The Bible makes some huge claims concerning the beginning of the universe:

1. John 1:3, “All things came into being through Him, and apart from Him nothing came into being that has come into being.”
2. Hebrews 3:4, “Every house is built by someone, and the builder of all things is God.”
3. Colossians 1:16, “For by Him all things were created, both the heavens and on earth, visible, and invisible, whether thrones or dominions or rulers or authorities—all things have been created through Him and for Him.”
4. Hebrews 1:2, “In these last days he has spoken to us through His Son, whom He appointed heir of all things, through whom also He made the world.”
5. Hebrews 1:10, “You, LORD in the beginning laid the foundation of the earth, and the heavens are the works of your hands” (Psalm 102:25).
6. Revelation 4:11, “Worthy are You, our Lord and our God, to receive glory and honor and power; for You created all things, and because of Your will they existed, and were created.”
7. Romans 1:20, “For since the creation of the world His invisible attributes, His eternal power and divine nature, have been clearly seen, being understood through what has been made, so that they are without excuse.”
8. Psalm 33:6, “By the word of the LORD the heavens were made, and by the breath of His mouth all their host.”

How is it we can justify these claims? Can they be proven scientifically? There is actually a great amount of philosophical and scientific evidence which proves that God created the Heavens and the earth by his own will out of nothing.

One of the great questions of life is “why?”. Why is there life? Why is there a universe? Why is there something rather than nothing? If there is something, when did it begin?

We may try to fathom an infinite past, but it quickly becomes a nonsensical option. What makes the most sense is that the universe had a beginning. This is what we read in Genesis 1:1, “In the beginning God created the heavens and the earth.” A Persian philosopher, Al-Ghazali noted: “every being which begins has a cause for its beginning; now the world is a being which begins; therefore it possesses a cause for its beginning”.

Thomas Aquinas said God was the Unmoved Mover or Uncaused first Cause. He is the necessary being—He exists by virtue of his own nature without cause.

Leibnizian cosmological argument

The argument comes from Gottfriend Wilhelm Leibniz. Leibniz wrote, “The first question which should rightly be asked is this: why is there something rather than nothing?”:

1Every existing thing has an explanation of its existence, either in the necessity of its own nature or in an external cause.

2If the universe has an explanation of its existence, that explanation is God.

3The universe is an existing thing.

4Therefore the explanation of the universe is God.

The Thomistic cosmological argument

1What we observe in this universe is contingent (i.e. dependent, or conditional)

2A sequence of causally related contingent things cannot be infinite

3The sequence of causally dependent contingent things must be finite

Conclusion: There must be a first cause in the sequence of contingent causes

William Lane Craig put forth the Kalam Cosmological Argument:

1. Whatever begins to exist has a cause.
2. The universe began to exist.
3. Therefore, the universe has a cause.

This is a very simple syllogism (argument), yet it is very profound.

Examine point number 1. No one really believes that something can come from nothing. If that were possible, it would still occur. Those who claim that something came from nothing do not mean nothing as we mean nothing. They are referring to an indescribable amount of energy compacted into the tiniest space imaginable. It is a vacuum of fluctuating energy governed by physical laws and having physical structure. We must still find where it came from and why it came.

Some would say that premise 1 is true of everything except the universe. That is an absurd claim. What about God? The premise does not say everything has a cause. The premise says that everything which has a beginning has a cause. God does not have a beginning or a cause. This is not special pleading for God. It is exactly what the atheist claims for the universe.

The universe did begin to exist. Things infinite do not exist in physical reality. Although, they may exist in potential, there is no opportunity for infinite series to actually exist. We may be able to speak of an infinite series (0, 1, 2, 3,….). However, that would never actually exist in reality. Many of the arguments against an actual infinity can also be traced back to Aristotle and John Philoponus.

Scientific evidence for the universe having a beginning does exist. The “Big Bang Theory” is often now regarded as an atheistic philosophy. However, when it first was proposed, it was met with approval by theists because it helped to prove what Genesis 1 claimed. This is a quick summary of the events which led up to the theories developments. Albert Einstein assumed the universe was static (unmoving) when he was working on his theory of gravity, the general theory of relativity. He actually had to fudge the numbers in order to make his theory work with the static universe he believed existed.

Alexander Friedman and Georges Lemaitre took Einstein’s equations at face value, and they arrived at the conclusion that the universe is expanding. This theory of an expanding universe was confirmed in 1929 when Edwin Hubble discovered that light from distant galaxies appeared to be more red than expected. This “redshift” is the result of galaxies moving away from a center of the universe. It was as if there was a beginning and everything was rushing from it. This Friedman-Lemaitre model eventually became known as the Big Bang Theory. Both time and space had a beginning point—Genesis 1:1. God was the cause of the effect and the source of the material.

The thermodynamics of the universe also point to Biblical creation. Since everything is expanding, it will eventually become a featureless spread in which no life is possible which is referred to as the “heat death” of the universe. Since this is the case, we can know that the universe has not existed forever. If it was infinite, then this heat death, should already have occurred. The laws of thermodynamics fit the Biblical model.

The universe has a personal creator. An actual infinite series of regress to explain the universe is impossible. Only a “being” would be able to arrange and begin and supervise the beginning. Since the cause must be sufficient for the effect, then the cause for the universe must be greater than the effect.

We again must turn again to the Biblical evidence which is in perfect agreement with the scientific evidence. Hopefully, after this study the Biblical claims will be more impressive after a more in depth study of their claims. Note how the beginning of the universe (both time and space) fits with the following Biblical claims.

1. John 1:3, “All things came into being through Him, and apart from Him nothing came into being that has come into being.”
2. Hebrews 3:4, “Every house is built by someone, and the builder of all things is God.”
3. Colossians 1:16, “For by Him all things were created, both the heavens and on earth, visible, and invisible, whether thrones or dominions or rulers or authorities—all things have been created through Him and for Him.”
4. Hebrews 1:2, “In these last days he has spoken to us through His Son, whom He appointed heir of all things, through whom also He made the world.”
5. Hebrews 1:10, “You, LORD in the beginning laid the foundation of the earth, and the heavens are the works of your hands” (Psalm 102:25).
6. Revelation 4:11, “Worthy are You, our Lord and our God, to receive glory and honor and power; for You created all things, and because of Your will they existed, and were created.”
7. Romans 1:20, “For since the creation of the world His invisible attributes, His eternal power and divine nature, have been clearly seen, being understood through what has been made, so that they are without excuse.”
8. Psalm 33:6, “By the word of the LORD the heavens were made, and by the breath of His mouth all their host.”