God versus the rock

If God is really God, can He make a rock so big that He can’t lift? 

It one of those "throw it out there" sort of questions.  The one they try to stump you with.  A question that Christians are not supposed to be able to answer.

So, can God make a rock so big that He can’t lift?

Even this loaded, nonsensical question with its curricular, no win argument has a rather elegant answer. But first let’s look at the point they are trying to make:  If God can make rock so big that He cannot lift it, then He is not God because He cannot lift the rock.  But if He can lift it, then He is not God because He cannot make a rock big enough.

God can’t win this one, or can He?  Since this is a hypothetical question and God is not into performing circus tricks to entertain a whim, then the answer can only ever be hypothetical.

So, how big is big? 

How about a rock as big as a car or even a house?  Well I don’t reckon that God would have a problem with making or lifting either of them.  How about as big as block of flats, skyscraper?  Not a problem. How about a rock as big as a small town, or even a city, or maybe even a country, how about as big as the earth?  Well God made the earth and put it in to motion around the sun so he's actually done that one.

We've got to go bigger! How about as big as the solar system?  Well God made the galaxies and put them into motion too.  So even a rock the size of a galaxy should not be a problem. However, a rock of that size would collapse in on itself to form a giant black hole so God may have to change a few of the laws of physics.

Well how about making a rock the size of universe: infinity to infinity.   Yes I am quite sure that God could do that if He wanted too.  Imagine that, a single rock of infinite size, stretching to infinity in every direction, the whole universe one giant never ending rock. Only problem is that if this rock was infinite there would be nothing else except for this rock, so there would be no place to lift the rock from.

So the answer to the question:

Yes, God could make a rock infinitely big that would fill all of space. But if He did this, there would be no place to lift the rock from.  So how about that, God is still God.  This is because the question was flawed and did not take into consideration infinity.

About those other questions:

There are a lot of questions like that out there, some of them could be answered much like this one, but there some that can’t because most of these questions are loaded and/or intrinsically impossible.   

By loaded I mean a question like: “Do you still have that problem with Kleptomania?”

The question is loaded because if you answer “no”, then it was a problem you once had, and if you answer “yes” then it is a problem you still have. 

Intrinsically impossible question is one like: “Can you make a square circle?”  The question is intrinsically impossible and self-contradictory.

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C.S. Lewis stated:
His (God’s) Omnipotence means power to do all that is intrinsically possible, not to do the intrinsically impossible. You may attribute miracles to Him, but not nonsense. . . It remains true that all things are possible with God: the intrinsic impossibilities are not things but nonentities . . . nonsense remains nonsense even when we talk it about God (Problem of Pain, 18).

There are other examples of impossibilities for an Omnipotent God:  “it is impossible for God to lie.” (Hebrews 6:18) Lying like sinning is against God’s nature and because God is good, it is intrinsically impossible for God to lie.

So, the next time someone tries to undo you with one of these silly little questions or statements, have fun dismantle it.  Take your time and think your way through it properly, and if you cannot see through it straight away, tell them that you will get back to them. Have fun.

Who created God?

If God created everything, then who created God? 

How many times have you heard that question or variations of it? I have heard it many times.  But inherent within the question there is an assumption, and this assumption that is wrong. Because when someone asks the question, “Who created God?”, they make the assumption that there was a time when God did not exist.

If God created everything, then He created absolutely everything: space, stars, planets, mountains, rivers, oceans, life etc.  This means that He would also have to create all matter (the atoms that things are made from).  All this God would have made from nothing or else where did it all come from?  He would also have laid out all the rules that hold it all together: the laws of gravity, laws of motion, laws of thermodynamics and the rest; all the laws that hold the very fabric of the universe together. 

This means He also created the dimensions; you know: up - down, left - right and forward - backwards. Without these dimensions there would be no ‘place’ to put the stars and planets etc. 

If God created everything, He also created time.  If He created time then there wasn’t a time when God did not exist.  This would make God outside of the dimensions of time and space that we are bound by.  We are bound by these things; He is not.   For God, all of time would be, sort of like an open book.   God is bigger than any box we can make for Him.

So, the question “Who created God?” is the wrong question because to ask this is to assume that there was a time when God did not exist.  Because of this the question is nonsensical and a bit like asking, “What is the smell of the colour 9”.

So what is the right question?

Well a much better question is: “What is God like?”  And the answer to that can be found in the Bible.