Hello Parable,
Good of you to respond and I'm sorry for being so long in my reply, but I have been away for the last few days. Let's go over the lineage from Adam to Noah together.
Genesis / Luke
Adam - Seth / Adam - Seth
Seth - Enosh / Seth - Enosh
Enosh - Cainan / Enosh - Cainan
Cainan - Mahalalel / Cainan - Mahalalel
Mahalalel - Jared / Mahalalel - Jared
Jared - Enoch / Jared - Enoch
Enoch - Methuselah / Enoch - Methuselah
Methusaleh - Lamech / Methusaleh - Lamech
Lamech - Noah / Lamech - Noah
If we add up the years from father to son given in the Genesis account we come to about 1046 years +/- a year or two if we assume that each child wasn't born on the first day of the father's years and so we may have a half year added here or a couple of months or days extra added there of the partial years. I'll be generous and allow that each son was born on the last day or week of the father's age of years and give an allowable error of 8 years. So that leaves us at 1054 years of creation at the birth of Noah.
Notice that none of the genealogy between the Genesis account from Adam to Noah is even one son different from Luke's account. Therefore, I think it safe to understand that up until Noah's birth we can be confident that the Genesis account and the Luke account agree. Matthew, unfortunately doesn't go back as far as Adam and so his gospel is of no value in this comparison.
So, here we are, confirmed twice in the Scriptures, that when Noah was born the creation age was, at most, 1054 years old.
Ok, let's continue adding years to the flood according to the Scripture record. We find in Genesis 7:11 that Noah was 600 years old when the flood came. This gives us a creation date of 1654 years from the day that God said the first "Let there be..." of creating all the heavens and the earth and His word to destroy all living things by a flood of all the waters in and upon the earth and in the heavens.
Now, you are certainly free to believe that the word translated 'begat' does not infer direct lineage if you so choose, but I'm convinced in the spirit, by the Spirit, that there is a very simple purpose for God including the genealogy we find in the book of Genesis. That simple purpose is so that any thinking man of faith can 'know' the power and glory and majesty of God in the very quickness in which He created all that is in this realm of creation and the very days that the creation has been in existence.
Friend, the God I serve, has the power and wisdom to create in just 144 hours, absolutely everything that is both visible and invisible in this, our entire realm of creation. From the most distant star of the most distant galaxy to the most minute paritcle of matter upon the earth, the God I serve began with a clear and concise 'plan' of what He would need to create to sustain the life of flesh that He desired to create to both love and be loved, at the first hour and created it all in full and perfect completion at the end of the 144th hour.
No millions or billions of years to think and consider and allow natural processes to do any, not one speck, of the physical processes that have brought us to this day, March 28, 2011. No, my friend, the God I serve knew what He was about to do and all that needed to be done to sustain and provide for flesh to live when He uttered the first words that began this realm of creation. He knew that from the moment He spoke the first "Let there be..." that in 6 days He would finish by gathering up some dirt of the earth and forming a man and blowing into that singular man the breath of life. He knew that all He had created, from the most distant star to the most minute particle upon the earth was perfect for the life that He would create in the flesh of men. He knew that from that humble beginning of man we would sin and we would rebel. He knew that He would set in place another 'plan'. A plan that would allow for any one of us who would turn from our wicked rebellion against Him and hear His cry to return to Him and the perfection of a new creation that He would also make for us to then live the eternal life that He had always had in mind to create us for.
Sadly, God was so grieved in the wicked destruction and pain that man had visited upon one another; the creatures of flesh that He had created to enjoy an eternal life of peace and satisfaction in serving and loving Him and being served and loved by Him, that in the 1600th year of creation He was so grieved that He swept His mighty hand across the whole earth and brought destruction to all that He had created for us. But, he relented just a bit, and started over with Noah and his family and soon called Abram to begin the work of His other great plan to save those who were willing to live under His authority and love.
He is a great and awesome God and is not in need of millions or billions of years to complete what He has begun. He merely speaks and the designs of His thoughts become reality to us. He merely says "Let it be so!" and thus, it is so! He is a God with greater power, wisdom, might, majesty and glory than we will ever truly be able to comprehend with our small finite minds and thoughts that we feebly consider today. That is the God who reveals Himself to His created in the Scriptures that He caused to be written for us that we might know who He is and who we are. That we might know how we got here and that because it is all by His mighty hand, why He deserves our obedience and love.
The Scriptures are written to us by God that we might understand that it is His power, His wisdom, His glory that we even have a life to live in the first place. The Scriptures are written to us from God that we might know how He wants us to live and that even though there is not a one of us who has been able to live the life that He has intentioned for us, we can, after finding Him through His word to us, return to Him who is the giver of life and receive that life for eternity and live with Him where we will be free forever and ever and ever and ever and ever more to drink from the spring of the water of life. THAT IS THE GOD THAT I SERVE!!!!!
In Christ, Ted