[bondserv]

The Book of Genesis presents a disturbing problem for many Bible-believing Christians. Did God really create the heaven and the earth in just six 24-hour days? How does a serious student of the Torah - the five books of Moses - reconcile the Genesis account with the "billions of years" encountered in the dictums of astronomy, geology, et al?

[Arthur Wildfire! March]

"The changes in the velocity of light not only impacts our understanding of the astronomical distances and properties, it affects the atomic behavior involved in the red shift of spectra, the reliability of radiological dating, etc."

That is utterly fascinating! I'm getting behind in understanding the latest in science.

The Lord had blessed me with some in-depth understanding about Genisis when I was a teen, back in the '80s. The sun was not around when the world was first created. Therefore, when God first told mankind that the earth was created in six days, we truly don't know if those were days of heavan or days of earth, or days beyond our comprehension. God is a time traveller. He sees time differently than we do.

[azhenfud]

Good Read!

[RaceBannon]

The first statement is false.

The book of Genesis does NOT present ANY problem for a Bible Believer.

God spoke, and it was done, and it took six days...anything else, means you are NOT a Bible believer, but a believer in evolution of some sort.

[aquawrench]

If you want a lucid explanation from the "billions of years" creation perspective, go to...

www.reasons.org

[VadeRetro]

The "real" science Missler trumpets seems to be a blend of H. Russell Humprhries's "White Hole" theory, Barry Setterfield's CDK, and some sort of Zero-Point Energy Quackery. On the last of these, there is a demonstrable zero-point energy (try a web search on "Casimir Effect"), but it can't be huge or it would be collapsing the universe gravitationally. Neither of the first two has ever succeeded as science.

[Conservative til I die]

The author just makes things worse with his foray into numerology.

[Charles H. (The_r0nin)]

Why Six Days?

Because the creation myth that the ancient Hebrews were most familiar with (the Babylonian Enuma Elish) and patterned their own creation myth after takes place in seven parts. Also, because of a basic translation mistake. The number "seven" in Babylonian also had an idiomatic connotation of "many," so it could be used both as a number and as a general term (much as the ancient Hebrew "forty" was mistranslated by medieval scholars as a direct number where it could have equally meant many... think the Deluge).

[CarryaBigStick]

Just what is a 'day' to all seeing and all powerful God, who can manipulate space/time to His needs and already knows a future that we cannot. We need to consider His point of reference as well as mans when we debate this issue.

Consider known concepts like relativity theory as applied to this argument and it starts to make a little more sense. Time is dependant on your point of reference and your speed...and I suspect that the Lord moves pretty fast.

[Robert A Cook PE]

OK - Lettuce firmly insert tongue in cheek here, and then ask how the orignal writers could give exact time chronologies when the zero had not been invented yet. Much less powers-of-ten, the decimal place, and the concept of millions, billions, and trillions of years.

That said, how could the writer(s) of Genesis get all the evolutionary theory and physics progression in exactly the right sequence WITHOUT Divine inspiration?

For example, Genesis is clear that there was only one continent at first, but contentinal drift wasn't predicted until the 1920's, and wasn't accepted until the mid-60's!

Genesis is clear flying creatures (insects and birds) were present before domesticated animals, but the idea that birds evolved from dinosaurs is only now coming up.

Genesis is clear that only "chaos" existed before the plasma fluids (the waters above) evolved into gaseous clouds that could condense and cause fusion. (Light" is NOT what He started the universe from!) ... yet the concept of fusion and fluid flows (separation of waters) was also only a 20th century prediction.

Each stage of today's science follows Genesis.... including the revelation of stars as the clouds cleared up ... AFTER the plants began.

[SkyPilot]

read later

[Louisiana]

"yom"

"evening and morning"

"by faith we understand that the world was framed by the word of God" - Hebrews 11

[Quick1]

Let's say you want to explain how you just created the world to someone who has absolutely no scientific knowledge. Would you tell them exactly what happened, or would you make it into a story that people can understand?

Think of how you might explain something to children who don't have the understanding of the thing that you do.

[firebrand]

This guy is on the wrong track.

Maybe he could look instead at the absolutely uncanny way the ancient document parallels, in a way that everyone can understand, what we know today about the sequence of events.

When I was in elementary school, one of the subjects we were supposed to be studying was transportation (second grade). For that segment of the morning, our teacher had us draw horses every single day for the entire year, except for the last week, when we drew pictures of chariots.

Same principle. It's a teaching method, one that puts things in their proper time perspective, or something close to it, in a way that you can never forget. Just as we need to remember for how short a time we had the wheel, much less the motor vehicle, we need to remember how short a time we have been here in the grand scheme of things. Imagine how confused people must have been before Genesis was written.

And how did the writer know this? Uncanny wisdom.

No need to postulate about light traveling at different speeds back then, for pete's sake.

[TomB]

Given the Bible as we read it is essentially a translation of a translation of many stories written down by fallible men, and given the numerous inconsistencies in it, it would seem to be folly to try to read it literally.

[pctech]

Does it even matter?? If the Bible says He did it in 6 days, then He did in 6 days!!! Why search for an argument when there shouldn't be any? This is where comes into play. God says it, I believe it. What is so hard to understand? Besides, most modern scientists got their head so far up their butt they will try and find anything to discredit the Bible.

[Bloody Sam Roberts]

There are four basic questions that confront all of us: Who am I? Where did I come from? Why am I here? Where am I going when I die?

According to Douglas Adams, the big questions are:

How are we born? Why are we born?...and Where shall we have lunch?

[billbears]

Did God really create the heaven and the earth in just six 24-hour days?

What does it say? What is the believer supposed to gather from it? Did it or did it not take 6 days? Personally I don't know and I will never know until reaching Heaven. God's ways are not our ways. But I do know that He did create it. I didn't come from a monkey, an amoeba, or a slug.

Ping for a few. Didn't know if y'all were here yet

[RaceBannon]

GAP Theory
http://www.middletownbiblechurch.org/sciences/scienc5.htm

Science, Scripture, and the Saviour
http://www.middletownbiblechurch.org/sciences/science.htm

[ladyinred]

Chuck Missler is a very interesting guy. He gets deep, and is very science minded. We have several of his tapes and his approach has been beneficial to my husband who is also science minded. I am more simple, I just believe the Bible for what it says and don't need proof, but I realize many do.

[Khepera]

"The Book of Genesis presents a disturbing problem for many Bible-believing Christians"

No, it only creates a disturbing problem for heathen asses.