Part 2 – Divine Aseity
Not that I’m attempting necessarily–but if you forced me to choose the most foundational statement in the Bible concerning God’s being, essence, and activity–it would have to be his extraordinary self-description in Exodus 3:14.
“I AM that I AM.” [1]
Exod. 3:14
Every one of God’s attributes begins with this statement. But before any other, I want to first consider God’s aseity. Though a disturbing number of self-proclaimed evangelicals today have pitiable deficiencies in their understanding of theology generally, including in their doctrine of God [2]–divine aseity seems to be especially unrecognized or neglected. You may even be thinking to yourself now that you’ve never heard of that word, let alone that it describes God. For most, that will likely be because they were never taught, and so they just don’t know what they don’t know. You may find yourself in that category as well, as I did until several years ago.
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The Doctrine of Divine Aseity
So, what is divine aseity? Put simply, it means that God is absolutely self-existent and self-sufficient, and therefore, utterly independent. He exists a se–that is, he is “of himself”. [3] He doesn’t cause himself to be; he is being. He is life and existence, and therefore, dependent upon nothing and no one. It wouldn’t be wrong to simply say of God, “He is.” Or, to use his own words, “I AM”. Each of God’s three persons is essentially a se, because each of the persons is of the same substance (or essence) since all three are the one divine Being–”one God in Trinity, and Trinity in Unity; neither confounding the persons, nor dividing the substance.” [4] He is the first, and he is the last (Isa. 48:12). The living God (Isa. 37:17), and “the fountain of life” (Psa. 36:9). His life is his own; ours is derivative and dependent. “God lives at once, but we live over time, progressing…[he] lives necessarily, but we do not.” [5]
“The Lord our God is but one only living and true God; whose subsistence is in and of Himself…” [6]
Baptist Confession, 2:1
“God, having all life, glory, goodness, blessedness, in and of Himself, is alone in and unto Himself all-sufficient, not standing in need of any creature which He hath made, nor deriving any glory from them; He is the alone fountain of all being, of whom, through whom, and to whom are all things…” [7]
Baptist Confession, 2:2
One necessary conclusion to be drawn from divine aseity is that God is actus purus. That is, he is “most pure actuality” or “perfect actualization.” [8] He is, as Aquinas said, the “Unmoved Mover…[as] the first efficient cause of being must itself be pure act.” [9] He didn’t come from anywhere or anyone and he isn’t headed anywhere. In his divinity he is uncreated, immense, omnipresent, and atemporal–“a most pure spirit, invisible, without body.” [10] He created and fills all of time and space, while at the same time standing outside of them as eternal. There’s nothing about him in need of supplement, augmentation, or becoming. He is the most fundamental source of all things that depend upon him for their existence–which, of course, is everything in all of creation that ever was, is, or will be—everything that is not God. “That is to say, God, as the first cause of all things, must be a being who is not susceptible to further actualization because He possesses fullness of being in and of Himself.” [11] To put it more simply, there is no potential in God. He is supremely perfect in all ways. He is eternally incapable of becoming anything or losing anything. Nothing can add or subtract from him, including himself. He is utterly perfect and transcendent in all ways. He is eternally original and exemplary. He is only Being; he is in no way becoming. [12] Here we find that words ultimately fail us, though these descriptions are true all the same. But we should also find ourselves in worshipful awe and reverence.
In one sense, though all the excellencies we attribute to God are equally eternal and perfect, divine aseity “is the key that unlocks all other attributes. Without it, every other attribute cannot be what it is. With it, we see why God is who he is. We see why his perfection is, well, so perfect.” [13] Hence why I’ve started this series with divine aseity.
Who can give to this great Creator? What can he profit from us? Can we or any other created thing add anything to God? What does he need from his creation? Absolutely nothing (Acts 17:23-28). He is the Giver–and “In him we live and move and have our being” (v. 28) –not the other way around.
What can contain him? Nothing (1 Kings 8:27). Who can repay him? No one (Rom. 11:35). If you are righteous, does he gain or receive anything from you that he doesn’t already possess (Job 22:2-3)? And if you sin against him, do you cause him any harm? Not at all (35:6-7). God himself says to Job, “Who has first given to me, that I should repay him? Whatever is under the whole heaven is mine” (41:11), and, “Whom did [God] consult, and who made him understand? Who taught him the path of justice, and taught him knowledge, and showed him the way of understanding?” (Isa. 40:14). The implied answer, of course, is nobody. Our God is the “Alpha and the Omega, the first and the last, the beginning and the end” (Rev. 22:13). He is not the Alpha somehow in process of becoming the Omega.
You may be thinking at this point something like, “Yeah that’s all really great, but is that helpful in my day to day life?” More than you may know.
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Counseling God’s Aseity
What this means ultimately and quite practically is that God is sufficient in all ways and all things. Being purely independent, he alone is enough for you and everyone you encounter no matter the person or the circumstances. And as believers, weak and sinful as we are, we can blissfully confess with Paul, “But he [says] to me, ‘My grace is sufficient for you, for my power is made perfect in weakness.’ Therefore I will boast all the more gladly of my weaknesses, so that the power of Christ may rest upon me” (2 Cor. 12:9).
Think of all those people who have been betrayed, deceived, taken advantage of, and harmed by others. Think of all those who are stuck in cycles of sin and shame no matter how hard they’ve tried to stop. For anyone you sit with who is in Christ through faith, God’s aseity ensures they can trust him even when everything else—including themselves—proves unreliable and limited. The promise of salvation–including your sanctification–is absolutely certain not so much because a promise was made, but because of who is making the promise. The promise is sweet because of the Promise-keeper. God has been so kind as to display “more convincingly to the heirs of the promise the unchangeable character of purpose, [guaranteeing] it with an oath, so that by two unchangeable things, in which it is impossible for God to lie, we who have fled for refuge might have strong encouragement to hold fast to the hope set before us” (Heb. 6:17-18). Jesus has gone before us as a sure and steadfast anchor of our souls giving us infallible hope (v. 19). Not a feeling of hope that comes and goes in us, but one that’s always sure and steadfast because of a God who cannot be moved and a Christ whose work cannot be undone.
And for those who don’t know Christ savingly, this is what you have to offer them—real hope. The kind that isn’t uncertain but is assured and convicted of things not yet seen because God saves to the uttermost those who draw near to him in Christ through faith (Heb. 7:25; 11:1).
Unless we have a God who is truly self-existent and self-sufficient then we can’t be sure that anything I’ve just said (or the Bible says) is true or won’t somehow change. But he is enough and he will sustain you and those you counsel. He promises to bring to completion the good work he’s started in you and in them (Phil. 1:6), and his promises are not as sure as fallen creatures, but as sure as he is. Encourage those around you to take their eyes off of their ever-changing, inconsistent, fallible selves and look to the God who is a se. He alone is unassailable. That is, he has true and perfect integrity as the one who is existence himself. No one can assault him. No one can prove him wrong or wanting. Why? Because he is exclusively independent. And he is for his people not against them. Only a God like that can be fully trusted.
Take yourself and everyone you speak with swiftly to our a se God.
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Questions For Reflection
Have you ever thought about God in these terms? What rises to the surface in you when you read about God’s aseity? Are you comforted, afraid, angry, or something else? Perhaps some combination? Whatever comes up, pray for wisdom to see God as he is and love him for who he is. Allow this immeasurable truth to lead you to worship. Accept the mystery of it, but also the steadfast truth of it. How does God’s aseity change things for you, or recast the way you’ve thought about God, yourself, others, your past, present, and future? What would a universe without a God who is a se be like? Is that universe logical, tenable, or endurable? Compare and contrast that universe from the one in which God is a se, and talk with someone about the differences and consequences of both ideas.
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Footnotes
[1] Or “I AM WHO I AM,” or “I AM THAT WHICH I AM.”
[2] Every two years Ligonier Ministries and Lifeway Research partner to “take the theological temperature of the United States to help Christians better understand today’s culture and to equip the church with better insights for discipleship.” The result is The State Of Theology research study. See the key findings from 2022 here: https://thestateoftheology.com/
[3] Muller, Richard A. Dictionary of Latin and Greek Theological Terms: Drawn Principally from Protestant Scholastic Theology. Grand Rapids, MI: Baker Academic, 1985. p. 47.
[4] Athanasian Creed (6th century), Art. 3-4.
[5] Jones, Mark. God Is: A Devotional Guide To the Attributes Of God. Wheaton, IL: Crossway, 2017. p. 67.
[6] 1689 Baptist Confession Of Faith & the 1695 Baptist Catechism. Port St. Lucie, FL: Solid Ground Christian Books, 2018. Otherwise named the Second London Baptist Confession of Faith, first published in 1677 and then again in 1689; hereafter abbreviated as the Baptist Confession. This excerpt is from Chapter 2: Article 1.
[7] Baptist Confession, Chapter 2: Article 2.
[8] Muller, p. 24.
[9] Thomas Aquinas, Summa Theologiae Ia.2.3.
[10] Baptist Confession, Chapter 2: Article 1.
[11] Dolezal, James E. All That Is In God: Evangelical Theology and the Challenge of Classical Christian Theism. Grand Rapids, MI: Reformation Heritage Books, 2017. p. 16.
[12] To be more technical, there is no “passive potency” in God. The Puritan scholastic Stephen Charnock wrote in 1682 the following: “God is of himself, from no other. Natures which are made by God, may increase, because they began to be; they may decrease, because they were made of nothing, and so tend to nothing; the condition of their original leads them to defect, and the power of their Creator brings them to increase. But God hath no original, he hath no defect, because he was not made of nothing: he hath no increase, because he had no beginning. He was before all things, and, therefore, depends upon no other thing, which, by its own change, can bring any change upon him. That which is from itself cannot be changed, because it hath nothing before it, nothing more excellent than itself; but that which is from another as its first cause and chief good, may be changed by that which was its efficient cause and last end.” Charnock, Stephen. The Existence and Attributes Of God (Vol. 1). Grand Rapids, MI: Baker Books, 1996. p. 321.
[13] Barrett, Matthew. None Greater: The Undomesticated Attributes Of God. Grand Rapids, MI: Baker Books, 2019. p. 68.