I thoroughly enjoyed reading and analyzing Psalm 139:1-18 this week. Growing up in a family of faith, this was constantly read aloud to me as a child. Daily, even now at the age of 21, I get reminders from my mother saying that I am “fearfully and wonderfully made.” However, this is the first time I have analyzed this text with the question of determinism upfront.
Although I can see how a lot of determinists may favor this passage, I like taking a more compatibilist approach to dissecting it. Within this text, David says that God is all-knowing, but that does not mean that God has mapped out every aspect of our life. I think David takes a comfort in this chapter, because he rests knowing that God has a plan for our life- HOWEVER, it is up to the individual to accept His plan and live according to it. The story of Jonah and the big fish also helps to illustrate this idea. Jonah was asked to perform a certain task by the Lord, and Jonah declined. He then took it upon himself to make alternative choices, which led to Jonah living in the stomach of a great fish for several days. This imagery is a great way to depict how making our own life choices may lead to consequences that God didn’t have planned for our lives. This story is a great way to show how compatibilism is the most reasonable answer for the question of having free will, because both free will and determinism are depicted here.
The determinsts put up a good argument with David’s passage in Psalm 139, but I still believe that all three of the Biblical readings all point toward compatibilism as a reasonable answer.
-Katie Callaway
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