the 6000 year old earth folks don’t believe God can work in mysterious ways, over billions of years, and use whatever tools he likes. the 6000 year old earth folks insult the glories of God and the wonders of His universe.
A casual reading of scripture leads one to believe that Satan and his angels lived before the 6 day creation. I wonder why they don't consider that as a prior age?
“the 6000 year old earth folks don’t believe God can work in mysterious...”
Lazy strawman alert!
Many 6000 year old Earth folks feel that this idea of a pre Adamic Earth is a recent revelation from nineteenth century theology, but Hebrew scholars were debating this issue at the beginning of the second century. The Targum of Onkelos, one of the earliest Aramaic versions of the Old Testament translates [Genesis 1:2] "and the Earth was laid waste". Obviously something in the original language led them to believe that "something" had caused some type of general destruction between 1:1 and 1:2.
Origen (186-254), in his commentary "De Principiis" explains that [Genesis 1:2] says "That the Earth had been cast downwards"!
In the middle ages Victor Hugo (1097-1141) says this about [Genesis 1:2]: Perhaps enough has been debated about these matters thus far, if we add only this, "how long did the world remain in this disorder before the regular re-ordering....of it was taken in hand"?
The Dutch scholar, Simon Episcopius (1583-1643) taught that the Earth had been created before the six days of re-creation described in Genesis. This is about 200 years before geology was to discover evidence for a more ancient origin.
Thus.....the separation of a great gulf of time between Genesis 1:1 and 1:2 has a long history of discussion and thought.....much of it pre dating the KJV, which in my opinion has caused much of the mis-understanding because of its limited scholarship. Anyone who would claim that this idea was of recent origin to attempt a reconciliation between geology.....and theology is mistaken.