Featured If the Universe was created in 6 literal 24 hour days...

Good luck. Every person under 30 I've talked to has the biggest issue with age of the earth and the creation account in Genesis.

 

There are some ways to deal with this, namely that prior to creation the heavenly realm existed and Satan's fall was either at the temptation of Eve or prior to creation. This is usually the tact for most folks.

Essentially, heaven and hell are other ontological planes where angels and demons exist. Since God has no physical parts, He must be ontologically instantiated differently than creation. This goes for his primary dwelling. So, the point is that angels and demons live on the other side of an ontological plane.

The bigger issue, in my view, is dinosaurs and other palaeological data.

 

Michael, Gabriel, Satan and all the other angels were created before the Earth was. Genesis only deals with the earthly creation. It does not address one way or the other when, how or what time frame the spiritual beings around God were created.

The same could be said for "life on other planets" questions. A pastor I once knew said, quite wisely I thought, "I don't know if there is life on other planets or not. The Bible does not address any planet but this one. However, if there is life elsewhere, we can rest assured God has revealed Himself to them in a manner appropriate to their state of being."

Just because the Bible doesn't address it doesn't mean God didn't. His only concern in directing the writing of Scripture was to reach man on this planet in and regarding the time frame of man's existence.

 

The primary emphasis in Genesis that was made by author Moses is that Gos created the entire Universe, and that He made life unique here upon the earth, that He made life by fiat of divine creation, not thru evolutionary stages, and that man was a special creation in his own image!

That satan and his rebelled is taught in the Bible, and the truth of divine creation is also!

And the thing about those "pre man" hossils found, is that NONE have them have ever been proven to be any thing other than primates such as monkees/Great apes, NO Missing link ever found!

 

On the first day God created the heaven, so I believe this is when he created the heavenly beings.

Gen 1:1 In the beginning God created the heaven and the earth.

I personally do not believe Satan has been cast out of heaven, that does not occur until Revelation 12. Satan was still in heaven falsely accusing the brethren in the book of Job.

Rev 12:7 And there was war in heaven: Michael and his angels fought against the dragon; and the dragon fought and his angels,
8 And prevailed not; neither was their place found any more in heaven.
9 And the great dragon was cast out, that old serpent, called the Devil, and Satan, which deceiveth the whole world: he was cast out into the earth, and his angels were cast out with him.
10 And I heard a loud voice saying in heaven, Now is come salvation, and strength, and the kingdom of our God, and the power of his Christ: for the accuser of our brethren is cast down, which accused them before our God day and night.

I believe these events are future, as you can see, when Satan is cast out, there is no place for him in heaven "any more", yet, we see Satan falsely accusing Job in the book of Job.

Job 1:6 Now there was a day when the sons of God came to present themselves before the LORD, and Satan came also among them.

We see Satan still in heaven here:

Job 1:9 Then Satan answered the LORD, and said, Doth Job fear God for nought?
10 Hast not thou made an hedge about him, and about his house, and about all that he hath on every side? thou hast blessed the work of his hands, and his substance is increased in the land.
11 But put forth thine hand now, and touch all that he hath, and he will curse thee to thy face.

We see Satan falsely accusing Job here, he basically accuses Job of only loving God because God has blessed him. He claims that if God were to take away Job's blessings and afflict him, that Job will hate him and curse him to his face. We find out this is false in the story.

Satan was perfect at first:

Eze 28:14 Thou art the anointed cherub that covereth; and I have set thee so: thou wast upon the holy mountain of God; thou hast walked up and down in the midst of the stones of fire.
15 Thou wast perfect in thy ways from the day that thou wast created, till iniquity was found in thee.
16 By the multitude of thy merchandise they have filled the midst of thee with violence, and thou hast sinned: therefore I will cast thee as profane out of the mountain of God: and I will destroy thee, O covering cherub, from the midst of the stones of fire.
17 Thine heart was lifted up because of thy beauty, thou hast corrupted thy wisdom by reason of thy brightness: I will cast thee to the ground, I will lay thee before kings, that they may behold thee.

Satan was created perfect (vs. 15)

That Satan has not been cast out is shown again in vss. 16 and 17.

Satan sinned after the sixth day. How do we know this? Because on the sixth day everything was still "very good".

Gen 1:31 And God saw every thing that he had made, and, behold, it was very good. And the evening and the morning were the sixth day.

If someone tries to sell you the "Gap Theory" that Satan sinned between Gen 1:1 and 1:2, don't believe it, scripture shows that everything was still very good on the sixth day. We do not know how long after this Satan and Adam and Eve sinned.

 

This is the right answer. Genesis deals with the temporal universe. The angels are eternal.

 

Aaron, just curious, is this found or at least implied in scripture?

Thanks
HankD

 

Neither. Only God is eternal. Anything created cannot be.

 

John Sailhamer in his book, Genesis Unbound, discusses the phrase, "In the beginning...". He says that it is not a single point in time but a period of time, such as when we say, "In the beginning of a race".

Rob

 

The interpretive options for Genesis 1 notwithstanding, the condition for access to an different ontological plane isn't the characteristic of eternality but simply being unique to that ontological plane.

BTW: Sailhammers point is on mark. Thanks for bringing it up.

 

Is what found or implied, exactly?

 

nontemporal, if you wish. The angels were before time.

 

Aaron that still makes angels eternal before time? I think the Triune God has that cornered by \Himself. However I will add that whatever we have in scripture is enough for us to know God and believe in His love for us and plan for us. If it isn't clear in scripture then God didn't feel it necessary for us to know. In other words who cares when angels were created? We know they exist for God tells us so. We need to let our kids no we don't have the answers to everything.

 

Where wast thou when I laid the foundations of the earth? declare, if thou hast understanding. Who hath laid the measures thereof, if thou knowest? or who hath stretched the line upon it? Whereupon are the foundations thereof fastened? or who laid the corner stone thereof; When the morning stars sang together, and all the sons of God shouted for joy? Job 38 4-7

Is it not at least implied that prior to the foundation of the earth there were some kind of being, other than the one speaking, LORD God

 

If you bump into the good doctor, please send my regards. :wavey:

Varying ontological planes also aids in making the multiverse argument. I'm a fan so it provides a cogent move to explaining origins, pain, choice, and such.

 

This works for me, and ....

.... it helps to explain the life and death of the dinos....

You know, and I'll say this for all the other comments in regard to the OP .... I do not see it being wrong to question all these things that young people are questioning, but the truth is, if we have a Biblical World View of all, we believe, that means we have no doubt about anything that the Bible says about Creation!

I don't know if it was six literal days, or millions of years per day: I just believe that if God said it, that is it! And while there is nothing wrong with questioning, it should not be forgotten that it was the devil in the form of a serpent, who went to Eve and placed doubt in her mind too!

In other words, I think the places of education are being used by the devil to cause tons of questions that lead to DOUBT, and this is why our young people can't wrap their heads around the simplest of answers .... IF GOD SAID IT, IT IS TRUE! End of story! Now, that works for me!

I know there are skeletons or early man and dinos, and I also believe that Satan rebelled and came to this place and ran it for some unknown time period. It is quite possible, in the realm of everything we don't know, to believe that the left overs of those earlier beings was the dead remnant of Satan's attempt to rule this earth! Who knows, those caveman bones may very well be physical remnants of demons! Actually, I don't know, and I don't care. I just trust God to be who the Bible says He is, and that because of the cross, I am going to live forever with Him! Selah and Shalom! :type:

 

I am well past thirty and I would fall into that camp of "opposition' to YEC views on the age of the earth....and btw, there are multitudes of "folk" like me in regards to this.