The Day of the LORD
It's only been a week...what's your hurry?
But do not let this one escape your notice…with the Lord one day is like a thousand years, and a thousand years like one day. The Lord is not slow about His promise as some count slowness, but is patient toward you, not wishing for any to perish but for all to come to repentance. 2Peter 3:8-9
I believe that: Creation was accomplished in seven literal days – rotations of the earth on its axis that resulted in an evening and a morning. I am not an adherent of the idea of uniformity, so I am willing to accept that the length of those rotations might be different today than they were at the time of creation, but not to such a degree that it would change the implications of life on earth (so, not so long that the dark side of the earth would experience cold that would be non-survivable, for example).
The first 6 days were for the actual work of creation; the seventh was for rest.
If we took the general themes of creation, we would observe the following pattern:
Days 1&2 brought light and darkness to everything within creation, above earth’s atmosphere – big, universe defining events that though affecting the earth were not “in” the earth.
Days 3&4 brought land and sea and life on earth; and sun and moon and luminaries in the heavens – order and structure to the place God was preparing for His creatures.
Days 5&6 brought soul creatures to the air and water and land; and, in the Likeness and Image of God – a man in whom He placed His Breath and gave Eternal Life.
Day 7 brought rest and the rewards of a job done well.
I also believe that: Redemption is accomplished in a week as well – 7 days where the days are the “days of the Lord” – each spanning what would be measured as 1,000 years for man.
Just as there were general patterns in the days of creation, the days of redemption reveal the same.
Days 1&2 were the Age of the Father; His language to Man, who is the epitome of the works of His hand, was Creation itself. It spanned from the formation and fall of Adam to the Covenant with Abram and the changing of his name to Abraham. Faith/Confidence was the anchor. The Book of Redemption was written, and the Rights were acquired.
Days 3&4 were the Age of the Son; His language to Man was that of the Covenants, words of agreement and conditions and promises. It spanned from Abraham’s only son Isaac to God’s only Begotten, Jesus. Hope was the anchor. The Price of Redemption was Paid.
Days 5&6 were the Age of the Spirit; His language to Man was Relationship and Indwelling – Man in the Anointing and the Anointing in Man. It spanned from the Outpouring of Pentecost to the Trumpet of Atonement and the Presentation of those who are alive and remain. Love was the anchor. The Rights of Redemption are Exercised and Redemption is fulfilled.
This thousand years of the dragon’s time in the abyss will be the Week’s day of Rest and Restoration, the Wedding Feast for all of the Ransomed and Redeemed – the attainment of all that Adam was meant to have, will be accomplished; the whole earth will be a garden – and then the New will come!
According to Martin Antsey’s seminal research regarding chronology of the Bible, we can be certain that we are about 6,000 years into Mankind’s existence on earth; it is in fact the year 6060 An. Hom. (Creation of Man). His work was based on two positions of faith: first, that God created Mankind for a purpose; second, that the times of Man were a means by which He (God) would demonstrate the first position.
If we accept Antsey’s conclusion (which I do) and Peter’s statement above, we find ourselves in a very different world than the one that has become the accepted norm over the last 200 years or so. (BTW 200 years on the scale of a thousand years equalling a day is a little over 5 hours - just saying.)
For those who hold a different perspective than I (so, for example, the current, secular norm) - please bear with me: allow me to present my case in full before you wad it up and toss it in the trash. Oh…and keep in mind that all positions on the origin of Man require faith in that none of us were there to scientifically (unless you accept Moses’ second hand perspective) document it.
In Paul’s letter to the believers in Rome, he makes a fairly strong (and so currently, fairly offensive) declaration: “For the wrath of God is revealed from heaven against all ungodliness and unrighteousness of men who suppress the truth in unrighteousness, because that which is known about God is evident within them; for God made it evident to them. For since the creation of the world His invisible attributes, His eternal power and divine nature, have been clearly seen, being understood through what has been made, so that they are without excuse.”
It is the last 6 words that I am referring to: “so that they are without excuse.” Though I can easily imagine that the first phrase is offensive to some as well.
Accepting that the idea of the blind knight who needs to climb a thousand floors to save his true love; but that each floor has a thousand doors only one of which would lead to the next staircase - the other 999 leading to certain death. Accepting that that correctly describes that chance of adding DNA data for a single, simple act of evolution (not to be confused with the loss or omission of data known as mutation).
Accepting Paul to be genuine - that he believed what he said, that the universe itself proved creation (specifically creation by a Creator that was currently involved in His creation’s lives), and he demonstrated that belief by how he acted - specifically toward others. But also that to deny that proof was inexcusable to God as the Creator.
And accepting that Peter too was genuine - that he believed that God was willing to be patient in order to give not just the idea of Mankind, but each member of it the time they needed to figure out the truth and to change the way they thought based on new information (which is what the word “repent” in the Greek actually meant). That to God waiting one day was like waiting a thousand years (as regarded how much He could get done) and that a thousand years was like a day (as regarded His patience).
If someone accepted all of those points (which I do) what would that mean?
For me it means that I believe we are nearing the last of the last days. That because of that and despite God’s proven patience, time is running out - literally. He has already committed, by legal contract (and God, Who is God, cannot break the Law), to give us the better part of the week - we are in the sixth day - and the sun is setting.
I also believe, like any father whose family is running late, that things will get more serious, more focused, more defined - as God works to get our attention - to help us all be on time!
The Father’s last words in the Bible: “Write, for these words are faithful and true: They are come into being. I am the Alpha and the Omega, the beginning and the end. I will give to the one who thirsts from the springs of the water of life without cost. He who overcomes will inherit these things, and I will be his God and he will be My son.”
Jesus’ last words: “I, Jesus, have sent My message to testify to you these things concerning the fellowships of those I have called out. I am the root and the descendant of David, the bright, morning star.” And, “Yes, I am coming quickly.”
The very last words of the Bible - Rev.22:21 - “Amen, Come, Lord Jesus! The grace of the Lord Jesus be with all. Amen.
As you know HGV, there has been an ongoing debate between the 'ancient Earth' (4.5 billion years old) and 'young Earth' (6000 years old) schools of thought. I have been an engineer and scientist for all my life, so naturally I subscribed to the 'ancient Earth' timeline.
Recently I've been reading quite a few things that point out the problems with that viewpoint. Your writings here now one of them. Also Noah at https://wltreport.com/ has been making such arguments. One of the things I find fascinating is the fact that in the early times of the Bible people seemed to live for many hundreds of years. How could that be, unless the scriptures were figurative and not literal?
I don't know if you've heard about 'telomeres' -- these are bits of unnecessary DNA added onto the genes of living things, 'unnecessary' in that they do not provide essential DNA code required to build that living thing. Well, over time starting when we are born, inevitable genetic damage happens in the replication of our genes as we age, and most of this happens at the tips of the DNA strands. The effect of that is to reduce the lengths of our telomeres. This eventually affects the 'important' parts of our DNA, which causes defects in the creation of new cells in our body, resulting in degradation of said body and eventually can cause death (if we do not die first due to some external event). So our bodies age and eventually we die.
But this degradation in DNA also affects the genes passed down to succeeding generations, which when you think about it means that as we become an older species, the expected lifetime of each generation becomes a bit less than that which preceded, due to loss of telomeric DNA. So, it is not illogical to think that people who lived thousands of years earlier, would also have had much longer lifetimes.
Then people say, "But what about the dinosaurs?" Well, what of them? Did they really exist or did God create the fossils and layers of rock that all appeared by our 'measurements' to be hundreds of millions years old? I can't explain why God would have created the earth this way, but certainly He could have and apparently did. The same for the universe -- we assume that it must have been there for a long time because physicists have been able to create a theory that agrees with 'observations' that tells us the universe is tens of billions of years old. But there were no witnesses there to provide any justification of the theory.
Noah described this problem with a simple example. Suppose we walk into the kitchen and there is a coffee cup in the sink, and the faucet is dripping into it at a certain rate. We can easily measure that drip rate and how much water is in the cup, and deduce how long the cup has been there.
But it is likely that nobody watched that cup for the entire time, so we must make a set of assumptions (including 'uniformity' as you mention) to make that deduction. As long as all we have to determine the age of things, whether it is the time it took the faucet to fill the coffee cup or the age of Earth or the universe, based only on things that we can measure and know today, there is a critical set of assumptions that must be made to make that determination. And by definition, there is no way to validate those assumptions, and indeed it is the height of arrogance for us to claim we 'know' such facts when indeed, they rest on unproven (and unknowable) assumptions that are in reality as likely to be wrong as right. And the further back we try to estimate the age of something, the more likely those assumptions are to be wrong.
After all, if we can't really be sure how long that faucet has been dripping into the cup (a matter of hours perhaps), how in God's earth can we claim to 'know' the Earth is 4.5 billion years old? Answer, of course, is -- we cannot.