Apologetics 5 - What God is Like

The Moral/Ethical Argument for the Existence of a Personal God

A common argument for the existence of God, and on C.S. Lewis relies on quite a bit, is that there are universal morals, that exist throughout all cultures and all times. Another is the that are universal truths. The argument is that there must be an ultimate, independent source of these, and that must be a personal God who is moral, ethical, and true.

The Anthropological Argument for the Existence of a Personal God

• Humans are personal beings who are:
• self aware
• rational
• experience emotions
• possess agency
• Humans have not caused their own existence
• Any Characteristics possessed by an effect is properly attributed to its cause
• Causes cannot give what it does not have
• All characteristics must pre-exist in its cause

We see that the cosmic environment possess a characteristic of personhood. The question, then, is does the cosmic environment provide the features of personhood? If so, then the ultimate context of which we exist is itself a personhood (pantheism or panentheism). If not, then, nature cannot be the cause of personhood, so there must be another cause, which must be a personal being or beings that has/have personhood/personhoods.

The Design (or Teleological) Argument for the Existence of a Personal God


The anthropic principle tells us that all of the exact current intricacies of the universe are necessary for conscious life to exist and must be exactly as they are for the way the universe to function as it is. As stated by Dr. William Craig, "The incredibly complex and delicately balance nexus of initial conditions necessary for intelligent life seems to be most plausibly explained if the nexus is the product of intelligent design.... To say that apparent design is a result of chance or coincidence is in fact to leave it unexplained."

Thomas Huxley, an evolutionists calculated the odds of life as we know it today occurring. It is important to note, here that for statisticians 1 in 10 to the 50 is considered "impossible" The probability of life in the form of a single cell randomly occurring is 1 in 10 to the 40,000. The probability of evolving a horse is 1 in 10 to the 3,000,000. Barrow and Tipler estimated the odds of evolving the human genome are 4 to the 180(110,000) and that is assuming that the universe already existed in the capacity to support it (e.g. containing the proper elements.) Hoyle famously stated that believing in chance evolution is like believing that, "a tornado sweeping through a junkyard might assemble a Boeing 747 from the materials there." 

Even atheist physicists admit that the universe appears to be designed, even if they personally don't believe it actually is. Because the features of the universe indicate design, it is completely reasonable and logical to conclude that the best explanation for the cause of the beginning of the universe is an intelligence and purposeful designer. Being the creator of the universe means that God is powerful. Lastly, as the architect of the universe, he is intentional and intelligent. This, then leads us to what is called, "Supernatural Theism."