Then God Said

Genesis 1:1-3

Biblical Narrative

(There was no real problem accepting this outside the fact that no one could explain it. It was simple the revelation of the Word of God that He was the created.

Typically this was and has been the position of Judaism and Christianity, both Catholic and Protestant.)

All things are going just fine

We were better able to study our world. Until, there was advancement in our ability to see and know things previously unknown.

The conclusion is that the earth is not young but old. And there would be no way that the Genesis story could account for these phenomena. Six literal days plus the genealogical record of the Bible does not allow for enough time to explain this world we not understand to be much older than Genesis would allow for.

I think it would be helpful here to point out that the belief in an old earth has its roots in what we call uniformity – or uniformitarianism. That is; everything has continued in uniform fashion without any interruption or changes.

So, if the geologic layers and the fossils don’t fit before or during the creation week, where can we fit them in a biblical timeframe? Most geologists will agree that many of the large rock layers were deposited in water-related conditions. Further, to deposit the fossil record, we would need to kill millions of animals and quickly deposit them in wet sediments. Is there a biblical explanation for this? That’s right, the worldwide flood!

There is a vast blanket of sedimentary rock layers that stretches over most of North America, and almost every continent. It contains marine fossils, which indicates that the oceans were over the continents at one time.

Now there are different ways to interpret these sedimentary rock layers. The standard way is known as the uniformitarian way. A uniformitarian geologist looks at the current rates, and calculates backwards to find out the age. For example, if one layer accumulates per year and there are a million layers, we might assume that it took a million years for the whole sequence to form.

On the other hand, a catastrophist geologist says that most of the geologic record was not deposited slowly and gradually, but is actually the results of catastrophic events; that a large amount of geologic work was done in a short period of time.

So, if the geologic layers and the fossils don’t fit before or during the creation week, where can we fit them in a biblical timeframe? Most geologists will agree that many of the large rock layers were deposited in water-related conditions. Further, to deposit the fossil record, we would need to kill millions of animals and quickly deposit them in wet sediments. Is there a biblical explanation for this? That’s right, the worldwide flood!

There is a vast blanket of sedimentary rock layers that stretches over most of North America, and almost every continent. It contains marine fossils, which indicates that the oceans were over the continents at one time.

Now there are different ways to interpret these sedimentary rock layers. The standard way is known as the uniformitarian way. A uniformitarian geologist looks at the current rates, and calculates backwards to find out the age. For example, if one layer accumulates per year and there are a million layers, we might assume that it took a million years for the whole sequence to form.

On the other hand, a catastrophist geologist says that most of the geologic record was not deposited slowly and gradually, but is actually the results of catastrophic events; that a large amount of geologic work was done in a short period of time.

The old earth belief is no problem for the one who subscribes to evolution in the first place. In fact, this just gives the evolutionist more ammunition to belittle the belief in a God CREATED world

SO HOW DO YOU EXPLAIN THIS?

You either trust the Biblical account

You see if there is another solution

You either trust the Biblical account

You see if there is another solution

There are basically three proposals. However, only two of those are prominent

The first is that something happened before the creative week – that begins with verse three of Genesis one.

Or, something different happened during the week of creation – or the period of creation described in Genesis one

Let me explain. The first idea – something happened before creation is that there is a gap between verses one and two

Before we get to verse three, something else has gone on.

The thrust of the argument rests on an understanding of verse two that says that this world is in a chaotic state. Something is drastically wrong at the outset

Look at verse two

In the beginning God created the heaven and the earth. And the earth was without form, and void; and darkness was upon the face of the deep. And the spirit of God moved upon the face of the waters.

- Genesis 1:1-2

Essentially, this is what creation would look like.

Day as Ages

Has two primary camps.

Theistic Evolution – means that God started the building blocks and then let evolution run its course

Progressive Creationism – God started it and was regularly involved in the process that took time over these long periods

Issue #1 – The Bible tells us God created

Does this mean only the initial building blocks - Theistic evolution

God created everything

The testimony of Scripture is that God created everything

If you believe the gap theory then Essentially, this is what creation would look like.

What about verse 2

In the beginning God created the heaven and the earth. And the earth was without form, and void; and darkness was upon the face of the deep. And the spirit of God moved upon the face of the waters.

-Genesis 1:1-2

There is another legitimate way of handling this verse.

However, if this is Ruin and Restoration then you still have the same problem you started with. We have geological ages – that we study – and they came before Genesis 1:3. But if it was all ruined how can we study it?

Form

The Hebrew word - tohu

Unformed

Tohu – without form

Bohu - unihabited

Darkness
no light energy

Deep

In the presence of

the deep

“Day”

The Hebrew word,

Yom

refers very specifically to a

24-hour day.

Yom

•Occurring more than almost 2,200 in the Old Testament it almost always means a day

For in six days the LORD made heaven and earth, the sea, and all that in them is, and rested the seventh day: wherefore the LORD blessed the Sabbath day, and hallowed it.

- Exodus 20:11

Jesus and the Writings of Moses

•There is one who accuses you: Moses, on whom you have set your hope. For if you believed Moses, you would believe me; for he wrote of me. John 5:46

•All things were made through him, and without him was not any thing made that was made John 1:3

•But from the beginning of creation, ‘God made them male and female. ‘Therefore a man shall leave his father and mother and hold fast to his wife, and the two shall become one flesh Mark 10:6

Think about this: millions of years of animals ripping each other apart, killing one another, and eating each other. And then we get to the end of creation week, and the Creator pronounces all of the death, pain, and gore as “very good”?

Quote

“…Time is in fact the hero of the plot… given so much time, the “impossible” becomes possible, and the possible probable, and the probable virtually certain. One has only to wait: time itself performs miracles.”

Position statement of the American natural Assoc of Biology Teachers (1995 )

"The diversity of life on earth is the outcome of evolution: an unsupervised, impersonal, unpredictable and natural process of temporal descent with genetic modification that is affected by natural selection, chance, historical contingencies and changing environments."

2 Peter 3:3–4

“Knowing this first, that there shall come in the last days scoffers, walking after their own lusts, and saying, Where is the promise of his coming? for since the fathers fell asleep, all things continue as they were from the beginning of the creation.”

2 Peter 3:5–6

“For this they willingly are ignorant of, that by the word of God the heavens were of old, and the earth standing out of the water and in the water: Whereby the world that then was, being overflowed with water, perished.”

FORM

Does this mean only the initial building blocks - Theistic evolution

God created everything

The testimony of Scripture is that God created everything

How Long Is A Day?

Occurring more than almost 2,200 in the Old Testament it almost always means a day

When modified by a numeral (359 times) it always mean a literal day

When modified by evening and morning (38 times) it always means a literal day

It forms the basis for the week we know (Exodus 20:11)

Remember the Sabbath day, to keep it holy. Six days you shall labor, and do all your work, but the seventh day is a Sabbath to the Lord your God. On it you shall not do any work . . . For in six days the Lord made heaven and earth, the sea, and all that is in them, and rested on the seventh day. Therefore the Lord blessed the Sabbath day and made it holy.

The Principle of Uniformity

§Extrapolating present processes and process rates into the far distant past

§Accounting for the origins of all things by present process

§Applying uniformity leads to inconsistent results

§World-wide “clocks” show that major events have occurred in the past

Written history is too short.