“My Lord, What a Morning!”

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By David Brand

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While many scientists suffer professional ridicule, if not retaliation, over their affirmation of the biblical six-day creation, Canadian American astrophysicist, Hugh Ross, recently interviewed on the NRB network, alluded to four books of the Old Testament which, unlike any other ancient religious writings, affirm an ever-expanding universe.  The fact that “expand” is the established meaning of the pertinent Hebrew verb is affirmed by such reputable Old Testament commentators as Keil and Delitzsche.  But how can an astrophysicist reconcile an ever-expanding universe with a six-day creation?  Someday Christians may want to discuss that with Job or Isaiah.

Dr. Ross stated that through the world’s most powerful telescopes creation itself can actually be observed occurring on the outer edges of the universe.  A visit to the Canadian’s website revealed that Hugh Ross is not of the “young earth” school associated with the Institute of Creation Research.  During the interview Ross stated that the survival of human life would be impossible apart from the preceding creative acts of Genesis chapter one.  Dr. Ross holds to “progressive creationist” “old earth” views, in which he rejects macroevolution while affirming microevolution within the “kinds” of Genesis 1, but holds to the “day-age” theory in which creation occurs in rapid bursts spread out over millions of years.

Consistent with many current Old Testament scholars, Hugh Ross regards Job, rather than Genesis, as the most ancient book of the Bible.  Dr. Ross regards God’s series of questions posed to Job as an excellent blueprint for modern scientific investigation.  He attributes atheism among scientists to the fact that in today’s world biologists far out-number astronomers.  He referred to a meeting of astronomers in the eastern U.S. in which all 350 attendees proved to be evangelical Christians.

Dr. Ross’s perspective on Genesis 1 prompts the following rhetorical questions traceable to Augustine:

1. Might Ross’s thesis be compatible with Genesis 1 if we view Genesis 1 as God’s reductive account of primal beginnings designed to communicate complexities in the simplest of terms, yes, even to children, while at the same time to challenge the greatest of intellects, such as Saul of Tarsus, by its straightforward yet profound simplicity? My Lord, what a morning!

2. Because one day in the God’s courts is better than a thousand elsewhere; and one day is as a thousand years, and a thousand years as a single day where the Lord is concerned, (Psa. 84:10; 90:4; 2 Pet. 3:8), dare we limit the eternal God to literal human chronological categories designed by Him for our finite lives?  While it is his prerogative to chronologize our earthly existence, and specifically the allotted time appropriate for human rest and renewal (Exod. 20:8-11), is it not also his prerogative to apply those categories to his own work and pleasure in a manner appropriate for “the high and lofty One that inhabiteth eternity” (Isaiah 57:15)?  Or do we dare to presume upon the Eternal God to abide by that chronology as it applies to mere humans?

3. Dare we presume to impose our limitations upon the Almighty, the all-wise God to the 24-hour days prescribed for humans? Of course, the temporal categories imposed upon the incarnate Son during his earthly pilgrimage are quite another manner, for He participated in, and assumed, our common humanity.

These rhetorical questions which suggest possible reconciliation of the day-age theory with the six-day creation of Genesis 1 are presented on the heels of the recent scientific discovery, reported by PBS, of a subterranean, sub-magma reservoir which contains more than three times the volume of earth’s oceans.  Such a discovery can only strengthen the case for the literal six-day creation related to the so-called “flood geology” of the Institute for Creation Research founded by the astute hydrologist at Virginia PolyTech, Dr. Henry Morris, in the early 1960s.  In speaking of the flood, Dr. Morris, in The Genesis Record (1976), referred to the extraordinary phenomenon of the “breaking up of the ‘great-deep’ complex of subcrustal reservoirs and conduits, the tremendous release of heat energy, and the outflow of great quantities of water and magma” (p. 206).  This distinguishes Henry Morris from those “floods geologists,” as well as those “old earth geologists,” characterized by respected author Dr. Vern Poythress as assuming “that the flood resulted from ordinary means” (Redeeming Science: A God-Centered Approach, p. 126).                     

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Sources Cited

Morris, Henry M. 1976. The Genesis Record: A scientific and devotional commentary on the book of beginnings. Baker Book House: Grand Rapids

Nelsen, Eleanor. June 13, 2014. Article: “Huge Underground Reservoir Holds Three Times as Much Water as Earth’s Oceans.” Nova. http://www.pbs.org/wgbh/nova/next/earth/huge-underground- reservoir-holds-three-times-much-water-earths-oceans/

Ross, Hugh. August 2014. Web Page. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hugh_Ross_%28creationist%29

Poythress, Vern S. 2006. Redeeming Science: A God-Centered Approach. Crossway Books: Wheaton, Illinois

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About the Writer

David Clark Brand is a retired pastor and educator with missionary experience in Korea and Arizona. He and his wife now reside in Wooster, Ohio, where they first met at a Presbyterian youth conference in 1958. They have four grown children and seven grandchildren. With a B.A. in the Liberal Arts, an M. Div., and a Th.M. in Church History, Dave continues to enjoy study and writing. One of his books, a contextual study of the life and thought of Jonathan Edwards, was published by the American Academy of Religion via Scholars Press in Atlanta.

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