According to the Bible, God created the universe and everything in it. From this basic premise, Christian thinking goes off in all sorts of directions. Generally speaking, Christians believe one of the following about the creation of the universe:
- Young Earth Creationism: God created the universe in six literal twenty-four-hour days, 6,028 years ago.
- Theistic Evolution: God created the universe by and through the process of evolution, leaving room for God to personally intervene in human history when needed.
- Old Earth Creationism: God created the universe with the appearance of old age.
Yesterday, I listened to a podcast featuring an old-earth creationist trying to defend his beliefs. Things did not go well for him. Science aside, old-earth creationism posits that God deliberately deceived humanity by creating the universe with the appearance of age. Thus, they can accept what science says about the age of the universe while at the same time claiming God created everything.
In other words, God lied to us. The Earth “looks” old, but it’s not. God is just playing a trick on us. If the Earth is 6,028 years old, why do various testing methods say differently? Simple, God is playing a game with us. He’s a trickster, telling us a painting is thousands of years old, when it is, in fact, two years old.
Why would God do this? What is his endgame? Why would he lie to us? You would think that God would want us to have accurate information about creation and the age of the earth/universe. When science says the universe is billions of years old, this is a factual claim, old-earth creationists say, but — with a wink — they confidently say, “God created the universe with apparent age.” This, of course, is a faith claim.
Evangelicalism has nothing to offer when it comes to science. Their core beliefs about the universe are directly contrary to what science says about the matter. Even the theistic evolutionist is inserting God where none is needed. Science doesn’t have all the answers, but it is superior to the manic rants of preachers about the literal interpretation of Genesis 1-3.
Bruce Gerencser, 68, lives in rural Northwest Ohio with his wife of 47 years. He and his wife have six grown children and sixteen grandchildren. Bruce pastored Evangelical churches for twenty-five years in Ohio, Texas, and Michigan. Bruce left the ministry in 2005, and in 2008 he left Christianity. Bruce is now a humanist and an atheist.
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so, a “god” who tells us not to lie, lies to us, and it’s okay with these people…?
makes me wonder if there is anything else that he has lied to us about?
doesn’t sound to me like “he” is a “god” worth worshiping, if he tells us not to lie, but lies to us, and the people who believe it is okay are people of whom i would be EXTREMELY skeptical… 😒
You missed the entire point. It’s not a lie if God says it’s true. See now?
Well, there are two possibilities. Either God lied, or God made a mistake. To rabid Evangelicals (indeed, any ferociously devout believer), this concept is utterly absurd, but considering the swathes of evidence that point to the earth and the universe being billions of years old, it would be more absurd to throw all of that to one side for the sake of a religious text. The approach by other, more moderate Christians – namely to treat the Bible as allegorical in many aspects – is at least an attempt to acknowledge reality.
DutchGuy—The worst kinds of parents say that to their kids. And God is the “father.”
The fundamentalist Christian school I attended (primarily staffed by those in the Bob Jones University camp) were young earth creationists who said Hod created the earth with the appearance of age. Actually, I think the faculty were somewhat split because I came away from it all confused. On the one hand, we were told that God created the universe in 6 literal days 6,000-10,000 years ago. The BJU Earth Science textbook had a section about how the carbon dating methods were contaminated and gave “ridiculously old” readings and the earth was only 6,000-10,000 years old. Some teachers/preachers said God created the universe with the appearance of age. Why? To test our faith. I thought that was a crappy thing for God to do but I certainly couldn’t say that, and even thinking it put me in danger of punishment from an omniscient deity. Others said that the dating methods used by scientists were the devil trying to deceive us, or the anti-God pro-atheist agenda of scientists who were trying to scrub God from science and turn us all away from Truth.
Honestly, I was so confused about all this that I stayed away from pursuing biology. I regret that. I wish I had had the maturity to ask the actual scientists I knew for guidance. From age 16 I worked in University Biochemistry and Molecular Biology labs during summers. Interestingly, some were Christian, though the “wrong kind” because they were Episcopalian or Lutheran. I didn’t want anyone to think I was dumb. I was insecure about attending the fundamentalist Christian school. They were all kind and tried to help me in their own ways. One scientist kept me supplied in books – everything from Orwell to Dostoevsky to Kerouac. She really helped to expand my horizons through classic books.
In a podcast I listened to, one former BJU student who became a faculty member for a few years stated that BJU moved exclusively to young earth creationism is the early 90s. Maybe that’s why I heard different things – i graduated from high school in 1988.
The fundamentalist Christian school I attended (primarily staffed by those in the Bob Jones University camp) were young earth creationists who said Hod created the earth with the appearance of age. Actually, I think the faculty were somewhat split because I came away from it all confused. On the one hand, we were told that God created the universe in 6 literal days 6,000-10,000 years ago. The BJU Earth Science textbook had a section about how the carbon dating methods were contaminated and gave “ridiculously old” readings and the earth was only 6,000-10,000 years old. Some teachers/preachers said God created the universe with the appearance of age. Why? To test our faith. I thought that was a crappy thing for God to do but I certainly couldn’t say that, and even thinking it put me in danger of punishment from an omniscient deity. Others said that the dating methods used by scientists were the devil trying to deceive us, or the anti-God pro-atheist agenda of scientists who were trying to scrub God from science and turn us all away from Truth.
Honestly, I was so confused about all this that I stayed away from pursuing biology. I regret that. I wish I had had the maturity to ask the actual scientists I knew for guidance. From age 16 I worked in University Biochemistry and Molecular Biology labs during summers. Interestingly, some were Christian, though the “wrong kind” because they were Episcopalian or Lutheran. I didn’t want anyone to think I was dumb. I was insecure about attending the fundamentalist Christian school. They were all kind and tried to help me in their own ways. One scientist kept me supplied in books – everything from Orwell to Dostoevsky to Kerouac. She really helped to expand my horizons through classic books.
In a podcast I listened to, one former BJU student who became a faculty member for a few years stated that BJU moved exclusively to young earth creationism is the early 90s. Maybe that’s why I heard different things – i graduated from high school in 1988.
Sadly, in the 21st century, Christian Cultists are building academic institutions all over the country as fast or faster than the Govt builds public schools, to indoctrinate the minds of youth with the ridiculous ideas of a 6 day “universe” creation, a planet that is just over 6,000 years old, that dinosaurs, apparently, were on the ark, and of course to elect maga (traitor) republicans.
There is literally a MOUNTAIN of evidence, in geology, in paleontology, in DNA research, in chemistry, in astronomy, in the fossil record, that unequivocally disproves Christian Creationism (and every other cult religious creationist theory).
The argument about “Earth” being the “center” of the Universe was crushed by science 400 years ago. Yet the cultists insist on propagating lies.
It is interesting to me that the cultists, outside of perhaps the Amish, the Mennonites and a few others, reject secular science yet are more than happy to enjoy all the conveniences of it. Electricity, Automobiles, I-Phones, etc.
Just another prime example of the insanity of the human condition.
TheDutchGuy – you are confusing me, which doesn’t make whatever point you’re trying to make any more believable, and makes me think that, possibly, you are one of the people about whom i should be skeptical. 😒
I appreciate Bruce and others willingness to write and tackle this topic. I have always believed the best path is to find common ground between theology and science in a way that allows them to compliment each other and allows them to exist in the same space.
I tend to subscribe to the day gap theory which correlates to the idea that each day falls into the span of approximately a billion years. One of the core aspects of my view is philosophically time to God is non-existent and organisms do naturally evolve and progress.
I understand my perspective requires me to subscribe to an element of theologic and Christian faith. I realize atheists and agnostics might disagree with my position here. There is value and dignity in differences of opinions and I am respectful to other views.
Trouble with that theory is we think the observable universe is about 14 billion years old. Weeks of one billion year days would be 14 days long to cover the week of creation….
Yes Steve, I was thinking the self same thing. It seems to me a master class in theological gerrymandering to equate the billions of years that the universe has existed to the days of creation in Genesis but if that floats your boat…..
Well I happen o be a believer in Last Thursdayism. Prove me wrong.
It does remind me of my meeting with the late evangelical preacher Joe Crews. I asked Joe to explain his theory about all creation occurring 6000 years ago, while geological history, dinosaur bones, starlight seen from many light years away, and even oil showed the theory was flat dead wrong.
Joe had an easy answer. Everything was created with “The Appearance of Age.” I later found that he was quoting the “Omphalos hypothesis”, from an 1857 book trying to answer the same objection.
So I asked what I thought was an obvious question:
If God had gone through that much trouble to create the illusion of age shouldn’t we, in all fairness, be good sports about it and agree to be deceived?
To his credit, Joe laughed amiably, but left the question unanswered.
I must admit, I liked him.