The Necessity of God

Open your Bible please to Genesis chapter 1. Genesis chapter 1 please. And we're going to focus on actually part of Genesis chapter 1 verse 1. The Bible says, "In the beginning God created the heavens and the earth." Look the first four words of that verse, which by the way are the first four words of Scripture. The first four words in the entire Bible are these, "In the beginning God." There's no introduction to the Bible, no inspired introduction. You may have an introduction in your Bible, but it wasn't inspired. It was written by the editors explaining things like that.

But there's no inspired introduction to the Bible explaining the existence of God. No interesting to lay the groundwork for the concept of God. No information about whatever existed before, what is here described as the beginning. To be sure the Bible speaks elsewhere about the nature of God, the character of God and His attributes like His omniscience, which means He's all-knowing. His omnipotence, which means He's all-powerful. His omnipresence, which means He is everywhere present. He's everywhere all the time. His eternality, His aseity, which is a great word, just simply means that He has the power of being within Himself.

We don't have time to get into all of that, but maybe one day we'll do a study focusing on the attributes of God. Talk about stretch your brain and increase your faith. You think you understand what omnipotence is until you dig in to what it means to really be all-powerful or omniscience. It's fascinating to study those, to have a good study, and it'll increase your faith and bring you to worship. It's good stuff.

The Bible also speaks about the time before time, which is really a terrible way to describe it, but we are almost trapped by our language and trapped by the fact that we live inside of time, and we have a hard time conceiving the idea of there being no such thing as time. I don't think we can conceive it, actually, but it's sometimes referred to as eternity past, but even the word past is a time word, right? We don't realize how much our language is tied to the concept of time. In any event, Scripture does speak of these things as they were before the beginning mentioned in Genesis 1.1, and in short, there was God and nothing else.

It's an interesting side note. Have you ever realized it's impossible to think of nothing? What I mean is this. Think about the concept of nothingness. Think about the idea of nothing, and then consider this. Whatever you think nothing is, that's not it. Whatever you think nothing is, whatever it is that pops into your head when you attempt to answer the question, "What is nothing?" is wrong. When you try to imagine nothing and some concept begins to define itself in your mind, that's not nothing. It's something. You see what I mean? Nothing is no thing.

No thing, whether material or immaterial, visible or invisible, name or unnamed, known or unknown. Before the beginning, there was God and nothing else. So your homework for tonight is to try to think of what nothing is. Write down your answers, then immediately scratch them out because you're wrong. You've written down what something is, not what nothing is. I know it's kind of mind bending to think those things, but it's important to, and you will see why in a minute, to establish what nothing is. It's no thing. It's nothing. But back to the verse. In the beginning, God.

No explanation, no introduction, no words building a case for God, but just the bold, almost shockingly bold, startling proclamation in the beginning, God. In the very first verse of the Bible, the existence of God is assumed and asserted as fact. It is announced rather than explained. No pleading, no convincing. God is presented as self-evident with no explanation needed. That might prompt the question, well, is there evidence for the existence of God? And the answer, of course, is yes. There's abundant, overwhelming evidence for the existence of God.

And I would propose that the evidence is so overwhelming, Moses didn't think it necessary to include any before the statement we have before us in Genesis 1.1. Paul tells us something about that, and we'll look at that shortly. Right before we get to that, though, I want to briefly touch on a couple of equally startling proclamations found in the Psalms. It's actually the same startling proclamation repeated twice, once in Psalm 14.1 and once in Psalm 53.1.

Psalm 14.1 and Psalm 53.1, which flatly say this, "The fool says in his heart, 'There is no God.'" The fool says in his heart, "There is no God." Actually, there's more than that repeated from 14.1 to 53.1, but that's the key piece for our discussion tonight. We get the word "fool" from the Hebrew word pronounced something like "nobol," which means in its primary sense, "stupid," "s senseless." Does that sound harsh? Does it sound harsh for the Bible to say that people who say there is no God are fools, but such people are stupid, senseless? Why does the Bible say that? Twice. Psalm 14 and again in Psalm 53.

Do the Scriptures say anything more about it? Yes, in fact, they do. Turn to Romans chapter 1, please. Romans chapter 1. Romans chapter 1, and we're going to look briefly at verses 18 to 24, where we'll see Paul's words to which I referred earlier. Romans chapter 1, starting in verse 18, "For the wrath of God is revealed from heaven against all ungodliness and unrighteousness of men, who by their unrighteousness suppress the truth. For what can be known about God is plain to them, because God has shown it to them.

For his invisible attributes, namely his eternal power and divine nature, have been clearly perceived ever since the creation of the world in the things that have been made." So they are without excuse. "For although they knew God, they did not honor him as God or give thanks to him, but they became futile in their thinking, and their foolish hearts were darkened. Claiming to be wise, they became fools and exchanged the glory of the immortal God for images resembling mortal man and birds and animals and creeping things.

Therefore God gave them up in the lust of their hearts to impurity, to dishonoring of their bodies among themselves, because they exchanged the truth about God for a lie and worshiped and served the creatures rather than the Creator, who is blessed forever. Amen." And actually the chapter goes on to talk about a continuing series of God turning them over to deeper and deeper depravity, but it's interesting where it starts. You know, it starts by people suppressing the truth. Now that doesn't mean it's talking about suppressing the truth within themselves.

In other words, people can see the evidence of God with their own two eyes, and they suppress it. There are a number of reasons why that might be possible. That's not the point of our discussion tonight. But look, you see the word translated foolish in verse 21 there, and fool in verse 22. Now this comes from the Greek, not the Hebrew. The Hebrew was "nobal," meaning stupid or senseless, could actually also mean wicked in a connotation. In these passages come from a Greek word from which we get our word "moron." So where do we get our word "moron" from?

So Paul is saying that people who see the evidence of creation and suppress it through wickedness are morons. That's pretty strong. That's pretty strong. Pretty harsh language. But in Romans chapter 1, Paul lays out the indictment. He provides the evidence for why people who say there is no God should correctly be classified as fools, morons, stupid, senseless people. Paul is not telling us to run around calling people stupid. We're talking about classifications of people here. Paul isn't hurling insults here. Neither was the psalmist, and by the way, neither am I.

Rather, they are, Paul and the psalmist are, and I am, classifying people based on attributes demonstrated by those people. They are simply using terms to describe the dismissal of obvious evidence. Think of it this way. We want to be polite, right? It's good to be polite. It's commendable to be polite. But if you were to run into a person who denies the existence of the sun on a clear day at straight up noon, can you think of a more polite term that would describe that level of denial? "I don't believe in the sun." Well, look up. See that big flaming ball in the sky right there? Yeah, I see that. That's the sun. I don't believe in the sun.

That's what we're talking about here. It's that level of denial. No person would have to be described, no, a person who would have to be described as foolish or senseless to look straight at the sun, feel its warmth, and deny its existence. That's what we've come to in Romans chapter 1. Paul doesn't leave room for people, such a denial of the existence of the sun can't be classified as ignorant. It can't be classified as misinformation. It can't be classified as simply being mistaken. Paul leaves no room for that in Romans chapter 1.

He says that such folks are ungodly and unrighteous, and because of their ungodliness and unrighteousness, they suppress the truth. What does he mean by that? Look at the next verses. For what can be known about God is what? Plain to them. Why? Because God has shown it to them. God didn't hide it. God's not a trickster. It's plain for his invisible attributes, namely his eternal power and divine nature have been what? Clearly perceived in the ESV. Ever since the creation of the world in the things that have been made. So they are without excuse. It's not something that has to be thought deeply about.

I'm afraid thinking deeply, although we should think deeply, but we have to think rightly. We have to think deeply, rightly. Thinking deeply without the confines of rationality or the word of God leads you into all kind of nonsense, and it's kind of the point of where we're going tonight. You don't have to think deeply about the creation. You see it? It's there. God put it there, and it points to him. Paul says that, and so much more eloquently than I just did, so that there is no excuse. They can't claim ignorance because the evidence is plain.

They can't claim to have been misinformed or mistaken because the evidence has been clearly perceived since the beginning. What Paul is describing here is what theologians refer to as general revelation. In a nutshell, God has chosen to reveal himself in two ways. Broadly speaking, general revelation which refers to what God has revealed about himself through creation, through nature, through the laws of nature, through the things that we can see, smell, touch, taste, and comprehend of the world around us. God further chose to reveal himself through what can be called and is called specific or special revelation.

And he did that through the Scriptures and through the person of Christ, through the prophets, so forth, as recorded in Scripture. General revelation is not enough to save you. It's enough to damn you. It's not enough to save you. You need specific, special revelation for that. Romans 10 tells us what that truth has to be, or what truth has to be believed in order to be saved. And by believe, Paul's not describing simple mental ascent like, "Yes, I see the sun in the sky and believe it's there." That's another topic for another message. But also in that same Romans 10 passage, Paul explains that people come to believe by hearing the gospel.

That's special revelation. That's specific revelation. So again, general revelation is not enough to show a person that they need a savior and that Christ is that savior, the savior that they need. But general revelation, Paul says here in Romans chapter 1, is more than enough to show a person that God exists. In fact, Paul says that the evidence from creation is overwhelming, so overwhelming that for a person to see it, comprehend it, then deny God as creator is simply moronic. It's foolish. It's senseless. It's also irrational, which would be another word for moronic.

Consider this, on the day of judgment, no one will be able to claim ignorance. No one will be able to say, "I didn't know you existed." Paul says that such foolish people are without excuse. All right. That's all well and good. What am I driving at here? Why are we talking about this on a Wednesday night at Grace Life Church in Brooklyn? Well, the idea of faith is under attack. Has been for a few centuries now.

Did you know that, and I don't know that you know this, did you know that there was a time when for the most part scientists and philosophers also started from the premise, "In the beginning, God?" I'm talking about way back, but surprisingly up to not really too long ago. The majority of something, Sir Isaac Newton was a devoted Christian. He did science to discover God, to discover God's hand in it. Listen to this. Here's a guy that died as recently as 1907, Lord Kelvin. I don't know if you all remember his name from high school, formulator of the first and second laws of thermodynamics. He didn't create those laws, by the way.

He figured them out and wrote them down. Who wrote it? God did. Listen, he said, "Do not be afraid of being free thinkers. If you think strongly enough, you will be forced by science to the belief in God, which is the foundation of all religion. You will find science not antagonistic, but helpful to religion." Listen to this guy, Max Planck. He was a pioneer in quantum physics who died as recently as 1947. He said both religion and science need for their activities the belief in God. And moreover, God stands for the former in the beginning and for the latter at the end of the whole thinking.

For the former, God represents the basis for the latter, the crown of any reasoning concerning the worldview. And I love this one. This is a guy that going back a little further. So David Brewster, he was a physicist who died in 1868. He says, "It can't be presumption to be sure." He was talking about of our forgiveness, of the claims of Christ. He said, "It can't be presumption." I guess he was accused or he was dealing with the accusation that you sure are presuming, you're being presumptive if you believe all that's true.

He refuted it by saying this, "It can't be presumption to be sure of our forgiveness because it is Christ's work, not ours. On the contrary, it is presumption to doubt his word and work." Because you're presuming to be smarter than God. I love that and listen to this. On his deathbed or as he near death, I don't know if he was actually moments before, but near his death he said, "I shall see Jesus and that will be grand. I shall see him who made the worlds." A noted physicist, he wasn't an atheist. He understood that God instituted the laws of the universe and he did his work to find out what they were.

And hundreds of years prior to the death of Sir David Brewster, the guy we just talked about who died in 1868, very many scientists and philosophers operated under the assumption that God exists as the Bible describes him and that the Bible is his word to man. I recommend you spend some time on the internet and get on Google and search something like great Christian scientists or great Christian philosophers and you'll be amazed. You'll come away with the question, what happened? How did we get here? Why do so many modern scientists and philosophers deny the existence of God now?

Well, first it's important to note that not all scientists and philosophers of modern day denied the existence of God. There are great many out there who were stout, brilliant minds and great defenders of the faith and renowned scientists who still do the same thing. They do their work to find out, to learn about God and see his handiwork. Philosophers too, there are some powerful Christian philosophers but yes, sadly, there are a lot of prominent atheists too. And with the internet being so pervasive, their ideas have spread far and wide. There are a lot of books that have been written to answer the question, what happened?

And we don't have time to even partially answer that question here tonight. I'd be happy to point you to some resources if you want to learn more, just ask me later. But there are two reasons, the question I started that with is, what are we doing here tonight? Why are we talking about this tonight here at Grace Life Church? There's two reasons we're talking about this tonight. Number one is, chances are you're going to meet people who've been exposed to and influenced by atheistic ideas.

Something I didn't think about, it's a good thing because I went back and not printed out the right page, was that if you've got kids in school, you need to be armed for this stuff, okay? We want you to be equipped to defend your faith. First Peter 3.15 says, "But in your hearts, honor Christ the Lord as holy, always being prepared to make a defense to anyone who asks you for a reason for the hope that is in you. Yet do it with gentleness and respect." And again, we're not encouraging you to get billboards and go out and stand on the corner. Atheists are stupid. Atheists are morons.

No, no, because then you'll violate that command right there. But we do want you to be equipped to offer a defense of the reason for the hope within you. That's a rational defense. That's an educated, knowledge-based, understanding-based, Holy Spirit-inspired, Holy Spirit-empowered defense based on reason, okay? So we want to help you be prepared to do that. The second reason is that we want to strengthen your faith. That's the second reason we're doing this. The Christian faith is not blind faith. For a lot of time, it's called that. I heard just a seat and I was listening to R.C.

Prole when I was getting in the shower and he was talking about the prevalence of people talking about a childlike faith. And yeah, there's a place for that. We do, in the sense that we trust God in the dark places because he's omniscient, omnipotent, and all of that. But he says that's morphed into, in many Christian circles, what they're really describing is a childish faith that never proceeds beyond milk and never proceeds to meat like the Scriptures talk about. So the Christian faith is, it's not a blind faith, but it's a faith that's founded upon rock-solid evidence.

The Christian faith, specifically the existence of God, is supported by the laws of logic. In fact, listen to this, I'm facing a rocky right here. The existence of God is more than supported by logic. You ready? Logic demands that God exists. Let me say that again, the laws of logic demand that God exists. According to logic, God is necessary. The Latin term is "ens necessarium." God is necessary being. It's not a necessary being, he is necessary being. According to logic, God cannot not be. Does that hurt? It still hurts when I try to wrestle with that. Don't worry, we're going to lighten up on that for a minute.

Our time is limited, and some of you are saying not limited enough. It would take weeks to just brush the surface of all the categories of evidence for the existence of God. So I'll just mention a few in case you want to study further on your own, then we'll spend just a few minutes hitting the high points of one of these categories. We've already alluded to one category of evidence for the existence of God from Romans chapter 1, namely creation itself. Paul says that all of creation screams at us that there is a creator, and there's no excuse for thinking otherwise. I love the simplicity and I think profundity.

I think it's profound that one of my heroes, frankly, Ray Comfort, he uses this analogy, and I think it's spot on. I think we dismiss it because we think we're smarter than that and it doesn't sound sophisticated enough of an argument. You know what? The sophisticated argument is not always the right one, Pastor. Sometimes the simple argument is the right one. Ray Comfort says this, something like this. I didn't look it up, and he said it a number of ways over the years. But he says this. When you see a painting, you immediately and intuitively know that there is a painter who painted it, right?

When you see a building, you immediately and intuitively know that there was a builder who built it. And piggybacking on the words of Paul, talking about the truth that people suppress, he finishes that analogy by saying, "And when you see creation, you immediately and intuitively know that there was a creator who created it." So the first category of evidence is the creation itself. The second evidence I'll mention in passing is the human conscience. That's fascinating to study how the human conscience is evidence of the existence of God.

I don't have time to get into it really, so suffice it just now to say this, that the Bible says God's written his laws on the hearts of men. And there is a general sense of right and wrong resident in every human being. Different cultures might train the conscience a little differently. Some things considered taboos in other cultures might not be forbidden here or considered instinctively taboo here and vice versa. Some things instinctively considered taboo here might not be so elsewhere. But there exists a general sense of right and wrong inside of every person in the world. How'd it get there? Where'd it come from?

Now some have tried to account for human conscience without granting the existence of God, but frankly their arguments, we don't have time to go into it, but their arguments are very weak and some are even irrational. Maybe we can talk more deeply about that at another time. It really is a fascinating thing to talk about. The third category though, and one that we will discuss for just a few more minutes, is rationality itself or the laws of logic that I mentioned before. This is a brand new area of study for me and it's captivating to me. Listen to 1 Corinthians 1433.

First Corinthians, you don't have to turn there, 1 Corinthians 1433 says, "For God is not a God of confusion but of peace." Now to be frank, the context matters, it does, and in the context of that statement, Paul is delivering instructions for orderly worship services. He was saying everybody have a psalm, a hymn, you've heard that? But not everybody talk at once, and the spirits of the prophet is subject to the prophets and things of that nature. So he's describing orderly worship service. He's not talking about apologetics.

He's not talking about defending the existence of God here, but there's a principle in that statement that is universal, and that is God is not a God of confusion. I love that Chris and I were talking about KJV earlier. I love the way that KJV puts it, God is not the author of confusion. What does that mean? Well, a lot of the atheistic philosophers and scientists that attack and assail the existence of God say that the universe resulted from chaos. You know what another word for chaos is? Not directly, but similar confusion. Chaos is the opposite of order.

God is a God of order, and he created a finely ordered universe governed by laws of logic that are unbreakable. When God created everything, he did so in an orderly fashion, and he fashioned the universe to operate on a set of very precise rules or laws. Some of those are the laws of logic. Other laws like the first and second law of thermodynamics. Those are very precise laws. Some laws may have exceptions. The laws of logic do not. They can't be broken by their very nature. These laws are strong, compelling evidence of a law giver. And I would submit to you that it would serve you well to study them.

I can recommend some resources written by Christians that will allow you to do so. See me after class if you're interested. I'll tell you now, look up "Not a Chance" by R.C. Sproul. Fascinating. Not a chance. You'll hear that word "chance" again here in a minute. Oddly enough, the Greek philosopher Aristotle, who certainly was not a Christian, he was the first to describe the laws of logic. To be clear, he didn't invent them. Just like that gentleman didn't invent the laws of thermodynamics, he deciphered them. He discovered that they existed and wrote them down. Same thing with Aristotle. He didn't invent logic.

God created the laws of logic, put them in place in the universe. Aristotle figured it out. Again he wasn't a Christian, but the laws have always existed since God put them in place. He was just the first to put them in words and formulas. These are ironclad laws that cannot be violated. Nothing exists outside of these laws. You ready? There's the law of non-contradiction. Now basically the law of non-contradiction says, just relax, take a deep breath, something cannot be "a" and "non-a" at the same time and in the same sense. What in the world does that mean? Well here's a simple example.

Something can be light and dark at the same time, but not in the same sense. If you're talking about color, it can't be light and dark at the same time. That's a contradiction. It's a nonsense statement. But the word light could mean not heavy, right? The word dark could mean mysterious and foreboding. So something could be light in color and mysterious and un-voting at the same time, but that's a different sense. Does that make sense? That's a statement of absurdity to say that it's light in color and dark in color at the same time. We're talking about one whole thing.

I can see Becky's creative mind saying, "Well what if it's like got polka dots?" I'm talking about one object, solid color, it can't be light and dark at the same time and in the same sense. Here's another example. I can be a father and a son at the same time, but not in the same sense. I'm not my own son. Neither am I my own father. Neither can I be. And for me to say that I am my own son is what's described as a nonsense statement. It is absurd. It prevents meaningful communication. You can't communicate based on that because it violates the law of non-contradiction. I hope that makes sense. I know it's just kind of deep.

If the law of non-contradiction did not exist, meaningful communication could not exist. Incidentally, consider this. A person cannot be a man and a woman at the same time and in the same sense. There's lots of reasons, but for me the primary one is it's a violation of the law of non-contradiction and it's nonsense. It doesn't make sense and for us to pretend that it does is irrational. It's irrational. It violates lots of God's laws, but one of them is the law of non-contradiction. It's just absurd and it's that simple. Next is the law of causality, which basically says every effect has a cause and every cause will have an effect.

That sounds pretty simple. It really is. This law is said to be analytically true, sometimes called formally true, which is kind of a fancy way of saying it's true by definition. What does that mean? Well, the very words inside the law force it to be truth. What do I mean by that? What is a cause by definition? A cause is that which produces an effect. See how that works? What is an effect, pray tell? Well, it just so happens an effect is that which is the result of a cause. You see what I mean? It's analytically true. It can't be denied. It is formally true. Every effect has a cause and every cause has an effect.

There are a number of other laws that are all fascinating like the law of basic reliability of sense perception, which means that we can basically trust the reliability of what we perceive with our eyes, ears, hands, taste buds within limits. That's why it's called basic reliability. Paul actually appeals to that law in Romans chapter one. The apostles and the gospels appeal to it when they say, "We're not reporting to you fables. We're reporting to you what?" What we saw, touched. They are appealing to the law of the basic reliability of sense perception.

Paul is saying in Romans chapter one, the basic reliability of sense perception declares you guilty because when you see that tree, you follow me? God isn't pulling tricks on people. You can trust your senses for the most part when you encounter creation. There's the law of the analogical use of language, which is also fascinating to study, but for the sake of time, let's just say that words mean things and there must be common understanding of what words mean or there cannot be meaningful communication. Here's a familiar example. The word man means something. If the word man can mean anything, how can we have meaningful communication?

If I call the pastor and tell him, "I need some help," my truck broke down. He's going to immediately get an image in his brain of what I've said. He's going to see me on the side of the interstate with the hood up. What if I meant by saying my truck broke down that my wife has just died in a fire? I just decided to make those words mean that. Can't do that. That's irrational. We have to have a common understanding of the meaning of words. This is all coming somewhere. Be patient. We're not far from the end. So that's the analogical use of language, the law of the analogical use of language.

We have to have, in order to have meaningful communication about anything, we have to understand and agree on what words mean. Again, there are other laws that deserve your attention because studying them will equip you with critical thinking and sharpen your reasoning skills and bring glory to God because he gave you the ability to reason and he wants you to use it. We are commanded to love the Lord our God with all of our heart, soul, mind, and strength. We're called upon to sharpen the mind that God gave us to help us think clearly and deeply about such things.

But I want to wrap up our discussion by hopping back to the law of causality for a moment. It's sometimes called the law of cause and effect. And remember, it basically says this, every effect has a cause. Every cause has an effect. And it's formally true. You can't deny it. It's true by definition. Now let me ask you a question. Have you ever heard somebody say, or maybe you've even said it yourself, I know I have, use the phrase by chance when describing something that has happened. I went to Walmart and by chance ran into an old friend of mine, right? We say that all the time and I'm not telling you to quit saying it.

It's perfectly fine to say that. We all understand what that means because we adhere to the law of the analogic use of language. We have a common agreement in Mississippi anyway. What we mean by that, okay? Second question is this. Thinking about what we just talked about, saying by chance I ran into my friend. Is chance a cause? When I say by chance I ran into my friend, did chance cause me to run into my friend? Can chance cause anything to happen? I hope the reason I'm probing this is obvious, but maybe it's not.

Let's look back at Genesis 1.1, opens with, "In the beginning, God created." The Bible asserts right off the bat with no explanation, no leading up to it that God is the cause of the universe and everything in it. In terms of the law of causality or the law of cause and effect, the universe and everything in it would be the effect requiring a cause and God would be the cause and his effect would be the universe in this case. Well, I'm sure you're aware there are plenty of those modern scientists and philosophers, atheistic ones that we discussed earlier who claim that the universe came into being by chance.

You ever heard anybody say that on TV or read about it? They declare themselves to be wise and boldly assert that long, long ago there was absolutely nothing. Remember our discussion of what nothing is? It's nothing. You can't conceive of it because it's nothing. And then suddenly, a long time ago when there was nothing, suddenly by chance the universe came into being. Now I realize I'm being, that's a gross oversimplification of what they assert, but that's it in a nutshell. If you reduce their arguments down to its basis, that's it. There was nothing and by chance the universe appeared. Not as it is now.

They might say it was some, some of them will say some, you know, out, out, there was nothing and then by chance some little tiny particles appeared. All right? Then morph into this and blah, blah, blah and over billions and, eleven billion years it would get this. You got me? But still, what I just said is the same as saying there was nothing and then the universe. Okay? They view chance as the cause of the universe. But what is chance? Chance is no more or no less than a word that describes mathematical probabilities. Right? If you flip a coin you say what are the chances that it's going to be heads or tails?

That's a word that describes mathematical probabilities. That's it. That's what chance is. It has no being. It has no power. Chance has no ability to do anything because it isn't anything. R.C. Sproul's found the same. Chance is no thing. Chance is nothing. But here's the bottom line. Don't feel intimidated when you hear somebody claim the universe was created by chance. Instead, be confident in the laws of logic and confident in the God who put those laws into place. Claiming that the universe was created by chance violates the law of the analogy of language. The analytical, we talked about we have to agree on what words mean.

Words mean things and chance means mathematical probability. But mathematical probability has no power. It's simply a unit of measure, so to speak. It doesn't do anything except represent a measurement. But see, they play these games where they change, they slightly alter the meaning of a word that for centuries has had a common under- everybody's understood it to mean simply a measurement of mathematical probabilities. They tweak it a little bit. That's not fair. It's irrational. You can't have meaningful communication unless everybody understands what a word means. Does that make sense?

So if chance can't do anything, then we're back to the law of causality. Chance can't be a cause. Chance isn't anything. So unless the professors want to argue that the universe is not an effect, which incredibly some of them do, why not say that? Because if it's an effect, it has to have a cause. So some people argue for the eternality of the universe, that the universe has just always existed. That's absurd for reasons we don't have time to go into. But unless they want to argue that, they actually argue that the universe is uncaused. And unless they argue that, they violate the law of causality.

Finally, if they're arguing that the universe by chance creates itself, then they're violating a third law. They're violating the law of non-contradiction. Why? Because that would mean that the universe would have being and non-being at the same time and in the same sense. Think about this. If they say there are lots of very smart, well-credential people that say the universe created itself, there was nothing and the universe created itself. Think about it. How could the universe have created itself before it existed to create itself? You understand the implications of that? It would have had to have already existed to do that.

And if it already existed, why would it need to create itself? It was already there. I know it's mind bending to think about these things. The universe would have had to have been before it was. That's irrational. It's absurd. And it's really unbelievable that anybody gives any credence to such arguments because it's just patently absurd. Also this, if the universe had a beginning and before the universe existed, there was nothing, what could possibly exist now? Let me rephrase that question and I want you to answer me. If there was ever a time where absolutely nothing existed, what could possibly exist now? Nothing. Nothing.

If there was ever a time when nothing existed, then nothing would ever exist. The Latin phrase is ex nihilo nihil fit, which means out of nothing, nothing comes. Again, if there was ever a time when there was absolutely nothing, there would be absolutely nothing now. So let's rephrase that for evidence for the existence of God. If anything exists now, if a cat exists now, we know there's tons of stuff to exist, but the simplicity of the argument is this. If anything exists now, then we can know unassailably with absolute certainty that there was never even a moment or a fraction of a moment when there was nothing.

Because if there had ever been even a fraction of a moment when there was nothing, there'd be nothing now because ex nihilo nihil fit, out of nothing, nothing comes. You can't get something from nothing. Does that make sense? Look I know that's a lot. Bottom line is this, in the beginning God is not a cop-out by Moses because he didn't want to take the time to explain or because he was unable to explain. No, in the beginning God actually makes perfect sense and it's actually the only logical possibility. You can be confident in what the Bible says. You can be equipped to help your unbelieving friends do one of two things.

One of them is great, one of them not so great, but here are the two possible outcomes. You can be equipped to help your friends either see the plain evidence and come to the proper conclusion or you can force them to take the side of irrationality and absurdity. Because if you talk it through and think it through, the only option is to admit the truth or deny the laws of logic at which point you, as Froll would say, you have dived into a sea of absurdity. You can't have a meaningful discussion anymore. There's no middle ground. In the beginning God created the heavens and the earth. It's the only possible explanation.

You can take comfort from that. I hope your faith is strengthened by that. I hope your hunger to want to understand more about how you can know that has increased. Let's pray. Man, God, you didn't have to do all that. You didn't have to make it so plain. I think sort of humorously how with all of our technological advancements in this century that we just think we're so smart, but man, we've overcomplicated stuff.

We've made obvious truths harder to see for people and understand by not we, but those who would call themselves wise, profess themselves wise, but become fools and they babble on about irrationalities and make nonsense statements as if they're brilliant. Lord, I pray that we would help our brothers and sisters to understand that the things they say are not brilliant, they're nonsensical. They're irrational and they're contrary to meaningful discourse. Lord, the whole purpose of this is to bring us in all of you. And when I say you, bring all to you, Christ.

We've talked about Genesis 1.1, but we know from the Gospel of John that that was you. In the beginning, God created the heavens and the earth. You did that, Lord Jesus. And it all belongs to you. And all we want is for you to get the glory for everything you've done from creation through redemption, our sanctification. I pray you be glorified in this church because you did this. We're humbled and thankful to be called upon as servants. May we be found faithful in Jesus' name. Amen.