Who Made God? Pt.3

Third, one could appeal to the scientific evidence and ask the question, “The universe hasn’t always existed. Where did it come from?” Big bang cosmology tells us that our incredibly fine-tuned universe, all matter, energy and space, had a beginning to its existence. In other words, there was a creation event. Anything that begins to exist has a cause. Therefore, the universe had a cause (and God seems to be the best candidate). We also know that time itself, as Stephen Hawking, George Ellis, and Roger Penrose discovered around 35 years ago, had a finite beginning concurrent with the big bang. Since space and time are created entities, then whatever, or whomever, created them is not just another spatio-temporal being but would exist outside space and time.

Now, time is the dimension where cause and effect take place, and it is linear. The universe is confined to a single dimension of time moving in only one direction. Anything that begins to exist (such as the universe) has a starting point along this time dimension and is caused by something else. The law of causality tells us that effects follow their causes. But since God created time and is not limited to it, he can operate outside of our time dimension and not be subject to the law of causality. Consequently, if God is not subject to the law of cause and effect, He has no cause or beginning. This means that He has always existed. This is in concord with the traditional concepts of God. He must be eternal and necessary. He depends on nothing else for his existence. Non-theists who object should remember that they have always said that the universe was eternal and uncaused. Unfortunately, the scientific evidence has shown this position to be unacceptable. (Slight digression: And those who appeal to the existence of infinite universes to explain the fine-tuning of our universe are themselves stuck with the question of origins, to wit, where did all those universes come from?)

All three responses to the question of God’s origin, taken together, make for a cumulative case for God as the uncreated, Creator of the universe (Of course, I’ve presented only a short, lay-person written summary. I suggest reading the linked books for more detail). Even if not everybody is satisfied with what I’ve presented, that’s fine. I’m just trying to point out that when it comes to the existence of God and His nature, the realm of science and philosophy is still very much occupied.