I believe in free will. I believe that our freedom plays an essential role in the process whereby God, first, brings us into existence as rational and self-aware beings, and second, perfects us as his sons and daughters. But as a Universalist, I also accept two additional Pauline claims: (1) that the very same “all”who died in Adam will most assuredly be made alive in Christ (I Corinthians 15:22), and (2) that our destiny “depends not on human will or exertion, but upon God who shows mercy” (Romans 9:16).