Featured Creation: 6 days or billions of years... or both?

There doesn't have to be.

The Scriptures do not imply that the Sun nor any star is the fundamental source of all light. God creates light according to the Scriptural account, and then days later, he creates the Sun moon and stars to "rule" the day and night, not necessarily create them and also to serve as signs for seasons, days, years etc...

The Genesis account has light and evenings and mornings before and quite independent of, celestial bodies. The Genesis account is unique and incredible that way. No other ancient creation account would have suggested that anything OTHER THAN the sun itself is the source of light, and so also the moon. It's quite counter-intuitive. And yet, nonetheless, the Genesis account plainly and unashamedly says so and quite clearly. That's a testament to the truth of Scripture.

We need neither to assume that light has slown down nor that the Earth is billions of years old. I wouldn't even say that it has the "appearance" of age either....Because....the Bible implies quite clearly that celestial bodies themselves were not the only things responsible for shedding light.

 

Gen 1:1 In the beginning, God created the heavens and the earth.
Gen 1:2 The earth was without form and void, and darkness was over the face of the deep. And the Spirit of God was hovering over the face of the waters.
Gen 1:3 And God said, "Let there be light," and there was light.
Gen 1:4 And God saw that the light was good. And God separated the light from the darkness.
Gen 1:5 God called the light Day, and the darkness he called Night. And there was evening and there was morning, the first day.

 

I think it is silly to count time the same with the sun as without it.

What is an hour without the sun?

How does it work if there is no earth turning on its axis causing the sun to rise?

There is absolutely no reason whatsoever to think that those were literal 24 hour periods. None.

Most of the time the word "day" does NOT mean 24 hour periods.

It makes much better sense to think of it as an epoch of time as in "the DAY of the Lord" or "there was a DAY when the sons of God came to present themselves before God..." (Job 2:1).

All that means is that there was an epoch of time when this took place.

We say, "Back in my day..."

We don't mean 24 hour period. We mean an epoch of time.

Now we should use the NOT 24 hour period as our default position on this text until a 24 hour period is clearly expounded BECAUSE the first four "days" had no sun which is essential to making a 24 hour day what it is.

 

What is not necessary is to think of this as a literal 24 hour perido when the word "DAY" rarely means 24 hour period.

That is ESPECIALLY true when it has always been the sun that has made a 24 hour day possible.

The problem young earth guys have is that there are these stars we look up and see that do not exist. They blew up a billion years ago and their light is just now reaching us. We see them as they were a billion years ago because it took their light that long to get to us.

We know this to be true.

So we rethink Genesis 1 and we say, "Is it possible that Genesis 1 is not talking about literal 24 hour periods?" And then we V-8 juice smakc ourselves in the heads and say, "DUH! Day RARELY means 24 hour period! Why should it mean that here ESPECIALLY since there was no sun for the first half of creation whereby hours and literal days exist!!!"

 

Imho!!!

I tend to believe that Peter hit it out of the park with his words in 2 Peter 3:8 (NLV), "But you must not forget this one thing, dear friends: A day is like a thousand years to the Lord, and a thousand years is like a day." It is also mentioned in Spalm 90:4 - "A thousand years in your sight are like a day that has just gone by, or like a watch in the night."

As I've said regarding other things in the Bible, especially those things that seem to conflict with science; the time periods to create this earth and everything else we know and see is in the eye of the beholder, and will be revealed when God brings us before Him in Heaven!

It doesn't matter to me if it is a thousand years or a day! I am only concerned with one thing....and that is that God created this planet, all life, the universe, and if He said and did it, that is good enough for me!

Will it really matter in the realm of all things if it is a day or a million years? Just knowing that He was awesome enough to speak all this into place and being is good enough for me, and I am certainly not going to argue or question Him, and the time it took to do all we see and know doesn't matter so long as I am saved and going to spend forever with Him!

 

Luke...

You are considering "science" to be the truth standard, when in fact it is the other way around.

Gods declarations are the truth standard. Science needs to get with the program.

 

Guess it all comes down to which is the more sure revelation about Universe origins, the Bible or modern science?

 

D. Russell Humphreys has the most eloquent explanation for distant starlight in a young universe, and it fits the Genesis account quite elegantly.

 

Why must there be such a dichotomy? Why must it be either...or?

Because the reality is that God has given both natural/general revelation and specific/special revelation. Why can't we honestly see the evidences of the natural world as inspired as the text of a book of books?

Now, certainly, some scientists go outside their own discipline's limitations with dramatic claims about certitude concerning cosmology, which is really no different than some theologians (or pastors) who do the same thing with claims about what the Bible reveals that go well beyond its limitations.

However, why can't we hold the Bible in one hand and read it alongside our reading of nature?

There are reasonable explanations for many things in nature, and natural science doesn't eliminate God. Perhaps our overreaction to science's legitimate field of inquiry is a failure on our own part to trust God and understand deeply the manner in which He reveals Himself to us all.

 

Think the problem is that many Christians seem to wantto adjust the Bible in order to accomodate "scientific facts", claimed such as really old age, evolution etc, but the truth is that the bible when properily interpreted never conflicts with scienctific truths, problem is that we make science as nalid as biblical revelation!

 

Alive, God has granted us access to two sources of truth. The scriptures and the natural domain, for which we have been granted rationality to explore and discover. As J Polkinghorn stated, the scriptures (bible) is not A book, rather a collection of books and narratives, some prose, some poetry, some history, some prophecy, some theology etc. His position, which I tend to agree is that the record and narrative of Genesis 1-2 is not intended to be a scientific point by point description, rather it is "THEOLOGICAL" in its nature. The emphasis being "GOD CREATED".

 

Well, while you were fishin' for catfish with a bamboo pole, I was reading. Quite a few secular physicists have argued that light is slowing down and given much higher numbers than Setterfield.

Luke, do you know how much 10 to the 10th power is?

Right Luke. Hey, while you were talking a catfish took your bait.

I wouldn't bet your paycheck on that Luke.

 

Excellent points PJ, a reasoned and reasonable scientist, without an agenda should be involved in an unbiased search for understanding properties of numbers,atoms and molecules. Atheists which most scientist are often accused of being (many are) come in two flavors.

(DeSouza)

1. Methodological: Scientists who go about their work assuming that we live in a natural world where miracles are forbidden, not because they cannot happen but because science limits itself to natural causes. Everything must be studied from a materialist perspective. It is the job of the scientist to only explore material effects.

2. Philosophical: This is the dogma that the natural and material is all that there is, has been or ever will be. These are the "new athiests" the neo-darwinists. They are on a mission to destroy or discredit any semblance of theism

 

I see what you are saying, and its a reasonable view. I still think that the best way to go is to believe God literally 1st, and then find how science can agree with it...rather then the opposit.

 

It is ignoble to make God literal when he is not being literal. In so doing you misrepresent God himself and this ought to be condemned with great fervor.

The text gives NO indication whatsoever that the "days" of Genesis 1 are literal 24 hour periods while being clear that they are not since an hour cannot exist without the sun which did not exist until the fourth "day".

Therefore we OUGHT to take this language the way God intended. There is nothing noble about taking it literal and misrepresenting God.

That would be like saying that the Second Person of the Godhead LITERALLY has a wounded bleeding head covered in back and front with eyeballs and horns.

That would be an insult to Christ- but it is what the Bible says about him- except that clearly that is not literal.

Clearly these days are not literal in Genesis as well.

 

What is this "catfish" business??

You are weird old man.

 

It's alright Luke, nothin' wrong with fishin'.

Must of been what you were doing when quite a few secular physicists also theorized that light has slowed since the Big Bang.

Now, Christians are down on the Big Bang, but the scriptures repeatedly say God stretched out the heavens just as the Big Bang theory says. In fact, when the Big Bang theory first came out, it was opposed by many scientists because it agreed with the Bible.

Isa 45:12 I have made the earth, and created man upon it: I, even my hands, have stretched out the heavens, and all their host have I commanded.

Truth is, many secular scientists also believe the speed of light was MUCH faster at the Big Bang.

Now, I seriously doubt this fellow believes the universe is only about 6000 years old, but that is the issue, if the speed of light was millions or billions of times faster during creation, radiometric or radioactive forms of dating will give very old dates. This would be so even if the universe were only about 6000 "solar years" old.

Ah, why bother, here is something more in line with your thinking;

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FR38-908Hec

Wow, lucky day at the creek Luke! :thumbs:

 

No one has a problem with saying that the speed of light might not be constant, Winman. If you could read, you would see that.

What you said NNE ON EARTH WOULD SIGN THERE NAME TO IT.

You said it slowed down by (and I burst forth in laughter here) "BILLIONS OF TIMES SIX THOUSAND YEARS AGO"

HAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA!

The catfish I do catch from time to time have better logic.

 

I said no such thing, it is scientists who have theorized that light has slowed down, and that light was perhaps billions of times faster just a few thousand years ago. Secular scientists have actually theorized that light was many millions of times faster than Setterfield's figures.

There are different theories of how quickly light slowed down. Some theorize light "slammed on the brakes" while others like Setterfield have argued for a more gradual slowdown. That is still being studied.

Look Luke, this theory may end up being completely false, but it actually agrees with the Bible and could explain how distant starlight many billions of light years away is visible on earth. This theory does not belong to one crazy creationist scientist, many secular scientists support this theory.

Time will tell.

 

No they don't. NOBODY says that light slowed down by billions of times six thousand years ago.

Nobody- but you.

Even pseudo-scientists like Setterfield would not say such a ridiculous thing.