This is a follow-up discussion to Will Barlow’s Scripture and Science class, part 3: Reading on Genesis One (1). If you haven’t watched or listened to that yet, you can go here or find it on the Restitutio podcast feed as episode 460 on Apple Podcasts or Spotify.
Sean Finnegan and Will Barlow discuss how to read the creation account in Genesis 1. They discuss the different ways to interpret the age of the earth. Sean asks Will about the history of young earth creationism and the problems with science, including radiometric dating and distant starlight. Will expresses doubt over the alleged overturning that will occur to big-bang cosmology in light of the recent James Webb Telescope images.
1. In this episode you overviewed three kinds of views of creation: young-earth views, old-earth views, views compatible with each. Why did you decide to present all of these views rather than just the one you think is the most compelling?
2. Let’s talk about young-earth creationism. Have you ever held this view? If not, tell me about your impression when you first came across it.
3. You said YEC had been unpopular for a long time, but then came back in the late 1950s. Do you know what happened there? Why did bible-believing Christians suddenly find this so attractive?
4. Assuming the days of Genesis 1 are 24 hours and then using genealogies is “using the text to do something that it wasn’t designed to do.” What do you mean by that? Why do you see that as questionable?
5. Talk a little bit about the Satan-rebellion issue. Why would a young-earth creationist struggle to give Satan enough time to rebel?
6. Let’s talk about starlight and time. Briefly explain to us how we know the stars are billions of light-years away. How do they measure distance?
7. What about relativity? Since both velocity and acceleration affect the speed at which time passes, could it be that both are true? –that from one perspective the universe is 13.5 billion years old and also 6,000 years old at the same time?
8. Apart from starlight, what other clocks indicate the earth is old?
9. I see an evangelism issue here. If we invite a young lady who loves science and is curious about faith and she hears a sermon about how there’s a massive conspiracy of all scientists to coverup the true age of the earth, won’t that put a huge stumbling block before her?
10. God made the universe appear old to test us. You came out pretty strongly against this view. Why are you so passionate here?
11. Also, what do you think about the idea that the devil imprinted the earth and universe with signs of old age to deceive us?
Very thought provoking, Sean and Will – and here’s one :
Is it not possible that the first two chapters of Genesis are referring only to the creation our physical universe of four dimensions (inclusive of the dimension of time); and have no immediate reference to a higher dimensional, supernatural ‘heaven’ as the abode of God, and other supernatural beings (inclusive of the angelic being who fulfils the role of ‘the Satan’ / ‘the Devil’ (LXX), in Job 1-2 and Zechariah 3)?
The primary meanings of the Hebrew word ‘Samayim’ (H8064) appear to be :
”The visible heavens, the sky as the abode of the stars, the visible universe, the atmosphere, the air”.
‘The Expanded Bible’ thus consistently translates the Hebrew ‘samayim’ in Genesis chapters 1-2 as “sky” – except for Genesis 1:20 and 1:30, where ‘samayim’ is translated as “air”.
Genesis 2:1 in ‘The ‘Expanded Bible’ reads :
“So the sky [heavens], the earth, and all that filled them [their hosts] were finished [completed].”
John — I think that this is a fair point. If we conceive of the angels existing in an entirely separate dimension, perhaps they already experience time differently from us.
This is by far not the strongest critique of YEC but something to consider at least.
Thanks for your comment, Will.
God bless you – and all yours.
I have for many years had the similar thoughts Will & John.
By the way … Loving this series guys! Provokes discussion and fresh out-of-the-box thought. Don’t camp out in past – I absolutely agree. Go for it! But stay within the guardrails of scripture (keeping right context).
*** THIS IS A COMPLETELY UNSCIENTIFIC COMMENT ON MY PART ***
Whenever I have experienced a waking vision (I have had a few over the years, I have had a very distinct sense that time was flowing at quite different rates to our earthly existence). Each generation thinks they are close to having most of the answers in a given field, and then major new evidence comes along to disrupt currently held paradigms. I say continue to be curious about understanding Creation and its design and working, but don’t become too rigid or comfortable with currently held scientific paradigms (even our operational science may be a simplistic understanding of larger realities that we will scientifically uncover in the future).
*** MY VIEW OF THE CREATION PROCESS ***
For me, suggesting that we might be painting Almighty God as a deceiver if we were to accept a … YEC “appearance of age” that includes “functional maturity” on both cosmological and geological scales is a disappointing strawman argument. “Appearance of age” and “functional maturity” at all macro and micro-scales are not band-aids for me. I believe time may well be slowing down (winding down like everything else – and tied to second law of thermodynamics in ways we do not yet understand), and that starlight was quite probably created in transit. The other view I am considering is that the speed of light and time was flowing at a very much faster rate at the beginning – so much so, that it might appear He created starlight in transit to begin with. “The devil perhaps doing it as yet another form of deception” was new for me. Gives him way too much power … Chuckled over that comment! Interesting times ahead for science. I do not claim to have it anywhere near worked out – this is just where I am at currently as both a scientist and a student of scripture.
*** PART OF MY BACKGROUND ***
Personally, I have 8 years university training including in theoretical physics with a physics degree, a geology honours degree, an uncompleted master’s degree in geophysics; and then a post-grad degree in information science, along with a smattering of university-level biology, mathematics and chemistry. I was informally invited to join Creation Ministries about 6 years ago, and while I differ in commonly held sideline positions (I am not a dispensationalist or trinitarian) I also did not consider the Creation Ministries invitation seriously as this is not my main calling. When starting out as a born-again Christian at 15 (45 years ago), I started with deep-time, billions of years theistic evolution position and then moved onto … GAP theory & modified GAP theory … then to mainline YEC (12 years ago) … then to alternative YEC position currently working out. Genealogy gaps … re-creations … other dimensions … lots of rabbit holes to explore and speculation to get caught up in. I have gone down many of them over the years. I did in fact put down the “old earth theistic evolution view” at the cross when I returned to Christ in 2010. This was the first “metanoia” He challenged me to work on (much to my surprise as it was not on my radar at the time). This was amazing for me the way this happened in the first 4 months of my re-commitment. As I already stated, this certainly does not mean I have it all worked out now.
Over the last 11 years, I have completed 2 ministry qualifications through part-time bible college, and three full-time qualifications as a Christian counsellor. These are in line with my main calling. I guess I am a bit of a perpetual student of many areas (16 years post-high school formal studies). Each time I have told myself I am finished with further formal studies, I then work in that field for a while. Problem is I then continue to be interested and informally exploring other areas in between. I am incredibly curious about a lot of things.
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You covered a lot of ground briefly in your presentation above – much of which I have explored to some extent and have my own views – some similar, some different. I will touch on just one for now …
*** For many, recent JWST imagery has disrupted the secular “Big Bang” paradigm and view of deep time ***
James Webb Space Telescope’s Discovery of Galaxies Shatters Big Bang Theory
Curious Science >>> https://youtu.be/tmlpVSPd6Rc (8 min)
Recent news concerning the so-called “Big Bang” in both secular and Christian media has Big Bang cosmological evolution theorists in a flap.
James Webb Space Telescope FINALLY Proves the Big Bang Theory Is Wrong!
https://youtu.be/vAxgaTvYA7Y (12 min)
The most powerful and expensive ever telescope is in operation, the JWST is threatening to turn astronomy upside down with a single finding! Many are claiming the latest pictures from the JWST have proven the Big Bang theory did not happen, sending the scientific community into a frenzy!
Evolutionists PANIC Over James Webb Space Telescope Pics
Answers in Genesis >>> https://youtu.be/HjmkDgE0MpQ (first 9 mins)
What do Christians and also secular scientists replace the “Big Bang” with? An even Bigger Bang? More than likely there will be more than one new hypothesis that either include or exclude the Grand Designer of everything and everyone.
Had my ramble for now. Looking forward to further conversations.