The Volitional Personality of Man
The Will of Man
God has given each one a will, the ability to make decisions. But the free will never operates alone. God has given man the responsibility to use his intellect to examine the alternatives of life and then the will can choose the direction of life.
Also, God has given man emotions to enrich his life and these sometimes control his will, while at other times the will dominates both intellect and feelings. God gives men intellect, emotions, and will to determine the direction and quality of life. Our conversion, sanctification, and relationships with others can all be determined in part by the way these act upon one another. But in this section we shall examine the will or volitional aspect of man, the final ability that makes the decisions that gives meaning to life.
Conversion
The most important decision anyone will ever make concerns his eternal salvation. God does not force anyone to believe in him because the Lord wants the free expression of a person’s trust. Jesus Christ extends an invitation to eternal life in the form of a choice. “Verily, verily, I say unto you, He that heareth my word, and believeth on him that sent me, hath everlasting life, and shall not come into condemnation; but is passed from death unto life” (John 5:24). Even the last chapter of the Bible contains an invitation to respond to the gospel. “And the Spirit and the bride say, Come…. And let him that is athirst come. And whosoever will, let him take the water of life freely” (Rev. 22:17).
When the Holy Spirit is at work in a person, and the person responds to the invitation of the gospel by faith and is saved, he has responded from the heart. The person knows he is lost and he knows the gospel (intellect), then he is convicted of his sin and in love reaches out to God (emotions); this leads to a decision of salvation (will). The Bible places the process of belief in the heart (Rom. 10:9), but the soul is saved.
Children go through this process when they are told to pray, “Come into my heart, Lord Jesus.” Paul rejoiced in the conversion of the Romans by identifying the will in the heart, “that whereas ye were once the servants of sin, ye have obeyed from the heart that form of doctrine which was delivered you” (Rom. 6:17).
Growth in Christ
We must serve God as Christians the same way we are saved, by faith from the heart. If we are desirous of pleasing God, we must remember that “without faith it is impossible to please him: for he that cometh to God must believe that he is, and that he is a rewarder of them that diligently seek him” (Heb. 11:6).
Instructing the Corinthians, Paul reminded them that a decision to give to God came from the heart. “Every man according as he purposeth in his heart, so let him give; not grudgingly, or of necessity: for God loveth a cheerful giver” (2 Cor. 9:7).
Interpersonal Relations
Paul told the Ephesians how a Spirit-filled Christian ought to behave. Part of those instructions included obedience to masters on the part of servants, “in singleness of your heart, as unto Christ” (Eph. 6:5).
This obedience was obviously tied to their intellectual ability, since he used logic to appeal to their will: “doing the will of God from the heart” (Eph. 6:6). The total personality of man is operative in each act of thinking, willing, and feeling. The one cannot be considered without the other, for man is a unity, as is God, in whose image he was created.
