First, here’s a quick summary of some arguments for the existence of God. There are many more arguments, and more to be said on each of these, but this is the “light” version.
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Cosmology – Space-time and matter had a beginning out of nothing. The Second Law of Thermodynamics, expanding universe, radiation afterglow and great galaxy seeds from the big bang explosion, and Einstein’s Theory of General Relativity are scientific evidence for this. There is also undeniable philosophical evidence for the beginning as today never would have arrived if there were an infinite number of days before today. Since space, time and matter had a beginning, there must be a spaceless, timeless, immaterial and super-powerful cause beyond the universe that brought the universe into existence. These are some of the attributes of a theistic God.
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Teleological – The universe not only exploded into being out of nothing, it did so with extreme precision and it remains fine-tuned today. If any one of dozens of forces (gravitational, weak force, electromagnetic, etc.) were different by an infinitesimal amount (like one part in 10 to the power of 100), life would not exist. The initial conditions for the universe were also fine-tuned. If the expansion rate of the universe was different by one part in a thousand, million, million a second after the big bang, the universe would have collapsed back on itself or never developed galaxies. The big bang was not a scattered explosion, but a fine-tuned guided creation event that continues to be guided today. If the force of gravity was different by one part in 10 to the power of 40 (think one inch vs the entire known universe), our sun would have never formed. The best explanation for this extreme fine-tuning is an intelligent Being – the very same spaceless, timeless, immaterial and super-powerful Being that created the universe. There is no cosmic evolutionary theory that can explain this. A Designer is the best explanation.
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Moral – If objective moral values exist, then God exists. If there is even one action that is objectively morally wrong, such as torturing somebody for fun or murdering six million people in the Holocaust, then God exists. Why? Because only an unchanging moral authority can provide unchanging moral laws that are binding on humans. If no objective, unchanging moral law giver exists, then no objective unchanging moral laws can exist. Without God, everything would be a matter of human opinion. Without God nothing is really just or unjust, good or evil, right or wrong, and there are no true moral causes or human rights.
- Impossibility of the Contrary – Without God, you couldn’t know anything for sure. Atheists assume 4 things: 1) Uniformity in nature. 2) Their five senses are working properly to engage in experimentation. 3) Constants. 4) Principle of Induction (past and present have some bearing on the future). None of these can be proven without God; an intelligent Being who gave these things. Philosophically speaking, atheists cannot say their 5 senses are working properly if they’re just a result of millions of years of chance random mutation. A theist worldview can engage in science, philosophy, etc since they know their 5 sense are working properly, given to them by God. More coming soon.
God of the Bible
So, how do we know it’s the Christian God? If the New Testament is reliable – if Jesus really died and rose from the dead – then it’s pretty easy to make the case that Jesus is God and the entire Bible is the Word of God. There are four questions to ask and if all of their answers are “yes”, then we know the New Testament is reliable.
- Does truth exist? Of course, it’s self-defeating to deny it. To say “there is no truth” and represent that as true violates the law of non-contradiction.
- Does God exist? Well, see above. God is an infinite Being who is spaceless, timeless, immaterial, powerful, personal, intelligent, moral, and who sustains creation.
- Are miracles possible? Since God exists, yes. We have excellent scientific and philosophical reasons to believe the greatest miracle in the Bible (Gen 1:1 – “In the beginning God created the heavens and the earth.”) has already occurred. Therefore, it’s foolish to hold any bias against the other miracles in the rest of the Bible. The miracles in the New Testament may have actually occurred to authenticate Christ as the Messiah.
- Is the New Testament historically reliable? There are seven reasons that affirm that it is. Each of them describe the nature of the testimony provided in the New Testament. The testimony is…
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- Early – Most of, if not all, of the NT documents were written before 70 AD. This is far too early for them to be the result of legend.
- Eyewitness – NT writers proved they were eyewitnesses, proven by archaeology and other historical sources. The authors get hundreds of trivial historical details correct that would only be possible if they were true eyewitnesses.
- Elaborate – The NT is an elaborate series of interlocking puzzles that reveal the NT documents contain independent eyewitnesses of actual historical events. Details in one writer’s account inadvertently fill gaps in another writer’s account. In the NT, there are over 60 “undesigned coincidences”.
- Embarrassing – People, especially people in the ancient world, did not lie to make themselves look bad. They would have lied to make themselves look good and heroic. The NT, however, routinely describes the authors as bumbling, lazy, rebuked, skeptical, dimwitted and failing Jesus. They don’t even understand what His mission is about until after the Resurrection. If men were inventing the story but trying to pass it off as the truth for possible gain, they wouldn’t have said women were the ones who bravely discovered the empty tomb and risen Jesus – especially considering that the status of testimony from women at the time was considered to be much less than that of men. They told it like it was, not like you would if you were inventing a story.
- Excruciating – 11 of the 12 apostles died as martyrs for claiming the Resurrection was true. There is no evidence from Christian or non-Christian sources that any of the apostles ever recanted their beliefs. They were firmly convinced Jesus rose from the dead because they had verified His resurrection with their own senses – they saw, talked to and touched Jesus. They saw Him do miracles. What did the NT writers have to gain by making up a new religion? They got no glory, no wealth, no status. They got tortured, crucified and burned alive. They all refused to recant under the most excruciating forms of torture. If the NT were false, at least one person would have recanted to save themselves or stop their torture.
- Expected – Jesus fits all the criteria from the Old Testament about the expected Messiah. Read Isaiah 52:13-53:12 and ask yourself who it describes.
- Extra-biblical testimony – There are 42, ten of which are non-Christian, sources within 150 years of Jesus’ life that corroborate the basic NT storyline. Few, if any, NT scholars claim Jesus never existed. In comparison, Roman emperor Tiberius is only mentioned by ten sources at all. If you believe Tiberius existed, how can you not admit the same about a man who is cited by four times as many people and has had an immeasurably greater impact on history?
Even if we throw out people like Matthew, Mark, Luke, John, Peter, Paul, James, and Jude as if they were biased and unreliable, consider how many others wrote about Jesus Christ early on. What are we left to believe if:
- Josephus and Lucian indicate that He was regarded as wise and…
- Pliny, the Talmud, and Lucian imply He was a powerful and revered teacher and…
- Josephus and the Talmud indicate He performed miraculous feats and…
- Tacitus, Josephus, the Talmud, and Lucian all mention that He was crucified and…
- Tacitus and Josephus say this occurred under Pontius Pilate and…
- the Talmud declares it happened on the eve of Passover and…
- there are possible references to the Christian belief in His resurrection in both Tacitus and Josephus and…
- Josephus and Celsus record that His followers believed He was Messiah or the Son of Elohim and…
- Pliny and Lucian indicate that Christians worshipped Him as a Deity and…
- Mara of Syria suggests that calamites came to be partially as a result of the execution of the wise King of the Jews and…
- Phlegon indicates (with Thallus indicating something similar?) that there was an eclipse of the sun during the full moon that was accompanied with earthquakes during the reign of the emperor who was in power from 14 CE to 37 CE and…
- both Tacitus and Suetonius indicate that Christians were punished by the emperor who was in power from 54 CE to 68 CE and…
- there was even a huge fire as far away as the Italian Peninsula that was blamed on followers of Him as early as 64 CE?
The short version of this actually turns out to be pretty long, so thanks for reading it all with an open mind. There’s a lot more to be said on this and the entire field of apologetics is dedicated to it. However, the evidence laid out above conclusively proves there’s a God and that it’s the Christian God.
This is evidence outside of a personal transformative testimony, of course. The moment you’re able to humble youself and realize how your actions are contrary to what God expects from you, then you should ask God to reveal Himself to you in His own way and He will hear your call. “The sacrifices of God are a broken spirit, A broken and a contrite heart— These, O God, You will not despise.” (Psalms 51:17)
Lee Strobel had an interesting walk finding God, if you’re interested. You may also find the videos below helpful or interesting.