Click here for the first part of this series: How Do We Know God is Real?
The fact that I exist is scandalous.
We don’t know what to make of this fact. I think we live our entire earthly lives never quite coming to grips with it. On a daily basis, we set aside our shock over the fact that we exist in order to pretend to be like the other people we see who appear to be getting on with their lives.
But it’s not just that I exist—I have the ability to make my own decisions. I am someone. My own life, will, perspective, and choices are different from those of every other person. It is not just that “I think, therefore I am.” I think in a particular way, so therefore I am a particular person. This is the fact that is scandalous, and this, indeed, is what makes me distinct from God. At the same time that I am someone, I am also not someone else. I am finite. The statement “I am” therefore is truly complete only for God. I need a predicate. That is, “I am Pete,” or “I am a person.” God does not need a predicate, but I do.
Another way of saying this is that God is “identityless,” at least insofar as the nature of identity is defining and confining. The fuller name for God that the Bible also gives is “I AM THAT I AM.” This name and statement describes the way that the totality of God is accounted for entirely through the fact of God’s existence. His eternal nature means that no justification is needed or even applicable beyond this fact—a fact that we have recognized to be observable from all that is.
Note also that “I AM” is present tense. When Jesus accounted for his own identity this way, he forced the gospel account to violate the rules of grammar—“Most assuredly, I say to you, before Abraham was, I am” (John 8:58). This points to another aspect of the nature of God. Part of being eternal is being unchanging, and part of being unchanging is being ever-present.
By contrast, I am not like that. I am finite. I am moving through the world and changing as I go. I am making mistakes. I am getting older, and in some ways seeing my possibilities decline. It is true that “I am”—but it is also true that “I was” different than I am, and “I will be” different still. And one day, I won’t be any longer.
God is real, and I am a part of his creation. I don’t know why I exist, but he does. I have at least this much relationship to him. So what does a person do, any person, once he discovers God? This is the next fundamental question. We search out the impact, the meaning, and the direct personal consequences of our coming to realize that we live, move, and have our being within I AM.
The fact that I exist is scandalous.
We don’t know what to make of this fact. I think we live our entire earthly lives never quite coming to grips with it. On a daily basis, we set aside our shock over the fact that we exist in order to pretend to be like the other people we see who appear to be getting on with their lives.
But it’s not just that I exist—I have the ability to make my own decisions. I am someone. My own life, will, perspective, and choices are different from those of every other person. It is not just that “I think, therefore I am.” I think in a particular way, so therefore I am a particular person. This is the fact that is scandalous, and this, indeed, is what makes me distinct from God. At the same time that I am someone, I am also not someone else. I am finite. The statement “I am” therefore is truly complete only for God. I need a predicate. That is, “I am Pete,” or “I am a person.” God does not need a predicate, but I do.
Another way of saying this is that God is “identityless,” at least insofar as the nature of identity is defining and confining. The fuller name for God that the Bible also gives is “I AM THAT I AM.” This name and statement describes the way that the totality of God is accounted for entirely through the fact of God’s existence. His eternal nature means that no justification is needed or even applicable beyond this fact—a fact that we have recognized to be observable from all that is.
Note also that “I AM” is present tense. When Jesus accounted for his own identity this way, he forced the gospel account to violate the rules of grammar—“Most assuredly, I say to you, before Abraham was, I am” (John 8:58). This points to another aspect of the nature of God. Part of being eternal is being unchanging, and part of being unchanging is being ever-present.
By contrast, I am not like that. I am finite. I am moving through the world and changing as I go. I am making mistakes. I am getting older, and in some ways seeing my possibilities decline. It is true that “I am”—but it is also true that “I was” different than I am, and “I will be” different still. And one day, I won’t be any longer.
God is real, and I am a part of his creation. I don’t know why I exist, but he does. I have at least this much relationship to him. So what does a person do, any person, once he discovers God? This is the next fundamental question. We search out the impact, the meaning, and the direct personal consequences of our coming to realize that we live, move, and have our being within I AM.
