The day age theory, let me read this for you, day age creationism, it is a metaphoric interpretation
of the creation accounts in Genesis.
It holds that the six days referred to in the Genesis account of creation are not literal
24 hour days, but are much longer periods from thousands to billions of years.
So the day age theory teaches that the six day creation is just symbolic.
Every day was not a literal day, it could have been thousands, could have been billions
of years that it represents.
And here's their proof text, 2 Peter 3 says, but beloved, you don't have to turn that,
I'll just read this for you, but beloved, be not ignorant of this one thing, that one
day is with the Lord as a thousand years and a thousand years as one day.
Say, well, see, look, the Bible says there that one day is with the Lord as a thousand years.
Look, if you look at 2 Peter 3a in its context, you'll find that what's being spoken about
is the patience of God.
And that to God, a day is like a thousand years, to God, it's no big deal for him to
wait one day or for him to wait a thousand years.
But this isn't saying that one day literally is a thousand years for God.
And that sure doesn't say anything about the creation week.
So if you want to try to make stuff up and just grab whatever verse you want and apply
it into the passage, you can do that, but you're not a Bible believing Christian.
Because the only way to walk away from Genesis chapter one is to believe that there was a
six day literal 24 hour creation week.
And that these days are not symbolic.
Look, I agree that to God waiting a thousand years and waiting one day, no big deal.
He's patient.
And for him, he's eternal.
He lives in eternity, but that doesn't mean that the six day creation week was each a
thousand days or symbolic of a period of time.
But even if you were to say, well, I just kind of think that maybe it was, well, you've
got some problems with the day age theory.
Because what you'll notice in the creation week, and I'm going to just point this out
to you real quickly.
There is a pattern in the creation week and the fact the pattern maybe will help you remember.
If you're trying to teach this to your children, help you remember what was created.
Because there's a pattern where God creates, does three different things on day one, day
two and day three, and then comes back and fills.
He creates certain spaces, day one, day two, day three.
And then he comes back and fills those spaces in days four, five and six.
By the way, this is why the Bible says that the earth was void and without form.
He created a space that was empty.
Then he came back later on in the week and he filled it.
Let me give you an example.
On day one, the first day, God created the heaven and the earth.
And he also created the light and he called the light day and he separated the light from
darkness and he called the darkness night.
That happened on day one.
He creates the heaven and the earth.
He creates the light.
And then what did you do on day four?
He creates the sun, moon and the stars that are connected to the light.
And we're going to talk about that later on in the sermon.
On day two, he creates the firmament, which is the sky, and he divided the waters above
the firmament from the waters below the firmament.
On day five, he creates the birds and the fish to be in the water that he separated
from the firmament and to be in the sky that he separated from the water.
In day three, he gathered the waters together and called it sea and he made the dry land
appear.
On day six, he made the land animals.
So we see that in the first day, he deals with the lights and on the fourth day, he
gives us the source of the lights, the sun, moon and stars.
On the second day, he gives us the firmament and divides the waters from the firmament.
On the fifth day, he fills the firmament, the sky, with birds and fowls and he fills
the water with fish.
On the third day, he makes the land to appear and on the sixth day, he creates the land
animals and of course, he also creates human beings that dwell on the land.
So there's a pattern there.
Now here's what's interesting.
In the pattern, you also find some things that you and I might think if you and I were
telling the creation story, and by the way, I believe this is one of the reasons why we
can trust the Bible.
Because if you and I were telling the creation story, we would not tell it the way that God
tells it.
Because we think we're smarter than God.
We're really idiots.
God is much smarter.
But see, if we were creating things, we would put them in a different order.
Here's what's interesting.
On day three, look down at verse number 11, Genesis chapter one, verse 11.
And God said, let the earth, notice these words, bring forth grass, the herb yielding
seed, and the fruit tree yielding fruit after his kind whose seed is in itself upon the
earth and it was so.
And the earth brought forth grass and herb yielding seed after his kind and the tree
yielding fruit whose seed was in itself after his kind and God saw that it was good.
And the evening and the morning were the third day.
Once you notice that on the third day, God gathered the waters, called it sea.
He made the dry land to appear upon the earth and he made plant life to grow on the third
day.
On the fourth day, look at verse 14, and God said, let there be lights in the firmament
of heaven to divide the day from the night and let them be for signs and for seasons
and for days and for years.
Look at verse 16.
And God made two great lights, the greater light to rule the day and the lesser light
to rule the night.
He made the stars also, obviously referring to the sun, moon and stars.
He makes the plant life appear on the third day.
He makes the sun appear on the fourth day.
Now these are literal 24 hour days, no problem.
But if we're supposed to believe that these days are symbolic and they actually represent
long periods of time, you know, thousands of years or billions of years or whatever,
then the day age theory has a problem because plants were created on day three of the creation
week and the sun was created on day four of the creation week.
And if these are actually times that are separated by a thousand years or a million years or
a thousand years, if each day represents thousands or millions of years, how could plants survive
without the sun?