1. Definition
a. a se
means by itself; self-existent or self-sufficient
b. When we say that God is self-existent we mean that
he derives his being from no outside source. He exists in and of himself. He
did not will himself into existence. His existence is grounded rather in his
nature. He necessarily exists by reason of what he is in himself. (Edgar Young
Mullins, The Christian Religion in Its
Doctrinal Expression, pg. 223)
2. Scriptural Data
a. John 1:1-3: In the beginning was the Word, and the
Word was with God, and the Word was God.
He was in the beginning with God.
All things were made through him, and without him was not any thing made
that was made.
b. Isaiah 40:17-23: All the nations are as nothing
before him, they are accounted by him as less than nothing and emptiness. To
whom then will you liken God, or what likeness compare with him? An idol! A
craftsman casts it, and a goldsmith overlays it with gold and casts for it
silver chains. He who is too impoverished for an offering chooses wood that
will not rot; he seeks out a skillful craftsman to set up an idol that will not
move. Do you not know? Do you not hear? Has it not been told you from the
beginning? Have you not understood from the foundations of the earth? It is he
who sits above the circle of the earth, and its inhabitants are like
grasshoppers; who stretches out the heavens like a curtain, and spreads them
like a tent to dwell in; who brings princes to nothing, and makes the rulers of
the earth as emptiness.
c. Romans 11:36: For from him and through him and to
him are all things. To him be glory forever. Amen.
d. Psalm 90:2: Before the mountains were brought
forth, or ever you had formed the earth and the world, from everlasting to
everlasting you are God.
3. Consideration and
Reflection
a. God
doesn’t merely not need anything; He couldn’t need anything.
i. The creation, conservation, and future-being of the
universe rely on God. No God, no universe. But, no universe, God still exists.
b. God’s self-existence doesn’t imply monotony and
nothingness.
i. And here emerges the central and most glorious
application of the term all-sufficiency. The Infinite Being is not the vast and
unrelieved monotony of existence that Pantheistic mysticism defined as the
abstract Nothing. It has in it infinite life, and, if such language be lawful,
infinite variety of life, in the mutual knowledge, love, and communion of the
Father, the Son, and the Holy Ghost. (William Burt Pope, A Compendium of Christian Theology, 1:301)
c. Who made
God?
i.
This objection fails when God’s aseity is properly understood.
ii. If God was contingent, he was dependent on
something else for His existence, He wouldn’t be God. The being that caused God
to exist would be God.
d. Abstract
objects
i. If abstract objects are real (such as numbers,
sets, etc.), then it seems as if they are eternal, necessary, and uncreated
which is contrary to the biblical witness. What to think?
ii. arealism: meaningless question
-not
widely held anymore (verificationism)
iii. realism: they are either concrete or abstract
objects
-concrete: physical (formalism) or mental (divine
conceptualism)
-formalism: scratch marks on paper (What about
speech?)
-divine conceptualism: ideas in God’s mind (think of
the number 2; it’s in your mind not God’s)
-abstract: created (absolute creationism) or uncreated
(Platonism)
-absolute creationism: bootstrapping objection (for
God to create the property of being powerful, He already has to be powerful)
-Platonism: eternal, necessary, uncreated like God (no
world where God exists alone or creates independently)
iv.
antirealism: do not exist
-many
views
4. Practical Application
a. God should be our ultimate concern in life because
He is the sole ultimate reality
i.
Whatever is your object of ultimate concern is god for you
ii. “Among all created beings, not one dare trust in
itself. God alone trusts in himself; all other beings must trust in him.
Unbelief is actually perverted faith, for it puts its trust not in the living
God but in dying men.” (A. W. Tozer, The
Knowledge of the Holy, pg. 42 in James Montgomery Boice, Foundations of the Christian Faith, pg.
105)
b. God’s
self-existence ought to exclude our selfishness (independence)
i.
Rebellion is an attempt at gaining independence from God
ii.
This takes us right back to the garden
iii. The freedom offered in Christ is not
independence, but radical dependence on the only perfect being ever to exist
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