Originally posted by RJHinds
You are right that complete details do not seem to be there in Genesis to say conclusively that the days are 24 hour days. But from a simple reading of the text, it seems that 24 hour days is what is meant because the week Moses established for Israel consists of 7 (24 hour) days and the seventh day is used as a day of rest from work to remember that God's s the Holy Bible. HalleluYah !!! Praise the Lord!
http://rcg.org/questions/p193.a.html
At this point I am sstisfied that the creation days are 24 hour days. But I am open to another interpretation, if 24 hour days no longer seems correct to me. But to me the most logical interpretation is that the creation days are 24 hour days, especially if we don't consider what scientist say.
I think Moses meant us to understand 24 hour days or typical solar days.
Now let me ask you this about the light and the sun and the stars. If you really want to be strict YEC then shouldn't you say that the FIRST thing God created was DARKNESS ?
We see God say
"Let there be light". But if before we see light we see DARKNESS -
" But the earth was waste and emptiness, and darkness was on the surface of the deep." (1:2) darkness seems created by Him first.
Did you ever wonder why it doesn have God FIRST say "Let there DARKNESS" and then latter
"Let there be light" ?
We are introduced to the universe where already there is:
1. matter
2. water
3. gravity
4. darkness
"In the beginning God created the heavens and the earth." (1:1)
It does not speak of God creating darkness which logically it might if it is revealing the absolute beginning of everything.
What follows reads more like a limiting of chaos, a limiting of the effect of entropy, and a pushing back on the all pervading encoachment of darkness.
The references to LIGHT in the New Testament seem to have this tone also:
"And the light shines in the darkness, and the darkness did not overcome it." (John 1:5) - refering to the eternal Logos of Christ who is with God and God.
This is LIGHT overcoming something opposed to LIGHT -
"the darkness did not overcome it." I think John is making an allusion to Genesis.
Again Paul speaks of the glorious message of the gospel -
"Because the God who said, Out of darkness light shall shine, is the One who shined in our hearts to illuminate the knowledge of the glory of God in the face of Jesus Christ." (2 Cor. 4:6)
In both these New Testament passages, the apostles use darkness to indicate something in opposition to life and truth. In both these passages which refer back to Genesis, the tone is one of recovery, restricting or overccoming that which is opposed to God and God's life.
So I think the waste, void, and darkness within which God commanded
"Let there be life" presupposes something working against God's ordering hand.
A pre- Adamic age, I think, is indicated in which something when wrong. And in six days God commenced a new order beginning with assaulting the darkness with the command for LIGHT to be.
Notice in Revelation the new heaven and new earth are without the sea.
"And I saw a new heaven and a new earth; for the first heaven and the first earth passed away, AND THE SEA IS NO MORE." (Rev. 21:1)
Some symbol of death and judgment, the sea must have.
"But the earth became waste and emptiness, and fdarkness was on the surface of the deep" (Genesis 1:2 RcV)
Before God says
'Let there be light" the sea which shall be no more, is seen under thick darkness.
I think this Genesis 1 and 2 is a work of recovery and further creation signifying a previous order. Something is left over from this previous order - a subtle serpent which seems to have some evil knowledge gained from experience.
"And the serpent said to the woman, You shall not surely die! For God knows that in the day you eat of it your eyes will be opened, and you will become like God, lnowing good and evil." (Gen. 3:1)
How does he know ?
From where did he gain this knowledge ?
Was it recently he gained this insight or was it gained in some previous age ?
And what is this negative enfluence doing in the Paradise garden of God in the first place ?
Was Adam's mandate to GUARD the garden and keep it ? Was Adam to guard the garden from the likes of creeping, subtle, lying creatures like this serpent ?
I don't wish to argue about Carbon dating or Moon dust. Theologically, this evil serpent as the practical embodiment of Satan and the pervading darkness all indicate a previous age of Satanic rebellion. And other DAYS may have occured in that pre-Adamic world.