Honestly, this was a question from one of the year three lads at our Holiday Bible Club this week; ‘is God a show off?’

The previous day he’d asked why God had created the world. I told him that I’d give him a proper answer if he came back tomorrow. I needed time to think and dig out the Westminster Confession of Faith, which I was sure had it covered!

I suggested that the reason God has created the world in the first place was so that everyone would see how wonderful He is. Creating the world and everything in it does that because

1. You’ve got to be really powerful to make a universe with nothing to work with. We’re good at making something out of something else, but we can’t make something out of nothing. But God made everything out of nothing. And He did so just by speaking. This means that God is immensely powerful and so He deserves our praise (Revelation 4:11). 

2. You’ve got to be really wise to make a universe that works as well as this one does. If God wasn’t really, really clever and if He hadn’t thought of everything, then this world wouldn’t be able to work. But it does. And it’s amazing. This means that God is the most incredibly wise person ever to exist and He deserves our praise (Psalm 104:24).

3. You’ve got to be really good to make a world as enjoyable as this one. God could have created a world which was dull and boring. But it’s not. It’s incredible. There are so many different things in it. Even the colour green has loads of different shades. There are so many good things in it for us to enjoy. And God gave those to us and so He deserves our praise (Genesis 1:29-31).

I was so pleased with my answer that Jake’s comment took the wind out of my sails; ‘So, God’s a bit of a show off then!’ I said something about God’s showing off and our showing off not being the same sort of thing. I tried to explain that our showing off is always about wanting people to think we’re amazing, even though we’re not. But when God shows off it’s OK because He’s the most amazing thing in the whole of creation. I even suggested that it would be wrong if God didn’t let everyone know that He was amazing because He’s the only perfect thing in the universe. I bought myself a bit of time. But I’m not sure he was convinced.   

Completely coincidentally, Al Mohler deals with this topic in his blog. I’m sending Jake the link!