Does God Exist?
By Krista Call
It's one of the oldest questions anyone has ever asked. And depending on where you are in life, it might feel like a simple yes — or a hard one.
For those who didn't grow up with scripture, faith, or a community of believers, the question can feel genuinely hard to answer. And honestly, even for those of us who did grow up in the Church, there are moments, especially in a world full of suffering and cruelty, when it's easy to look around and wonder: Where is God? Does He actually exist?
Having honest questions like that doesn't make you faithless.
What Philosophy Has to Say
Thinkers have wrestled with this question for centuries, and a few arguments have stood the test of time.
The Cosmological Argument says everything that exists has a cause. The universe began to exist. So something outside the universe must have caused it. Modern physics backs this up — the Big Bang points to an actual moment of origin. Something had to start it.
The Teleological Argument (or Design Argument) points out that our universe looks fine-tuned for life. Things like gravity, the speed of light, and the mass of electrons are set to such precise values that even a tiny variation would make life impossible. The odds of that happening by accident are staggering.
The Moral Argument asks where our deep sense of right and wrong comes from. If there's no God, morality is just a social agreement. But most people feel, instinctively, that some things are wrong no matter the culture or the opinion. That points to a moral lawgiver.
Even some of the greatest minds in science have pointed toward God:
"That the eye, with all its inimitable contrivances…could have been formed by natural selection, seems, I freely confess, absurd in the highest sense." — Charles Darwin
"In the absence of any other proof, the thumb alone would convince me of God's existence." — Sir Isaac Newton
What the Human Body Tells Me
My background is in exercise science, and I find the human body endlessly fascinating. I am also the mother of two little girls. I carried them, felt them grow, and watched them enter this world. I've walked away from both of those experiences in awe — stunned by the complexity and strength of a woman's body, which was designed precisely for the purpose of creating and sustaining life.
I can't help but feel that those experiences pointed to something larger: that just as we gave our daughters life, I too was created and given life by someone. It felt like proof.
Proof enough for me.
This story from Douglas L. Callister captures what I mean better than I can:
"One of my brothers is a physician. During medical school he was assigned to study anatomy alongside an agnostic classmate. Their education eventually required that the two of them carefully examine and dissect a cadaver. They studied the incredibly complex yet harmonious systems of the body. They noted the body's power to correct its own deficiencies and to send healing antibodies to the site of injury or infection. They learned of over 150 trillion cells within the body — if set end to end, those cells would encircle the earth more than 200 times. Today medical students learn of more than 1 billion miles of DNA in a single human body.
My brother and his classmate learned of a brain that continuously receives signals from 130 million light receptors in the eyes, 24,000 hearing receptors in the ears, 10,000 taste buds, and hundreds of thousands of receptors in the skin. The two students grew silent as they contemplated what they were examining. Sensing the moment was right, my brother said quietly: 'Coincidence is a marvelous thing, isn't it?' His agnostic classmate responded, 'You win.'"
What Creation Testifies
My husband and I recently backpacked into the Wind River mountain range in Wyoming. Standing among those peaks, surrounded by the granite and silence and vastness of it all, I felt something I can only describe as a knowing. In my heart and soul, something testified to me: He is real, and aware of me. He created this. He created me.
The Wind Rivers, Wyoming. Hard to stand here and not feel like Someone made this.
The Book of Mormon captures this beautifully. When an anti-Christ named Korihor demanded physical proof of God, the prophet Alma responded:
"All things denote there is a God; yea, even the earth, and all things that are upon the face of it, yea, and its motion, yea, and also all the planets which move in their regular form do witness that there is a Supreme Creator." — Alma 30:44
What I've Come to Know
I know God exists, not because I've found an argument that can't be refuted, but because I have lived experiences that have testified to me that He is real.
I've felt Him in the delivery room. I've felt Him in the mountains. I've felt Him in quiet moments of prayer when I needed Him most. These aren't logical conclusions. They are living experiences. And they have changed me.
That said, I understand that personal experience isn't the same as evidence you can hand someone else. So to those who are genuinely seeking, I'd offer this:
Open your eyes. God is not hiding. He is speaking through the complexity of the human body, through the order of the natural world, through the still, small moments of your life — if you have the humility to recognize Him.
As Preach My Gospel puts it: "Humility is a vital catalyst for spiritual growth."
"Then you will call upon me and come and pray to me, and I will hear you. You will seek me and find me, when you seek me with all your heart." — Jeremiah 29:12–13
The conclusion I keep coming back to is this: belief in God is rationally defensible. Serious, thoughtful people throughout history have held it. But at some point, it takes faith. The evidence can support that step, but it can't replace it.
My Invitation to You
If you're asking this question, I think that's a beautiful thing. Seeking is the first step to discovery.
My invitation is simple: open your eyes, truly seek Him, and take one step of faith. Come to Him in prayer. Study the scriptures. Ask with a sincere heart. And watch what happens.
I have had many living experiences that have testified to me that God is real — that He knows me, that He loves me. That knowledge is the anchor of my life. It is why we started this blog.
He knows you too. And I believe, if you seek Him, He will show you.
What questions do you have about God's existence? We'd love to hear where you are in your own journey — leave a comment below or come share in our community.
