Methodius — Concerning Free Will (excerpt)

Orthodox: I do not think it right to say that human beings were made by God as mere necessities. I say the first human was made self-determining — that is, free — and from him the heirs of the race inherited the same freedom.

So I affirm that the human being was made free, yet a slave to whatever he wills to serve. I say this is the greatest gift given him by God. For all other things serve the divine command by necessity: if you speak of heaven, it stands bearing its Master, not leaving its appointed place; if of the sun, it completes its set course, not refusing the run, but serving the Master by a kind of necessity.

Earth likewise you see fixed and bearing the command of the one who ordered it. The rest also serve the Maker by necessity, none of them able to do anything other than that for which it was made. Therefore we do not praise them for obeying the Master this way, nor is a better hope laid up for them, because they kept the command unwillingly.

But the human being received authority to obey whatever he wills, bringing himself into service — not mastered by necessity of nature, nor stripped of power. I say this was granted for the sake of better things, so that he might receive something more than he has from the Better One — something that comes to him from obedience and that he may claim from his Maker as what is due.