Divine Aseity is a fascinating and important topic. In reference to God, His Aseity means that He has the property by which He exists in and of Himself, from Himself. In other words, He is the cause of Himself. All other things in the universe (visible and invisible) are caused by God; however, He is the Uncaused Cause. Additionally, He has no needs whatsoever. In Acts 17, St. Paul described to the Athenians God’s total independence from all things.
Acts 17:24-25 “The God who made the world and everything in it is the Lord of heaven and earth and does not live in temples built by human hands. 25 And he is not served by human hands, as if he needed anything. Rather, he himself gives everyone life and breath and everything else.
So, St. Paul told the Greeks that while everything is dependent upon God for its existence, God is independent from all things and, therefore, has no needs of any kind.
In fact, God’s Holy name given to Moses at Mt. Sinai reinforces His Aseity in that it tells us that He is “Existence” or Being.
Exodus 3:13-14 Moses said to God, “Suppose I go to the Israelites and say to them, ‘The God of your fathers has sent me to you,’ and they ask me, ‘What is his name?’ Then what shall I tell them?” 14 God said to Moses, “I am who I am. This is what you are to say to the Israelites: ‘I am has sent me to you.’”
Whereas all creatures–like ourselves–have existence, God is existence. In Him we “we live and move and have our being” (Acts 17:28).
I was recently in an online discussion with an atheist who told me that my belief in God as the Creator “begs the question” as to “who created God?” I was able to show him that, if the universe has a beginning (which now is a scientific consensus), then God must be uncaused. It makes no sense to ask the question “who created God?” The reason for this is simple. If something or someone created God (we will term it as C-1), then that immediately begs the question, “Who created C-1?” Therefore, we must have a C-2. But it cannot stop there. We have to have a C-3, and a C-4, and on and on. We are driven backward infinitely in an endless regress of creators. The problem, though, is we cannot have an infinite regress and ever arrive at “now.” Everything just keeps moving backward infinitely. So, we are stuck. There must be an Uncaused Cause that begins everything. That Uncaused Cause is God. He has Aseity.
TheologyGuy 