http://reknew.org/2014/10/gods-regrets-and-divine-foreknowledge/
quote:
Some may object that if God regretted a decision he made, he must not be perfectly wise. Wouldn't God be admitting to making a mistake? Two considerations lead me to answer this question in the negative.
First, it is better to allow Scripture to inform us regarding the nature of divine wisdom than to reinterpret an entire motif in order to square it with our preconceptions of divine wisdom. If God says he regretted a decision, and if Scripture elsewhere tells us that God is perfectly wise, then we should simply conclude that one can be perfectly wise and still regret a decision. Even if this is a mystery to us, it is better to allow the mystery to stand than to assume that we know what God's wisdom is like and conclude on this basis that God can't mean what he clearly says.
My second point, however is that in the open view there is little mystery involved in accepting that God can regret his own previous decisions. Once we understand that the future is partly open and that humans are genuinely free, the paradox of how God could experience genuine regret over a decision he made disappears. God made a wise decision because it had the greatest possibility of yielding the best results. God's decision wasn't the only variable in this matter, however, there was also the variable of Saul's will. Saul freely strayed from God's plan, but that is not God's fault, nor does it make God's decision unwise.