Is God Real?

How Can I Know God Is Real?

Does the Bible prove God is real?

If I was to go to a store and wanted to buy something with a check, The clerk behind the counter would surly ask for proof of ID. What do you think she would do if I wrote on a piece of paper, "I am John smith" and handed it to her? I can not offer proof of my ID by offering my word, written or otherwise.

In the same way, many things can be proved from scripture; the deity of Christ, the nature of God, and God's will for us to name a few. However, one thing that the Bible does not prove is the existence of God. You see, the Bible takes for granted that the reader believes that God excises. If we read Genesis 1:1 we see this assumption in the very first verse of the Bible.

Genesis 1:1

In the beginning God created the heavens and the earth.

And the Bible goes as far as to say in Psalms 14:1

Psalms 14:1

The fool says in his heart, "There is no God."

Therefore, while the Bible is God's word to us, to find direct proof of God's existence in it isn't really possible unless you already believe in his existence. Once we do except that God is real then seeing how God speaks to us through the Bible and by seeing the accuracy of the prophecy in it we can verify God's existence with his word.

If a person has never read the Bible and has no belief in any particular god, what proofs can we find that would lead that person to search for his god?

What does our being tell us?

The Wonderful Man

If you heard from someone that there was a man who could make you rich, healthy and do wonderful things for you chances are you wouldn't put much faith in his words. However, if a hundred or a thousand people told you this you may be inclined to look for this man. What if millions told you there was this amazing man. Well, how much of this world believes there is a god? Now, I had a teen tell me that one of his teachers said "man has an inherent need to believe in something bigger than himself. We all have a need to have a god." I say this is true, but why do we? Why in nearly every nation and every race people have gods. From jungle tribes in Africa, to Native Americans, to Aztecs in Mexico, humans have searched for their god. This has gone on through all time. Why? The best answer is because there is a god. Man has a creator and that creator put a need for himself in his creation. Our very being testifies there is a god.

The Moral Argument

Again, through out time, and in all races there has been a standard which people adhere to. All people have a right and wrong, humans grasp the concept of sin. Only man has this character. Animals make no moral decisions and do they feel guilt. Animals don't desire to help others nor do they offer encouragement. While we have the characteristics of animal's in that we have instinct we also have knowledge of right and wrong, good and evil, and self sacrifice. Why does only man have these qualities? The best answer is that a creator chose to give man these qualities.

To better illustrate this, look at these passages.

Romans 2:14-15

(Indeed, when Gentiles, who do not have the law, do by nature things required by the law, they are a law for themselves, even though they do not have the law, 15since they show that the requirements of the law are written on their hearts, their consciences also bearing witness, and their thoughts now accusing, now even defending them.)

Deuteronomy 10:11-13

11Now what I am commanding you today is not too difficult for you or beyond your reach. 12It is not up in heaven, so that you have to ask, "Who will ascend into heaven to get it and proclaim it to us so we may obey it?" 13Nor is it beyond the sea, so that you have to ask, "Who will cross the sea to get it and proclaim it to us so we may obey it?" 14No, the word is very near you; it is in your mouth and in your heart so you may obey it.

Is there evidence in nature?

There are many ways to show the existence of a god by evidence in nature. I want to illustrate two here. Before I do though I want you to understand a couple rules of our universe. First, all things in our universe are subject to the rules of our universe. Second our universe is not eternal, this can be proved by the fact that our universe is expanding, it had a beginning point from which it began expanding.

Romans 1:20

20 For since the creation of the world God's invisible qualities--his eternal power and divine nature--have been clearly seen, being understood from what has been made, so that men are without excuse.

Objects at rest

Objects in our universe are moving. A basic law of physics states that an object will remain stationary unless it is moved by another object. As we go back in time and eliminate things that caused other things to move, at some point in time we will see our universe had to have been stationary and there had to have been something that set our stationary universe in motion. That something could not be a part of our universe or it would be subject to the laws of our universe. Hence a god.

Finite time and chance

There are 1,929,770,126,028,800 (One quadrillion, nine hundred twenty nine trillion, seven hundred seventy billion, one hundred twenty six million, twenty eight thousand, eight hundred) possible color combinations on a Rubik's cube. Yet with all those combinations, a person who knows the solution of the cube can solve it quite quickly. The best time for restoring the cube in an official championship was 17.04 sec, achieved by Robert Pergl in the 1983 Czechoslovakian Championship. But how long would it take a blindfolded person to solve the cube by pure chance? If that person made one move every second and never rested, it's calculated it would take about 1,350,000,000,000 (1 trillion 350 billion) years to go through all the possible combinations. Now if we take into account how long a person lives, we can say with confidence that a blind folded person can not solve the Rubik's by chance.

While the Rubik's cube is made up of 54 different squares, one human cell is made up of about 200,000 different amino acids that are arranged in an exact sequence to form that cell. There are a huge number of combinations that the acids could fall into. Something like 1 with 10000 zeros after it. If amino acids combined every second non-stop, the amount of time required to go through all the combinations to form a human cell by chance would be trillions years. Consider this, The Earth is about 4,600,000,000 years old, that’s 4 billion, 600 million years. The whole universe is only 14,000,000,000 years old. Trillions of years for amino acids to fall into the right sequence to form a human cell… Of course we should account for time for the acids to gather, and for a human to evolve from some single celled creature into a person. Who knows how high the number would be? The universe has simply not been around long enough to allow humans to evolve by chance.

Genesis 2:7

7 the LORD God formed the man from the dust of the ground and breathed into his nostrils the breath of life, and the man became a living being.

What does reason say?

Reason is using common sense to come to a conclusion. For instance if you feel the floor by a toppled glass and it's wet you can reason the glass was filled with some liquid and then knocked over and the liquid was dumped on the floor. Reason can be used to come to the conclusion that there is a god. This is called reasonable assumption. Here are a few. Again remember the universal rules.

If something exists, the thing that makes it possible for that something to exist must have existed before it. In other words. A smiley face exists because the person who drew it existed. So it stands to reason if our universe exists, the thing that made it possible for our universe to exist must have existed before it. That would be God. (Not bound by universal rules.)

Genesis 1:1

1 In the beginning God created the heavens and the earth.

If I take a new deck of cards and shuffle them, they will get more mixed up. The cards don't become more ordered but more mixed up. To put them in order I would have to use intellect and sort them. Our universe is incredibly ordered. Since chance doesn't produce order, it stands to reason that our universe is a product of intelligent design, it had a designer.

1 Corinthians 14:33

33For God is not a God of disorder but of peace.

Psalms 8:3

3When I consider your heavens, the work of your fingers, the moon and the stars, which you have set in place,

If I told you there wasn't anything of value in my backyard you might believe me. If I put a forty foot wall around my yard and posted signs that read "There is nothing behind this wall if you attempt to get into my back yard I will beat you" and then I placed armed guards around it you would probably think differently. We hear many people claim there is no god. Yet as we view human history we see that the religious have always been persecuted. Especially followers of Christ. If there is no God why do so many fight against him.

Acts 4:25

… `Why do the nations rage and the peoples plot in vain? 26 The kings of the earth take their stand and the rulers gather together against the Lord and against his Anointed One.

Conclusion

you have just been given reasons why we should believe there is a god. These may not prove there is a God, but as I stated earlier if someone decides that there is no God, there is really no way we could prove to him there is a god. I want you to see though that to say there is no god really is foolish. It defies every law in our universe, and it completely ignores all sense of reason. On the other hand God can't be disproved either. So it comes down to this you either chose to believe or you don't. The choice is simple but the result of your choice is life or damnation.

Pascal's Wager.

This is not a proof of God; as a matter of fact it is really for those who are believers, to encourage them to continue believing. This is not a reason for a non-believer to believe in Christ!

Blaise Pascal was a man who lived in the early 1600's. He stated something like this; let's say you have considered all things and have concluded that God is real. And now you wonder if you made the right choice. Well life is a gamble, you must place your bet somewhere.

If you decide that God exists and it turns out he does then you win everything.

If you decide that God exists and it turns out there is no God you lose nothing and you win nothing.

If you decide that God doesn’t exist and it turns out he does, you lose everything.

If you decide that God doesn't exist and it turns out he doesn't, you lose nothing and you win nothing.

If you believe in God you either win everything or lose nothing.

If you don't believe in God you either lose everything or win nothing.