The death of Christ was according to the “determinate counsel and foreknowledge of God” (Acts 2:23; Acts 4:27–28). Nobody is disputing that. What Scripture does not say is that God's purpose required Him to irresistibly cause Judas, Pilate, Herod, or any particular sinner to become wicked in order for that purpose to succeed. You have quietly moved from God determined the event to God causally determined every individual's unbelief necessary to the event. Those are not the same proposition. Look at Judas carefully. Jesus prayed through the night before choosing the Twelve, and Judas was actually one of the twelve men He chose and “named apostles” (Luke 6:12–16). Peter does not later describe Judas's apostleship as some theatrical appointment that was never truly his: “For he was numbered with us, and had obtained part of this ministry” (Acts 1:17). And even more devastatingly: “…this ministry and apostleship, from which Judas by transgression fell” (Acts 1:25). You cannot fall by transgression from an apostleship you never actually possessed. Judas had a real calling, a real office, a real ministry and a real place among the Twelve. His betrayal does not prove that God secretly ordained him to unbelief. Scripture says Judas turned aside from what had actually been given to him. And Saul makes the point almost impossible to evade. Samuel did not tell Saul, “You were merely a temporary prop until God's real choice, David, arrived.” He told him: “Thou hast not kept the commandment of the LORD thy God… for now would the LORD have established thy kingdom upon Israel for ever. But now thy kingdom shall not continue” (1 Sam. 13:13–14). Read the grammar. Would have established. But now shall not continue. Because thou hast not kept what the LORD commanded thee. God Himself later says concerning Saul, “I regret that I have made Saul king,” and gives the reason: “for he has turned back from following me and has not performed my commandments” (1 Sam. 15:11). If your theology forces “the LORD would have established thy kingdom… but now” to mean that God never genuinely would have established it at all, perhaps Scripture is not the thing that needs adjusting. God's sovereign purpose does not depend upon human rebellion, and human rebellion cannot defeat God's sovereign purpose. Those truths are perfectly compatible. God determined that Christ would give Himself for the sins of the world. That does not mean Judas had to be irresistibly determined to become Judas the betrayer for God to accomplish Calvary. God is not so fragile that His redemptive purpose requires Him to manufacture somebody's unbelief. The same God who knew Judas would betray Christ could genuinely appoint Judas an apostle, genuinely hold him responsible for abandoning that apostleship, foreknow his betrayal, incorporate that freely committed wickedness into His redemptive purpose, and still accomplish exactly what He intended. That isn't “Plan B.” That is a God whose wisdom is so great that no creature's obedience is coerced and no creature's rebellion can overthrow His purpose. And Acts 2:23 itself refuses to collapse those categories: Christ was delivered according to God's determinate counsel and foreknowledge, yet those who crucified Him did so with “wicked hands.” God determined the redemption but men committed the wickedness, and God accomplished His purpose through their wickedness without becoming the author of their wickedness. So yes, God had a plan. What has not been demonstrated is the additional philosophical claim that for God's plan to be certain, Judas had to be causally determined to unbelieve, Pilate had to be causally determined to condemn, and every alternative act of repentance had to be rendered impossible by God. Don't smuggle determinism into the word “determined.”