If I say God could have used someone other than Judas or Pilate, does that make me an Open Theist?
No. Saying "if Judas or Pilate had repented, God could have accomplished his purpose through someone else" is a counterfactual, a statement about what would have been true under different circumstances. It says nothing about whether God knows the future. Open Theism is the claim that God does not exhaustively know future free choices; a counterfactual is just a conditional, and Scripture is full of them, spoken by God himself. You can hold that God knows the future perfectly and still say his purpose did not hang on one particular person's choice.
What the text states
Scripture states counterfactuals plainly, and some are God's own words. - Esther 4:14: "if thou altogether holdest thy peace at this time, then shall there enlargement and deliverance arise to the Jews from another place." Mordecai says Esther's response matters, and that if she refuses, deliverance will come another way. Her choice is real; God's purpose is not dependent on her specifically. - Jeremiah 18:7-10: "If that nation... turn from their evil, I will repent of the evil that I thought to do unto them" (18:8); "If it do evil in my sight... then I will repent of the good" (18:10). God describes what he will do in response to different human actions, the potter and the clay, stated as conditionals by God. - Matthew 11:21: "if the mighty works, which were done in you, had been done in Tyre and Sidon, they would have repented long ago." Jesus states a counterfactual about what Tyre and Sidon would have done under different circumstances.
The strongest opposing reading
“The charge (made here by James White against Leighton Flowers) is that saying "God could have used someone else" smuggles in Open Theism: if God's plan could have gone another way, then God did not certainly know or decree the way it went, so the speaker has denied God's exhaustive foreknowledge, whether he admits it or not. On this reading the church prays and God acts according to a fixed decree, and any "could have been otherwise" language concedes the openness it claims to reject.”
The charge (made here by James White against Leighton Flowers) is that saying "God could have used someone else" smuggles in Open Theism: if God's plan could have gone another way, then God did not certainly know or decree the way it went, so the speaker has denied God's exhaustive foreknowledge, whether he admits it or not. On this reading the church prays and God acts according to a fixed decree, and any "could have been otherwise" language concedes the openness it claims to reject.
The answer
A counterfactual is not a denial of foreknowledge; it is a statement about what would have been true under other conditions, and making one is not Open Theism. Jesus makes one in Matthew 11:21 (Tyre and Sidon "would have repented"), and no one thinks Jesus thereby denied the Father's knowledge of the future. God makes them in Jeremiah 18, stating what he will do if a nation turns or does evil. Mordecai makes one in Esther 4:14, deliverance will come "from another place" if Esther is silent. In every case the human response is genuine and God's larger purpose is secure, which is exactly the Provisionist claim: God's ends do not hang on coercing one particular person, because he is able to accomplish them through free creatures whose responses he knows perfectly. Isaiah 46:10 holds both at once: God declares "the end from the beginning... My counsel shall stand," his purpose is certain, while Scripture still speaks in conditionals about the human choices along the way. Whether God exhaustively knows future free choices is a separate question (Provisionism affirms that he does), and it is not settled by anyone's use of a counterfactual. To make the charge stick, you would have to show why "God could have used someone else" requires a denial of foreknowledge, and it doesn't: it requires only that God's purpose not be hostage to one man's will, which is the opposite of the claim being attributed.
What this means for you
You can affirm that God knows the future perfectly and still say his purpose did not hang on one man's choice. The two are not in tension. When you read a conditional in Scripture ("if that nation... turn," Jer 18:8), you are reading God describe real responses, not confess ignorance. Don't let a label ("Open Theist") be pinned on you for reading the Bible's own conditionals the way the Bible states them.
What this does not prove
This does not endorse Open Theism, and it does not deny God's exhaustive foreknowledge; Provisionism affirms God knows all future free choices. It proves only that a counterfactual, "God could have used someone else," is not by itself a denial of that knowledge. The foreknowledge question is real and separate, and it is settled in God's favor, not against it.
Go deeper
Verse, parse, and count checked by a person.
Checked 2026-10-02 by Claude (content) + CCT (table-pass). 9 Scripture citations verified against the KJV rows. 9 KJV quotations table-passed against public.verses, exact, ellipses split. ONE CORRECTION: the 'What this means for you' section as supplied read "if that nation turn," Jer 18:8; the KJV reads "if that nation, against whom I have pronounced, turn from their evil". An ellipsis was inserted to mark the elision ("if that nation... turn"), matching how the same quotation is handled in the body. Nothing else changed. Not linked because it does not exist in public.answers: does-god-know-who-will-believe.
This answer is the short form. The argument is made at length in God Chose Judas.