The words "foreknowledge" and
"foreknow" are rarely used in the Bible, but the concept of God's
foreknowledge is found throughout Scriptures. In the New Testament, the
verb "foreknow" comes from the Greek word proginosko; and the noun
"foreknowledge," from the Greek word prognosis.
In the Bible, God alone has
foreknowledge. Nothing is outside of His knowledge-past, present, or
future. Nothing is hidden from Him, and only fools think they can hide
their deeds from God (Psalms 10:11; 11:4-5; Proverbs 15:11; Isaiah
29:15-16). God knows completely the thoughts and doings of human beings
(Psalms 139). Jesus taught that God has complete knowledge of human
beings (Matthew 10:29-31), and the author of Hebrews wrote that,"...
there is no creature hidden from His sight, but all things are naked and
open to the eyes of Him to whom we must give account," (Hebrews 4:13).
God's foreknowledge encompasses
future events. Over seven hundred years before Jesus was born, God
through Isaiah told of His virgin birth, and ascribed Deity to Him
(Isaiah 7:14; 9:6). In Luke 22:34, the Bible says, "Then He said, '/
tell you, Peter, the rooster shall not crow this day before you will
deny three times that you know Me.'" Here Jesus told Peter the following
specific things about Peter's impending denial of the Lord: 1) How many
times the denial would occur; 2) When it would occur; 3) Exactly what
the denial would entail. The Lord's foreknowledge of these things did
not rob Peter of his own free will in this matter. Peter denied Jesus of
his own accord, not because he had been fated to do so by what the Lord
knew.
The foreknowledge of God
admittedly raises the difficult theological question of human freedom.
If God already knows in advance who will be saved or elected, does that
not eliminate free human will? In all of the attempts to answer this
question through the years, brother Alton Maner's explanation to yours
truly years ago makes as much sense as any. Brother Maner simply
explained, "What He knows is based on our free acts, not our free acts
on what He knows."
The foreknowledge of God also
raises some discussion regarding such statements in Scripture as: "But
the Angel of the LORD called to him from heaven and said, 'Abraham,
Abraham!' So he said, 'Here I am.' And He said, 'Do not lay your hand on
the lad, or do anything to him; for now I know that you fear God, since
you have not withheld your son, your only son, from Me.'" (Genesis
22:11-12), and, "And the LORD said, 'Because the outcry against Sodom
and Gomorrah is great, and because their sin is very grave, I will go
down now and see whether they have done altogether according to the
outcry against it that has come to Me; and if not, I will know.
'"(Genesis 18:20-21).
If God knew and does know all
things, then why are statements such as these made?
It would be good at this point to
note a word of caution. We must be careful, it seems what we decide or
conclude that God does or does not know. If we say that He does NOT know
all things in His foreknowledge, then we place ourselves in the
precarious position of identifying the things that God doesn't know.
This, in a sense, puts us in a position where we are almost saying that
WE know things that God doesn't, because we know and can identify things
that He Himself doesn't know.
In John 16:30, we read, "Now we
are sure that You know all things, and have no need that anyone should
question You. By this we believe that You came forth from God. "Also, in
John 21:17, the text says, "He said to him the third time, "Simon, son
of Jonah, do you love Me?" Peter was grieved because He said to him the
third time, "Do you love Me?" And he said to Him, "Lord, You know all
things; You know that I love You." Jesus said to him, "Feed My sheep."
These statements come from men: Jesus' followers. They ascribe to Him at
least a degree of omniscience. Not once does the Lord refute what they
have said of Him. Perhaps we should be careful and slow to do the same.
David Decker