The creation week Question

[ozark]

I have often heard and I believe read that one day with God could be a thousand years with man. At least meaning that.
In this context, the creation week may have been many thousand years. If this is so then it would answer many questions about relics found and dated many thousand or million years ago. If we think of Gods day as being a thousand or million years it provides us with a glimpse of His time table. I haven't made a great attempt to understand the Bible because I am unable to understand how a man could live in the belly of a fish for even an hour. I certainly cannot know the thinking process of an Almighty God. Believers must accept Grace and Faith and not try to understand it all intellectually. At least IMO. But I love to read the questions, answers and the discussions we are recently having here. Ozark

[dougedwards]

Ben.....you stole my next question from me!! ;D

I was going to ask the guys here on the board if they believe that the Holy Spirit inspired every single word that was originially written by the prophets and writers of the various books of the bible as sort of a dictation or if the writers wrote based on how they perceived the inspiration. This opens up a can or worms I know but the question hits at the heart of such a question that you ask.

The passage that you refer to that expresses that with God a thousand years is like a day and a day is like a thousand years is found in 2Peter 3:8

Beloved, do not forget this one thing, that with the Lord one day is as a thousand years and a thousand years as like a day.

In this case I do believe that Peter was expressing a thought that came directly from the Holy Spirit but was in no way indicating that a day represents a thousand years to God. Peter was instructing his church that in the end times "scoffers" would come asking "where is this promise of the return of Jesus?" Peter further tells them that God is not slow in keeping His promise to them as most of them might understand the concept of slowness. But that God (who transends time and space) was being patient with them not willing that any should perish but that all should come to repentance.

Peter never said that a thousand years IS a day to God or vice versa. He said that to God a day is as a thousand years and vice versa. Most have interpreted this to mean that God doesn't work on the same time constraints as His creation operates under. If a man makes a promise and that promise does not manifest itself as completed within a reasonable amount of time then other men naturally consider that to be an empty and false promise. Peter was instructing his church that God does not operate on a human time table.

None of this helps to explain the conflict that is created between scientific discovery of the age of things, and the Word that expresses that the earth was changed from "null and void" into a place of habitation ending with the creation of Man on the sixth day. Even six thousand years would not be of any help to scientist who feel that the evidence shows that it took literally millions of years for the earth to take it's shape and for mankind to take it's place in earthly history. 2 Peter 3:8 gives us no help in comprimising the two trains of thought.

Maybe some others will chime in here and give insight to this apparent dilema.

Doug

[ozark]

I believe the Apostles and believers understood that Jesus would return during their generation. The mentioned that the time was at hand, or nigh. Obviously they were incorrect if indeed they believed they would live to see his second coming. But If God functions on a different time frame than humans then to Him soon could mean any length of time that we are not privileged to know. The writers were inspired certainly. But, they did not speak for God IMO. They had human minds and they didn't understand all the teachings of Christ easily. They questioned him often to get his meaning. So, I would suspect that their understanding was inspired but not God speaking. Many today are inspired but not all knowing. If indeed, they thought the second coming of Christ would happen during their generation then in that instant they were incorrect.
I am inclined to believe that God determines His own timetable and that as He wills, it can change.
I don't feel it was meant for man to know all things. Look at outer space. Imagine out to the limit of what man knows and then be aware that that may only be the small inner part. Let the mind go on out to the very limits of your imagination and it is likely that you have only reached the near edge of infinity. Like so, man is unlikely to even come close to knowing the whole of God. He is all knowing, all powerful, and greater than we can even imagine. It is like trying to define eternity or infinity. There are no diminutions or limits in my opinion. For Him to even care about us is an enormous blessing. I don't know his time keeping system if He even has one. He is as an ocean and we are just a molecule of moisture.

[petev]

Jan 24, 2010 18:26:38 GMT -5 dougedwards said:

Ben.....you stole my next question from me!! ;D



The passage that you refer to that expresses that with God a thousand years is like a day and a day is like a thousand years is found in 2Peter 3:8

Beloved, do not forget this one thing, that with the Lord one day is as a thousand years and a thousand years as like a day.

In this case I do believe that Peter was expressing a thought that came directly from the Holy Spirit but was in no way indicating that a day represents a thousand years to God. Peter was instructing his church that in the end times "scoffers" would come asking "where is this promise of the return of Jesus?" Peter further tells them that God is not slow in keeping His promise to them as most of them might understand the concept of slowness. But that God (who transends time and space) was being patient with them not willing that any should perish but that all should come to repentance.

Peter never said that a thousand years IS a day to God or vice versa. He said that to God a day is as a thousand years and vice versa. Most have interpreted this to mean that God doesn't work on the same time constraints as His creation operates under. ]

This most fascinating passage was the subject of a mass I went to about 15 years ago. I was having some pretty tough times, and when the priest explained that what the passage meant was that when you are waiting for something (the second coming, or relief from a difficulty) that one day can seem as a thousand, and when things happen, so much good happens at once that a thousand days seem to all be in one.

[whyohe]

what does time mean to some one that had no beginning and has no end? Doug has it right IMO. time is relative even to us. look at times when you are in the woods and the day just DRAGS for some reason but other times it just flys by. when some one says "in a/my life time" how long is that. OR how about when some one says "in my DAY..." what day was he or she talking about? well we under stand it to me a PERIOD of time not a specific day. IMO " a day is as a thousand years" is just that we cannot think of time in our way of thinking of time when it comes to profacies.

I think of how time may feel to animals that dont have the life span we have. dogs can live from 7 to 20 HUMAN years. the life span of a house fly i beleave is less than a week. look at sea turtels, we really dont know how long they live but it is longer than us, 150 + years. I know animals dont really have a percepion of time that we do but when some thing has a shorter or longer life span than us it makes me wonder on perception of time.

[ozark]

Interesting post Whyohe. Perhaps time in itself is not specific. Just a period or a space. The thousand years mentioned by Peter may have just been a figure of speech meaning that Gods reckoning of time was not like ours. We try to think in human terms and could wonder if God ever eats, sleeps or ever participates in anything enjoyable. We tend to see all living things compared to human compassion, thinking and thought patterns. We are really not very smart about most things I guess.

[Jed]

Gentlemen,

This is a very interesting topic that you are discussing. I know that you don't really know me from Adam since I'm new here (pun intended), but I though that I would weigh in on this topic since its something that I recently studied.

The question posed by Ozark is more or less, "If a thousand years with God is like a day, and a day like a thousand years, then that could explain the long periods of time observed in the fossil record." Basically, it allows one to fit long geological time frame into the opening chapter of Genesis.

As I studied this particular question (which is a good and legitimate question), a couple of problems became evident. First, in the Ten Commandments, God said to the Israelites that He made the world and all that was in it in six days. (Exodus 20:11 - For in six days the Lord made the heavens and the 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.) According to the plain meaning of this text, how would the average Israelite have understood creation? I think that he would have understood it to have occurred in six days. (Remember, what Peter wrote was thousands of years after this)

Second, how could the plant life that was made on day 3 have survived for thousands of years without the sun, which was made on day 4? It's easy to understand how plants can live for 24 hours without sunlight...just take a plant, put it in your basement, leave it there for a day and take it back outside. It perks right up. But if you leave it in your basement for a week....that baby is dead! So logically, the days would have seemed to have been literal 24 hour days for all the events to make sense.

Third, the repeated phrase, "and there was evening and morning" after each day loses all meaning if each day was a thousand years or more. Why would God include that phrase if we were to understand that these days were not literal days, but figurative language that indicated 1000 years or more?

Finally, I don't want you men to think that I'm being critical of you. I am merely presenting some arguments and issues to think about in relation to the question originally posed by Ozark. I look forward to reading your responses!

~ Jonathan

[ozark]

Your response has logic jonathan. Thanks. I doubt if any person knows the answer to all Bible questions. Reading in revelations would confuse about anyone. I accept it was not meant for me to understand it all.

[Jed]

Ozark,

Recognizing that it's impossible to understand the whole Bible is a mark of great humility. Many men have stumbled because they thought they "knew it all" - especially about the Bible. One of my favorite verses that encourages me when I study the Bible is John 14:26 - “But the Helper, the Holy Spirit, whom the Father will send in My name, He will teach you all things, and bring to your remembrance all that I said to you." Obviously, the Holy Spirit won't bring things to our remembrance in the same way He did for the apostles, but what's great about this verse is that since each believer is indwelled with the Holy Spirit, each believer is able to have Him be guiding us in our understanding of God's Word. Another great passage that demonstrates this truth is 1 Cor. 2.

Hope your study of God's Word is fruitful and invigorating!

[deadon]

petev, that makes a lot of sense.

[deadon]

jed,Thanks for chiming in. I should read all and post once.