Does God Exist?

John 1:1  In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God.

This is not just a philosophical puzzle. It is a deeply personal question. If there is no God, then we are alone in a silent universe, left to invent our own meaning. If there is a God, everything changes. If you are asking this question, you are not alone, and the Bible does not tell you to shut off your mind. Scripture teaches that God has not left us in the dark about His existence. He has given clear pointers in the world around us, in our own hearts, and supremely in His Son, Jesus Christ.

The first thing to notice is that the Bible does not begin with formal philosophical arguments for God’s existence. From the very first verse, “In the beginning, God…” (Genesis 1:1), His reality is simply assumed. There is no opening chapter of arguments, only the declaration that God is, and that He is the Creator of all things. The Bible also says, “The fool says in his heart, ‘There is no God’” (Psalm 14:1). In Scripture, “the fool” is not someone mentally slow, but someone who denies what is plain and obvious. Romans 1 says that people “suppress the truth” about God. The idea is to hold down or hold under what keeps pushing up. Paul writes that God’s eternal power and divine nature “have been clearly perceived … so that they are without excuse” (Romans 1:20). In other words, not believing in God is not just one respectable option among many. It is a moral response to truth we know deep down, even as we push it away. That should not make Christians proud or harsh, but humble, because all of us by nature resist the God who has made Himself known to us.

First, we see evidence of God in creation itself. Whether you look through a telescope at the vastness of space or through a microscope at the intricate machinery of a single cell, or consider the DNA, a four letter information system that writes the instructions for every cell in your body, you are not looking at an accident. Even the fine balance of our own planet points to this. The sun is about 93 million miles away from the earth. If our planet were significantly closer, life would be burned away by heat. If it were much farther, the earth would eventually be locked in ice.

Many thoughtful scientists have been struck by this kind of design. One example is Dr. Ming Wang, a Harvard and MIT trained eye surgeon who spent decades as an atheist. After over 55,000 eye surgeries and years studying the staggering complexity of the human eye, he finally concluded that such intricate design could not be explained by blind chance and must point to a Creator. A professor once asked him if a pile of random metal could ever assemble itself into a car, then pressed the question, if not, how could the far more complex human eye arise by pure randomness. That simple challenge helped shatter his atheism. Dr. Wang now tells young people they do not have to choose between science or faith, but can embrace both under the Lordship of Christ. The Bible says, “The heavens declare the glory of God” (Psalm 19:1). Just as a painting points to a painter, the finely tuned, intelligible world we live in points to an intelligent, powerful Creator. It is reasonable to believe that a personal God stands behind a world filled with design, order, and beauty.

Second, we sense God’s reality in our own consciences. Across cultures and throughout history, people have had an inner sense that some things are truly right and wrong, and that our choices matter. The Bible explains that God has written His law on our hearts (Romans 2:15). Even when we do something wrong in secret, we often feel that inner sting. That is more than social conditioning. It is God’s law pressing on our consciences. Our thirst for justice, our outrage at evil, and our longing for ultimate meaning are not random feelings. They are signposts that point beyond ourselves to a moral Lawgiver, One who cares about good and evil and will one day set all things right.

Third, God has made Himself known in history through Jesus Christ. The claim of Christianity is not that we discovered God by our own efforts, but that God came to us. Jesus did not only teach about God. He claimed to be God in human flesh and backed that claim with His sinless life, His public miracles, His sacrificial death, and His bodily resurrection on the third day. The New Testament does not present the resurrection as a vague spiritual idea, but as a real historical event. The tomb was empty. The risen Christ appeared to many witnesses. The apostles were willing to suffer and die rather than deny what they had seen and heard. On that basis, they proclaimed that God has made Jesus “both Lord and Christ” (Acts 2:36), and that He “will judge the world in righteousness by a man whom he has appointed, and of this he has given assurance to all by raising him from the dead” (Acts 17:31).

Ultimately, the question of God’s existence is not merely about winning a debate. It is an invitation. The God who made you calls you to know Him, to be forgiven through Jesus’ death on the cross, and to receive new life by His resurrection. If you are wrestling with this, a good next step is to pray honestly, “God, if You are there, please show Yourself to me,” and then begin reading the Gospel of John with an open Bible and an open mind. Christians are not better than anyone else. We are sinners whom God has graciously opened to the truth we once resisted. If you sense that you have been pushing this truth away, you are not alone. All of us, by nature, do the same until God, in His kindness, opens our eyes. If you want to go deeper on this, consider reading Tim Keller’s The Reason for God or R. C. Sproul’s If There’s a God, Why Are There Atheists?, and we would be glad to talk with you in person at King’s Church.

Written by John Samson / Kings Church

Image

Follow-up question answered by my friend John Hendryx at monergism.com:

Part of a Conversation With an Atheist Worth Sharing

Atheist visitor: “If God appeared before me face to face, I would not worship Him. I would detest Him for His evil treatment of humanity and turn my back on Him.”

My (John Hendryx) response:

Ironically, this is exactly what Christianity teaches about the natural human heart. Left to ourselves, we would not worship God even if He stood right in front of us. We would resist Him, accuse Him, resent Him, not because God is evil, but because we are.

Paul says: “The mind set on the flesh is hostile to God.” (Romans 8:7)

Jesus says: “Light has come into the world, but people loved darkness rather than light.” (John 3:19)

So when you say you would reject God even if He appeared, you have unintentionally affirmed one of Christianity’s central truths.

Human beings do not naturally love God. We naturally hate Him. And that is why we need grace. You really did hit the nail on the head.

———————-

The atheist’s second objection regarding Lot and his daughters. The atheist then posted an image describing Lot’s daughters getting him drunk and becoming pregnant by him to show that the Bible is immoral.

Response:

The story is not praising their behavior. It is exposing it. The narrative shows the corrupting power of Sodom, the moral collapse of Lot’s household, and the lingering effects of the culture they lived in. The Bible does not hide human depravity. It shows it in full light to reveal our need for grace. The point is not “Look how virtuous they were.” The point is “Look how deeply sin warps the human heart.”

You are reading the story as if God is approving the behavior. In reality, the Bible is shining a spotlight on human corruption. That is the difference. And that is the moral lesson.

Many people make the mistake of thinking the Bible is a collection of inspirational moral stories. It is not. The Bible is the story of a fallen human race, a long record of corruption, rebellion, and spiritual ruin. And set against that dark backdrop is the real message: the redeeming grace of God toward ill deserving sinners like me.

Now let’s talk about a real issue:

You are condemning biblical morality while holding a worldview that cannot account for universally binding morality in the first place. Moral outrage AT OTHERS makes no sense if you affirm materialism and moral relativism. Because if atheistic materialism is true: We are the accidental byproduct of blind physical processes …. Every thought, desire, and action is determined by chemistry and physics … No one “ought” to do anything. We simply do what our neurons make us do

In that worldview, calling someone “evil” or “wrong” is no more meaningful than saying you dislike broccoli. You cannot consistently accuse others of moral failure when your worldview denies the existence of objective morality. And the moment you apply your judgment to others, you are appealing to a moral standard outside yourself, as if everyone else were bound by your personal standard … an objective standard your worldview cannot supply.

So the moment you say “What you are doing is morally wrong,” you have already stepped outside atheism and into the Christian worldview where real evil exists, people are accountable, and human actions are not just chemical reactions. In other words, you must borrow Christian morality in order to object to Christian morality.

That is the contradiction.