Origin is a word that can apply only to things created.

When we think of anything that has origin we are not thinking of God. God is self-existent, while all created things necessarily originated somewhere at some time. Aside from God, nothing is self-caused.

By our effort to discover the origin of things we confess our belief that everything was made by someone who was made of no one. By experience we are taught that everything “came from” something else. Whatever exists must have had a cause that antedates it and was at least equal to it, since the lesser cannot produce the greater.

The child by his question, “Where did God come from?” is unwittingly acknowledging his creaturehood. Already the concept of cause and source and origin is firmly fixed in his mind. He knows that everything around him came from something other than itself, and he simply extends that concept upward to God.

John 5:26 “For as the Father has life in Himself, so hath He given to the Son to have life in Himself.”

God has life in himself, not only because He alone lives by his own inherent power, but because, it is containing in himself the fullness of life, he communicates life to all things. With thee is the fountain of life, (Ps 36:9.)

Now, since the majesty of God resembles as unknown and hidden us, for this reason it has been openly manifested in Christ. We have thus an open fountain placed before us, from which we may draw. This title is strictly applied to Christ, so far as he was manifested in the flesh.

Basic to the Being of God, and one of the fundamentals truths about God that Scripture reveals to us, is that God is completely independent and has no need of anything outside of Himself.  Jesus says, “God has life in Himself!”  As far as this important matter of life is concerned, we must understand that God has life of and in and through Himself.  God does not depend upon anyone or anything outside of Himself for life. Not only does He have life in Himself, but God is life; He is the immortal, living God who is the Lord of life!

God is independent as to mind (Romans 11:34), as to will (Ephesians 1:11), as to love (Hosea 14), and as to power (Psalm 115:3).

There is something else to remember here:

• God is so independent and without need of any thing outside of Himself that nothing can ever add anything to God.
• Creation does not add anything to God.
• Creation reveals the wonderful glory of God, but it does not add to it.
• God is independent in glory, in Himself He is all-glorious.  The salvation of the Church as a whole, and each member of the Church in particular does not add to God’s great glory!

Salvation reveals the wonders of His grace and glory, but salvation cannot increase it!  From eternity to eternity God has all glory!

Even more the Lord Jesus Christ in His incarnation, ministry, death, resurrection and ascension, did not add anything to God either!  All the fullness of the Godhead dwells in Christ bodily!  That Christ revealed the glory of God to us is wonderfully and forever true!  But in so doing He did not add anything to God.  How could He?  God is unchangeable.

Before creation He is the God of all glory, as well as after creation, and He is that to all eternity, of Himself!

God is the God of life who sustains all, but who is Himself independent of all.  He gives to all, but He is enriched by none.

Isaiah 40:12-17 do you think that the sacrifices of bullocks, sheep, and goats by the Israelites in the temple added anything to God?  Did God need those things, was He enriched by them?  What of our service of God on the Sabbath Day in His house, as well as from day to day?

Does God need us to be happy to be complete, to be glorious in perfections and praises? Not at all!

Undoubtedly the name of God that reveals the greatness, glory, and independence of God most clearly of all is the name YAHWEH (or the Latin translation JEHOVAH (I AM or I AM THAT I AM).  God names Himself, I AM, He very truthfully and confidently asserts that He rests for being upon no one but Himself, exists before all things, and all things exist through Him.

When God says, “I AM”, He confidently asserts that He has need of nothing, but by and through and of Himself, is!

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