The following timeline by Theodore Pederson appeared in The Christian News, March 26, 2001, page 18.
How old is the earth? If we go back 500 years, we come to the time of Martin Luther (born in 1483), and Columbus, who sailed the ocean blue in 1492.
If we go back 1000 years, we come to the time of Leif Ericson, Christian explorer, who preached Christ to pagans. (World Book, 1983, vol.6, page 270.)
If we go back 2000 years, we come to the birth of Jesus Christ. Our calendar is dated from His birth.
If we go back 3000 years, we come to the time of David and Solomon; they ruled Israel about 1000 BC.
If we go back 4000 years, we come to the time of Abraham (2000 BC), ancestor of Arabs and Jews.
If we go back 5000 years, we come to the time of Enoch, who walked with God 300 years and God took him [into Heaven].
If we go back 6000 years, we come to the time of Creation, and Adam and Eve (4004 BC). Luke, evangelist and historian, records Adam as the first man (Luke 3:38).
The earth is about 6000 years old. Let God's people rejoice in Him who made them! (Psalm 149:2)
We would add that although many people don't accept this timeline of history, they have difficulty deciding exactly when they would start to disagree with it.
Was Jesus Christ real? The Bible says he was, and no serious historian doubts it.
Was King David real? The Bible says he was. Again, there is no reason to doubt it.
Was Abraham real? The Bible says he was. There seems no reason to doubt this either.
Was Enoch real? The Bible says he was. There is no reason to think the Bible has suddenly lapsed into fiction when the other people were genuine historical figures.
Was Adam real? Well, Enoch was a son of Cain, who was a son of Adam. So if Enoch was real there is no reason to think that his father Cain wasn't, or that his grandfather Adam wasn't. They were only two generations away.
And Adam was the first man, created in the first week of the earth's existence.
He lived about 6000 years ago.
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Lamentation 3:24 The Lord is all I have, and so in him I put my hope.
Personally, as a Christian creationist, I agree with this timeline. However, I think that regardless of how much "proof" is brought to light about which one is right, evolution or the Bible, there will always be some people who will believe whatever they WANT to believe regardless of what is the truth. The Bible says that there is a God who made the earth, plants, people and wants us to LIVE by His will and laws. Evolutionists say that there is no God, that we are the descendants of apes, that all you see and touch and feel is all that there is, and that you can screw whoever you want to have sex with without fear of being sent to any "hell" for doing it (which is pretty much the MAIN REASON why they support evolution to begin with). So the two sides will ALWAYS be on polar opposites on this, and every other issue, because one is centered upon God and the other is centered upon man (or more like, man's self-centeredness).
It is like with the issue of homosexuality: regardless of how much scientific proof comes out that shows that I am BORN gay, there will always be some self-righteous hypocrite who will stick his finger into my face and say, "I don't care what your fancy science stuff says! YOU either TURN from your sodomizing ways, or you will BURN IN HELL!" Why? Because his belief system does not allow for people being born gay. He thinks that if am born gay, then I must be doomed to spend an eternity in hell REGARDLESS of how much I love God. His little brain just won't accept the fact that his own version of biblical hermenutics is wrong.
The same is true with the athiest: regardless of how much we see "intelligent design" in our universe, he will NEVER come to accept the truth that there is a God. He has decided in his heart that if he can't feel it, or experience it or "figure it out", then it just doesn't exist. And he will use the ACLU and his own interpretation of the U.S. Constitution to FORCE the rest of humanity to "bow the knee" and go along with him. There must not be any more churches, or bibles, or public prayers because there is NO GOD...and you are a "redneck" and a "backwards-thinking hillbilly" if you say otherwise!
So you see, no matter who "wins" in the public forum...
I, a gay Christian...will always lose.
That is why I just don't care about the evolution/creation debate anymore.
Krypto wrote: The following timeline by Theodore Pederson appeared in The Christian News, March 26, 2001, page 18.
How old is the earth? (etc etc etc...)
This kind of thing just seems written for the sole purpose of making certain people angry, and certain other people to feel "in the right." I'm not criticizing you, Krypto-- I'm criticizing the guy who wrote this.
Extremely conservative Christians AND anti-bible-pro-science people- botth sides of this issue- like to claim the Bible disagrees with science. The cons. Christians, because they like to "prove science wrong," and the anti-bible people, because they like to "prove the Bible wrong."
The easiest solution to the problem involves how exactly we determine the age of the earth according to the Bible. The way it's done usually is by those long, boring geneaologies that list people's ages and descendants etc etc. It's been said before and it should be said again, that those geneaologies do NOT necessarily rule out generations of people BETWEEN the names listed. So for example, Jesus is called the "Son of David," but of course he is not LITERALLY David's son. The same with the geneaologies that get used to "determine Earth's age." When it says "son of" or whatever, it can also mean "descendant of." So trying to guess the earth's age by geneaologies is ridiculous.
Then it's ALL academic because in Genesis when it says God created the earth in seven "days," we don't know how long this "day" really was-- meaning it could have been a literal 24-hour day, or it could have been billions of years between each act of creation.
So the Bible doesn't actually claim the Earth to be 6000 years old. It can be read that way, but the Bible isn't intended as a timeline of the Earth's existence-- it's about GOD. So when science proves that the Earth is actually trillions of years old, in stead of accusing science of being "wrong," why not just admit we misread the Bible in the first place? Because it's more fun to be right.
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"I'd place myself... oh... somewhere between Galadriel and Peter Griffin."
I tend to agree with the timeline....even though scientists say the earth is millions of years old, what do you think is the possibility that God created the earth with an age? Things that make you want to go hmmmmm.....
ding72 wrote: what do you think is the possibility that God created the earth with an age? Things that make you want to go hmmmmm.....
I've wondered about this as well. I mean, we assume (if the story of Adam and Eve is to be taken literally) that God didn't create them as little babies, so if they were created with an age, why not the earth? Who knows? Does it really matter? I think ultimately this is one of those issues that's not really worth all the arguments surrounding it.
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"I'd place myself... oh... somewhere between Galadriel and Peter Griffin."
You all have such deep, thoughtful answers to this question. I thought the answer to "how old is the earth?" is just a little bit older than me!!
So what was it like being the one that gave the idea to the SERPENT to tell Eve to make APPLE PIE for Adam's dinner that fateful day?
That creature in that jar looks just like the crawdads that live in the caves out here in KY.
"Hobbits", huh? So I guess that we didn't come from either Adam and Eve, nor King Kong and Faye Ray...but FRODO AND GANDALF! So THAT'S why Ian McKellen was born GAY!
How can they tell Adam and Eve lived 6000 yrs ago?
Anyway, I believe in cavemen, and dinosaurs...what does that say about me? I believe there were many, many lives on the Earth before Adam/Eve...and the rest of us.
It's funky, cuz I'm somewhat conservative on my views of christianity...but, i believe in the carbon dating and the like. *shrugs*
I don't know what to think on this one. It's like, "Why is the sky blue??"
*christian hugs* Darrel
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That if thou shalt confess with thy mouth the Lord Jesus, and shalt believe in thine heart that God hath raised him from the dead, thou shalt be saved.
Darrel wrote: I don't know what to think on this one. It's like, "Why is the sky blue??"
You know, I learned in some science class back in grade school, that the color of the sky is actually a shade of PURPLE!!! Apparently, due to something faulty with our eyes, we're not able to perceive that color correctly, and there are only a few creatures (some birds) can actually see the sky as purple.
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"I'd place myself... oh... somewhere between Galadriel and Peter Griffin."