If God Is Perfect, Why Isn't Creation?

 He could’ve created a universe without sin, but then there could be no love and ultimately no free will or choice to obey or disobey God. Evil was once good and is a perversion, distortion, or parasite of good. When God did create everything, He did say, “It was very good.” But God couldn’t grant us free will or choice and then prevent us from using them to disobey or hate Him. Love and obedience must be voluntary and a choice. So God inevitably created the possibility of evil.

As far as the fact that everything cannot be perfect, that is hard to define since perfection involves immutability and eternity (it cannot improve or need improvement, nor change for the worse). Note that this world is only a staging area for eternity and heaven will be perfect, and no sinners will be there or it would no longer be perfect. This world is temporary and a test or trial for the next. Even hell will be perfect: perfect justice.

What’s more, nature is always in a state of flux! You never step into the same river twice! Only God cannot change and is immutable and unchangeable in nature or attributes. Jesus is the same, yesterday, today, and tomorrow! We will always be in need of improvement and always on a learning curve. God’s knowledge is perfect—past, present, future—all things logical and possible. We are confined and limited to the time-space continuum but God is immaterial and spirit.

Only God can be perfect and He could not create another God and creation by definition isn’t perfect because it was created and perfection implies being uncreated or eternal without beginning,. But there can only be one Supreme Being who is Almighty in the same reality or cosmos. The closest we see to perfection in this life is Jesus because He is the Son of God and without human flaw—-sinless,

Is There A God Who Created Everything Or Is Science Correct?

Correct in what? To be created implies a Creator. To be designed and planned implies a Designer or Planner. There is no final conflict and they can be reconciled. Something must logically be eternal and have no beginning; it’s easier ot believe this is God than the chaos of random energy before the big bang. There’s only one alternative to a Creator behind the creation of the physical world, and that is evolution. But this theory doesn’t answer all the questions of where life came from originally for instance.; we know that life only raised from life as the metabolic motor, DNA, from previous DNA.

What you're then saying is that the world created itself and this is illogical and science is supposed to be logical. Nothing can cause or create itself. All effects must have a cause. Everything that begins to exist and that includes the world has a cause. This begs the question of a First Cause that Aristotle thought and that originated it all. No matter which side you take, you are going by faith because neither theism nor atheism has all the answers and requires you to be a person of faith; faith in science is still faith.

Science, by the way, is not intended to answer metaphysical questions such as the existence of God but only the physical parameters it is limited to. Science is know-how, not know-why. It is a false dichotomy to say that science and faith in God are antithetical and opposes. The scientific method was formulated by Sir Francis Bacon, a believer in God.

Science, you will know has no answer to the origin of the universe before the big bang but from some singularity, but where did that come from? and the big bang is not contrary to God but could be the methodology He used. They siill dont’ know what caused the big bang and even who programmed it with all the universal, physical constants and laws of nature if not the Lawgiver Himself. This refers to intelligent design or ID and leads to an Ulitmate Mind because of the existence of intelligence.

What Would Life Be Like If God Hadn't Created Man?

 “In him was life, and the life was the light of men.” (cf. John 1:4). If you’re saying we had evolved apart from being created, man would not be in the image of God obviously because things would be without God in the equation. But God is life and breathed in Adam the breath of life and he became a living soul as Genesis depicts. God created all 11 million known lifeforms on earth and He would be the same and His life also, even had He never created mankind. It seems like nature gets along quite well without us in the picture. Without God in the metric, we are but grown-up blue-green pond scum that deserves no respect!

This is what that bleak outlook looks like: no purpose or meaning in life, no hope of eternal life, no dignity or sanctity of life, and no fulfillment in life itself. We would be mere animals in heat, seeking pleasure and avoiding pain, driven by instinct. Instead o life being the deliberate act of God, it would be by chance, spontaneous generation, and evolution. We came from nothing, are here for no reason, or nothing, and going to nothing or nowhere; a brief episode between two oblivions.

But mankind was meant to bring glory to God (per Isaiah 43:7) and to be a lifeform in the image of God that He could have fellowship with, know, and love God. With no humans in the biblical sense on which to bestow His love, it would be a loveless world for God cannot express His love adequately through mere beasts. No lifeform would be moral or even spiritual to know right and wrong and to God Himself. Lifeforms would certainly not be intelligent for we are homo sapiens or wise humans. We alone are rational and have a volition that can go either for or against God.

No animal rebels against God and sins but acts according to instinct like self-preservation and procreation, satisfying its appetites. Animals are oblivious to God and do not build chapels! “Where is He who makes us wiser than the beasts?”

If God Created Time And Space, How Can He Exist Without Time Or Space?

 The Creator is greater than His creation. God must exist to create! Nothing can just happen without cause all by itself. Even science knows something existed. Because He’s eternal from everlasting to everlasting, the Father of time or time/space just doesn't exist apart from the material world of matter/energy. No one knows what the concept of time really is but God is not confined, defined, nor limited by it.

He can see the future as the present all in one moment because of this. God is immaterial and therefore doesn't need space or time as He is not part of the time-space continuum. God is spirit and that means immaterial and not having any physical limits; therefore, not time or space dimensions (God is ultra-dimensional and can enter any dimension He chooses; I AM WHO I AM WHO I AM ….. He decides the terms of His existence which are infinite and incomprehensible to us: the finite cannot grasp the infinite by definition; this can also be interpreted as I CAUSE TO BE.... (God as the First Cause or Uncaused Cause). 

Even science knows that time (the energy clock) began at creation (the Big Bang) and that something or someone must have “existed” before that due to the law of cause and effect; everything that begins to exist has a cause—the universe began and therefore was caused and most likely by God. For nothing can cause or create itself. Soli Deo Gloria! 

Who Created or Caused God? Doesn't Everything Have A Beginning And An End? ...

 

NB: THIS IS A THEOLOGICAL ARGUMENT NOT MEANT AS SCIENTIFIC. THERE SEEMS TO BE SOME AGREEMENT HERE IN THE TWO. THESE VIEWS ARE NOT FRINGE BELIEFS BUT FAIRLY WIDELY ACCEPTED.

The maxim that out of nothing, nothing comes is valid. God is not a thing but the Creator of all things. But we must not jump to the conclusion that everything was created or had a beginning. Then there would be a time when nothing existed and that means nothing would exist now. The fact that something exists really proves something must be eternal. Only that which is within the time-space continuum has a beginning. God isn’t as its Creator and is therefore eternal or without beginning.

All events and effects have causes. Even the Big Bang had a cause outside itself. Everything that begins to exist has a cause; how can God be the First Cause if He began or was created? God is eternal and that means without a beginning point or cause: He’s the First Cause. Aristotle settled this issue and called God the First Cause that caused all things to begin.

It’s impossible to cross infinity, to say everything had a beginning is just that; it's faulty logic. A caused B caused C caused D ….. (AT SOME POINT WE RUN OUT OF LETTERS). Infinite regress is impossible philosophically, mathematically, and logically. Every chain of events has a beginning point and a cause. God is not an event or an effect, but the uncaused cause, which is possible philosophically and logically. So you cannot say that there was no beginning or creation point when God began it all.

If someone or something made God, God would not be the Creator but a creature and be caused Himself and not the First Cause. If someone made God you could ask who made him? and so forth ad Infinitum. God says He is the Alpha and Omega, the beginning and the end Himself! Even time had a beginning and is part of creation for God created it because it's a corollary of space and matter. Many things just are: love, truth, logic, justice; where did they come from? God is love, true, just, and logical. “In the beginning was the Word” [Logos or logic, understanding, intelligence, law, order, design, purpose, design].

Science, not philosophy or religion has come up with the theory that time would not exist had it not been for the existence of both space and matter. That time began therefore at the big bang when the time-space continuum began. This was postulated (some may say speculated) by physicist Stephen Hawking who wrote The Brief History of Time supposedly outlining the beginning and end of time. Before the Big Bang, there was no time! Even the Bible (cf 2 Tim. 2:9; Titus 1:2) says that time began or had a beginning.

According to Einstein’s General Theory of Relativity space and time are interwoven and connected. It is said that at absolute zero no time exists and that after the so-called “heat death” of the cosmos that it will too. Also, that time began at the Big Bang and someday will cease to be. I do not claim to be a scientist but am well-read on the subject. This is a lay opinion and meant to be a philosophical/theological answer, not a scientistic one. I regard the Bible as the final arbiter of truth and rule of faith for the Christian.

I refer all questions to The Nature of Time and Space by Stephen Hawking. I did not intend to make a direct quote but what science has come to believe.: “Almost everyone now believes that the universe and time itself had a beginning at the Big Bang.” (Page 60).

In conclusion, God’s name is I AM with no predicate (I AM WHO I AM WHO I AM ….) God is whatever He needs or desires to be and is complete in Himself, self-contained, and self-existent. (cf. Acts 17:25).

Can Christians Affirm The Big Bang?

 

1. The Bible doesn’t explain how God created the earth. The know-how is left to science, not religion.
2. The Bible doesn’t make it clear when creation happened, but only “in the beginning," it doesn't start, "Once upon a time," but commences somewhere in the time-space continuum. 
3. There is nothing contradictory in the Big Bang that would directly contradict Scripture,” it admits that the first thing formed was “light.”
4. Even scientists acknowledge that time and space began at the Big Bang or creation.
5. The Bible says God created time and that time “began,” (the energy clock began ticking).
6. Scientists have no answer as to the know-why of the Big Bang but can find out know-how. 
7. Science doesn’t know who fired the Big Bang into existence; who banged it!

Note that ID or intelligent design is necessary for the cosmos; without logos or logic there could be no cosmos for many universal constants were “programmed” into the Big Bang because pure energy has no form or intelligent purpose! The input must be design from a Designer!  Soli Deo Gloria!

Old Earth, New Earth

 Contrary to popular interpretation, the Bible doesn’t say when the earth was created. It says merely, “In the beginning…” whenever that was, possibly billions of years or eons ago.  This isn't just a way to begin a story and it doesn't say, "Once upon a time!"  There is a possible gap between verses one and two of the chapter that could have taken this long. Note that a day with the LORD is not always twenty-four hours, such as the day of the LORD and the day of judgment.  The Bible only tells us the earth was created and who did it; namely, God. It wasn’t a fluke or accident and it didn’t evolve or create itself, impossible! 

Nothing can create or cause itself according to the law of cause and effect. Something has to be eternal for anything to exist because everything cannot have a beginning or be created, or there would be nothing now (out of nothing, nothing comes). God is seen as the First Cause or who got it all started. There can be an uncaused cause but not an uncaused effect. Since God is eternal, He can have no cause since then He would have a beginning. Everything that begins to exist has a cause; the universe began and therefore has a cause; most believably God.

The Bible assures us that even time had a beginning and was created by God as a corollary of space and matter. (cf. 2 Tim. 1:9 Titus 1:2). But don’t bet your soul on science getting it right because they have been wrong and cannot answer a lot of questions of the earth’s origin; science is know-how, not know-why. Genesis is not a science lesson and the Bible is not a scientific manual but a way to show us salvation and to know God.

There have been conflicts between science and the Bible before and the Bible has proven right. The theory of an eternal universe is untenable and it had a beginning: this implies a Beginner!  Soli Deo Gloria!

Can You Justify Biblical Creation?

 

1. Even science acknowledges a beginning (the Big Bang)
2. Matter/energy/time all began about 13.7 billion years ago accordingly and not contradictory to the Bible
3. If there was a beginning, there must be a Beginner or cause behind it
4. Creation implies a Creator (order an Orderer, purpose a Purposer, etc.)
5. The Bible doesn’t say when the beginning was or when the earth was created but only “in the beginning,” there is a gap between Gen. 1:1 and Gen. 1:2 that is an unspecified amount of time
6. The so-called six days of creation could be interpreted as epochs or episode, not necessarily 24-hour days; to God, a day can be a thousand years, for example, or a period of time (the day of the LORD)
7. The Bible doesn’t tell how things happened but that God made them happen at His word by the breath of His mouth
8. The Big Bang or creation is an event; all events require explanations and have causes
9. Everything that begins to exist (creation) has a cause; that cause is most likely God—the First Cause (infinite regress is impossible)
10. Science cannot explain many things and doesn’t have all the answers, such as the mystery of life and its origin.    Soli Deo Gloria!

Who Created God?

"Every house is built by someone, but God is the builder of everything" (Hebrews 3:4, CEB). 
NOTE:  WE ARE ASSUMING EVERYTHING HAS BEEN CREATED!  

This is a trick question since God is the Creator Himself, and no one else can create ex nihilo (out of naught) but Him.  The question implies God can be created or that there is a Superior Being to God in the same universe!  If God were created then He would not be Creator but created, and would not be eternal but captive to time with a beginning like us. God exists independent of the time-space continuum and therefore has no beginning (being eternal) and therefore cannot be created.   But this is the one question that led to Bertrand Russell's faith collapsing--he couldn't reconcile this.

Nothing can create itself, or it would be a contradiction in terms--both a creator and created, both existing and not existing before itself!  We know from the rules of logic that nothing can create itself nor be its own cause.  Anything that has a cause is not eternal; God is eternal, and therefore uncaused. There can be causes without a cause but not an effect without a cause--God is no effect and not a creation but the original Cause and Creator.  If someone caused God or created Him, that person would be the Creator or First Cause, Causa Prima, or Primary Mover of the cosmos--we define God as the Uncaused Cause, Uncreated Creator, Prime Mover, or Unmoved Mover.  This is His self-existence or aseity.  God is independent of everything and everyone and needs no one or nothing, not even a cause.

This is all Cosmology-101 (or dealing with causality--nothing just happens by itself!) and it demonstrates that you cannot cross infinity or infinite regress is impossible.  That means that you cannot have an endless series of finite causes, but must have a first cause to start the chain of events.  Every event has a cause (if an explosion happened, you would want to know what caused it).  According to the kalam cosmological argument for God, "everything that begins to exist has a cause"--the universe began to exist and therefore had a cause or Beginner, while God didn't begin to exist and has no cause (creator)!  But God is no event and a living Being that doesn't change, while being created implies being changed.  God is the perfect One who needs no improvement, who cannot change for the better since He's already perfect and cannot change for the worse since He is perfect and needs no change or improvement and is immutable, according to Arthur Pink.

None of us will ever have a grasp on the creative act of God and the know-how of it, but we must accept God as our Creator by faith since faith pleases God.  It is not too difficult to imagine something uncreated:  where did love come from? where did justice and righteousness come from?  what about fairness and mercy?  God is love and without love, there would be no God--that's His essence.  God needs no one and is a Law unto Himself with no one to be accountable to but Himself; i.e., He is also self-sufficient and meets all His own needs without us. He is complete in and of Himself.   If He wants something He creates it.  In this sense, God is the only free Being in the universe who can act freely and without restraint on His wants.  We are fortunate that God wants us by His grace!

By contrast, men like to say they are self-made men, but this means they worship their creator, which is themselves!  We need God--He doesn't need us!  He is our judge; we are not His judge or critic. God shares of Himself and blesses us with gifts to be used as gifts back to Him; i.e., He gives us faith as a gift to us, and what we do with it is our gift to Him!  In closing let me state that God is the Supreme Good and the standard and measure of goodness--the ultimate plumb-line.  Without God, we would not know good--where would the idea come from if not God?  And so goodness just exists as part of God's nature and it wasn't created either.          Soli Deo Gloria!

The Timeless One

"... Even from everlasting to everlasting, You are God"  (Psalm 90:2, NASB).  
"Do you not know?  Have you not heard?  The Lord is the everlasting God..." (Isaiah 40:28, ESV).
"For thus says the high and lofty One
  who inhabits eternity, whose name is Holy;
'I dwell in the high and holy place [outside the time/space continuum]"  (Isaiah 57:15, RSV).
"[W]ho has saved us and called us to a holy life--not because of anything we have done but because of his own purpose and grace.  This grace was given us in Christ Jesus before the beginning of time"  (2 Tim. 1:9, NIV).

Most people don't know that time actually began!  Before there was a cosmos, there was no time--it was not of the essence!  "[G]od ... promised before time began"  (Titus 1:2, HCSB, emphasis added).

To our disadvantage, we are confined to time to comprehend things because we fit into the four dimensions that it included; whereas God created time and is timeless; from everlasting to everlasting He is God, according to Psalm 90:1.  Scientists have determined that if there were no space or matter, there would be no time.  What we can infer is that they were all created ex nihilo or out of nothing by the command of God simultaneously, since time is merely a corollary of space and matter.  If God created time, he cannot be defined in terms of it and is independent of it, and cannot be confined to it as we are.

God lives in more dimensions than we do and ones we cannot fathom.  When we say God is timeless, it means He doesn't age nor change--He is immutable!  Everything that begins to exist has a cause according to the ancient Greeks, and since God didn't begin to exist, He has no cause--He's not an effect, which means He owes His existence to no one or nothing.  God is not an effect since He had no beginning! Therefore, He must be self-existent and is who He is.  We don't know what God was doing before creation--some say He was creating hell for curious souls!  

But Jesus is the "Alpha and Omega," who always is, always was, and always shall be; the One "who is, and who was, and who is to come, the Almighty" (cf. Rev. 1:8), having no beginning and no end.  He is called the eternal "I Am" in Scripture and this is not an Is-ness or state of being, but an Is-ing, a living Being (the Is-ing One), that is independent of all other life.

What God did was create a place in our heart to long for eternity--He set eternity in our hearts according to Eccl. 3:11.   When God is not defined in terms of time, it means He's timeless and will never grow old, become obsolete, nor become weary due to age.   If God created time, then, He has the right to manipulate it according to His will and to step outside it and to see all of it in one big spectrum or perspective.  To Him, a day is as a thousand years (He can accomplish as much as He wants in any given moment), and a thousand years is as a day (He can speed it up to His desires).

In summation, we can see how man cannot fathom God's limits nor understand eternity since the finite cannot grasp the infinite, as the Greeks said.  We are limited no matter how we approach the equation of God.  "Canst thou by searching find out God?" (Cf. Job 11:7).  You cannot put Him into a box or equation!  Jesus Himself pronounced:  "... Before Abraham was, I Am [already existed as the eternal One]"  (cf. John 8:58).  God created the time/space continuum and is able to manipulate after His will.   Soli Deo Gloria!

How the Earth Was Made

Maybe you've been intrigued by History's "How the Earth Was Made." Scientists think they have it all figured out! But I'm sorry, you can't take God out of the equation and maintain intellectual integrity--you're really committing mental suicide. Man will be without excuse as Rom 1:20 proclaims. They supposedly believe in the "Big Bang" but not in the "Beginner!" If you heard an explosion, wouldn't you wonder whodunit? Science is very good at telling us "know-how" but not "know-why." If they would stick to their guns on what they observe in nature there would be no conflict. One who believes science and religion cannot coexist or contradict each other doesn't know either science or religion. I can see how you can look at the sad state of affairs of a man socially and wonder if there's a God, but how can you not look up to the heavens and deny Him? Napoleon was once asked if there was a God: (looking to heaven)  "But who made all that?"

"In the beginning God...." God is the logical starting point and orientation point to get our bearings straight. If your philosophy starts anywhere else it will be erroneous. The source of all and instigator of all is God. This is of primary importance, i.e., that we acknowledge that God is the one and only creator--we are merely creatures. The account is not comprehensive, but gives us what we need to know--God believes in a need to know philosophy. The question of "when" is the beginning--the beginning of time and space as we know it--yes the Bible proclaims that time had a beginning and scientists are realizing this also.  It is better to begin with God and explain the universe, than begin with the universe and try to explain God.

The point is that everything in our four-dimensions of the time-space continuum had a beginning. You and I both had beginnings. Every atom had a beginning; nothing could be more obvious. But R. C. Sproul says not to jump to the conclusion that everything had a beginning. That would be "fatal" and contrary to reason, science, logic, and faith. Why? Imagine the total negation of everything--total nothingness! A rule of science and philosophy says: Ex nihilo, nihil fit or "out of nothing, nothing comes." There must be something transcendent or supreme over creation that didn't have a beginning in order for everything to exist in time and space. We all owe our very existence to this Being (the formulation we all refer to as "God").
 
The Bible gives us everything we need to know for our faith to nurture and save us. It answers "why," "what," and "who" and "when." God created the earth by His Word or command (Ps 33:6,9; Heb 11:6). He created it out of nothing by virtue of His essence as Creator-God. Rev 4:11 gives us the reason why God created the heavens and the earth. For the glory of God and that it would elicit worship of the Godhead.   Soli Deo Gloria!

Scientific Creationism?

It is impossible to have a science of creation because no scientist was there to observe the event that only God and the sons of God saw. "Where were you when I laid the foundations of the earth?" An event must also be repeatable to be valid scientifically. The only true knowledge we have on creation is the Bible or from theology, which we believe is a divine revelation--another accurate way to truth. When scientists claim they know how the earth was formed, it is only conjecture and induction and certainly not infallible. They hypothesize and theorize, but cannot know for absolute certain. "By faith, we understand that the universe was created...."

Now there are some Christians who don't believe in a literal 24-hour day in the Genesis 1 account. The sun wasn't created until the 4th day so it might be postulated that a day could be any length of time--like when we say, "Let's call it a day!" There is also the gap theory that says there is a pause between Gen. 1:1 and 1:2. Grammatically this could be interpreted as a title and then an explanation of the opening remark. The Bible doesn't intend to tell how long it took to create the earth, only that God created it.

Now, as far as man being created on the sixth day, it looks like Eve was also created on the 6th day--and I thought Adam had to name all the animals and get time to get lonely first before he met his match. Another discrepancy is that when you take everything literally, there is no time for the angelic rebellion. Were there angels before there was heaven? By the time of the temptation in the garden of Eden, there was already evil present in the cosmos.

The entire six days is looked on like one day later in Genesis ("On the day that I created...") As you may know, "day" in the Bible doesn't always refer to a 24 hour period, but may even be a thousand years, as in the "day of the Lord."

In summary: We have to be tolerant of Christians who believe scientific findings that don't directly contradict the Bible, e.g., evolution. The Bible is not a scientific textbook, but where it does say something scientific, it is inerrant. Keeping the main thing the main thing, we should be glad that one believes God did create the cosmos and not quibble over words or doctrines that have no relation to the Christian life, and are therefore considered "minor" doctrines.   Soli Deo Gloria!