When God Doesn’t See Evil Coming: A Case Against Open Theism

Many are drawn to Open Theism because they believe it helps with the problem of evil. After all, if God doesn’t know what free creatures will do in the future, then He cannot be blamed for their choices—right? If God didn’t foresee the horrors that awaited, then perhaps He’s off the moral hook.

At first glance, this seems like a promising solution. It paints a picture of a well-meaning deity doing His best in a dangerous world filled with free creatures. But upon closer examination, this strategy doesn’t just weaken the traditional attributes of God—it dismantles them entirely. The god of Open Theism begins to look shockingly limited, tragically naïve, and certainly not maximally great or worthy of worship.

Let’s consider one concrete historical example: the Holocaust.

Perhaps this god was surprised that Hitler and the Nazis would actually go through with building and operating death camps for the genocide of the Jews. But surely, once the gas chambers were constructed—before the first trainload of kidnapped Jews arrived—this deity would have caught on. Maybe he was too late to stop the first round. Tragic, but perhaps understandable.

But then Hitler murders a million Jews. Then another million. And then another. At some point, any morally decent being—let alone a sovereign one—should intervene.<1>

If this god knew what was happening and still allowed it, then he is morally monstrous. But if he didn’t know, then he is incompetent. Either way, this being isn’t worthy of worship. He might be supernatural (big deal), but he is certainly not God in any classical or biblical sense. This view doesn’t solve the problem of evil—it just replaces divine sovereignty with divine short-sightedness (or worse). And it gets worse.

Open Theism and Prophecy: A Hidden Cost

One of the lesser-discussed casualties of Open Theism is the doctrine of prophecy. Scripture is filled with God declaring future events—sometimes centuries in advance. And these are not vague predictions like Nostradamus or a weather forecast. They’re precise, detailed, and often involve morally significant actions.

So here's the question: If God doesn’t know the future, how can He confidently—and repeatedly—predict it with precision?

The only remaining option is that God causally determines the prophesied events via His own power. But in many cases, those events involve sin. That means the Open Theist either (1) admits that God doesn’t really know whether His prophecies will come true, or (2) claims that God ensures their fulfillment by causally determining every evil act they contain.

In trying to avoid divine responsibility for evil, the Open Theist walks into the very problem they sought to escape. The view becomes functionally indistinguishable from divine determinism—except now, it’s paired with incompetence.

Biblical Prophecies Involving Evil

Let’s look at a few examples where God doesn’t merely predict evil—He foreknows it in detail and declares it in advance.

1. Joseph Sold into Slavery – Genesis 37:28; 50:20 “You meant evil against me, but God meant it for good.” Joseph’s betrayal by his brothers—foreshadowed in his dreams—is an evil act. But it’s part of God’s plan to save many lives. If Open Theism is true, these dreams were either guesses or manipulations. But the text suggests divine foreknowledge with redemptive intent.

2. Judas’s Betrayal of Jesus – Psalm 41:9; John 13:18; Acts 1:16–20 “The Scripture had to be fulfilled concerning Judas.” Judas’s betrayal is prophesied in the Old Testament and explicitly fulfilled in the New. This is a morally reprehensible act, yet God speaks of it as necessary and foretold. Did God cause it? Did He merely get lucky? Neither option helps the Open Theist.

3. Peter’s Denial of Christ – Luke 22:34, 61 “Before the rooster crows today, you will deny me three times.” This isn’t a probabilistic guess—it’s a specific prediction of a sinful act, repeated three times, within a narrow time window. On Open Theism, how could Jesus have possibly known this without either causal determinism or blind luck?

4. The Crucifixion – Isaiah 53; Acts 2:23 “This man was handed over to you by God’s deliberate plan and foreknowledge.” The crucifixion—the greatest injustice in human history—was not a cosmic accident. It was foreknown and foretold with astonishing clarity. If God didn’t know the future, then the prophets were gambling. If He did, then the future isn’t open.

5. The Destruction of Jerusalem – Luke 21:6, 20–24 “Not one stone will be left on another.” Jesus predicts the Roman siege and destruction of Jerusalem. This was not only a national tragedy—it was an event filled with sin, violence, and suffering. Yet Jesus speaks of it as a certainty.

   
   

In each of these cases, Open Theism forces an impossible dilemma: either the prophecy is a lucky guess (undermining the trustworthiness of God), or God causally determines the evil acts He predicted (undermining His goodness). Pick your poison. The former is absurd. The latter is just as gross as Calvinism.

The Consequences of Failed Prophecy

There’s another often-overlooked problem with Open Theism: in the Old Testament, failed prophecy wasn’t a small mistake—it was a capital offense.

“But the prophet who presumes to speak a word in my name that I have not commanded him to speak…that same prophet shall die” (Deut. 18:20).

According to Scripture, the test of a true prophet was whether their prediction came true (vv. 21–22). False prophets were to be executed. But if Open Theism is true—if even God doesn’t know the future with certainty—then this standard is not just unreasonable, it’s morally appalling.

On the Open Theist view, a prophet might sincerely report what God believed would happen, only for circumstances to shift and invalidate the prediction. In that case, the prophet is killed—not for lying, but for trusting a deity who couldn’t see past tomorrow.

That’s not the God of Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob. That’s a morally compromised deity who gets people killed for trusting His failed predictions.

Once again, the Open Theist ends up with a god who is less than maximally great (he doesn’t know the future) and less than morally good (he allows people to be executed for relaying inaccurate information he gave them).<2>

In trying to soften the hard edges of divine sovereignty, Open Theism unintentionally crafts a god who is unworthy of trust, reverence, or worship.

Enter Molinism: A Better Way Forward

Molinism offers a far more satisfying—and biblical—solution.

According to Molinism, God doesn’t need to causally determine evil in order to foresee it. He knows what any free creature would do in any possible situation. This “middle knowledge” allows God to sovereignly guide history while preserving genuine libertarian freedom. He doesn’t guess or cause; He foreknows and orchestrates.

God is like Doctor Strange in Avengers: Infinity War—not because He causes all events, but because He knows all possible timelines and chooses the best feasible one based on its eternal endgame. Every moment of suffering, every act of evil, every heartbreak is permitted with eternal goods in view—goods that could not be achieved otherwise in a world of truly free creatures.

This means that God can guarantee the fulfillment of prophecy without moral compromise. He knows what Judas would do, not because He causally determines it, but because He knows Judas’s heart. He knows what Peter would do, not because He determines Peter’s will, but because He knows how Peter would respond under pressure.

Molinism upholds both the sovereignty and goodness of God. It avoids the fatalism of Calvinism and the limitations of Open Theism. And most importantly, it gives us a God who is worthy of worship: omniscient, omnipotent, and omnibenevolent--a maximally great being!

Conclusion: The God Who Did See It Coming

Open Theism attempts to protect God’s moral character by limiting His knowledge. But this doesn’t exonerate God—it diminishes Him. It leaves us with a deity who is shocked by evil, unable to warn us of it, allows evil acts to continue once they've started, and powerless to ensure redemption through it.

In contrast, the God of Molinism knows the end from the beginning. He permits evil—not because He’s weak or wicked—but because He knows that all the pain, evil, and suffering in the world is merely "light momentary affliction" that prepares free creatures for "an eternal weight of glory beyond all comparison" (2 Corinthians 4:17).

God--who possesses middle knowledge--knows exactly how to bring about the greatest eternal good through these afflictions. That’s not just a theological theory. That’s the God revealed in scripture and a God you can trust.

Stay reasonable (Isaiah 1:18),

Dr. Tim Stratton

Notes

<1>This is where Molinism provides a morally and theologically superior option. A maximally great, intelligent, and loving being endowed with middle knowledge would permit all kinds of finite evils—even the Holocaust—only if He knew it would ultimately contribute to the best feasible, freedom-permitting world. This is a world in which evil is ultimately defeated and all non–transworld-damned persons eventually enter a true love relationship with God that will never fail.

<2> See Deuteronomy 18:20–22. This passage is frequently cited in discussions of prophecy, divine knowledge, and moral accountability. The idea that God would sanction capital punishment for failed predictions that He Himself got wrong (on Open Theism) is absurd. It’s far more plausible that God knew with certainty what would occur—and held prophets accountable accordingly. Compare also Isaiah 44:7–8 and Jeremiah 1:5–12, where God challenges false gods on the basis of their inability to declare the future, underscoring that infallible foreknowledge is a mark of the true God. The god of Open Theism is not the God revealed in Scripture.