Ask Lee... About Who Made God

By Lee Strobel

8.3.06

Thanks to everyone who submitted a question! CLICK HERE to pose a question for a future newsletter. Though we can’t answer them all, we’ll select the ones that seem to have the broadest appeal – or are the most intriguing!

Q. What do you tell a child that says, “If God created everything, then who created God?”

A. I’d say, “Great question! I’m so glad you’re thinking about important things like God!” Then I’d chase down an expert to get a good answer!

The Case for a Creator: Evidence from Cosmology  (5:04)

Actually, a few years ago I was a contributor to a book called Who Made God? One of the book’s general editors, theologian Norman Geisler, boiled down the answer in a way that even a child could comprehend:

“Who made God? No one did. He was not made. He has always existed. Only things that had a beginning – like the world – need a maker. God had no beginning, so God did not need to be made.”

Pretty clear, huh? Of course, much more could be said – and Geisler says it in the book. When I get asked this question, I usually refer to the Kalam Cosmological Argument for the existence of God, which says:

• Whatever begins to exist has a cause.
• The universe began to exist (as virtually all scientists now concede).
• Therefore, the universe had a cause.

As my book The Case for a Creator demonstrates, logic dictates that this cause must be an uncaused, beginningless, timeless, immaterial, personal being endowed with freedom of will and enormous power – all qualities of God.

Then who created God? Well, notice that the Kalam argument doesn’t say that everything has a cause. Only those things which begin to exist need a cause. By definition, God didn’t have a beginning and therefore he needs no cause or creator.

Philosopher William Lane Craig says atheists should have no problem with believing something can be eternal. He points out that until the scientific evidence convinced cosmologists that the universe began to exist at a point in the past, atheists had long maintained that the universe itself was eternal and therefore didn’t need a cause. (see William Lane Craig on www.LeeStrobel.com)

So, said Craig, “how can they possibly maintain that the universe can be eternal and uncaused, yet God cannot be timeless and uncaused?”

Thanks to everyone who submitted a question! CLICK HERE to pose a question for a future newsletter. Though we can’t answer them all, we’ll select the ones that seem to have the broadest appeal – or are the most intriguing!