Lesson for January 5, 2024

The Law of Volitional Responsibility

Lesson 1

Galatians 6:8, “Do not be deceived, God is not mocked; for whatever a person sows, this he will also reap. For the one who sows to his own flesh will reap destruction from the flesh, but the one who sows to the Spirit will reap eternal life from the Spirit.”

The Law of Volitional Responsibility is a general principle that applies to the entire human race. This law means that each one of us is responsible for our thoughts, attitudes, decisions, actions, and words. Since every human being is responsible for their own choices in life, they can never blame others for their misery or unhappiness.

As believers in Christ, this law applies to both what happens before and after salvation with regard to our relationship with God. God has given each of us the control of our lives. We were born with free will. God never forces a thought, an attitude, a decision, or an action upon us. Therefore, our volition determines the course of our lives.

Once we make the decision, from our own free will, to believe in Christ and the payment He made for our sin, we receive the gift of eternal life. This one decision secures forever our eternal relationship with God. However, after salvation we are instructed (not forced) to develop an ongoing relationship with God from our own free will. This means that the Law of Volitional Responsibility is very much a part of the spiritual life of every believer in Christ. Jesus made it very clear in Matthew 6:24, “No one can serve two masters; for either he will hate the one and love the other, or he will be devoted to the one and despise the other. You cannot serve God and mammon [money, possessions, fame, status, or whatever is valued more than the Lord].”

If a believer chooses to live in accordance with God’s plan for their life, they take full responsibility for their spiritual life. A casual approach to the development of the spiritual life results in a lukewarm attitude toward God and His Word. Instead of rapid spiritual growth that leads to spiritual stability, this person’s life is unstable and in constant turmoil. (James 1:8) On the other hand, a serious approach to the development of the spiritual life results in a positive attitude toward God and His Word. This person desires to know God in an intimate way by making the study of God’s Word number one priority. Spiritual growth and spiritual stability come rapidly for this believer. (II Peter 3:17-18)

The Negative Aspect of the Law of Volitional Responsibility

Under the Law of Volitional Responsibility, believers sometimes inflict self-induced misery and divine discipline upon themselves, from negative volition. By failure to learn, believe, and apply the accurate teaching of the Word of God, believers fulfill the negative aspect of this law.

This negative attitude toward God comes in a variety of ways. Often this attitude begins in the early stages of spiritual childhood. The lack of truth of God’s Word may be unknown or ignored by a believer or by those responsible for teaching them, such as a parent, a pastor, or Sunday School teacher. In either case, the result is the same – no real spiritual growth.

Without the knowledge of God’s Word firmly implanted in the mind of a young believer, the only alternative is to operate their lives with human viewpoint. Human Viewpoint Thinking takes a believer into many directions, some which do not invoke the negative aspect of the Law of Volitional Responsibility and some do. Living your life based solely on human viewpoint will lead to a variety of results – some good (by human standards) and some bad (by all standards).

Negative volition originates in the mind. A mind controlled by the thinking of Satan’s corrupt world system leads to many counterfeits to the truth of God’s Word. The alure of sin is used by the world system to entice people into a lifestyle that ignores God and His plan for their life. Though not all lifestyle choices are harmful to others or to society in general, they still fall in the category of negative volition and are subject to divine discipline. Some lifestyles are evil and affect others and society in negative ways.

Any attitude or thought that keeps a believer from being in fellowship with God is wrong and cuts off divine viewpoint thinking. The result is often suffering related to wrong thinking, wrong motives, wrong decisions, and wrong actions in life. Good decisions result in blessing from God; bad decisions result in suffering. This type of suffering is self-induced through negative volition, which ignores the Law of Volitional Responsibility.

A negative believer chooses (deliberately or by default) the hard way of living, which is “live and learn.” This is the negative aspect of the Law of Volitional Responsibility. This method of learning results in self-induced misery and divine discipline. This way of living carries with it a tremendous amount of guilt that devastates a person’s life.

“Live and learn” leads to a life of perpetual carnality (being out of fellowship with God) which destroys a believer’s spiritual life and incurs divine discipline from God and leads to self-induced misery. “Live and learn” is grieving the Holy Spirit (Ephesians 4:30) and/or quenching the Holy Spirit (I Thessalonians 5:19). The principle of “live and learn” is “sowing to the wind and reaping the whirlwind.” (Hosea 8:7) Colossians 3:25, “For he who does wrong will receive the consequences of that wrong. And there is no partiality.” 

Hebrews 12:4-6, 11, ^“ You have not yet resisted to the point of shedding blood in your striving against sin;and you have forgotten the exhortation which is addressed to you as God’s children, ‘My children, do not regard lightly the discipline of the Lord, nor faint when you are punished by Him; for whom the Lord loves He disciplines, and He punishes every child whom He accepts.’ For the moment, all discipline seems not to be pleasant, but painful; yet to those who have been trained by it, afterward it yields the peaceful fruit of righteousness.”

Divine discipline always comes from the love of God, which does not change when believers sin and/or enter into a prolonged status of carnality, called reversionism. Since every believer is a member of the Royal Family of God during the Church Age, divine discipline for sin is designed for blessing. You are meant to learn something from divine discipline. God never disciplines us apart from having blessing tied into it. Blessing will be the result of enduring the discipline and recovering our fellowship with God. Failure to use the Rebound Technique leads to a lifestyle of misery, guilt, anxiety, fear, and unhappiness.

Through divine discipline, we learn that certain things are not worth thinking, doing, or saying. If we do not learn from divine discipline, all that is left is to live in a state of self-induced misery. If we learn to respect the Lord through divine discipline, we will think twice before committing the same sin repeatedly. Instead, we will keep short accounts of our sins and use the Rebound Technique to stay in fellowship with God a maximum amount of time. I John 1:9, “If we confess, admit, acknowledge our sins to God, He is faithful and righteous to forgive us our sins and cleanse us from all unrighteousness.” 

The worst thing that could happen to believers after salvation is to “live and learn.” The best thing that could happen to believers after salvation is to “learn and live,” Believers who “learn and live” avoid divine discipline, by doing what is right based on the accurate Bible doctrine they have learned and applied.

The other result of the negative aspect of the Law of Volitional Responsibility is self-induced misery. When a believer rejects God and His Word over a prolonged period of time, they eventually become reversionistic.

Reversionism is the condition of a believer that is negative toward Bible doctrine and as a result has stopped growing spiritually. It is failure to follow God’s plan of living the Christian Way of Life. A reversionist is a believer in perpetual carnality, out of fellowship with God, and controlled by their sin nature. (If you are not advancing toward spiritual maturity as a Christian, you are retreating into reversionism).

The Bible says that reversionists are “enemies of God,” “enemies of the Cross,” “children of the devil,” “double-minded,” and “unstable in all their ways.” Since they do not continue in the teaching of Christ, the Bible says they “delude themselves,” “they lack faith,” “they faint in their minds,” “they are prisoners to sin,” “they have come short of the grace of God by engaging in legalism,” “their souls are tortured,” and “they make themselves miserable.” The Bible says reversionists have left their first love (Christ), fallen away from their spiritual lives, and have become “lukewarm” believers (have no interest in God or His Word). (James 4:4; Philippians 3:18-19; I John 3:10; James 1:8, 4:8; II John 9; James 1:22-24; Romans 7:23; Hebrews 12:3-15; II Peter 2:7-8; Revelation 2)

Some believers start their Christian lives very well, under sound, accurate doctrinal teaching from their pastor-teacher and stay with it. Others wander off spiritually immediately after salvation and remain in a state of reversionism and misery until they die. Then we have Christians who begin well by studying and applying Bible doctrine on a consistent basis but finish poorly by neglecting it or failing to apply it. We all have equal opportunity to succeed or to fail in the Christian Way of Life. Success depends on positive volition towards Bible doctrine. 

When a believer abandons Bible doctrine, it is a short step into the arrogance complex of sins of self-justification, self-deception, and self-absorption. Being no longer influenced by the doctrine in their souls, these believers become totally preoccupied with themselves and must learn the hard way (“live and learn”). The arrogance complex leads believers into all kinds of sin, especially mental attitude sins and eventuates in reversionism, which is a miserable way life for a believer to go through.