Who made God?
“But who made God?” The question usually comes with a smirk, as if five-year-olds and philosophers had finally stumped Christianity. Some call it the ultimate gotcha question. Richard Dawkins claims it's the end of intelligent design. Today, we're discovering why this supposed stumbling block is actually a stepping stone to understanding something profound about the nature of existence - and why the answer points to an even bigger truth about God.
Welcome back to Word for Word, I'm Austin Duncan, and today we're tackling one of those questions that seems so simple a child could ask it, yet so profound that it's occupied the greatest minds in human history. "Who made God?" And you know, I love this question. I really do. Not because it's easy to answer, it's not. But because when someone asks it, they're actually knocking on the door of one of the deepest truths in the universe. They just don't know it yet.
Let me paint you a picture. You're at a family gathering, maybe Thanksgiving dinner. Your skeptical uncle – we all have one – leans back in his chair after the pumpkin pie and says, "You know what I never understood about you Christians? You say everything needs a creator, but then you say God doesn't need one. Sounds like special pleading to me." And everyone kind of freezes, waiting to see how you'll respond. Or maybe you're the one who's wondered this. Late at night, when the house is quiet and you're alone with your thoughts, that question creeps in: "If God made everything, who made God?" And suddenly, this foundation you've built your life on feels a little shaky.
Here's what I want you to know right up front: this question doesn't threaten our faith. It actually illuminates it. The answer to "Who made God?" isn't a dodge or a philosophical trick. It's a doorway into understanding something absolutely mind-blowing about the nature of reality itself.
The Domino Problem
Let's start with something we can all picture: dominoes. You've seen those elaborate domino setups on YouTube, right? Thousands of pieces arranged in intricate patterns, and then someone tips the first one, and they all fall in this beautiful cascade.
Now, here's a question: could you have an infinite line of dominoes falling... with no first domino?
Think about that for a second. Every domino falls because the one before it knocked it over. But if there's no first domino – if the line stretches back infinitely – then how did the falling ever start? You can't get to "now" from an infinite past. It's not just practically impossible; it's logically impossible. This is what philosophers call the problem of infinite regress, and it's been recognized for thousands of years. Aristotle was wrestling with it 2,300 years ago. Thomas Aquinas built his famous "Five Ways" around it in the 13th century. And here's the kicker: every thoughtful person who's ever considered existence has had to grapple with this problem.
The universe is full of causes and effects. The coffee in your cup exists because someone brewed it. The beans existed because a plant grew them. The plant existed because a seed was planted. The seed existed because... well, you get the idea. Everything we observe is contingent – it depends on something else for its existence. But here's where it gets interesting. If everything needs something else to explain it, and that thing needs something else, and so on forever... we have a problem. It's like trying to hold up a chandelier with a chain where every link is supported by the link above it, but there's no ceiling. No matter how many links you add, the whole thing crashes down.
Imagine you need to borrow a book. You ask your friend, but she says she needs to borrow it from someone else first. That person needs to borrow it from another person, who needs to borrow it from another, and so on. If this goes on infinitely, do you ever get the book? Of course not. Somewhere, someone has to actually own the book.
Reality works the same way. Somewhere, something has to actually exist by its own power, not borrowed from something else.
The Necessary Being
This is where the concept of God as a necessary being comes in, and I know "necessary being" sounds like philosophical jargon, but stick with me because this is actually pretty amazing. Think of it this way: there are things that exist but don't have to exist. You and I – we're wonderful, unique, made in God's image – but the universe could have gotten along without us. The Earth could have existed without humans. The solar system could have existed without Earth. These are all what philosophers call "contingent beings" – they depend on other things for their existence.
But if everything is contingent, if everything is optional, then nothing would exist at all. It's like everyone at a party waiting for someone else to start dancing. If everyone's waiting, the dance floor stays empty forever. So logically, not religiously, but logically, there must be at least one thing that exists necessarily. Something that doesn't depend on anything else. Something that has existence built into its very nature.
And here's where it gets beautiful: this is exactly how God reveals Himself in Scripture.
The Divine Name
When Moses stood before that burning bush – talk about a moment that changes everything – he asked God a very practical question. "Who should I tell the Israelites sent me? What's your name?"
And God's answer? "I AM WHO I AM."
Now, in our culture, that might sound evasive, like God's avoiding the question. But in Hebrew thought, names revealed nature. God wasn't dodging; He was declaring His most fundamental characteristic: He simply IS. He exists by His own power. He doesn't derive His existence from anything or anyone else.
The Hebrew phrase is אֶהְיֶה אֲשֶׁר אֶהְיֶה ("Ehyeh asher ehyeh"), and it's built on the verb "to be." God is essentially saying, "I am the self-existent one. I am existence itself. I don't have existence; I AM existence."
This is radically different from every other god in the ancient world. The Egyptian gods had origin stories. The Babylonian gods were born from chaos. The Greek gods had parents and family trees that would make a soap opera look simple. But the God of Israel? He simply is. And this isn't just Old Testament theology. Jump forward to John's Gospel, chapter 8. Jesus is in a heated discussion with the religious leaders, and He drops this bombshell: "Before Abraham was, I AM."
The Greek is ἐγώ εἰμι (“ego eimi") – I AM. Not "I was" (past tense) but "I AM" (eternal present). Jesus wasn't just claiming to be older than Abraham; He was claiming the divine name. He was saying, "I am the self-existent one. I am the God who spoke to Moses."
The religious leaders understood exactly what He was claiming. That's why they picked up stones to kill Him for blasphemy. You don't try to execute someone for bad grammar. They knew He was claiming to be the uncaused cause, the necessary being, the I AM.
Why the Question Misfires
So when someone asks, "Who made God?" they're actually making what philosophers call a category error. It's like asking, "What color is the number seven?" or "How much does Thursday weigh?" or my personal favorite from Frank Turek, "What does Beethoven's Fifth Symphony smell like?" These questions don't make sense because they're applying the wrong categories. Numbers don't have colors. Days don't have weight. Symphonies don't have smells. And beings that exist necessarily don't have makers.
The question "Who made God?" assumes God is like everything else; that He came into being at some point and therefore needs an explanation for His existence. But that's precisely what God is not. By definition, God is the uncaused cause, the unmoved mover, the necessary being upon which all contingent beings depend. It's not special pleading to say God doesn't need a cause. Special pleading would be if we said, "Everything needs a cause except God, just because we say so." But that's not the argument. The argument is: "Everything that begins to exist needs a cause. God didn't begin to exist. Therefore, God doesn't need a cause."
This isn't a cop-out or a word game. It's a logical necessity. Something has to exist without a cause, or nothing would exist at all. And that something, by definition, is what we call God.
The Time Factor
Here's another angle that often trips people up. They ask, "What was God doing before He created the universe?" But this question also contains a hidden assumption – that God exists in time the way we do. Think about it: time is the measurement of change. Seconds, minutes, hours, years – they're all ways of measuring how things change in relation to each other. The Earth spins, we call it a day. The Earth orbits the sun, we call it a year.
But what if you exist outside the physical universe? What if you're not subject to change? Then time, as we understand it, doesn't apply to you. Augustine figured this out in the 4th century. When asked what God was doing before creation, he didn't say God was twiddling His thumbs for eternity. He said time itself is part of creation. There is no "before" creation in a temporal sense because time began with creation. God doesn't exist in time; time exists in God. He's not waiting through long ages. From His perspective, He simply IS. The past, present, and future are all equally present to Him. It's like an author holding a book – every page, every chapter, every word is equally accessible. The author isn't trapped in the story's timeline.
This is why God can say through Isaiah, "I make known the end from the beginning, from ancient times, what is still to come" (Isaiah 46:10). He's not predicting the future like a really good weather forecaster. He's outside the timeline altogether.
The Personal Touch
Now, I know we've been deep in the philosophical weeds here, and some of you might be thinking, "Okay, Austin, but what does this actually mean for my life? How does this help me when I'm struggling with doubt or trying to explain my faith to others?" Let me bring this home in a very practical way.
First, understanding that God is the necessary being, the I AM, means that He is the most real thing in existence. More real than the chair you're sitting on. More real than the device you're watching this on. More real than your own thoughts and feelings. Everything else could potentially not exist, but God cannot not exist. His non-existence is impossible.
That means when life feels uncertain, when everything seems to be shifting sand beneath your feet, you can anchor yourself to the One who simply IS. The stock market crashes? God still IS. Relationships fail? God still IS. Your health declines? God still IS. Governments rise and fall? God still IS.
This isn't just theological abstraction. This is bedrock for your soul.
Second, it means that existence itself is not an accident. If the universe were self-existent, if it were the necessary being, then personality, love, purpose, meaning – these would all be cosmic accidents, temporary arrangements of atoms that will one day dissolve back into nothingness.
But if a personal God is the necessary being, if a relational God is the foundation of all reality, then love isn't an accident. Purpose isn't an illusion. Meaning isn't something we invent to make ourselves feel better. These things are woven into the very fabric of existence because they reflect the nature of the One who IS.
Common Objections and Responses
Let me address some of the pushback you might encounter or might be feeling yourself.
"But this is just defining God into existence!"
No, we're not saying God exists because we define Him as existing. We're recognizing that the logical requirements for any existence at all point to something with the characteristics that the Bible has always attributed to God. We didn't invent the idea of a necessary being to save our theology. The logic of existence demands it, and our theology happens to match it perfectly.
"Why can't the universe itself be the necessary being?"
Great question! For several reasons. First, everything we observe about the universe suggests it's contingent. It's changing, it's expanding, it had a beginning (according to Big Bang cosmology), and it's heading toward heat death. These are not characteristics of a necessary being.
Second, the universe is composed of contingent parts. How could a collection of contingent things somehow become necessary just by being collected together? That's like saying a chain of dependent links could hold itself up if you just make the chain long enough.
Third, the fine-tuning we observe in the universe suggests it could have been different. The gravitational constant could have been slightly stronger or weaker. The speed of light could have been different. These variables suggest contingency, not necessity.
"This is too complex. Why can't there be a simpler answer?"
Actually, this is the simple answer! The alternative, infinite regress, is infinitely complex. It requires an infinite number of causes stretching back forever. God as the necessary being is the simplest possible solution: one uncaused cause rather than infinite caused causes. As William of Ockham (of Ockham's Razor fame) might say, we shouldn't multiply entities beyond necessity. One necessary being is simpler than infinite contingent beings.
"If God doesn't need a cause, why not just say the universe doesn't need a cause?"
Because we have good evidence that the universe began to exist. The Second Law of Thermodynamics tells us the universe is running down, losing usable energy. If it had existed forever, it would have run down by now. The expansion of the universe points to a beginning. The Borde-Guth-Vilenkin theorem shows that any universe that is, on average, expanding cannot be eternal in the past.
But beyond the scientific evidence, there's the logical problem we discussed earlier. The universe is full of change, full of contingent realities. It shows all the hallmarks of something that depends on something else for its existence.
How to Share This Truth
When someone asks you, "Who made God?" here's how you can respond graciously and clearly:
Start with affirmation: "That's a great question! You're thinking deeply about this, and I appreciate that. It shows you're not just accepting things blindly."
Use an analogy: "Let me ask you something. If every person in a room needed to borrow a dollar from someone else in the room, would anyone ever get a dollar? No, right? Someone has to actually have a dollar to lend. It's the same with existence. If everything needs something else to exist, nothing would exist. Something has to have existence built into its very nature."
Explain the distinction: "The question assumes God is like everything else – that He came into being and needs a cause. But that's not what we mean by God. We mean the necessary being that exists by His own nature, the uncaused cause that everything else depends on."
Make it personal: "I know it seems like we're playing word games, but we're really not. We're recognizing that the very fact that anything exists at all points to something – or Someone – who exists necessarily. And the beautiful thing is, this isn't just an abstract concept. This necessary being revealed Himself as I AM, the personal God who knows you and loves you."
Point to Jesus: "What blows my mind is that this necessary being, this I AM, stepped into our contingent world. Jesus claimed to be I AM in human flesh. The uncaused cause became caused. The infinite became finite. Not because He had to, but because He wanted to restore relationship with us."
The Bigger Picture
You see, the question "Who made God?" ultimately leads us to: existence is not self-explanatory. The fact that anything exists at all is, when you really think about it, absolutely mind-blowing. Why is there something rather than nothing?
The answer is that there is a necessary being, a self-existent reality, an uncaused cause – and this being is not an impersonal force or an abstract principle. This being revealed Himself to Moses as I AM. This being is personal, relational, and loving. Think about what this means. The foundation of all reality is not matter and energy subject to blind, purposeless laws. The foundation of all reality is a personal Being who chose to create, who chose to reveal Himself, who chose to redeem.
Every time you see a cause and effect – a parent loving a child, an artist creating beauty, a scientist discovering truth – you're seeing echoes of the great Cause, the source of all love, beauty, and truth. Every contingent reality points back to the necessary reality. Every "might not have been" points to the One who cannot not be.
Living in Light of This Truth
So how do we live in light of this truth? How does understanding God as the necessary being, the I AM, change our daily experience?
First, it changes how we worship. We're not worshiping a superhero, just a bigger, stronger version of ourselves. We're worshiping the ground of all being, the source of all existence. Every breath we take is contingent on His sustaining power. As Paul told the Athenians, "In him we live and move and have our being" (Acts 17:28).
This should fill us with awe. The next time you sing "How Great Thou Art," remember – you're not just singing about someone who is very great. You're singing to the One who IS, period. The One without whom nothing else would exist.
Second, it changes how we face uncertainty. In a world of contingent realities – where jobs can be lost, health can fail, relationships can break – we have an anchor in the One who cannot not exist. His existence doesn't depend on circumstances. His being doesn't fluctuate with the stock market. His reality doesn't change with political winds.
When anxiety creeps in, remember: you are held by the One who holds all existence in being. You are loved by the I AM.
Third, it changes how we share our faith. We're not trying to convince people to add God to their list of things that exist. We're helping them see that God is the reason anything exists at all. We're not arguing for one more being in the universe; we're pointing to the Being who makes the universe possible.
This shifts the conversation from "Is there evidence for God?" to "What best explains the existence of everything?" It's not about finding God within the universe like finding a needle in a haystack. It's about recognizing that the universe itself points beyond itself to its necessary source.
The Ultimate Answer
So, who made God? No one. God is unmade, uncaused, without beginning or end. He simply IS. And in that simple yet amazingly infinite truth lies the answer to existence itself.
The question "Who made God?" isn't the brilliant objection some think it is. It's actually an invitation to explore one of the deepest truths of reality. It's a doorway to understanding that existence is not self-explanatory, that something must exist necessarily, and that this something is the personal, relational God revealed in Scripture.
Richard Dawkins thought this question ended the discussion. But really, it's where the discussion gets interesting. Because once you understand why God needs no maker, you understand something fundamental about reality itself. You understand that at the bottom of everything, beneath all the layers of cause and effect, behind all the curtains of cosmic history, there is not nothingness, not chaos, not impersonal force – there is I AM.
And this I AM knows your name. This I AM became flesh and dwelt among us. This I AM offers you not just existence, but abundant life.
The next time someone asks you, "Who made God?" don't see it as an attack on your faith. See it as an opportunity to share one of the most profound truths in existence. See it as a chance to point beyond the contingent to the necessary, beyond the caused to the uncaused, beyond the creation to the Creator.
And remember, you're not defending an abstract philosophical concept. You're bearing witness to the One who revealed Himself to Moses in the burning bush, who spoke the universe into existence with a word, who entered our contingent reality in the person of Jesus Christ, and who even now sustains every atom, every moment, every breath by His power.
The question "Who made God?" doesn't diminish God. Properly understood, it magnifies Him. It reveals Him as the necessary foundation of all reality, the I AM who needs no explanation because He IS the explanation.
A Personal Invitation
Let me close with something personal. Maybe you've struggled with this question. Maybe it's kept you up at night, made you doubt, made you wonder if your faith is built on sand. I want you to know that your questions are welcome. God isn't threatened by them. He's big enough to handle them.
But I also want to challenge you to see this question not as a problem to be solved but as an invitation to go deeper. The God who IS wants to be known by you. The necessary being who sustains all existence cares about your individual existence. The I AM who revealed Himself to Moses wants to reveal Himself to you. If you're reading this and you've never made that connection – if you've never moved from knowing about the God who IS to knowing Him personally – let today be the day. The uncaused cause of the universe caused you for a purpose. The self-existent One wants to share His existence with you. The I AM is saying to you, "I AM... here for you."
And for those of us who already know Him, let's not take this for granted. We know the I AM. We have relationship with the necessary being. We are loved by the foundation of all reality. If that doesn't blow your mind and move your heart, I don't know what will. The question "Who made God?" leads us ultimately to worship. Because when we truly understand that God needs no maker, that He IS the great I AM, we can only respond with awe, wonder, and praise. So the next time you face this question – whether from others or in your own heart – remember: it's not a stumbling block. It's a stepping stone. A stepping stone to understanding the profound truth that God doesn't just exist. He IS existence. He doesn't just have life. He IS life. He doesn't just know truth. He IS truth.
And this God, this I AM, this uncaused cause of all that is – He loves you with an everlasting love. He knows you by name. He holds you in existence at this very moment by His power and His choice. Who made God? No one. God simply IS. And because He IS, we are. Because He IS, we have hope. Because He IS, we have meaning. Because He IS, we have eternity.
That's not a dodge. That's not philosophical sleight of hand. That's the deepest truth in the universe. It's personally transforming. It's the kind of truth that doesn't just answer questions – it changes lives. Because when you really grasp that the necessary being of the universe knows your name and loves you... well, that changes everything about how you see yourself, your purpose, and your future.
And that's a truth worth living for.
