carolinajazz
Well-Known Member
You say right, Dutch! The opening words of Genesis tell us: “In the beginning God created the heavens and the earth.” (Genesis 1:1) Do these words of Genesis say that this happened about ten thousand years ago? No, it gives no time period. “The beginning” could therefore have been billions of years ago.
However, right at “the beginning,” the Bible puts an intelligent being, the Creator, in control of the creative work. Although many scientists are uncomfortable with this idea, it harmonizes with the conclusions of astronomers that the universe did have a beginning, that it is very well ordered, and that it is governed by definite laws. An orderly arrangement based on law can come only from an intelligent mind. While science has explained many of these laws to us, Genesis alone introduces us to the Lawgiver!
The account in Genesis then goes on to outline the famous six “days” of creation. These days, though, were not the time during which the material of the earth and the universe was created. That had already happened “in the beginning.” The six days of creation were, rather, the periods of time during which the primordial, inhospitable earth was slowly made fit for habitation.
Was each one of those six days a literal 24-hour day? That is not what Genesis says. The word “day” in the Hebrew language (the language in which Genesis was written) can mean long periods of time, even millions of years. (Compare Psalm 90:4; Genesis 2:4.) For example, “the seventh day” in which we now live is thousands of years long. (Genesis 2:2,*3) Hence, the evidence shows that the entire period of six days should be viewed as tens of thousands of years long.
The order of the six creative epochs shows a procession of water, earth, light, atmosphere, plants, fish, birds, animals, and finally humans. (Genesis 1:3-27) This order of development is generally in agreement with the order uncovered by scientists.
But a noteworthy statement appears repeatedly in the account in Genesis chapter*1. For example, regarding the fifth creative day, Genesis 1:21 tells us: “And God proceeded to create the great sea monsters and every living soul that moves about, which the waters swarmed forth according to their kinds.” Regarding the sixth day, verse*24 reads: “Let the earth put forth living souls according to their kinds, domestic animal and moving animal and wild beast of the earth according to its kind.”
Hence, it was the kinds of animals that were created, not every individual species. But the various “kinds” were created separately and are not descended from one another. Within each “kind,” there could be great variety, as we see in the cat “kind” or the dog “kind” or the human “kind.” But genetic factors put there by the Creator would always keep these “kinds” separate from one another. That is why a cat and a dog cannot mate and start another form of life.
This contradicts the evolution theory. But it does not contradict any observed facts. While animals produce much variety within their “kind,” no one has ever documented that one “kind” of animal has reproduced or evolved into a different “kind.”
What of the structural similarities that exist between certain kinds of animals? These are understandable when we consider that all of them are the product of one Creator and that they were designed from the same materials of the earth to live in a similar environment.
Additionally, Genesis provides an answer to a problem that scientists cannot solve: From where did life come? Scientists try to answer this question with various theories, but in truth they cannot. And the hard fact that has been proved repeatedly in scientific laboratories is that life can come only from already existing life, and from the same “kind” of life.
Genesis also tells us that life is older than the universe and that all other life in heaven and on earth issued from the original Source of life, the almighty Creator. Science cannot come up with a better explanation, one that harmonizes with all the scientific facts that we can observe.—Psalm 36:9; 83:18; Isaiah 42:8; Revelation 4:11.
