"The discussion often proceeds as if God is bound by time, as we are. But He is the creator of time and as such is not constrained by it.
Wait for it. He will know exactly how God sees time, and it will be logically impossible.
We speak of foreknowledge, as if it is prior knowledge from God’s point of view, as it is from ours
When we talk about time and God we do not know what we are talking about.
. But for God, it is simply knowledge with no “before” or “after” about it.
He can know something as it happens — and it all happens for Him in one moment — without that knowledge being the cause of it happening.
You see what tangles we get into when we try to predicate anything of God?
Knowledge does not equal causality.
For example, if you and I were sitting together and you turned to me and said something, I would know what you were saying as you were saying it. But my knowledge of you saying it would not be the cause of you saying it.
"You would be free to say it or not. Likewise, God’s “foreknowledge” (which to Him is simply knowledge) of what we do, say, think or believe does not require that He be the cause of it.
In His sovereignty God has, for whatever reason, chosen to give us free will.
That is a grace.
And if He has chosen to influence our will by a further grace to turn to Him, it is still, as Lewis says, our will that does so.
If we treat the will as anything other than voluntary and free to do or not do otherwise, then we are really not talking about will but determinism.
After years of batting the question around I have found no significance to it. With Lewis, I suspect it really is a meaningless question, and agree that perhaps the distinction it makes really is nonsensical after all."