Millard Erickson outlines the problem: What makes certain actions right and others wrong? In medieval times one school of thought, the realists, maintained that God chooses the right because it is right. . . . Another school of thought, the nominalists, asserted that it is God’s choice which makes an action right. . . . Actually, the biblical position falls between realism and nominalism. . . . [T]hat standard to which God adheres is not external to God—it is his own nature. He decides in accordance with reality, and that reality is himself.

In our saying, however, that God’s law, his requirements of us, and his moral judgments are in accordance with his nature, and that his actions conform with his own standards, a further question appears to arise: Is God selfish? . . . [H]ere God seems to be in violation of his own command against selfishness. For the highest goal of God is apparently his own glory. Is this not an instance of the very self-centeredness which God forbids and even condemns in others? (Christian Theology, p. 287)

Probing questions indeed. What can be said in defense of God at this point? The author vividly remembers growing up in southern Illinois during the early years of World War II. Patriotism was at an all-time high. The day after the Pearl Harbor attack, tens of thousands of young American boys joined the various military services to fight, and, if need be, to die for freedom, justice, liberty, and truth. Would anyone have condemned these soldiers as being selfish and self-centered? Of course not! But why not? Because those concepts they fought for are unselfish in nature. In God, we have a perfect and personal divine being who created these noble concepts and is the very essence of freedom (John 8:36), justice (Jer 23:5), liberty (Gal 5:1), and truth (Ps 86:15)! Abraham, Moses, David, Isaiah, and Jeremiah understood all this as reflected by their testimonies (Gen 18:25; Deut 32:4; Ps 19:8; Isa 45:19; Jer 9:24). There is no element of selfishness or personal ego in these concepts. So it is with the very author of these virtues.