YeshuaSavedMe and others,
I am an unusual person and I look at the scripture apparently in an unusual way. This leads me to see many problems with the Young Earth Creation Theory. YeshuaSavedMe, I have much respect for you as you do well in your attempts to back up your position with scripture and because of that I am glad to call you brother.
However, I have many questions about the commonly held interpretation of the creation story. But I have one proof (in a long line of reasoning) that you have never heard (or at least I have never heard anyone else use it) used as a defense of the Old Earth/Gap Theory. I am NOT going to spoon feed the answer to anyone on this forum or anywhere else for that matter. You'll one day have to come hear me preach it

!
Let me start with the questions - to those of you who adhere to the YEC theory (this is not an exhaustive list - I have near one hundred questions that I have never seen asked nor answered):
1) Where does it say that God created water? The creation account does not include the creation of water. Earth (eretz=land, earth - meaning dirt, ground - it is eretz yisrael = the land of Israel not the globe of Israel), heaven (Shammayim), Sun, Moon, light, etc. Why no mention of water being created in the 6 days of creation?
2) Why would God create the planet in water only then to undo His first idea (i.e. a planet covered in water) and then redo it in order to separate some of the water into the atmosphere? And then, what is more, to undo it even more by raising the ground above the water? Why not create it this way to begin with? (To me this is a big problem.)
3) If God made the earth a void and a waste on the first go, why didn't he make Adam, Eve, the Garden, Angels, sun, moon, stars, EVERYTHING ELSE, waste and void first also, then then re-make them into what they should have been in the first place?
4) Why does it say that God created the plants and the herbs of the field and SAW that it was good, when He really didn't see it? Gen 2 clearly says no plants had yet sprung up!?
5) Why did God have to create the Garden of Eden in order to place man there?
6) Why did God take 6 days to "create" (really [re-]make) the earth when He could have done it in the blink of an eye?
7) Why did God rest on the 7th day?
(Seven is a good number to stop at don't you think? BTW there are definite, scripturally supported answers to everyone of those questions.)
And finally the proof. I am going to give you the proof that the earth is much older than the Young Earth Creation theory maintains. I am NOT going to give any supporting scripture (there is a lot of it and I am really tired). However, if you think about it and pull in several main principles clearly found in scripture (but rarely talked about) this proof is the crux of the argument. If you reverse the reasoning you will come to the conclusion that the earth must be far far more than 6,000 years old:
Why will Jesus rule on the earth for 1 thousand years with Satan bound in chains and then let him free at the end of the 1 thousand years?
In Jesus' mighty name,
TSS