Does God exist?

What the Bible says

The Bible does not open with a debate about whether God exists. Its first sentence is: "In the beginning God created the heavens and the earth" (Gen 1:1). It assumes that God is there, and it says that ways of knowing him are already open to every person. The first is creation.

The heavens declare the glory of God; the skies proclaim the work of His hands.

Ps 19:1

The psalmist goes on to say that this speech is "without speech or language," yet "their voice has gone out into all the earth" (Ps 19:3-4). The sky writes no argument. It simply points, for anyone willing to look. Paul has the same thought in Romans.

For since the creation of the world God’s invisible qualities, His eternal power and divine nature, have been clearly seen, being understood from His workmanship

Rom 1:20

The second way lies inside us. Paul says that Gentiles who never received the law still show that "the work of the law is written on their hearts, their consciences also bearing witness" (Rom 2:15). People who have been taught nothing still sense that right and wrong are real. Scripture reads this as a trace of God. These are the signposts of creation and conscience.

In Athens Paul also says what the signposts are for.

God intended that they would seek Him and perhaps reach out for Him and find Him, though He is not far from each one of us.

Acts 17:27

"Reach out for Him" is an honest phrase. The Bible does not pretend that finding God is easy. It admits that sometimes we grope as in the dark. Yet he is "not far from each one of us."

What, then, is faith? Hebrews names its starting point.

For anyone who approaches Him must believe that He exists and that He rewards those who earnestly seek Him.

Heb 11:6

Faith here is not a jump with eyes closed. It is coming forward on the strength of two beliefs: that God is, and that he does not turn away the one who looks for him.

The church's witness

The church has long reflected on these paths. Some, like Thomas Aquinas, set them out as formal arguments; here, as in Scripture, they serve as pointers. There is the fact that a world exists at all, the fact that it has an order we can understand, and the fact that we cannot live without talking about good and evil. Christians have taken these facts to point to a Creator. Each of these arguments also has serious critics, and thoughtful people have reached different conclusions. So this is not a closed demonstration. It is a weighing of evidence.

Matthew Henry, commenting on Psalm 19, says the heavens speak themselves to be works of God's hands, "for they must have a Creator who is eternal, infinitely wise, powerful, and good" Matthew Henry. An ordered world, he says, calls for wisdom behind it.

The Fathers, however, never spoke lightly of knowing God. Gregory says that in this mortal state we see God "only through the medium of certain images, not, in the reality of His own nature" Gregory. Chrysostom says that nature "is in Itself simple and without shape; It sits not, It walks not" Chrysostom. A signpost is not the destination. God is always greater than what we have understood.

The church's most famous witness is a prayer of Augustine. He opens his Confessions with the words, "Our heart is restless, until it repose in Thee" Augustine, Confessions 1.1. For him God was first not the conclusion of an argument but the one the heart had been looking for. It is worth remembering, too, that the book this app quotes as the Catena, the golden chain of the Fathers on the Gospels, was compiled by Thomas Aquinas. The theologian best known for reasoning about God's existence also gathered the Fathers' testimony with great care.

Matthew Henry adds on Hebrews 11:6: "Those who would find God, must seek him with all their heart" Matthew Henry.

In the original languages

The "create" of the Bible's first verse is bara (בָּרָא). In its basic form its subject in the Old Testament is always God. People make things out of material, but this verb is kept for God's creating. The word alone does not mean ‘out of nothing’, but its use fits the Bible's picture of God: not one more thing inside the world but the one who gave the world its being.

Another word is the "divine nature" of Romans 1:20, theiotes (θειότης). It occurs only once in the New Testament and means something like "God-ness," what God is like. Paul says that from creation we can recognise God's power and God-ness. He does not say that we know him fully. All things point to him, and knowing him leads on to pistis (πίστις), trust.

Common objections

"There is no evidence." This is not a weak objection. God cannot be measured in a laboratory, and the world has many competing religions. Some scholars argue that belief itself is a product of brains and cultures, needing no God to explain it. Christians agree that God is not something to put under a microscope. If God were one object within the universe, he would not be God. But the objection invites a question: what kind of evidence would be enough? We believe in love, justice and mathematical truth for reasons other than experiments. The evidence the Bible points to is not one decisive proof but several threads running in one direction. Some people find those threads sufficient, and others do not, and that should be said honestly. Why God does not show himself more plainly is taken up separately in Why can't we see God?

"Then who made God?" This is an old question, and a fair one: if everything needs a cause, so does God; if not, why not the universe? The Christian answer is that God is not a made being. Scripture says of him, "from everlasting to everlasting You are God" (Ps 90:2). What has a beginning needs a cause, but the question does not apply in the same way to one who has no beginning. Some will find this unsatisfying and will say it only pushes the problem back. Yet atheism too must leave the universe, or the laws of physics, as the point where explanation stops. Either way an unexplained starting point remains. The question is whether that starting point is mindless matter or a wise person.

"Science explains it all." Science has learned astonishing things about how the world works, and that should never be played down. We know far more than people did when lightning was explained as divine anger. But knowing how the laws operate is a different matter from asking why there are laws at all, and why there is something rather than nothing. That many scientists have believed and many have not shows that science itself does not settle this question. More on this is in Do science and faith conflict?

Going further

Whether God exists is first a question to answer, and only then a puzzle to solve. In reply the Bible does not hand the questioner a certificate. It hands over an invitation.

You will seek Me and find Me when you search for Me with all your heart.

Jer 29:13

This promise is not pressure. It is all right to be unsure today. Someone who seeks while doubting is still seeking. Beside this verse Matthew Henry notes that God never said, "Seek ye me in vain" Matthew Henry.

You might ask yourself some questions. What reasons do I have for wanting God not to exist, or to exist? Which signpost speaks most to me: the world, its order, or conscience? If I were to look for him with my whole heart today, where would I begin?

To read further, see Who is God?, the question that follows once we say that he exists. Reading the Gospel of John slowly from the beginning is also a good place to start.