The problem with prayer.

[Neo-Scholastic]

We don't know enough about any initial conditions of the Universe to conclude that a quantum vacuum at that point isn't nothing

That’s a silly statement. In this context, nothing means the absence of all existence as such. In contrast to this, the quantum vacuum is nothing in relationship to what does exist, kinda like holes.

You're the one proposing these laws came from a god - make your case.

I proposed no such thing. I showed that physical laws are not brute facts.

If there are absolutes, primitives, and/or fundamentals, then at some point those who wonder must accept some things as brute facts. The issue at hand is this: has the chain of explanations gone as deeply as possible? The Principle of Sufficient Reason only applies until it doesn’t. As a general rule, atheists stop too early and send boys to do the tasks of men. They take some things as brute facts, like quantum vacuum, even though those things do not satisfy the criteria for fundamentals.

And superintelligent beings with literally zero external evidence for their very existence do? [satisfy the criteria for a fundamental]

I’ve heard the ‘zero evidence’ bromide so many times I put the evidence in my signature. But in answer to your question, yes, the God of Classical Theism adequately satisfies the criteria of a fundamental: fully in act, efficacious, necessary, non-contingent, simple, etc.

I’m not sure exactly what you mean by ‘that conclusion’. What conclusion? Anyway, we have strayed far from the OP topic of prayer.

The conclusion that reality existed before time began.

Scripture says nothing about whether reality existed before time. Genesis begins with the Hebrew letter Bet not Aleph. Some interpret that to mean that even Genesis has a back story. Even still, it stands to reason that regardless of whether or not time extends into the infinite past, reality must at the very least be logically prior to time.