The Independence of God

The attribute of God’s independence is of extreme importance. Sometimes, this attribute is described as God’s self-existence. Others will use the term “aseity,” which means one’s existence can only originate from oneself. Nothing outside of the being can take credit for that ultimate existence.  

The concept is simple to communicate but challenging to grasp: God is without origin. He is the uncreated Creator. He is the causeless cause. Nothing existed before God, and God needs absolutely nothing to exist to prove his divine nature. The Creator does not require anything from the creation. In order to be God, he must be unequivocally absent of need. For if he needs something, that reveals him to be incomplete. God cannot be deficient.   

As the Apostle Paul visited Athens, he encountered the numerous statues venerating the plentiful gods. As he stared down men who were worshiping the objects of their own making, he felt compelled to confront their error. “The God who made the world and everything in it, being Lord of heaven and earth, does not live in temples made by man, nor is he served by human hands, as though he needed anything, since he himself gives to all mankind life and breath and everything” (Acts 17:24-25). Paul showed the hopelessness of any man’s religious devotion if given to a deity created by man. Anyone who has to make his or her own god (Ps. 115:4) will become like that god one day (Ps. 115:8).   

Paul did not follow the Needy God. He scoffed at the notion. When Paul commented, “as though he needed anything” (Acts 17:25), he was elevating the people’s perception of the one true God. He revealed the pitiful nature of having to fabricate anything for a deity. If a god requires a man to form him, that god’s resiliency must be severely compromised. The ability to identify as God assumes complete and utter independence.

We cannot create anything for the Creator. Paul believed in the one who needed no creation. This God defined himself. Paul’s belief in God’s independence originated from scriptural teaching. Inspired by God, these teachings were recorded by the likes of Job, Moses, Asaph, Isaiah, and others. Paul knew the Old Testament and knew it well. So, let’s start at the beginning of that book and at the beginning of this world. 

“In the beginning, God created the heavens and the earth” (Gen. 1:1). Even the phrase, “in the beginning, God created,” is fundamentally an implication that God existed even before there was a beginning! Before everything began, God already was. He was not dependent upon any other thing to live. God utilized no pre-existing matter to exist. God is the pre-existing matter. His steps even precede when there was a world to walk upon. He actually set the planet on its very foundation (Ps. 104:5). No person was even around to help him when he settled the globe’s infrastructure (Job 38:4). Even the very heavens are the work of his hands (Ps. 102:25). 

This God created every single thing in the universe (Rev. 4:11). All the diversified elements of creation find only one commonality – their Creator. In his wisdom, he was able to make all of the universe’s manifold works (Ps. 104:24). The only way to create all things is if you are before all things. The Apostle John taught that not only were all things invoked by the Godhead, but he made sure to emphasize that nothing has been made that was not caused by him (John 1:3). The belief in one God assumes that he is the one from who are all things and for whom we all exist (1 Cor. 8:6). “For from him and through him and to him are all things. To him be glory forever. Amen” (Rom. 11:36).   

All things were created by him and for him (Col. 1:16). He is not only the originator but the purpose as well. His existence before all things provides the essence of the stability needed for all things to hold together in him (Col. 1:17). He is known as the Ancient of Days (Dan. 7:9, 13, 22). He is God from everlasting to everlasting (Ps. 90:2). As the eternal God (Gen. 21:33), he precedes every single other element in the universe. He has no end to his years (Ps. 102:27). He is the first, and he is the last (Isa. 44:6; 48:12). He is the Alpha and the Omega who lives forevermore (Rev. 1:17-18).   

God has life in himself (John 5:26). God’s being does not originate outside of himself because it was not given to him by another. No external source provided him life or purpose for nothing outside him could ever hope to add value to him. He established every ounce of his being from within his own person.