[Ezekiel Bathfire]

In an earlier post, I wrote

Originally Posted by Ezekiel Bathfire

As far as Pastor Ezekiel Flint’s recorded age is concerned, I have been informed that this is an Ecumenical matter revolving around Psalm:90:4 and how we should interpret “years”. Discussions with the Southern Baptists are ongoing, and Pastor Flint from great personal generosity and in a spirit of love, agreed to be an example and thus his age was deemed to be 29 years for the purpose of the discussions. To change anything now would undo years of work.

I have now been inundated with letters asking what there is to discuss about “Years” – most of them can be summed up by “What’s the problem with a year? A year is a year, right?”

The answer is “Yes.” It is a question of what a day; evening; morning; month; year all mean. And they all mean exactly the same in American as they did to God, Adam, Jesus, and Paul - and even John the Divine (who sometimes appears a little too zealous for some people) knew what a year was.

When God say “I’ll have a word with you tomorrow – He does not mean, “I’ll speak to you in a thousand years.”

If we look at Psalms:90:4: For a thousand years in thy sight are but as yesterday when it is past, and as a watch in the night.

And if we look at Ge:1:5: And God called the light Day, and the darkness he called Night. And the evening and the morning were the first day.

To the Landover, Independent Baptist, this does not mean that the creation of Light and Darkness (on their own - because God creates the sun and moon later) took 1,000 years – that would be stupid.

But there are those who believe that. And they believe it because the Catholic Church accepts Evolution and an Old World – a World that is about 13 Billion years old.

Well, common sense tells us that the world cannot be 13 Billion years old, because– that is obvious for three reasons
(i) In the 17th century Archbishop Ussher simply counted backwards from Jesus’s birth using the information not only in the Bible, but from elsewhere, of how long everyone lived and how much time everything took. He discovered that the World was created in September 4004BC
(ii) the Old Testament describes Jesus’s direct, yet indirect*, descent from Adam, who was created by God. If the world were 13 Billion years old, then the Bible would be about 3 million times as long. If that were the case, nobody would have the time to read it and we’d all be atheists – and nobody is.

Because the Bible is inerrant and consistent, we need to look at the words:
Psalms:90:4: For a thousand years in thy sight are but as yesterday when it is past, and as a watch in the night.
What is the Psalmist saying? He is saying that to God, time does not matter in the same way that to you yesterday is past and gone and is of no consequence: it is a short time. And if you are immortal, everything is a short time, isn’t it? In fact time does not mean much at all.

And then we have: Exodus 20:10-11 and this seems to be that the six days of creation was followed by the Sabbath day of rest was a cycle of the same kind of seven day week that was to become the pattern of Israel's experience. It's hard for me to imagine someone coming to some other kind of conclusion unless he seeks to accommodate extra-biblical considerations from philosophy (that papist, Augustine,) or science (a la contemporary old earthers - 1Tm:6:20: O Timothy, keep that which is committed to thy trust, avoiding profane and vain babblings, and oppositions of science falsely so called)."

I may help you to be reminded of the original question at this point – the argument about “years”. It so happens that Southern Baptists are not dogmatic on a six-day Creation. But we are, and, in talks aimed at healing differences, all that is required is that the heretics among the Southern Baptists admit their fault and are banished and shunned for all eternity.

I hope this gives some idea of the complexities of the negotiations and our more than flexible approach.




* God created Jesus before he created Adam. Regarding Jesus, the apostle Paul wrote: “He is the image of the invisible God, the firstborn of all creation.” (Col:1:13: […his dear Son:
[…]
Col:1:15: Who is the image of the invisible God, the firstborn of every creature: ) Jesus’ life began long before he was born in a stable in Bethlehem.
See also the Old Testament Mic:5:2: But thou, Bethlehem Ephratah, though thou be little among the thousands of Judah, yet out of thee shall he come forth unto me that is to be ruler in Israel; whose goings forth have been from of old, from everlasting.

As God’s firstborn Son, Jesus was a spirit creature in heaven before he was born as a human on earth. Jesus himself said: “I have come down from heaven.”—John 6:38; 8:23.

So we see that Jesus was already there at Creation as a full adult and also born in Bethlehem.