Lets assume for the moment that the universe is indeed old (13 billion years according to many scientists) and the earth is likewise old (4 billion years) and that modern man has been around for a long while (say 50,000 years, with the dinosaurs long dead before Adam hit the scene). Is there a way to reconcile these figures with a literal reading of Genesis? Certainly. In the Bible, the term father means any ancestor. For example Abraham is our father. As a result, the biblical genealogies are totally ambiguous as to how many generations existed between Adam and Christ. Most Bible scholars maintain that it was Hebrew writing style to omit generations in the tally. (Had God deviated from this style, all the textual critics would only deny the Bibles authenticity even more). This takes care of the alleged 50,000 years worth of mankind.
Genesis tells us the origin of what is visible visible to ancient man who lacked telescopes to see distant galaxies. It doesnt have much to say about the universe as a whole. Perhaps the whole universe is mentioned in verse 1, In the beginning God made the heaven and the earth. Several days later He made the stars which speaks not of the whole universe but of those stars visible to ancient man, presumably our own galaxy alone. Thus our galaxy was not the first of all galaxies.
Were the six days 24-hour periods? The absence of a natural sun until the fourth of these six days allows for any possible length of daylight. It need not be 24-hour periods. God designated six days only to establish the paradigm/calendar of working six consecutive daylights and then resting on the seventh daylight (the Sabbath). Now since there was no sun at the outset, what is the meaning of the phrase repeated for each of the six days, And there was evening, and the morning, the [next] day? Evening/darkness simply contrasts with morning/day where day is the shining of a sun into a locale. Christs face as Sun illuminated our entire galaxy:
In the beginning God created the heaven and the earth. And the earth was without form, and void; and darkness was upon the face of the deep
And God said, Let there be light: and there was light.[This is Christ's face shining into the galax - see 2Cor 4:4-6]. And God saw the light, that it was good: and God divided the light from the darkness. And God called the light Day, and the darkness he called Night. And the evening and the morning were the first day (Gen 1:2-5).
This was the first galactic day of six. These six galactic days filled the entire galaxy with Christs light and thus have absolutely nothing to do with the earths local 24-hour daylights furnished by the sun newly created on the fourth galactic day (1:16-19). Each time that Christ suspended the shining of His face, and He did it gradually to create an evening-effect, a galactic night ensued. Thus in each case we have evening, and then morning, the next day (the next galactic day). And since it was His prerogative to decide when to shine, there is no telling how long these galactic days were. The first one could have been a billion years for all we know, the second one a million years all was entirely up to Him. After all, these six days were totally artificial fabrications serving no useful purpose other than to set up a paradigm/calendar of working six days followed by resting on the seventh day. As a result of this flexible timescale, Genesis cannot be construed as contradicting the age of the earth or the age of universe. (Presumably Christ made His galactic Light invisible to the earths creatures once the sun was in place on the fourth galactic day). Christ's Light also nourished the plants until our created sun was in place.
Now regarding the fossil record. Evolutionists claim that all the genetic evidence points to a common ancestor from which all species evolved. This is based largely on the commonalities among fossilized genetic materials. This may be true but does not disprove biblical creation because God could have formed all the main species from a single hand-held cluster of uniform genetic material (and in this sense from a single common ancestor). He did this forming not all at once but over the course of six galactic days, fashinoning Adam and Eve on the sixth day. Of course evolution/adaptation may have ensued after biblical creation assuming God programmed the DNA to adapt/evolve automatically to dangerous environments. Thus we are not faced with a mutually exclusive choice, either creation or evolution. A certain measure of both is possibly more realistic.
Why would God take so long for creation? One possible reason, among many, is that animals have free will, and free will is sometimes unpredictable even by God, as many theologians today admit (these theologians are called "open theists"). Hence God may have taken time to tweak/fine-tune the natural order to make sure that animal behavior would be in accordance with His plans for Adam and Eve. This tweaking of the natural order would help to explain anomalies such as vestigial organs. (Adam was the first "man" in the biblical sense, but there may have been many man-like species preceding him).
I am not totally convinced of evolution, but I see enough evidence to support it to warrant accepting it as a possibility. But I still take Genesis literally even though a huge percentage of Christians have migrated to a non-literal reading. Even if evolution can be shown, there is no way to prove that Gods hand isnt behind it, manipulating the DNA invisibly. Here's one problem with evolution. If it takes a thousand microevolutions to transform an ape into a man, there should be a thousand missing links in the fossil record and this would be true for each evolved species! The fossil record shows the opposite, namely many species but comparitively few candidates for transitional forms.
What now of the order of the fossil record? One will have difficulty using a global flood to account for the fossil record. There is simply too much scientific, geological, and archaeological evidence against it. Hugh Ross website links to an article that argues for a local flood based on the literal reading of the Hebrew texts involving Noah. Such a small flood would have no serious impact on the geologic column and thus cannot be significantly challenged by scientists. Moses laid out in Genesis an order of creation, starting with fruit-bearing plants, that seems compatible with the fossil record. Some evolutionists debate whether birds arrived early or late. If birds arrived late, the fossil evidence could be a challenge to Moses' account. If birds arrived early, Moses' account seems acceptable.
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