Is there an argument for the existence of God?

"In the beginning, God created the heavens and the earth." The first sentence in the divine canon sets us in the presence of Him who is the infinite source of all true blessedness. There is no elaborate argument in proof of the existence of God. The Holy Ghost could not enter upon anything of the kind. God reveals Himself. He makes Himself known by His works. The heavens declare the glory of God; and the firmament shows his handiwork." "All thy works shall praise thee, O Lord." "Great and marvellous are thy works, Lord God Almighty." None but an infidel or an atheist would seek an argument in proof of the Being of One who, by the word of His mouth, called worlds into existence, and declared Himself the All wise, the Almighty, and the everlasting God. Who but "God" could "create" anything. "Lift up your eyes on high, and behold who has created these things, that brings out their host by number; he calls them all by names, by the greatness of his might, for that he is strong in power; not one fails." (Isa. 40:26) "The gods of the heathen are idols, but the Lord made the heavens." In the Book of Job 38-41 we have an appeal of the very grandest description, on the part of Jehovah Himself, to the work of creation, as an unanswerable argument in proof of His infinite superiority; and this appeal, while it sets before the understanding the most vivid and convincing demonstration of God's omnipotence, touches the heart, also, by its amazing condescension. The majesty and the love, the power and the tenderness, are all divine.

That which proves there is a God, proves that we cannot know, nor conceive an idea of Him - i.e., that there must be a cause for what subsists. There is a God, because a thing cannot exist without a cause, but that is not God - it is, after all, only saying that we are finite. I must believe that He is. I am sure that there is a God, because I am sure that what exists, cannot exist without a cause, but what cannot exist without a cause is not God. The impossibility of conceiving existence without a cause (which proves there is a God) is the impossibility of conceiving Him who is that cause, and who exists without one.

Creation should, indeed, speak, and its voice be heard. What is invisible in the Creator should be and is seen, and seen clearly, being understood by the things that are made—even His eternal power and Godhead—not, indeed, His grace, or truth, or love, but infinite power and design, so much so that people are left thus without excuse. (See Romans 1:20.) Creation declares the power of God. It does not reveal what He is in Himself—His nature—but to any, except those wilfully blind, it is evidence sufficient of the existence of a Creator-God!

This lies at the very threshold of Christianity. It affirms as a matter of faith that without which no movement of spiritual life is possible. "He that cometh to God must believe that He is." To bring such a primary truth as the existence of God therefore into the realm of matters which may be discussed is to descend to the very elementary. Yet as "all men have not faith," and the propagation of rationalistic theories is being so actively pursued today, due attention upon even this fundamental fact is not bestowed in vain. Excessive labouring of the point need not be desired, as much occupation controversially with the topic would be a mistake on the part of simple believers; yet seasonable witness to its truth from whatever quarter is surely matter for thankfulness. It is satisfactory to begin with too, when one finds this argument for the being or existence of God based upon ethical rather than upon rational ground. That is to say, that our true knowledge of God is, at bottom, not a matter of reason or intellectual conviction, but intuitive and spiritual. And this is so. The existence of God is not a mere deduction proved by certain facts in nature, or by the undeniable traces of His hand throughout the entire universe, moral and material alike. It is a fact in itself, of which, as natural men even, we are convinced in the innermost recesses of our hearts, apart altogether from demonstration to the mental faculties. Nature's wonders may combine to pour into man's ear their testimony to their great Originator. Man's own indelible intuitions, however, and the promptings of his conscience, bear witness of Him in the heart.

143 It is a very simple principle, that the mind of man cannot go beyond the mind of man, or it ceases to be such; that it cannot reach God so as to know and grasp what He is. If he could, God is not God, or man not man. Cicero's subjecta veritas quasi materia can never take in God. It puts God and man wholly out of their place, and though in an innate sense there is a God remains, it is a fact that man by his own power has never known Him. His highest reach is an "unknown God." With conscience it is another matter; but that is not science. As to this it is clear, fixed laws cannot account for existence, for the things must exist to have the laws attached to them. They are forced to recognise causation; man does so necessarily, and that leads up to a first cause, but it is not science. This may occupy itself with fixed laws, but the laws were fixed somehow before it began its work. What they are when they exist, science may ascertain, but no more.

Most evidently creation demands a Creator, and Scripture plainly tells us what the great lesson of creation is. We read, “The invisible things of Him from the creation of the world are clearly seen, being understood by the things that are made, even His [God’s] ETERNAL POWER AND GODHEAD” (Rom. 1:20).

But the real worth of such evidence from nature, apart altogether from such modifications of it as have been alluded to as now prevalent, its evidence undiluted, at what estimate shall we take it if what we may see of its weight with, and effect upon, men be the criterion by which we judge? Does nature lead to nature's God inevitably? certain as it is that it points there most truly. What does scripture say of its witness? The first chapter of Romans we may take in its later verses surely as giving an instance of how mankind may be affected by the testimony of creation. It is in no special sphere such as Judaism, remember, that this history of man's attitude towards the knowledge of God is traced; but out in the open, among men at large, the Gentiles. From verse 19 onwards we are shown wherein the "ungodliness" of the Gentiles, previously spoken of, consists. This ungodliness of men against which the wrath of God is revealed, what was it but simply an entire absence of the fear of God, where there was sufficient testimony existing to render such a thing inexcusable? The apostle, in reviewing this testimony, goes back to what is primary. The largest, the most general sphere is chosen first, creation, "that which may be known of God." Primitive as is its witness, creation is still full of manifestation of God. That which was "knowable" of God, from the testimony of created things, contained a voice for any listening ear, wherever or whenever found. "Because that which may be known of God is manifest in them; for God hath showed it unto them. For the invisible things of Him from the creation of the world are clearly seen, being understood by the things that are made, even His eternal power and Godhead [divinity], so that they are without excuse."

The works of God truly render eloquent testimony regarding their Author; and "that which may be known of Him," in respect of His Being and power, finds adequate expression there. His eternal power and divinity, invisible like all His attributes, apart from His disclosure of Himself, visible objects of striking character are eminently suited to proclaim. "The heavens," we read in Psalm 19, "declare the glory of God, and the firmament showeth his handiwork." Above man then appeared, and around Him were strewn, wonders great and innumerable to draw and fix his attention upon that supremely wise and powerful One to whom they silently pointed. That these did point somewhere the most darkened heathen has never escaped the conviction of. To say, however, that such have merely missed, through inadvertence, the right direction in which they might have been dimly seen to point, would be to misrepresent the case. Had the indications been obscure, some such excuse might be found possible, but it is not a mistaken reading of the evidence that we must lay to man's account, but the wholesale rejection of it. The language that "day unto day uttereth" is as little ambiguous as its "pouring forth" is meagre. The knowledge that "night unto night showeth" is no esoteric doctrine, but breathes its whisper in the ears of all. "There is no speech nor language, their voice is not heard." Not in articulate fashion; yet "their line is gone out through all the earth, and their sayings to the end of the world."

The infidel may tell us that God is to be known in creation. Did any one ever find Him out there? No doubt, creation does prove the existence of a Creator, as we read in the first chapter of the epistle to the Romans, "The invisible things of Him from the creation are clearly seen, being understood by the things that are made, even His eternal power and Godhead; so that they are without excuse." Creation yields a testimony which the heathen were bound to receive, and, had they received it, a higher light would assuredly have shone upon them. But they did not receive it, nay, they actually worshipped the things that were made, instead of the One Who made them. Philosophers talk of rising from nature up to nature's God. But nature is a ruin, and man himself a ruin in the midst of ruin; and instead of rising to nature's God, he makes a god of nature, and degrades himself below the level of a beast. See Romans 1:21-32.

Look at the creation. There is a testimony God has given of Himself. Man is guilty, if he does not see God in it. There are many difficulties, many things he cannot explain; but the testimony is sufficient to condemn those who do not believe in God the Creator.

The heavens declare His glory, and the firmament gives unmistakeable evidence of His handiwork. For the full, revelation of God the world had to wait for Christ to come; nevertheless, creation clearly makes manifest to all His power and divinity. It is plain to any thoughtful and upright mind that the One who made that which we see above and below and around us must have power far beyond the creature, also that He Himself must be above man altogether. And like the testimony sent in grace to man today, the voice of creation has gone out into all the earth, and its words unto the ends of the world (Rom. 10:18). The powerful eloquence of this ancient preacher has doubtless been fruitful in multitudes of cases, in bringing home to their souls the great fact that God is, and in bringing them to cry to Him in their need. More than one has said, “When I consider Thy heavens, the work of Thy fingers, the moon and the stars, which Thou hast ordained; what is man that thou art mindful of him?” Nor have the words of Isaiah been in vain, “Thus says the Lord that created the heavens; God Himself that formed the earth and made it; He has established it, He created it not in vain, He formed it to be inhabited: I am the Lord; and there is none else … a just God and a Saviour; there is none beside Me. Look unto Me, and be ye saved, all the ends of the earth: for 1 AM GOD, AND THERE IS NONE ELSE.”