Paine was a bitter man, and his question is a strawman. The Bible does not say that he waited until the third day to make the sun.
Read “the Age of Reason” by Paine sometime. He wasn’t a bitter person, he was a person of extreme intelligence who could smell dishonesty a mile away. He helped found this country with “common sense”. Common sense is one of the best books you’ll ever read. It swept this country like wildfire. Its sales were only exceeded by the Bible. And Paine didn’t mind going after a sacred cow or two. The colonists who loved the Bible dearly, also consumed the writings of Paine just as voraciously. Odd, huh?
You might find your faith is stronger for reading it. Unless of course, your faith is etremely weak, then don’t read it.
4 And God saw the light, that it was good: and God divided the light from the darkness.
5 And God called the light Day, and the darkness he called Night. And the evening and the morning were the first day...
...14 And God said, Let there be lights in the firmament of the heaven to divide the day from the night; and let them be for signs, and for seasons, and for days, and years:
15 And let them be for lights in the firmament of the heaven to give light upon the earth: and it was so.
16 And God made two great lights; the greater light to rule the day, and the lesser light to rule the night: he made the stars also.
17 And God set them in the firmament of the heaven to give light upon the earth,
18 And to rule over the day and over the night, and to divide the light from the darkness: and God saw that it was good.
19 And the evening and the morning were the fourth day.
Apparently, Mr. Paine got his days mixed up; God created the sun, moon and stars on the fourth day, not the third one. A very unscientific thought is that He created light/Day, separating it from darkness/Night, as a general phenomena in the universe, but that He didn't create self-generating and light-reflecting celestial bodies for this solar system until Day 4 which were then assigned to marking time here. Until we get to ask Him, there will be those who will accept these passages literally (such as I) and those who will accept them as indicating ages.