“I’m on the Fence About the Age of the Creation, but I’m Open.”

So you are interested in the creation vs. evolution debate, and as a Christian, you don’t believe in biological evolution (including that we evolved from some apelike creature)? But you are not sure about the age of the creation and lean toward accepting the big bang theory and billions of years of geological and cosmic history. You are not convinced of the young-earth view. But you admit that you haven’t studied it much, and you are open to considering more. Then, please consider this.

As you explore this topic, you really need to decide first whether or not the Bible is the supreme authority in your life (in your thinking, speech, and behavior). If “science” is your final, supreme authority for determining what is true, especially regarding the questions about origins (related to Genesis 1–11), then you need to realize that you really mean this: the truth claims of the majority of scientists are your final authority for determining truth on this topic.

Following the Science?

But please understand that science doesn’t say anything. Science is a field of human activity that uses observation, experimentation, and the testing of theories to seek to understand the structure, behavior, history, and origin of the physical and natural world. It is a method of investigation. But it is not “science” that says that the earth and universe are billions of years old. Rather, it is scientists who make those truth claims. And they do not observe millions of years. They observe rocks, fossils, radioactive elements, starlight, etc., and then using nonscientific, philosophical (really theological) assumptions, they interpret the observational evidence in one way or another to come up with an age. However, not all scientists agree about questions related to the history and origin of the creation, including the question about the age of the creation.

There are many PhD scientists who are young-earth creationists and are just as smart and just as well educated as any evolutionary scientist is. These young-earth scientists got their PhDs not from mail-order catalogs or small Christian colleges but at respected secular universities that dogmatically teach evolution. There are no young-earth creationist universities where someone can get a PhD in science related to origins.

Furthermore, not all evolutionists agree about the big bang theory, gradualistic, neo-Darwinian evolution, how the moon formed, how and when the Grand Canyon formed, or how dinosaurs went extinct, etc.

So, if you “go with science,” then you are choosing to make the majority (consensus) view of scientists your final authority. But most scientists are not experts on the dating of rocks and fossils or planets and stars, so they are simply trusting the small number of scientists who are the declared experts. So “going with science” means that you are choosing to trust the words of a minority of scientists who were not there at the beginning, who were not there during the supposed billions of years to observe what they claim as proven fact, and who don’t know everything (compared to God—individually and even collectively they know next to nothing). Furthermore, those scientists, like all other scientists, make mistakes (and so they must rewrite their textbooks every few years), and most of them are sinners still in rebellion against God (suppressing the truth in unrighteousness, as Romans 1:18–20 says) trying to explain the origin and history of the creation within a naturalistic, atheistic worldview so they don’t have to feel morally accountable to God.

An Eyewitness Account of History

In contrast, God was there at the beginning. He was an observer of every event in history (including the ones recorded in Scripture). He knows everything. He never makes mistakes (and so never needs to rewrite his book, the Bible, which is the inspired, inerrant Word of God). And he loves us and wants us to know the truth that will set us free from sin and deception (see 2 Timothy 3:16–17; 2 Peter 1:20–21; and John 8:31–32). Furthermore, he created language and us and, therefore, knows how to clearly communicate with us so that we can know the truth.

Put simply you must choose what is your final authority: man’s word or God’s Word. Not choosing is in fact a choice—against God’s Word.

Put simply you must choose what is your final authority: man’s word or God’s Word.

If you choose God’s Word as your final authority, then you must look carefully at Genesis 1–11 and the rest of Scripture (especially the teachings of Jesus and the apostles) to determine what Genesis teaches about creation, the fall, the flood, the tower of Babel, etc. You must look carefully to answer the question, What does the Bible teach? Does it teach that Genesis 1–11 is myth or mytho-history or a parable or poetry or a theological treatise with some historical elements (but not all the statements are factually or literally true)? Or does the Bible teach that those early chapters of Genesis are straightforward history just like Genesis 12–50, Exodus, Joshua, and the book of Acts, etc.? Those books are more than history, for they teach more than historical facts. They teach truths about God and how we should live. And they tell us about the Messiah and lay the foundations of the gospel. But does the Bible indicate that Genesis 1–11 is factually accurate, to be understood in its plain, natural sense as historical narrative of real events?

If you decide that Genesis 1–11 is history, then you prayerfully study and ask: does it teach that God created things over the course of billions of years? Does it teach that during that long process of creating, he often destroyed (or permitted to be destroyed) billions of creatures through disease, mass extinction, earthquakes, floods, hurricanes, multiple ice ages, etc. (which is what evolutionists say filled those millions of years of earth history)? Does it teach that God created things in the order that the evolutionists say things came into existence? Does it teach that the flood was just a big flood in the Middle East?

The Main Question

The question is not, Assuming evolution and/or millions of years, can the Bible be interpreted in such a way so as to harmonize the Bible with those evolutionary truth claims?

No, the question is, What does the Bible teach? And we answer that the same way we would answer questions like, “Was Jesus born of a virgin? Did Jesus walk on water? Was Jesus really crucified for our sins? Did Jesus bodily rise from the dead?” We do that by taking the plain meaning of the words, studying them in context, paying attention to grammar, and comparing Scripture with Scripture.

When you do that, I submit you will find no biblical evidence for evolution or for millions of years, and you will conclude that young-earth creation is the correct interpretation of the text of Genesis 1–11. That is,

• God supernaturally created the original, completed universe in six literal, 24-hour days a little more than 6,000 years ago in the exact order that he said he created.
• God supernaturally created Adam from literal dust and Eve from his literal side on day six.
• God cursed the whole, very good creation at the fall of Adam so that now the creation is in bondage to corruption, waiting to be set free at the return of Christ.
• God destroyed the surface of the earth and all land animals, birds, and people not in the ark (and by implication would have ripped up all the vegetation on the land and killed lots of sea creatures) during the yearlong, catastrophic, global flood at the time of Noah.
• God supernaturally created different languages to divide the people at the tower of Babel to separate them to become many different nations.

I urge you to believe God’s Word as your final authority.

I urge you to believe God’s Word as your final authority. Every old-earth proponent you consider has ultimately made the dogmatic claims of the scientific majority his or her supreme authority. It is this authority that drives their various, conflicting old-earth reinterpretations of Genesis.

Since you expressed your uncertainty about the age of the creation, I hope that you will dig deeper into the biblical and scientific defense of the literal (young-earth) history of Genesis 1–11. It is foundational to the biblical worldview and the gospel and to understanding and properly responding to the immoral insanity that is engulfing and destroying America and the whole Western world. Old-earth evolutionism is built on naturalistic/atheistic assumptions that are used to interpret the scientific observations of the world. It is the foundation of godlessness and immorality and the false religions of the world. As Christians, we cannot just resist Darwinism. The issue is the inerrant truth and authority of God’s Word. It’s not just biological evolution that is contrary to Scripture and the real scientific evidence. The claimed millions of years of geological and cosmological evolution are also contrary to Scripture and to the observational evidence (once it is stripped of the naturalistic assumptions).

I would like to point you to these resources that might be helpful to you:

• There are biblical and historical reasons why all old-earth views in the church are wrong.
• The connection of a literal, historical, and supernaturally created Adam to morality, the gospel, and the authority of Scripture (and the age of the creation) (chapter 16 in Searching for Adam): https://answersingenesis.org/adam-and-eve/adam-morality-gospel-and-authority-of-scripture/.
• A critically important biblical truth that most Christians have overlooked regarding the age of the earth relates to the sin of Adam. Genesis 3:14–19, 5:29, 8:21 and Romans 8:19–23 say that when Adam sinned, God cursed the whole creation so that it is now in bondage to corruption. This truth alone is sufficient reason to reject the millions of years, as this article explains.
• Please read this short article on the critically important verse of Exodus 20:11, which all old-earth proponents have completely overlooked or treated very superficially.
• One of the most important reasons that Christians believe “science has proven millions of years” is radiometric dating. Here is a lay-level article to help you with that. Many more articles on this topic are here. Also consider my lecture on the flood, which looks at it biblically and then presents some of the geological evidence (I’m a younger man in this video, but the biblical and geological evidence hasn’t changed).
• Another reason many Christians accept millions of years relates to the question of how we can see distant starlight if the universe is only about 6,000 years old
• And another reason most Christians today favor one of the various old-earth views is explained in my one-hour lecture on where the idea of millions of years came from. It didn’t come from fossils or rocks or radiometric dating methods but from anti-biblical naturalistic assumptions imposed on the interpretation of the geological evidence, as this free video in three parts shows (based on my PhD research).
• My 25-hour series of lectures (14 topics) is here on Answers TV. The first icon in the series has recommended resources for each topic for further study. Over 6,000 excellent videos are on Answers TV, so it is well worth the cost of a yearly subscription (the price of 2–3 DVDs). You can try out Answers TV for FREE for one week.

I hope you will seriously pursue this issue of the age of the creation. What we believe about Genesis is critically important. As our culture, indeed the world, descends into greater wickedness and persecution of Christians, we must cling to the inerrant—supremely inerrant—Word of God, the Bible. We must do so for our own spiritual survival, for the effective and bold witness of the gospel to a lost world, and for the honor of Jesus Christ.