The Bible says planet Earth was created 6,000 years ago. How did the dinosaurs exist on this planet 66 million years ago?

As a Christian for heading up on 25 years, this question and questions like it are somewhat embarrassing. Where does the Bible say anything about the age of the Earth? Sure, I know someone has done some basic math based on people’s ages and biblical events and other things that I really haven’t bothered to look into. I know that some other people take these things as gospel and like to propagate silly beliefs like this one, especially now as we can go on the internet and parrot things we read somewhere else.

I answered another question like this a year of two ago here, in which my main contention was that “the Bible is not a science text book.” It’s not. Really. It’s not. It’s a book about having a relationship with our creator. It’s a book about salvation and seeking God. There are no scientific facts in its pages. Dinosaurs are not important to the story. Time scales, such as the age of the Earth, are not an important aspect of the story. We will never know the truth, at least while we live in this life, but it is my belief that the story purposefully begins around the time that mankind was sentient enough to begin to understand the world around them.

Were there a literal Adam and Eve, or is it symbolism? There are scholars (one of whom I am decidedly not) who present differing points of view, even from one another, but if there is anything that should be evident, especially about facts that we’ll never ever have, it is that presenting a viewpoint like this as gospel truth is a distraction.

I belong to a non-denominational church who, evident in the service just yesterday, believe in a point of view allowing for science and faith to coexist. Keith Shields, our pastor who presented the sermon, spoke of a spherical, spinning Earth. The message was a refreshing departure from the common stance taken by many Bible literalists online. I’m actually glad my church believes and teaches this way. Hearing any kind of crackpot beliefs espoused in a sermon would be grounds for me to walk away. As an aside, he didn’t address the age of the Earth question, but it is evident from the message, and by far the most likely case, that he does not believe in the 6000 year old Earth.

The point of all this is: There are open minded church-goers. There are closed minded church-goers. Going around on forums, even if they’re troll questions as some are likely to be, propagating the idea that these are settled questions pegs one as a closed minded person, not bothering to apply any critical thought. The good news is that critical thinking can be learned. One doesn’t need to just accept what one has heard or read somewhere, or the opinion of one or two pastors.

Does this mean our pastor is right or wrong? Am I trying to build my case on one message by one pastor? Absolutely not. As a Christian for 24 years, I’ve heard this type of thing addressed in sermons very few times, like you could count them on one hand. In time, I’ve built my own paradigms, based on my own beliefs. That’s all they are. Beliefs are all they can ever be, especially regarding an issue such as the age of the Earth. This issue is not even really important to the message presented in the Bible, evidenced by the aforementioned fact that you really don’t hear much of it in sermons and the scant detail presented in the book itself in the creation account.

The Earth is much older than the 6000 years presented by Bible literalists, in my opinion. The story says, “In the beginning, God created the heavens and the Earth. Now the Earth was formless and empty, darkness was over the surface of the deep and the Spirit of God was hovering over the waters.” Genesis 1:1 - 2 (NLT) It doesn’t say in this story at what point in the creation event this is. “The spirit is hovering over the waters,” it says. There were already waters, obviously, and obviously a planet to contain the waters. Is this one million years in? 500 million? Two days? It doesn’t say. To an eternal god, (if you believe in one) billions of years can be like an eye blink. How about, for analogy’s sake, to say that God could create the world and the universe in 6000 years, or even six minutes, but chose not to? Maybe he’s a God who believes in creating quality, in doing things right. Getting to the analogy: contrast microwaving to real cooking. One’s faster. One is much, much better. You can’t make food at microwave speed without sacrificing quality. God, in his wisdom, I would think chose to do it the quality way, if this is the case.

To end, some say the Earth was made fast, and some say slow. The fact is indisputable that even the scholars don’t know, can’t know. We’re just finite creatures living in an infinite(to our knowledge) universe; everything we know has a beginning and an end; there are things none of us, the smartest included, will ever know. Presenting things as fact that we can’t know is a mistake.