24 by Dr. Abidan Shah

24 by Dr. Shah, Clearview Church, Henderson, NC

Introduction: When I suggested to our team that the title of this week’s message be “24,” they instantly responded, “like the TV show?” That’s when I remembered that, back in the 2000s, there was an action-drama TV series called “24,” starring Kiefer Sutherland. Maybe, some of you saw it. I never watched it, but I remember hearing about it that it revolved around a counter-terrorism agent named Jack Bauer who had 24 hours to stop presidential assassinations, bioterrorism, bomb attacks, cyberattacks, and other acts of sabotage. The point was that every second and minute counted. At times, the TV screen was even split to show what was happening elsewhere at the same time. It was a hit show, but, as intense as it was, it cannot be compared to the six 24-hour days of creation when God made the heavens and the earth. As you know, we’re in our series on apologetics titled CONTEND and we are focusing on Genesis because many of the questions came from there – #1. I have heard that the days of creation could be thousands of years each. What do you think? #2. How can the earth function normally when the sun was not even created until the fourth day? #3. What is deep time? Main point: God could have created the world in a split-second or in billions of years, but by choosing to create in six 24-hour days, he was accommodating to our capacity and limits and even setting a pattern for us. It is like the incarnation where Jesus became like us to be our substitute and set a pattern for us on how to live.

Genesis 1       3 Then God said, “Let there be light”; and there was light. 4 And God saw the light, that it was good; and God divided the light from the darkness. 5 God called the light Day, and the darkness He called Night. So the evening and the morning were the first day.

Context: The big debate here is “How long was this day and the days following in that creation week? Was it 24 hours? Was it an age of thousands of years? Was it a literary style with nothing to do with time? The answer is based on how you read 2 things:

1. How do you interpret the rocks: Here, I am referring to “uniformitarian geology,” something that has risen in the past couple of hundred years. Uniformitarianism was proposed by James Hutton (1726-97), a Scottish geologist/farmer, and later developed by Charles Lyell (1797-1875), another Scottish geologist. The Scottish interest has to do with the unique geology of Scotland with their Highlands, mountains, lowlands, and uplands. They claimed that the natural laws and processes on Earth have been the same throughout its history. So, an ancient rock can be studied and interpreted based on the present geological processes. They asked questions like “How long did it take for a tiny mound to develop?” Based on that, “How long would it take for a huge mountain to develop?” Bottom line: the present is the key to the past. This is a simplistic explanation of their erosion, weathering, molten rock exposure, transportation, deposition, and lithification under earth’s atmosphere, weather, etc. Of course, uniformitarianism has developed from the “steady-state” cycles of Hutton and has become more complex with the advancement of science and technology. In fact, rapid catastrophic erosion and sedimentation is proving that it did not take billions of years for the rocks to take their shape. Nonetheless, all this has led to the concept of the “old earth” and “deep time.” One scholar (Henry Gee) said, “Deep Time is like an endless, dark corridor, with no landmarks to give it scale.” We will come to all this later in this series.
2. How do you interpret the word of God: Here, I am referring to the debate between nominalism and realism, something that has been coming for over a millennium but has especially risen in the past century or so. Nominalism claims, simplistically speaking, that the connection between a sign and the thing signified is arbitrary, not fixed. Realism claims that it is what it signifies. God has revealed in his word the truth about himself and us. Nominalism replies that truth is lost and what we have is just an attempt to get to the truth. For the past couple of hundred years, western culture has been sliding this book further and further away from the center. Last year, it got shoved off the table. It’s going to take a while to bring it back to the center. It’s the only hope for our world.

My goal in this series is to lay step-by-step the right biblical foundation. Let’s begin by looking carefully at the text, starting in Genesis 1:5. Before we rush past this verse, there’s a important clues that are given to us as to what God has to say about the age of the earth. Listen again to verse 5 “God called the light Day, and the darkness He called Night. Sothe evening and the morning were the first day.” There is a mistranslation here in light of the Hebrew (Sarfati and Steinmann). It is not “First Day” but “One Day.” In English we have cardinal numbers and ordinal numbers. Cardinal (counting) numbers are one, two, three, four… Ordinal (order) numbers are first, second, third, fourth… In the Hebrew, the word is not ordinal (yom rishon = first day) but cardinal (yom echad = One Day). What God is saying here is that this is the formula for 1 Day = Evening + Morning. How about the rest of the days? They are ordinal numbers. 8 “And God called the firmament Heaven. So the evening and the morning were the second day…” 12 “And the earth brought forth grass, the herb thatyields seed according to its kind, and the tree that yields fruit, whose seed is in itself according to its kind. And God saw that it was good. 13 So the evening and the morning were the third day…” 17 “God set them in the firmament of the heavens to give light on the earth, 18 and to rule over the day and over the night, and to divide the light from the darkness. And God saw that it was good. 19 So the evening and the morning were the fourth day…” 22“And God blessed them, saying, ‘Be fruitful and multiply, and fill the waters in the seas, and let birds multiply on the earth.’ 23 So the evening and the morning were the fifth day.” Something else important here, unlike the other days, day sixth and seventh have an article “ha” on the number – 31 “Then God saw everything that He had made, and indeed it was very good. So the evening and the morning were the sixth day.” Literally = day, the sixth one. Again, Genesis 2      2 And on the seventh day God ended His work which He had done, and He rested on the “seventh day from all His work which He had done. 3 Then God blessed the seventh day and sanctified it, because in it He rested from all His work which God had created and made.” Literally = day, the seventh one. Why this special focus on the sixth and seventh days? Because, on the sixth day, God created man to rule the earth and the seventh day, he consecrated as special. In other words, these clues have been given to clearly tell us that these days are not ages but regular 24-hour days with different emphasis. Isn’t God amazing! He took the time to give us such details.

Here are some common objections:

1. “How could the earth have a 24-hour day when the sun was not created until Day 4?” God is source of light. Until he was ready for the sun, there was another source of light. No different than in Revelation 21:23 “The city had no need of the sun or of the moon to shine in it, for the glory of God illuminated it. The Lamb is its light.” Also, Revelation 22:5“There shall be no night there: They need no lamp nor light of the sun, for the Lord God gives them light. And they shall reign forever and ever.”
2. “How could all those things that happened on the sixth day fit in a 24 hour period?” According to Genesis 1:24 onwards, God made every living creature (cattle, creeping thing and beast, man and woman) in one day. Also, according to Genesis 2:15 onwards (God goes in detail over certain parts of creation in Genesis 2), he even put Adam in the Garden of Eden, brought the cattle, beast of the earth, and the birds of the air for him to name, and then saw his loneliness and made Eve. Keep in mind that God could have made all the creatures in seconds. As to Adam naming all the animals, we are talking about 2500 or less basic kinds (the idea of species has become so malleable). Finally, wouldn’t it take time for him to feel lonely. Then, it would take time for Adam to fall asleep and then God form Eve from his side. Keep in mind – sin slows us down on many levels. This is prior to sin and Adam could feel, sense, and understand much faster.
3. “How about verses from Psalm 90:4 “For a thousand years in Your sight are like yesterday when it is past, and like a watch in the night” and 2 Peter 3:8 “But, beloved, do not forget this one thing, that with the Lord one day is as a thousand years, and a thousand years as one day”? The problem with such verses is that they are taken out of context. They are given to affirm that God is so much more than we are, especially with regards to time. In fact, the word for day (yom) is found about 65 times for indefinite periods and 2,239 times for 24-hour days. This is especially true in Genesis where the word for day (yom) is found 83 times in the singular, including 72 in absolute state. Each of the 72 uses are 24-hour days (Todd Beall). I can also give many references that affirm that other books in the Bible considered the Genesis 1 and 2 days as 24-hour days.

Why 24-hour days?

1. Jesus did it to accommodate to us.
2. Jesus did it to give us a pattern.

Exodus 20      8 “Remember the Sabbath day, to keep it holy. 9 Six days you shall labor and do all your work, 10 but the seventh day is the Sabbath of the LORD your God. In it you shall do no work: you, nor your son, nor your daughter, nor your male servant, nor your female servant, nor your cattle, nor your stranger who is within your gates. 11 For in six days the LORD made the heavens and the earth, the sea, and all that is in them, and rested the seventh day. Therefore the LORD blessed the Sabbath day and hallowed it.”

This is no different than what he did in his incarnation.

1. Accommodation
2. Pattern

Philippians 2         5 Let this mind be in you which was also in Christ Jesus, 6 who, being in the form of God, did not consider it robbery to be equal with God, 7 but made Himself of no reputation, taking the form of a bondservant, and coming in the likeness of men. 8 And being found in appearance as a man, He humbled Himself and became obedient to the point of death, even the death of the cross.

Is he your substitute? Are you saved? Are you following him?