary. Middle knowledge — God knows all possible futures and all actual futures — preserves genuine human freedom AND exhaustive divine foreknowledge. Why are we only given two options?

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  Drew3d ago

  fair point honestly. I conflate those too often. still think exhaustive foreknowledge creates problems I can't solve but I'll own the sloppy argument

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  Avery M.4d ago

  ^ This is the kind of comment that sounds smart until you actually go read the church fathers. Irenaeus, Origen, Augustine, Aquinas — none of them were reading Romans 8:29 and thinking 'relational knowing that doesn't include cognitive foreknowledge.' That revisionist reading is very recent and very Western evangelical.

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  Yuki L.4d ago

  If Open Theism is true then every single prophecy Jesus fulfilled was either a coincidence or God stage-managed it by overriding human freedom anyway. So you've either gutted prophecy or you've gutted free will. Pick one because you can't build a coherent theology that keeps both.

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  Reese _x4d ago

  Open Theists have actually addressed the prophecy problem extensively — Boyd argues that God can foreknow some things with certainty (things He intends to bring about directly) while leaving genuinely free choices open. It's a both/and not an either/or. Whether you find that convincing is a different question but the objection isn't the slam dunk you think it is.

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  Sam3d ago

  What I genuinely cannot understand is how Open Theists pray. Like what is the prayer actually doing? 'God, I know you don't know how this will turn out but neither do I, so... let's figure it out together?' That's not prayer that's a brainstorming session.

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  Kofi4d ago

  yall are giving me a headache and I went to seminary. this is what happens when you let philosophers near the pulpit

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  Zara3d ago

  the whole debate assumes we're going to figure out the nature of an infinite being by arguing about it on a website. respectfully lol

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• KM

  Kofi M.5d ago

  Open Theism is basically just making God your therapist who's figuring things out alongside you. Feel-good theology for a generation that can't handle authority.

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