The true and living God is the uncaused Cause of all things. He has always existed and always existed because it is His nature to be. He is eternal and is in need of nothing.
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The Self-Existence of God
Exodus 3:14
Once you have come to believe in the existence of God, the next all-absorbing question we should be asking is, “Who is this God?” In other words, “What is God like?” There are many different ideas and theories that people espouse on what God is like, but we are interested in what the Bible reveals about God. As followers of Jesus we have come to accept the Bible as the inerrant inspired word of God. It is our objective source of truth about God and His ways. Therefore, we are going to study the Scriptures to gain a better and deeper understanding of the attributes of God. But, what do we mean by an “attribute?” It is a quality or a characteristic of someone. So the Attributes of God are His qualities and characteristics. They are the things that make God, God.
You know, as I think of everything that we could study from Scripture, I am convinced that there is nothing that is more important for us to study than God! We could do bible studies on stewardship, time management, anxiety, stress, child rearing, marriage, etc, but all of these pale into insignificance compared with the study of God. I anticipate that we will be taking much of if not all of this year studying God. However, even if we took the rest of our lives to study the Person and Work of God, and never studied anything else, this would be time well spent. In fact, I can’t think of anything else that is more important than this study.
Did you know that the word “theology” means the study of God? It comes from two Greek words – Theos and logos. Theos means God, and logos means “word” or “study of”. Thus, theology is the study of God. However, Theological studies can be subcategorized in many different ways. For example, there is Soteriology (the study of salvation), Pneumatology (the study of the Spirit), Christology (the study of Christ), Ecclesiology (the study of the church), and Eschatology (the study of end times). However, if you are just going to restrict yourself to the study of God Himself, this is called Theology Proper. It is the highest and most ultimate branch of Theology. And that is what we are going to begin to undertake this morning!
However, when we come to Theology Proper, we are going to face a profound difficulty. God is infinite, and we are finite. He is wholly other than us. The only way we can relate to God’s attributes is to think of something we can understand. For example, we might define holiness as the absence of sin, because we understand and can relate to sin. We might define eternal as having no beginning and no end, because we understand and can relate to having a beginning and an end.
Thomas Manton, the powerful Puritan preacher wrote, “we know God as men born blind know the fire – they know that there is such a thing as fire, for they feel it warm them, but what it is they know not. So, that there is a God we know, but what He is we know little, and indeed we can never search Him out to perfection; a finite creature can never fully comprehend that which is infinite.”
There are three types of beings. There are those that had a beginning and will have an end. Plants and animals fit this description. Then there are those who had a beginning but will have no end. Men and angels fit this description. Then there is He who had no beginning and will have no end. The only Being that fits this description is God.
The Bible gives us many different titles for God: morning star, Good shepherd, the Vine, the King of kings and Lord of lords, the Head, last Adam, the Branch, the Servant, etc. But this morning I want to meditate on the Name of God that God told Moses to identify Him to the children of Israel. Let’s turn to Exodus 3.
In Exodus 3 we find the Israelites as slaves in Egypt. They are pressed into forced labor. The Egyptians compelled them to labor rigorously and made their lives bitter with hard labor in mortar and bricks. The sons of Israel sighed because of their bondage and cried out and their cry for help rose up to God. He heard their groaning and remembered the covenant He had made with Abraham, Isaac and Jacob. Thus, God appeared to Moses in the wilderness from the midst of a burning bush. God told Moses he must go to Pharaoh in order to deliver the children of Israel out of Egypt.
At this point Moses complains and says, “Lord they are going to say to me, “who is this God? What is His name? What shall I say to them?” And in verse 14 God utters these famous words, “I AM WHO I AM.” And He said, “Thus you shall say to the sons of Israel, “I AM has sent me to you.”
Now, there is enough to meditate on for the rest of your life in those 2 words – I AM! What does this name of God tell you about Him?
1. The True and Living God is Self-Existent
What is the self-existence of God? Could you tell someone that your name is “I AM”? I guess you could, but it wouldn’t be true. If your name is I AM, then you always are. To say about yourself, “I AM, is the opposite of saying that you were born, lived so many years, and then died. To say, I AM, is to say that your being and life are uncaused. And it’s right here that we run into so many problems. We just have no categories for a Being like God. We can’t see, hear, smell, feel or touch anything that did not have a cause. I exist, because my parents conceived me and brought me into the world. They existed because their parents conceived them and brought them into the world. And it has been this way with all people all the way back to Adam and Eve. However, there was a time when Adam and Eve did not exist, and God caused them to be. Every plant exists because a plant or tree produced a seed that brought it forth. Every animal exists because its parents brought it into being.
But when we come to God, we find a wholly different kind of being. Human beings are completed different from the Divine Being. Human beings are not self-existent. They are brought into being by Another. But God was not brought into being by Another. When you told your 3 year old that God made her, she might look up and say, “Who made you Mommy?” You tell her, “Sweetie, God made me.” She asks, “Who made Daddy?” “God made Daddy?” She asks, “Well, who made God?” “Oh, I know – God made Himself!” Actually that is impossible. For God to make Himself, would mean that Someone who did not exist brought Himself into existence. That is as absurd as to say that life created itself. Scientists today sometimes scramble for an explanation for life. Where did it come from? They would never say that God created life, and so their only answer is spontaneous generation. Being came from non-being. Life came from non-life. No, if life did not exist, then it is a contradiction to say that something that did not exist brought itself into existence.
God did not create God. It is God’s nature to exist. He has always existed, because that it is the essential nature of His being. Let’s put it like this. Apart from God I cannot exist. Apart from me God does exist. No human being has the power of being within himself. But God does have the power of being within Himself.
And it is right here that our brains start to short circuit! Why? Because we have no category for anything that is self-existent. Every single thing that we have ever seen, heard, touched, felt or smelled, came into being at some point. Nothing creates itself. For every effect there is a Cause. But God is not an effect. God does not owe His being to anything outside of Himself. God has the power of being within Himself. Let’s say that God was made by a bigger and more powerful God. Well, then we would ask, “Who made that God?” Don’t you see, that there must be a First Cause, a Being that has the power of being within Himself. If there is not a First Cause, then we can’t explain anything that exists today.
That’s what frustrates me so much about the Big Bang theory. Scientists say that before the Big Bang, the universe may have been an infinite stretch of an ultrahot, dense material persisting in a steady state. But, where did this ultrahot, dense material come from? Are you ready to say that matter is eternal? That it had no cause? That it just is, and always has been? That makes about as much sense as flying pigs. Either matter is self-existent, or God is self-existent. You have to have a First Cause. Now, what makes more sense to you – that matter has always existed from eternity, or that God has always existed from eternity?
Yahweh is the Great I Am. On the day He created the earth He could say, “I Am”, and 2 billion years from now He can still say, “I Am.” And, interestingly, the Lord Jesus said in John 8:58, “Truly, truly, I say to you, before Abraham was born, I am.” Wow! How could any human being say something like that? Only, if that person was God in the flesh. Only, if that person was uncreated and uncaused, having life in Himself.
If God is self-existent, then He must be a necessary being. What do we mean by a necessary being? We mean a being that cannot not be.
So, if God is self-existent, He is the Uncaused Cause. He has the power of being within Himself. And, if that is true, then there are three other propositions that must also be true.
2. The True and Living God Is Eternal
Now, we have no trouble believing that God will never die. Why? Because we will never die, and angels will never die, and Satan and the demons will never die, and the wicked will never die. No, our trouble is believing that God never began to exist. Why? Because nothing else in this universe fits that mold! Let’s look at the Word of God to see what it has to say about this awesome truth.
Psalm 90:2, “Before the mountains were born or You gave birth to the earth and the world, even from everlasting to everlasting, You are God.” There it is – “from everlasting, to everlasting You are God.” Clearly the Psalmist is indicating that God has been from everlasting.
1 Timothy 1:17, “Now to the King eternal, immortal, invisible, the only God, be honor and glory forever and ever. Amen.”
1 Timothy 6:15-16, “He who is the blessed and only Sovereign, the King of kings and Lord of lords, who alone possess immortality and dwells in unapproachable light, whom no man has seen or can see. To Him be honor and eternal dominion! Amen.”
In both of these passages Paul says that God is immortal. The word “immortal” means “not capable of dying, perishing, being destroyed, or ceasing to exist.” Well, isn’t that true of God’s children and angels? Yes, but no one but God has immortality of himself. If men and angels are immortal, they have that quality from God.
God can no sooner cease to exist as He can begin to exist. This is why the adjective “eternal” is applied to Him so often.
Deuteronomy 33:27, “The eternal God is a dwelling place, and underneath are the everlasting arms”
Genesis 21:33, “Abraham planted a tamarisk tree at Beersheba, and there he called on the name of the Lord, the Everlasting God.”
1 Chronicles 16:36, “Blessed be the Lord, the God of Israel, from everlasting even to everlasting.”
Psalm 93:2, “Your throne is established from of old; You are from everlasting.”
The Bible says that His lovingkindness is everlasting, His truth is everlasting, His kingdom is everlasting, and His dominion is everlasting. Why? Because God is everlasting!
Application:
Folks, let’s just stop right here and think about this. Let this attribute of God cause you to marvel, and wonder and adore! Your Creator just Is! In this area, He is wholly unlike you. In fact, He is wholly unlike anything else in all the universe. He stands alone in this regard. That’s why Paul says “God alone possesses immortality.” He alone deserves our worship. He is worthy of our dumbstruck adoration. He is in a class by Himself!
3. The True and Living God Is Self-Sufficient
If God is self-existent, then He must of necessity be self-sufficient. Why? If God has always been, then He must have existed before there was anything else. And if He existed before anything else, then He must be absolutely free from any dependence or need. All other beings derive their life and blessedness from God, but God has all He needs for His blessedness an happiness in Himself. God has no lack, no need, and is not dependent on anyone or anything.
Is this actually true about God? Well, let’s see how the apostle Paul describes God in Acts 17:24, “The God who made the world and all things in it, since He is Lord of heaven and earth, does not dwell in temples made with hands; nor is He served by human hands, as though He needed anything, since He Himself gives to all people life and breath and all things.” There we have the doctrine of God’s self-sufficiency stated in a nutshell. God doesn’t need anything. Instead, He gives to all people life and breath and all things. This is a humbling truth, but you and I can’t add anything to God. God did not create us because He needed us, or was lonely and wanted some companionship, or was somehow incomplete. Well, then, why did God create the universe? It must have been, not to fill His own need, but because He desired to make known His own perfections. In order to display His glory, He had to have creatures to make it known to. And that’s where you and I come in. Think of this world as a theater upon which God is directing a play. The theme of this play is His glory. God is the hero and primary actor. And all of us are sitting in the seats watching the show!
Psalm 36:9 says, “For with You is the fountain of life; in Your light we see light.” God is a Fountain! What needs does a fountain have? None. How do you serve a fountain? Well you really can’t. The fountain serves you. About the only way you can serve a fountain is to drink from it, find it exhilarating and refreshing, and then proclaim its excellencies. Interestingly, the apostle Peter says that God has called us out of darkness into His marvelous light that we might proclaim His excellencies.
Application:
We should not seek to be like God in this respect. In many respects we ought to seek to be like God. For example we should seek to be holy and love others like God. But we should not seek to be self-sufficient. Sin is seeking to be utterly independent of God. Sin is so evil and ugly because it is rejecting our creaturehood and exalting ourselves to be like God. Sin is saying, “I don’t need God.” Faith and prayer demonstrate dependence on God. Sin and self-will demonstrate our independence of God. The essence of pride is to say to God, “I don’t need You!” No, we should never seek to be like God in His self-sufficiency. We must realize our place. We are creatures – not the Creator.
We should never think that God needs us to make Himself complete. God is perfectly complete in Himself. We can’t add to Him. Our ceasing to exist can’t diminish Him in any way. God is not growing or developing or becoming more complete. We can’t make Him any more complete than He already is. The truth is, God doesn’t need us. Before we existed, He was perfectly happy. God has never been incomplete. God loves us, but doesn’t need us. He did not create us to meet some unfulfilled need in Himself. Sometimes we get the impression from a preacher that God was lonely and wanted companionship, so He created man. However, man sinned and therefore fellowship with man was cut off. And that’s why God had to send Jesus to save men from sin so that fellowship with God could be restored. You see God is lonely and incomplete without you! No, that message demeans God and exalts man, the exact opposite of the truth of God.
We should never think that God needs you to accomplish His will. We sometimes think that God can’t save those people unless I preach or witness. When Jesus rode into Jerusalem on a donkey on Palm Sunday, the Pharisees told Jesus to rebuke His disciples. Jesus answered, “I tell you the truth, if these become silent, the stones will cry out!” (Luke 19:40). Mordecai told Esther, “Do not imagine that you in the king’s palace can escape any more than all the Jews. For if you remain silent at this time, relief and deliverance will arise for the Jews from another place, and you and your father’s house will perish” (Esther 4:14). Folks, if we refuse to serve
Conclusion
So, what does the self-existence of God mean for you and me? What effect should it have in our lives?
It should draw us to worship Him. He is wholly unlike us. He is in a whole different class. We don’t even come close to being like Him! Yes, we can be like God to some extent in His communicable attributes, but we will never be like Him in His incommunicable attributes. God is holy. The root meaning of holy is to be “set apart.” That is certainly true in God’s case. He is unique, different, other than anything else in this universe. We think there is a great deal of difference between a cockroach and a human being. Now, I suppose there is a great difference between those too, but it is nothing like the difference between a human being and God! Why? Because a cockroach and a human being are both creatures. They belong to the same class of created things. They have that in common. But a human being and God are not in the same class. God is the self-existent Creator, and we are the dependent creatures. Contrary to the theology of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints, God the Father is not an exalted man with a body like ours. Joseph Smith taught that God was the son of a father. This suggests that God was brought into existence by another God, who was brought into being by another God throughout all eternity. No, the Bible teaches that God has always been and always will be. It teaches that He is the Creator of all, the First Cause.
I exhort you to take time to just meditate on the self-existence of God. Just spend time thinking about it. I can think of nothing that will cause us to realize our littleness and dependency on God, and His infinite greatness more than this truth.
So, brothers and sisters, the truth of an eternal, self-sufficient, self-existent God should cause us to drop to our knees, marvel, wonder, and worship! Oh, let us worship the true and living God!
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