Hello HankD, Pastor Larry, Dr. Bob, et al!
It's been a while since I dropped in! Got the email about site improvements. Looks great! Miss everyone hear a lot but my life has, shall we say, taken on new dimensions that have grabbed my "posting time."
Regarding the light years/stars problem, I offer this:
Job 9:8 (NIV)He alone stretches out the heavens and treads on the waves of the sea.
Psalm 104:2 (NIV)He wraps himself in light as with a garment; he stretches out the heavens like a tent
Isaiah 40:22 (NIV)He sits enthroned above the circle of the earth, and its people are like grasshoppers. He stretches out the heavens like a canopy, and spreads them out like a tent to live in.
Three men, used by God, moved by His Spirit to write the mind of God said, "he stretches out the heavens." You know what? I believe God stretched out the heavens. God created all matter. God created light on day one (a great source of light) which He stretched out to form the universe. As these bodies giving off light were "stretched" from the center of the universe to distances millions of light years apart, their continuum of light from their point of origin was not broken. Perfect solution by a perfect God!
As to Joshua's Babylonian myth debacle, I offer:
http://www.tektonics.org/babgenesis.html
But then as long as Joshua recognizes the canonical writings for what he's fashioned them to be, his three-ring binder Bible becomes quite convenient for removing what doesn't suit him.
Last note: The Hebrew word yom had various time meanings, but when used with a number, ALWAYS means day, and day to the Hebrews was from evening to evening (not sunrise to sunrise as in our culture) just like in Genesis!
In Christ,
John
P.S. Isaiah's verse above - "circle of the earth!" It's actually a myth that the whole earth thought the earth was flat until Columbus' discovery. Rip those pages out of the secular history books along with Java Man and Piltdown Man!