Dear all, thanks for sharing your views. After going through your replies, it widened my area of thoughts.
I realize I made a mistake by not being able to properly distinguish between free will & God's intervention as a result of His own decision / someone's prayer.
Basically as long a person is capable of deciding on a certain course of action willingly (without any threats or constraints) there is free will. The consequences of his/her decision is another issue on its own, nothing to do with any free will prohibition, like the case of Jonah, who had the freedom to choose not to follow God's instruction in the first place. And why God decided to 'escort' him there by a big fish, is not up to us to question since He has the complete picture afterall.
Now I have a perfect illustration. If God somehow decided & answered our prayer by orchestrating some events, this act/intervention of God does not undermine or defeats the purpose of giving us freewill in the first place because we chose to give Him 'permission' or rather willingly let Him makes the move. For example, you know where your destination is, however; you lost your way while walking there. Thus you hailed for a cab to send you there directly. Although the driver made the moves for you, his act did not infer that your freewill has been buried, its basically you allowing him to intervene and facilitating you to your destination, without altering your destination & depriving you from making any choices, for it is you who willing decides not to make any more wrong moves by walking further by yourself.
Ok, the doubt of this thread has been cleared, at least for me, thank you. Feel free to comment on my reflection & conclusion above.
I realize I made a mistake by not being able to properly distinguish between free will & God's intervention as a result of His own decision / someone's prayer.
Basically as long a person is capable of deciding on a certain course of action willingly (without any threats or constraints) there is free will. The consequences of his/her decision is another issue on its own, nothing to do with any free will prohibition, like the case of Jonah, who had the freedom to choose not to follow God's instruction in the first place. And why God decided to 'escort' him there by a big fish, is not up to us to question since He has the complete picture afterall.
Now I have a perfect illustration. If God somehow decided & answered our prayer by orchestrating some events, this act/intervention of God does not undermine or defeats the purpose of giving us freewill in the first place because we chose to give Him 'permission' or rather willingly let Him makes the move. For example, you know where your destination is, however; you lost your way while walking there. Thus you hailed for a cab to send you there directly. Although the driver made the moves for you, his act did not infer that your freewill has been buried, its basically you allowing him to intervene and facilitating you to your destination, without altering your destination & depriving you from making any choices, for it is you who willing decides not to make any more wrong moves by walking further by yourself.
Ok, the doubt of this thread has been cleared, at least for me, thank you. Feel free to comment on my reflection & conclusion above.