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One Day Is Like A Thousand Years
Posted by Chris Johnson in Baptist Life, Bible & Theology, Church & Missions, IMPACT Features, News & Culture
I have been on a bit of a sabbatical from blogging during this past summer, which has allowed me to focus on another subject that is dear to my heart; the element of Time and God’s Word. The Year 2000 marks an interesting point in the evolution of religious thought in our day. Time has brought us to the point that mirrors the error in the very definition now captured by the term evolution itself. And these errors are self inflicted, mainly because of a Christian’s increasing fascination with repeating a fatal mistake in evangelism; which is always an attempt to take out the “good news” of the Gospel and replace it with some brand of orthodoxy and harmonizing logic. Is the Gospel really worthy of harmonizing logic at all?
Therefore, my brethren, you also were made to die to the Law through the body of Christ, so that you might be joined to another, to Him who was raised from the dead, in order that we might bear fruit for God.
(Romans 7:4 NASB)
Or is obedience a more suitable response to the understanding of the Gospel? I know it will be surprising to you…. But, the best intentioned of Christian men and women lose sight of obedience at times.
Grindstone
There is an event that is conducted at Southwestern Seminary, in the great state of Texas, called Grindstone. I love these types of proceedings, which is generally a panel of experts that discuss a topic from all sides of an argument, and then there is a time that the experts are engaged in questioning about their comments near the end. This can result in some Grinding and Sifting around the veracity of the arguments.
In October of 2010, one of the topics caught my attention. The Grindstone offered up “Young or Old Earth (Parts 1 and 2). You can find the media here under the heading “Student Forums”. What was fascinating to me about this topic,…. was what became of the faculties goal. So as I listened, it became evident that the goal of the event was not to measure the scriptures in light of “Young or Old Earth”, but the mission and intent, of this evening with the professors, was to highlight “accepted views”. It seemed more important, except for only one of the four professors, to drive the discussion to some level of orthodoxy….so that in the end, the events of “In the beginning God created” could mean “just about”, but “not quite” anything. An “evening and a morning”, a “day”, a “gap” (which some have coined as a day), or a “gapless” thought of…“give me a few million years and can’t we all just hold hands and get along” type of orthodoxy. But probably even worse than some brand of orthodoxy,…the evening seemed to highlight a decision of this institution to sponsor variety, and dodge the more difficult question about evangelism,…obedience. Needless to say the arguments around the topic seemed to dodge the more obvious question,….is a day, truly a day?
There was a bright spot in the evening of orthodoxy though. Dr. Mudliar seemed to be the only one of the teachers that took scripture seriously in this matter. He simply stated the scripture and obediently defended the text. The other three… Dr. Patterson, Dr. Blaising, and Dr. Keyes, led the students down a broad path of well intentioned orthodoxy on the subject, framing the work of amazingly intelligent Christian men like Dr. Dembski and Dr. Collins as something that must be considered.
Should obedience to the written Word compete with orthodoxy in our Seminaries?
Is it possible or satisfactory to brand yourself as a orthodox “Christian” teacher of theology while at the same time remain confused about the definition of a “day” ….when it appears as “a thousand years”, “millions of gap years” or some other strata of time? Was God confused about the day that he created?
Oh yes,…and don’t use the argument of academic freedom,….that dog of a straw man will not hunt. The freedom to speak your mind is obviously not the issue at Southwestern and the series known as Grindstone truly illustrates that fact.
Blessings,
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Chris,
The key word to me is orthodoxy. How do you “practice” young or old earth? It is either the currency of the world or the currency of the kingdom that we work for so diligently, and spend. Sometimes these arguments benefit us toward a deeper kingdom relationship, sometimes not. Making the argument one way or the other may take away the unique characteristic about God that makes Him incomprehensible. I find the Trinity and One God inseparable, the same with election and free will. God seems to be able to do two or more things simultaneously and we, as humans, want one idea or the other. That is who God is. There should be a combination of thought to go along with the new and old earth idea.
You made me think. Thank you
Bruce,….Thank you so much for the comment. I spent some time thinking about your response. Here is just a few concerns I have with the current treatment of Time, and the subjective points of view of the word “Day”, and the current angle some seminaries to be relevant to cultural bias.
1. I always ask myself the question,…did Jesus or his disciples have issues with the word “day”, or were they ever compelled to try and explain what God had already written in the scriptures of which Jesus spoke much about concerning that subject? I can’t find one instance where they defended the word “day” or even had any theological question as to the veracity of that word being simply daylight/non-daylight cycle (evening/morning). Their responses seem to flow from the confidence of what had been written and taught to them by Christ.
2. Time, the right Time, and day are fundamental to the understanding of the gospel. When we waiver on this creative foundation, we tend toward other forms of time, and explanations that in a sense try and justify only current scientific opinion.
(Hebrews 4:3ESV) For we who have believed enter that rest, as he has said, “As I swore in my wrath, ‘They shall not enter my rest,’” although his works were finished from the foundation of the world.
(Hebrews 4:4ESV) For he has somewhere spoken of the seventh day in this way: “And God rested on the seventh day from all his works.”
3. Additionally, why is it that the Seminary feels compelled to buy into the scheme of longer than a “evening/morning” view of the word day? It appears that in all instances that refer, for instance, to 1000 years…. Those metaphor’s are attributable to the timeless God; are simply that…things about God, not man. Yet, we tend to run to an allegorical and expressive interpretation attributable to man, as if that could be a connection. But why?… It may make for good Sunday School discussion or banter,…possibly even alienate Christians in the same room. So, I always ask….what’s the point?
I simply argue that to paint this argument within the bounds of a definition of orthodoxy is to “reach for relevance” in a culture that lives that type of hype every day. You wouldn’t find the disciples getting locked into those same type of events…..that’s all.
Blessings,
Chris
I think most people have to think about what I say most of the time here when I make a comment. Thank you for responding.
My thinking, as it relates to the characteristics of God and creation, tells me if two thoughts are revealed in scripture causing us to have two separate views about God’s actions, there has to be that element about God that exist simultaneously in the two details. For instance, the stars were created by God and yet the light that we see at night has traveled, in some cases, a million or billion light years. The problem is, when you get past 6 or 8 thousand years you are out of Bible radar range. To simply say that God created it old goes against what the original creation was all about. I thought it was sin that made things grow old. I think we may have to say it differently in order to bring it together God’s way. Yes, Creation was six (6) 24 hour days, however, nothing was really mentioned about the universe. It’s big. If the universe had already been created billions of years ago and God created what He did within the 6 day period, including the stars, or the stars within the Milky Way, it would make much more sense about God’s method of creation. I suggest that we take the obvious and marry it with God’s creative design from the foundation of the “world” and let it be what it is. Trying to make everything fit has caused many to do like the evolutionist. They try to fill in the gap by defining the obvious differently than what it was intended to be or what exists. Sometimes I think we try to cater to the lost heathen with some of our reasoning, and that doesn’t even get them interested in salvation. This is a very complex subject that my mind cannot contain nor my lips can explain but I know this, if God can create a new man in me in a twinkling of an eye, He can do anything else we cannot understand either.
Thanks again, Chris.
There are multiple lines of evidence that has led almost all to conclude that the earth is quite old. If adherence to the text coupled with one’s view of inspiration demands a 6-10k year old earth then something has to be done with the science. Or, one can acknowledge there are interpretive issues that cause serious Bible students to differ on the age of the earth.
William,
I look at this subject from a slightly different perspective. If one is to truly trust God’s Word, which I whole heartedly believe what we have been given is that record of the truth, then we must look at the text and determine what it says. For instance,…. Hebrew experts agree that the word used in the Genesis account for “day” is defined by what is described in the text itself; “a morning and an evening, one day”. So, with the definition of the term “day” being a commonly known “day”, then serious bible students must understand that to be the truth, and if there are different interpretations or challenges to the term used in the language, then the burden of proof is on those that may argue for a different definition and they must validate the meaning of the language. You notice,…that in order to come to that conclusion or validation of the Hebrew term does not demand geological science as its foundation. Unfortunately, in this contemporary “science” culture, it appears that geological and biological sciences have become increasingly the foundation for textual criticism,…on which the biblical text is quickly being judged.
When we have professors in a seminary arguing for something other than what the Hebrew language has been proven to mean, then the disagreement is not about orthodoxy or a consistent hermeneutic, …it is tending toward relativism. If this term “day”, that is used in Genesis, is not the “day” as God has us living in now… from day to day…., it appears that someone is not completely convinced that the Hebrew word used in the text means “day”. I have not seen any credible or proven evidence to the contrary… have you?
-Chris
My own problem with insisting that this must be a 24-hour day is that the mechanism for the 24-hour day that we now know doesn’t exist until the fourth day of creation. That for me raises a contextual clue that even if the hebrew word normally means a 24-hour day, that might not be the meaning intended here. What can “there was evening, and there was morning, the first day” mean in a context where there does not yet exist any sun (you do have light and darkness, separated, and I suppose you might be able to take that separation as alternating periods of light and darkness, but there’s no indication of how long those periods might be)?
Note that I’m not particularly interested in vaguing down scripture to make it more palatable to the modern age. I *am* interested in listening to scripture on its own terms. And on the terms I see in Genesis 1, I have a hard time being dogmatic about the days of creation being 24-hour days.
Ok Ben, I am trying to follow your logic here, and will concede that if the writer was deliberately being vague then you may have a point. But, I don’t think the author (and for this exercise we will call him Moses), had anything other than what he knew a day to be “morning/evening, one day” in view as he was given inspiration about the creation. Of course we both know that we can’t know the motive of the writer beyond what he has already written. So, the evidence that a day “to the writer” at least is a period of time,…known to him as an “evening/morning, one day” would seem to make the best hermeneutic.
Now,…when we fast forward into our current time, it appears that we begin to question this writer of Genesis on his understanding of “a day”. I think that question or challenge is more from the pressure of the Scientist’s of our day, than it is from what the Holy Spirit has allowed to come forward in the text. And unfortunately, some Seminaries (not all), …for the sake of relevancy are moving in the direction of science over what the text has revealed. I tend to enjoy science,…but I know that science is not always that accurate and is every changing. That can’t be said for scripture…it remains constant and unchangeable.
-Chris
Chris,
After reading through the days again, I ran across “day” that seemed to clumped all the days of creation together as a period of time like 7 days or 7000 days. It is found in Gen. 2:4. Can you comment on that day?
Yes… Bruce, a very good question. The “day” mentioned in Genesis 2:4 clearly points to the day mentioned in Genesis 1:1-5. “in the day that the LORD God made earth and heaven” is the one day that is captured in the verse five verses of the Genesis account. A theory was hatched in 1814 by Chalmers and by others later on in order to sell versions and commentaries on scripture. Since the early 1800’s a systematic push for a “gap theory” of all kinds has fascinated many students…or as I put it, a hostile separation of verses 1 and 2 , from 3 through 5. This was the first real tug toward relativism among so called theologians of the day. They were using the predominance of cultured science as their tool for textual criticism as well. Yet, there is no consistent biblical interpretation that can separate any of the first five verses as a contextual unit, ….since it is the Spirit that connects the creative movement and continual embrace of elements breathed into existence during the first day of creation. That is the literal Hebraic understanding of the words rendered as “and the Spirit of God was moving over”.
Thus the heavens and the earth were completed, and all their hosts. By the seventh day God completed His work which He had done, and He rested on the seventh day from all His work which He had done. Then God blessed the seventh day and sanctified it, because in it He rested from all His work which God had created and made. This is the account of the heavens and the earth when they were created, in the day that the LORD God made earth and heaven.
(Genesis 2:1-4)
In the beginning God created the heavens and the earth. The earth was formless and void, and darkness was over the surface of the deep, and the Spirit of God was moving over the surface of the waters. Then God said, “Let there be light”; and there was light. God saw that the light was good; and God separated the light from the darkness. God called the light day, and the darkness He called night. And there was evening and there was morning, one day.
(Genesis 1:1-5)
So, again… the pursuit of geological moorings as a foundation for scriptural validity is an act of being more relativistic…. than it is following a consistent interpretive hermeneutic. Using the mask of an “in-house” debate or “orthodoxy” doesn’t quite fit the situation.
-Chris