In the long history of the Church, scholars have attempted to develop intellectual arguments—so-called 'proofs of God'—to justify belief in the existence of God. The chief ones include:
1. The Ontological Argument — based on the principle of perfection: God must exist because God is, by definition, perfect, and a god who exists only in our thoughts and not in reality is less than perfect (since he lacks the perfection of existence).
2. Cosmological Arguement — based on the principle of the universe's existence: basically the response given to the ad infinitum questions asked by three-year-olds, "Where did this come from?"
3. Teleological Argument — based on the principle of design: the natural world is full of purposeful designs; designs imply a designer.
4. Anthropological Argument — based on the principle of personality: there must be a personality, mind and will greater than and apart from human personality, mind and will.
5. Moral Arguement — based on the principle of ethics and history: surely history must have a purpose that only the existence of a god can explain.
While such intellectual arguments may be useful for apologetic and evangelistic purposes, it should be remembered that, ultimately, a god who can be proved can't be very much of a god. The Dutch Calvinist theologian Abraham Kuyper has a very low opinion of such rational proofs: "The attempt to prove God's existence is either useless or unsuccessful. It is useless if the searcher believes that God is a rewarder of those who seek Him. And it is unsuccessful if it is an attempt to force a person who does not have this pistis [faith] by means of argumentation to an acknowledgment in a logical sense."
Print Resources:
Louis Berkhof, Systematic Theology.
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Bruce Ware, Systematic Theology. Lecture 11: Theism; Proof of God's Existence. BiblicalLearning.org.
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