Humans are created free. Freedom is not an illusion. Choices freely made have real and lasting consequences!
God has made humanity free -- really free -- free to chose relationship with God and also free to reject intimacy with the creator. Jonah is free. He takes steps to leave the presence of the Lord. Of course he encounters God's design. In four chapters we see played out the basic theme of the Bible. JWS
“The depth with which human nature is imagined in the Bible is a function of its being conceived as caught in the powerful interplay of this double dialectic between design and disorder, providence and freedom. The various biblical narratives in fact may be usefully seen as forming a spectrum between the opposing extremes of disorder and design.” pg. 33 -- The Art of Biblical Narrative -- Robert Alter
“The Bible tells a story of an event between persons, divine and human. The mark of a person, divine or human, is to be free. This is the moral or dramatic fabric of the biblical drama.” -- pg. 31 The Comedy of Revelation: Paradise Lost and Regained in Biblical Narrative – Francesca Aran Murphy
