"God didnt create the universe, it has always been here"

I am amazed to say I actually hear this objection all the time.  Most people know what the big bang is, and the big bang shows that the universe did have an absolute beginning.  A beginning where all time and space and energy came into existence.  Also everyone seems to know that something does not come from nothing.  Nothing existed before the big bang.  Nothing.  No matter, no energy, no time.  I was chatting with someone today about this and I said to him if we heard a huge "BANG!" behind us and he asked me "what was that?" and I replied with "nothing" he would not believe me, no one would.  Something does not come from nothing, also life does not come from non life.  Science and logic supports this.  So anyone holding onto the idea of an eternal universe would have to deny either science or logic. 

Christians can get a bad reputation in this town, in my timme out at UBC especially I was called many names, specifically "creationist" with the idea behind it that Christians are people who deny science and follow blind faith.  I have never been this way and I dont know of many Christians that are this way.  It is usually people attacking straw men, because I see Christians being called names like this all the time rather than people trying to get to know them.  I understand that each individual atheist or agnostic is different and I cant judge their beliefs before I know them.  In our multicultural city most people understand this, so I would love to see it pass on to conversations between people on faith.

  I was amazed at the simplicity of William Lane Craig's Kalam Cosmological Arguement. Which is :

1. Whatever begins to exist has a cause.
2. The universe began to exist.
3. Therefore, the universe has a cause.

It is simple and memorizable and everyone has an opinion on it.  Making it a great talking point with people.  When I talk about it with atheists they usually will say things along the line of "most of that is true but not for the universe" when I ask why they usually dont know.  I dont think everyone needs to have an answer on the spot.  I myself will often say to people "I dont know the answer to that can I look into it and we can have a coffee in a week?"  but I do offer for people to take time and look into this arguement but rarely hear anything back.

Also I think a great talking point is if you sit down and find a cup of coffee on the table and it is still warm, you know one thing...that that coffee hasn't been there forever.  According to the 2nd law of thermodynamics we understand that the universe is winding down. Entropy increases.  So from the fact that we have a very young sun, and all the energy in the universe is not already used up, we can know that it has not always been here. 

I just want to add, that on this issue especially both Christians and Atheists can get very upset.  I think all of us humans can get upset or defensive when we get put on the spot and dont know the answer.  But lets always work together and reason together, these conversations should be engaging and even fun.