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Sunday School

Lesson 6: The Age of the Earth

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David Capoccia

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In this lesson, Pastor Dave Capoccia examines what the Bible has to say about the age of the earth. With the help of a couple videos from Answers in Genesis, Pastor Dave first overviews why Christians should not accept the popular old earth timeline from today’s scientists, then examines what earth-age information is given to us in the Genesis 5 and 11 genealogies, and then finally considers why radiometric dating does not prove an old earth.

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Note: This transcript and summary was autogenerated. It has not yet been proofread or edited by a human.

Summary

The age of the earth is a significant question for Christians—not because it is a salvation issue, but because it touches directly on the authority of Scripture. We are reminded that the Bible makes clear claims about the age of the earth through the chronological genealogies of Genesis 5 and 11, which are unique among biblical genealogies in providing specific ages and timeframes. By tracing these genealogies from Adam to Noah to Abraham, and connecting them with known history, we arrive at an earth approximately 6,000 years old. We are also called to critically examine radiometric dating methods, which rely on unprovable uniformitarian assumptions that contradict biblical history.

Key Lessons:

  1. The age of the earth is fundamentally an issue of biblical authority—whether we trust Scripture or defer to competing human interpretations.
  2. The Genesis 5 and 11 genealogies are uniquely chronological, using specific ages and the Hebrew word *yalad* (direct fathering), which distinguishes them from all other biblical genealogies and rules out gaps.
  3. Radiometric dating depends on three unprovable assumptions—known starting conditions, no contamination, and constant decay rates—making it unreliable for determining the age of the earth.
  4. Even if gaps were inserted into the Genesis genealogies, they would only add thousands of years at most, nowhere near the millions or billions required by old-earth theories.

Application: We are called to trust the clear testimony of Scripture regarding the earth’s age and not be ashamed to affirm what the Bible plainly teaches, even when it conflicts with popular scientific interpretations. We should also ensure that apologetic discussions about origins ultimately point people to the gospel.

Discussion Questions:

  1. If someone asked you why the age of the earth matters when it is not directly about salvation, how would you explain its connection to biblical authority?
  2. What makes the Genesis 5 and 11 genealogies different from other genealogies in the Bible, and why does this matter for calculating the earth’s age?
  3. How should Christians respond when scientific interpretations seem to contradict Scripture—what principles should guide our thinking?

Scripture Focus: Genesis 5:1-11 and Genesis 11:10-26 provide the chronological genealogies linking Adam to Abraham. Exodus 20:11 confirms literal creation days. Mark 10:6 shows Jesus affirming creation history. 2 Peter 3:3-7 warns against uniformitarian thinking and reminds us of God’s catastrophic interventions in history.

Outline

Introduction

Good morning. Welcome to Sunday school.

We are getting our tech up to speed as we start. But thank you for being here right at the start. We this morning are having a very apologeticsoriented question because we are asking and answering a specific question related to origins and that is how old is the earth? How old is the earth? And the age of the earth is a really sticky question for many evangelical Christians today.

Many may not accept evolution or even theistic evolution as an explanation for man’s origins, but they are still persuaded or at least open to the idea that the earth and the universe are billions or millions of years old.

After all, they say, doesn’t science prove that the earth is extremely old?

Why the Age of the Earth Matters

Others might say, “Why is the age of the earth important? It’s not like it’s part of the gospel. Why argue about a young earth versus an old earth?” Well, let me address the latter question first by way of parallel.

“Why is the age of the earth important? It’s not like it’s part of the gospel.”

We know that the Bible is inherent. It is without error. It is true in all its claims, including its claims about the miraculous.

For instance, the Bible claims that a series of supernatural and deadly plagues fell upon the kingdom of Egypt before the Israelites who were enslaved there were released from captivity.

The Bible also claims that the sun and moon lingered in their positions a whole day while the Israelites slew their enemies under Joshua.

The Bible also claims that a great Babylonian king named Nebuchadnezzar was made to live like a beast for seven periods of time when he boasted in his own greatness before God.

The Bible’s Authority Over Other Claims

Bible makes many other claims besides these, but these are clearly miraculous claims. Now suppose someone comes along and questions those claims.

They say there’s no mention of the plagues in the histories or archaeology of Egypt. They must be a myth. Or it’s scientifically impossible for the sun and moon or for the sun to remain in the sky in a particular position on the earth without the world falling apart.

You’re telling me the earth stopped rotating or some other thing happened?

The earth would have fallen apart. That can’t be right. Or there’s no record outside the Bible of Nebuchadnezzar ever going insane.

It must have been someone else. Bible must be an error.

Let me ask you, would it be important for Christians to stand against such objections as those?

Should we argue that those things are indeed true?

We should. But why? They don’t directly have to do with the gospel. So why stand for those details?

Okay, we are looking.

Okay, there we are certainly concerned with the alignment of the Bible with reality, but they’re saying it doesn’t align.

Okay, it does undermine it does contradict the inherency of the Bible, which compromises everything else.

Fundamentally, even though these things are, you might say, minor details of the Bible, it’s about the authority of the Bible.

Can we believe what the Bible says or not?

Does the Bible have to agree first with another authority before we can really believe what it says? If so, it’s not really the authority.

“Can we believe what the Bible says or not? If the Bible must agree with another authority first, it’s not really the authority.”

Isn’t that what’s referred to as evidentary fallacy, right? That we need the for the Bible to be taken seriously, we need evidence outside the examples and I’m sorry I missed the first couple but seem to be arguments from absence there’s no record of this but we’ve seen so many things for that but are no longer true we haven’t learned everything right yeah so Mark’s mentioning a few things that are valuable but yes this does have to do with arguments from silence or evidence of absence It’s not absence of evidence or even just things that we don’t somebody doesn’t see a clear explanation. So they say this isn’t reasonable to believe according to the Bible. We need another authority before we can believe it. But if the Bible makes a claim about something and it’s clear in the Bible, then even if it’s not a salvific thing, we Christians should not be ashamed of standing up for that truth because we know the Bible is reliable. We know it is an authority above all other authorities. It is the authority. So, I’m not going to be ashamed to say, “Yes, the sun and moon lingered in their spots for a whole day.” And yes, Nebuchadnezzar really did was the one who went insane for seven periods of time. Now, this is all a parallel to the thing that I want to talk to you about today, and that is the age of the earth.

Applying This to the Age of the Earth

The Bible makes clear claims about the age of the earth.

These claims are not hidden. They’re not in some obscure passage. Nor do you need a code book or a PhD to understand them.

They’re plain. They’re specific.

Therefore, in connection with the other things I just mentioned to you, to deny, to explain away, or to reinterpret the Bible’s claims about the age of the earth is ultimately to do what?

It’s to do the same thing as denying or explaining away those other miracles. It denies or at least undermines the authority of the Bible.

“To deny or reinterpret the Bible’s claims about the age of the earth ultimately undermines the authority of the Bible.”

And if we reject part of the Bible for the sake of some other authority, then we are in danger of rejecting another part of the Bible for the sake of that same authority. Now, as Christians can be inconsistent, people can be inconsistent. So sometimes they don’t deny everything because of one part. But logically, if an authority causes you to rethink the age of the earth outside of the Bible, then if you’re consistent, that authority is really the authority that can undermine any part of the Bible.

So, I’m presenting this to you so that you will not be misled. The age of the earth is an important issue for Christians today. Not because it’s salvific, but because it’s about the authority of the scriptures, the authority of God. Is the Bible really our authority for truth or not?

“The age of the earth is important for Christians today—not because it’s salvific, but because it’s about the authority of Scripture.”

But perhaps you’re wondering, “Wait a second, Pastor Dave. Are you sure the Bible really talks about the age of the earth?” Indeed, it does. And that’s what I want to show you in the class today.

Overview: Reasons to Reject Millions of Years

Yes. So, it looks like we’ve got things going. My agenda for what’s what we’re going to do today is that we’re going to first watch a short video that overviews seven or eight reasons based on the scriptures as ultimate authority that we should reject the idea of an old earth. That is earth that is millions or millions of years old.

Then we’re going to investigate two very fascinating genealogies given in Genesis, Genesis 5 and 11. And we’re going to compare them to other genealogies that we find in the Bible and see what these two genealogies tell us about the age of the earth.

Then finally, we’re going to take a closer look at one of the main proofs asented asserted by secular scientists today as an authority for the earth being old and that is radioisotope dating. And we’re going to see if it really is trustworthy for answering that kind of question. Right? Let’s pray before we go on.

Lord God, I pray that you would make this a really profitable Sunday school class. Help us to understand your scriptures and not to be ashamed of it.

Give us a clear understanding of the world that is informed by your scriptures. Help me to be able to clarify that. Explain that helpfully in Jesus name. Amen.

Okay, we’re going to start with a video.

So this one is called why shouldn’t Christians accept millions of years?

Just about four minutes. As you listen, see if you can note the different reasons presented for why Christians shouldn’t accept millions of years. This is or I’ll Yeah, I’ll just stop there.

Video Summary: Seven Reasons Against an Old Earth

Why shouldn’t Christians accept millions of years?

Why shouldn’t Christians accept millions of years? Today, most Christians seem to accept that idea and they have for the last 200 years. But there are a number of reasons why we shouldn’t. First of all, the evidence in Genesis 1 is that the days of creation were literal. God defined a day in verse 5. He used numbers, first day, second day, third day. We also get an idea of how long ago these days were in Genesis 5 and 11 where we have the genealogies from Adam to Noah and Noah to Abraham. And so those tell us how long ago the creation was. A second reason is Exodus 20:1.

God gives the commandment to the Israelites to work six days and rest on the seventh because he created in six days the heavens, the earth, the seas, and all that is in them. We can’t have any creation before the six days. And God uses the same word for days in both parts of the commandment showing that God created in six literal days. The third reason we should reject the millions of years is because of Noah’s flood. Noah’s flood literally washes away those millions of years. Because that millions of years idea came from supposedly the geological record, but it came as a result of of geologists in the early 19th century rejecting the biblical account of the flood and then using anti-biblical assumptions to interpret the rocks and the fossils. But Noah’s flood is described in Genesis as a global catastrophe. So it would have produced exactly the kind of geological record we see today of of thousands of feet of sedimentary rocks and fossils buried in them. A fourth reason is Jesus view. Jesus always took the Old Testament accounts in Genesis as literal history. And in Mark 10:6, Jesus is responding to a question by the Pharisees about divorce. And he says, “From the beginning of creation, God made them male and female.” He then quotes from Genesis 1 and2. So Jesus is saying that Adam and Eve were right back there at the beginning of creation, not billions of years after the beginning as the evolutionists would want us to believe. A fifth reason we should reject the millions of years idea is because of the Bible’s teaching about death. The Bible says in Genesis 1 that God created a perfect creation. It was very good.

People and animals ate plants. They didn’t eat animals. And then God cursed the creation bringing death into the creation. And so Paul says in Romans 8 that the whole creation is now in bondage to corruption. A sixth reason is because science has not proven millions of years. See the millions of years doesn’t come from the rocks and the fossils. It comes from the interpretation of those things. And those interpretations are based on anti-biblical assumptions that dominate the scientific community today.

So the rocks don’t say millions of years. It is the interpretation. And finally we should reject this because the radiometric dating methods are not foolproof methods for giving us the age of rocks. Those methods are based on anti-biblical assumptions again and there is good reason to believe scientifically that those assumptions are false. So ultimately the real battle here is not between science and religion. It’s a battle over authority.

Will we believe the word of God who was there at the beginning, who knows everything, who always tells the truth, who never lies, and who gave us an inspired account so that we would have the truth about where this world came from, why it is the way it is, and where it’s going? Or will we believe the fallible opinions of sinful men called scientists who don’t know everything, who make mistakes, and who are trying to explain the world without God so they do not have to be morally accountable to him. It’s an issue of authority, and we need to believe God’s word.

“Will we believe the word of God who was there at the beginning, who knows everything, who always tells the truth?”

All right, I know those came at you kind of fast, but I think it’s a really good overview of some of the things we’ve already seen and some of the things that we’ll see today as to why we shouldn’t accept millions of years.

Cataloging the Reasons from the Video

Just to catalog the different reasons presented in the video, this is a good summary.

Why shouldn’t Christians accept millions of years? Well, most most ways of trying to fit millions of years or billions of years into the Bible has to be fit into the creation account, Genesis 1 and 2.

But we’ve already looked at that. The creation account can’t fit millions of years because of the necessary way of interpreting the term day. The creation days are 24 hours based on the literary and the grammatical cues in the text.

“The creation days are 24 hours based on the literary and grammatical cues in the text.”

You can’t fit millions of years in Genesis 1 and 2.

Also, the Genesis 5 and 11 genealogies portray a young earth. We’ll say more about that today. Exodus 2011 confirms that the days of creation are just like the days of the Sabbath week or the week that culminates with the Sabbath in Israel. So, these are 24-hour days.

Noah’s flood totally messes up the fossil record, which those who don’t believe the Bible or who ignore the Bible rely on to postulate an earth that is millions or billions of years old. If the Genesis flood really took place and the fossil record does not mean what many scientists say that it means they interpret it according to anti-biblical that is assumptions that don’t align with the Bible that reject the Bible or contradict the Bible at least in certain areas. So Noah’s flood contradicts millions of years. Jesus view in Mark 10:6 where he says from the beginning of creation they’ve been created male and female that contradicts millions of years. Death before the fall. You need millions of years for you’re going to have all those evidences of death, thorns, carnivore killing, disease, all those things that supposedly took place billions and billions of years on the earth before man was even created.

You’re going to have to have death before the fall. And that contradicts what the Bible says. Death came through sin and sin through what Adam and Eve did. Science has not proven an old earth. It’s only interpretations of science offered based off of assumptions that say that the Bible is not true, at least in certain areas. And then the dating methods, particularly radioisotope dating, they’re not foolproof. And when applied to origins, they use unjustified assumptions. So people say, look, this radioisotope dating proves that the Earth is millions of billions of years old. Actually, there are some assumptions playing into those calculations which make it unreliable. We’ll say more about that later today. Now, who is this guy who’s presenting this information? This is Dr.

“Science has not proven an old earth. It’s only interpretations based on assumptions that the Bible is not true.”

Terry Mortonson. Actually, one of the authors of one of the books I plugged previously, Coming to Grips with Genesis, and we found a copy of it, is now available in our book. So if you want a copy right now or after Sunday school class, you can check that out.

But he’s one of the authors presented in that book, and I think he was also and some other good ones. So very very helpful scientist and teacher Christian teacher but he mentioned the genealogies. That’s one of the reasons listed up here. Genesis 5 and 11 portray a young earth.

Examining the Genesis 5 Genealogy

Let’s examine that line of reasoning more closely. So if you would please open your Bibles to Genesis 51.

Katherine, can you put the slides back up?

Just have to kind of like put it on the front of the screen, otherwise my clicker won’t work. There we go. Yeah.

So, whatever you did was right. Genesis 5:1.

And we’re going to look at these genealogies ourselves. Genesis 5 and 11.

Really, we’re going to focus on Genesis 5 1-11 because this gives us a flavor of the whole chapter and what we see in the other genealogy. Take too long to read through both of them. But let’s just start reading by Genesis 51-11.

“We’re going to look at these genealogies ourselves—Genesis 5 and 11.”

This is page 5 in the view Bible.

Genesis 5 1-11.

This is the book of the generations of Adam. In the day when God created man, he made him in the likeness of God. He created them male and female, and he blessed them and named them man in the day when they were created. When Adam had lived 130 years, he became the father of a son in his own likeness according to his image and named him Seth. Then the days of Adam after he became the father of Seth Seth were 800 years and he had other sons and daughters. So all the days that Adam lived were 930 years and he died.

Seth lived 105 years and became the father of Enosh. Then Seth lived 807 years after he became the father of Enosh and he had other sons and daughters. So all the days of Seth were 912 years and he died.

Enosh lived 90 years and he became the father of Kenan. Then Enosh lived 815 years after he became the father of Kenan and he had other sons and daughters. So all the days of Enosh were 95 years and he died. We’ll just stop there.

You’ll notice that the rest of the passage continues in the same way talking about the descendants of Kenan and and those who came after him. We got Kenan and Mahalal and Jared and Enoch, Methusela, Lamek and then this genealogy ends with Noah or he’s one of the the last main characters. We see his sons as well. But let’s briefly make some observations on the first 11 verses and some things about the pers.

Observations on Genesis 5:1-11

So like in Genesis 25:5, notice first that Genesis 5:1 functions like a heading for this passage, what does verse one tell us this passage is about or will be about?

Yeah, generations or the record of the descendants of whoever’s mentioned and it would be Adam. This is a factual record of Adam’s descendants. We saw the same phrase back in Genesis 2 2:4. This is the record of the generations of creation or these the generations of creation. This is the record of what happened. We see the same phrase used again here and remember it’s used elsewhere in Genesis. Now what information from Genesis 1 and two is reconfirmed for us at the beginning of this passage.

The Lord created and how did he do it?

And he he made man in his image. Male and female he created them. God created man in his image and made them male and female. And notice there’s a lot of repetition in this passage. You heard it even in just the sample. Such and such lived x years, became the father of such and such. Then he lived x years more after became the father of such and such and he had other sons and daughters. And all the days were another number years and he died. We also see likeness repeated. God made man in his own likeness. Then Adam fathered a son in his likeness.

“This is a factual record of Adam’s descendants.”

Now notice which descendant of Adam is listed as the son in his likeness. Not Cain, not Abel, but whom? Seth. Now, after Cain and Abel, was Seth the third son of Adam and Eve, or the third child of Adam and Eve?

Not necessarily. We don’t know. It could be, but this genealogy does not necessarily record the first descendant of each father, but it does choose to highlight a specific descendant.

Obviously, Seth was not the first descendant of Adam and Eve, but he was a particular descendant important for this genealogy. So, the text emphasizes him and others.

The text emphasizes each father and then a particular descendant and then mentions that he had other sons and daughters.

Key Details: Ages and Descendants

Now, how old how old was Adam when Seth was born?

130 years old.

Isn’t that amazing? And how old was Adam when Adam died?

930.

“Adam was 130 years old when Seth was born—and 930 when he died.”

Whoa. Who was the last person listed in this genealogy?

Noah, or to be more technical, the sons of Noah, who are Shem, and Japheth. Now, how old was Noah when he had them? According to verse 3200, 500.

Though notice this sentence breaks the pattern that we see throughout this passage by noting three descendants and not one. Usually we just get one. Now note also that Noah’s 500th year was not necessarily when these three were born.

Though Noah could have had triplets.

This know this number probably refers to when Noah either started to have children or had one of these three. One of these three’s boys were born. And why do I say that? Because we see the same kind of record at the end of Genesis 11 with Tara and Abram. We’re going to be told that three sons were born at the same time or what it could be interpreted as the same time, but it’s actually not the case. It just means that there were three sons born and at least one of them was born in this year.

The Genesis 11 Genealogy

Now according to Genesis 7:7, Noah was 600 when the flood came upon the earth. So 500 with these sons, 600 when the flood came. Now let’s pause in our observations of this passage and jump over to Genesis 11 for a moment.

Genesis 11:es 10 to 26. This is after the account of the Tower of Babel, the city of Babel. We’re not going to read through this passage, but if you just scan it, you notice that it’s quite similar to Genesis 5. It starts the same way. These are the records of the generations of, and it starts with Shem. And we also see the same structural formula as in Genesis 5, but here we don’t get a tally for the total age of each father.

But does that mean that we can’t know the total age at death of each person?

Even though it’s not tabulated for us, we can actually still figure it out because the text does tell us how old a person was when he fathered a particular son and then how many more years he lived. So just add those two together and you can still get the age of that person’s entire lifespan.

Now, more importantly, we can still know the age of a person when he a son.

And we’re going to see why that’s important in just a second. Now, who starts this genealogy in verse 10? It is Shem. Now, how old was Shem when he had his son Arpacshad says 100. Now, the text might be a little confusing at first.

We might have to put a little asterisk on 100 because it says Shem was 100 and then he had a son two years after the flood.

So, that could be interpreted to mean that he was 98 when the flood ended. Two years later, he had a son at 100. Or it could be that he was 100 when the flood ended and two years later he had a son which would mean he was 102 when he had a son. I think the second interpretation is more likely. Verse 10 probably means that Shem was 102 when our Pakshad was born rather than 100. He was 100 at the end of the flood.

It’s not super big deal between those two years, but the detail of two years after the flood is important because it allows us to link the genealogies of Genesis 5 and Genesis 11 because Genesis 7:7 says the flood took place in Noah’s 600th year.

“The detail of two years after the flood allows us to link the genealogies of Genesis 5 and Genesis 11.”

And the text here says that Shem was probably 102 when Shem fathered a son two years after the flood.

That means we can calculate when Noah begat Shem, namely when Noah was 500, right? Because if Shem is 100 when the flood ended and the flood took place 100 years after Noah begat sons, then Noah must have been 500 specifically when Shem was born. Maybe the other two sons too, but Shem, we know Noah was 500 and that’s when Shem began to live. Shen must have been Noah’s firstborn or one of his firstborn. Now notice how old Shem was when he died.

He lives 500 more years, but that doesn’t give us his total age.

We have to add it up.

500 plus how old he was whenever he bore his son our pacad.

So he was if he bore his son when he was 102 then he was 602 when he died because remember it says he lived 500 years later or he lived 500 more years after he became the father of our pakshad.

Declining Lifespans After the Flood

Now as we skim through the fig the figures and ages on the rest of list this list so you can just glance at that or maybe just remember this passage from your own Bible reading. Do you notice anything about the ages as the passage goes on?

They’re getting shorter. In fact, by the time we get to the end of the passage, they are much shorter.

“The ages are getting shorter. By the end of the passage, they are much shorter.”

Many in the Genesis. Oh, and that’s not the only difference. Is there another difference that you notice?

The specific descendant that is mentioned comes a lot earlier than in the Genesis 5 passage and increasingly early. Many in the Genesis 5 list, they didn’t give birth to that specific descendant until past age 70 or 100.

Sorry, this keeps coming in and out. But most of the fathers here, they have their descendants around 30, 35.

Now notice Nahor in verse 24 of chapter 11. How long did he live in total?

So that was 119 more years plus how old he was when he had his first or when he had that particular descendant.

So he was 148. Yes, we’re using math here. 29 + 119 148. And I had to double check these numbers because I often make really simple mistakes in math. About 148 years. And that’s a big difference than how old Adam was. Remember Adam was more than 900. And now we have Nahor at 148.

Bible does not specifically tell us why this decrease, this very noticeable decrease in age happened. Though the reason seems to have something to do with a change nature of the world after the flood though it could also have something to do with how DNA gets corrupted over time. So, it could be that just the accumulation of the genetic load meant that people were dying of diseases or other problems before they reached extremely long ages of life.

Terah and Abram: Understanding the Pattern

Well, anyways, notice which important person appears near the end of our list in Genesis 11 and verse 26. Who’s that?

Abram.

And then notice that verse 26 ends just like or the starting in verse 26 we see a shift in the genealogy just like we did in Genesis 5. Genesis 5:32 we have one descendant but with three listed sons.

Terara says lived 70 years and became the father of Abraham, Nahor, and Haron.

Now here’s where I’m explaining a little bit more what I said before. It says that Terara was 70 years old. And it could be interpreted that he had all these three sons right when he was 70.

It doesn’t necessarily mean that. In fact, it can’t mean that because of what we read on in Genesis 11 and 12 because the story is going to continue with this very important person in Israel’s history, Abram. And we see that Abram was actually not born when Tara was 70.

He was born later. And we know this because we’re told Terara dies at age 205.

And only then does Abram set out from Haron.

Genesis 12:4 says Abram was 75 when he left Haron, presumably right after Tara dies. Meaning that Abram must have been born when Tara was 130. So to follow what I just said there, I know I’m saying these things kind of quickly.

Terara dies at 205, but Abram sets out u presumably after Terara dies when he’s 75. So that means that Abram must have been born at 130 and not when Tara was 70.

“Abram must have been born when Terah was 130, not when Terah was 70.”

So it seems that 70 is the age that Tara either had his first son or the first of these three sons, either Nahor or Haron. So, don’t get don’t get confused by that.

That’s just a unique thing, I guess, with the genealogies. When these three are mentioned together, doesn’t necessarily mean they’re all born at the same time. At least one of them was. And the other information in Genesis helps fill in when a particular descendant was born.

Now, after verse 26, what does the rest of the chapter talk about?

Yeah, it’s basically about Abram and and his relatives. We get some more information about them.

Linking Adam, Noah, and Abraham

So, this is just overview some very fascinating, very curiosity stirring information in these passages in these genealogies. But to sum up, we’ve not only gotten in both of these passages a listing of descendants, but we’re told the lifespan of each father and the age at which they at which they fathered their first or a specific descendant.

And the list of descendants is clearly not arbitrarily chosen because they ultimately link three very important people in the Torah. Torah first five books. Who are those three people?

Abraham is one.

Noah is another. And Adam, Adam, Noah, and Abraham. They are the three main persons linked by these genealogies.

We are told the line of descent relating to these people and even the number of years between these people.

“Adam, Noah, and Abraham are the three main persons linked by these genealogies.”

Comparing Other Biblical Genealogies

Now before we try and build something related to the age of the earth, we should ask are these the only genealogies recorded in the Bible?

No, certainly not. Hebrews really love genealogy. So we see them many places in the Bible. In fact, just look at Genesis chapter 10 in between.

Notice we’re given the record of the generations of Shem and Japheth.

But there are three striking differences between this genealogy and the two that we just looked at from Genesis 5 and 11.

What do you notice as a big difference between this one and the other two we looked at?

There is no record of their ages or the number of years of descendants. What else?

Multiple.

That’s right. Multiple descendants are mentioned for each father. What else?

Yeah, there’s some mention of distribution.

Not only the mention that the land was divided, but as you get to verse 20, it says, “These are the sons of Ham according to their families, according to their languages, by their lands, by their nations.” We’re finding out how different lands become settled or different nations began.

So, this is definitely different than what we see in Genesis 5 and 11. But it’s not just this genealogy. Look over at 1 Chronicles 1. So, we’re going a little bit forward in the Old Testament here.

So, that’s page 414 in the Pew Bible, 1 Chronicles 1.

What do you see here again that is different from Genesis 5 and 11?

Right. Okay. So, we have a maybe rather than listing all the descendants of each father, we do have a selective mentioning of descendants though in some ways that’s similar to Genesis 5 and 11. But what’s different from Genesis 5 and 11?

Again, no record of years. And again, multiple descendants of each person are mentioned for some of them. And I think you could say that this is longer than the other ones that we see.

“No record of years and multiple descendants—that’s what makes other genealogies different from Genesis 5 and 11.”

This is another geneal Bible. But let me show you one more from the New Testament. Turn to Luke chapter 3.

Luke 3.

Just scan this passage starting in verse 23 and even look more closely at verses 34-38.

So Luke 3:es 23-38 focusing on verses 34 to 38. This passage details the genealogy of Jesus.

How is it different from the other ones that we’ve looked at?

It works backwards. That’s different.

What else?

Single descendant.

This time we have a single descendant.

So that’s similar to Genesis 5 and 11 except for Noah and Terra, but different from the other ones we looked at.

But what stands out, especially against Genesis 5 and 11?

Say that again.

No. These all seem to be tracking male descendants primarily. So, no, that’s actually pretty consistent.

But what’s missing here that we see in Genesis 5 and 11?

Jesus.

Oh, Jesus is mentioned. That’s definitely different.

No, no ages. Again, no mention of years.

That’s the big thing, by the way, in Luke. If you compare this genealogy to the to the ones we have in Genesis, there’s an extra Canaan put between Shem and Abram. But there’s very good reason to suspect that this is actually a scribal error that was not present in the original manuscripts of Luke. This is explained more in the book Coming to Grips with Genesis, also at Answers in Genesis.org. That probably is a repetition of the name Canaan spelled with a K, which we do see in Genesis 5 or Kenan. And it was wrongly put down as Canaan adding an extra son in some copies of Luke. So if you’re ever like, “Wait, why is there an extra guy here?” That’s probably the reason. Okay, so we’ve looked at all those genealogies, just sampling, there’s many, many more in the Bible. Hopefully you see that the Genesis 5 and genealogies are different than other genealogies in the Bible.

The Uniqueness of Chrono-Genealogies

There we see that there are in fact multiple ways to do to do genealogies but Genesis 5 are different in one particular aspect. They are the only chrono genealogies in the Bible. That is they are the only ones that tell us how old each father lived and how old they were when they had particular children.

In fact, Moses, the genealogies writer, he is very meticulous about time in his books. If you keep going through the Torah, you find that Moses records exactly how many years each of the patriarchs lived.

“Genesis 5 and 11 are the only chrono-genealogies in the Bible—the only ones that tell us how old each father was.”

He also records when they gave birth to their children.

He even tells the people of Israel how long they were in Egypt and how long they spent in each place when they came out of Egypt.

So Moses original audience from all these meticulous time details they would have had a very good sense of where they fit in earth’s timeline.

And if this was true of the original audience, then we too should be able to use the time details in the Bible, even the ones in Genesis 5 and 11, to discover where we fit in the timeline of the earth and even how old the earth actually is.

Objection: Are There Gaps in the Genealogies?

But now someone will say, “Wait a second, hold everything. You can’t use these two genealogies to calculate the age of the earth because they have gaps.

There are names and years omitted in these genealogies.

“You can’t use these genealogies to calculate the age of the earth because they have gaps—is that a fair objection?”

Is that a fair objection?

Well, the objection comes from two main truths or I should say two main sources.

It’s first based partly on modern scientific and archaeological consensus that says you cannot fit the necessary events of the ancient world and the fossil record in a timeline established by these two genealogies. I mean, okay, we can’t fit it fit it into Genesis 1 and 2, but we had to f it somewhere. So, Genesis 5 and 11 must be where we fit it. So, there must be gaps. That’s one reason for that objection. And the other reason is something that’s actually something that is definitely true. There are gaps in other genealogies of the Bible.

Some genealogies in the Bible do omit names that appear in other genealogies.

In fact, some of the New Testament genealogies do that.

Four Reasons Against Gaps

But I’m going to give you four reasons as to why we should not listen to this objection that there are gaps in the chrono genealogies and the genealogies given in Genesis 5 and 11. The first reason is, as we’ve seen, these two genealogies are different from any of the other genealogies in the Bible.

Whatever might cause a biblical writer to omit unimportant names in customary genealogies does not necessarily apply to these two unique genealogies.

Second reason is that part of the reason gaps appear in other parts of the Bible has to do with the word used to link the descendants. Most genealogies, many genealogies, we see the phrase blank, son of blank, son of blank.

Now the word son in that context it could refer to somebody other than one’s immediate descendant other than your literal son. It could refer to a grandson for instance. It’s more like the term relative. This word had a lot of flexibility.

And so for other genealological records for the writers of those records for the sake of brevity for the sake of symmetry for the sake of memorization they could use the word son of without being inaccurate.

People understand, oh, okay, this doesn’t necessarily have to be a direct descendant. That’s what you see with most genealogies in the Bible, but in Genesis 5 and 11, we don’t see that word used. We instead see the word became the father of fathered or beed.

These are all translations of the Hebrew word yalad. And it is a word that is only used to describe direct descendants, father to son, mother to daughter, etc.

So again, we see a difference between the Genesis 5 and 11 genealogies versus the others because they actually use a different word to link the descendants.

Third, it is inconsistent with the author Moses’s purpose and practice to put in gaps because I just told you and it’s observable in his five books, he is quite meticulous when it comes to time.

And we even see that in the genealogies themselves. So why would Moses suddenly open large swaths of time when he’s careful not to do that in the rest of his book?

So that is another reason to not believe in gaps. But fourth and finally, reading gaps into the genealogies actually accomplishes nothing for those who want to fit in millions or billions of years into Genesis.

Because as we’re going to see more clearly in just a moment, the two genealogies actually don’t account for very much time, relatively speaking.

So, if you were to stretch the genealogies to include double or triple the amount of time and triple the amount of people via omissions, you still don’t get more than 20,000 years, which is hardly enough to fit in most popular theories of an old earth.

And besides, why would someone write a genealogy that emitted more people than it included? You double or triple the genealogy based on inferred gaps, that doesn’t make sense. Why would he write a genealogy like that?

So even saying that there are gaps in the Genesis 5 and 11 genealogies, it still leaves one with a gross inconsistency between the biblical timeline of the earth and the popular evolutionary timeline.

So I say again, we can confidently assert that there are no gaps in the Genesis 5 and 11 genealogies.

“We can confidently assert that there are no gaps in the Genesis 5 and 11 genealogies.”

These are unique. These have been constructed in such a way that all the time information is included. And that means that we like the ancient Hebrews can actually use these genealogies to determine the age of the earth.

How much time went by between the beginning of creation and the patriarchs.

Calculating the Age of the Earth

So, let’s do that. Let’s do that right now. Let’s use the Bible to determine the age of the earth. And we’re going to do that in stages. And for the sake of time, I’ll be a little bit quick with this. Turn back to Genesis 5.

We can determine the total amount of time that went by from the creation to the patriarchs by noting starting with Adam the age of each father and when each descendant was born and then just adding up those ages. By doing that, we should be able to calculate how many years went by between Adam, Adam’s creation, and Noah’s birth.

So if we just start with Adam and Seth, Seth was born as we noted when Adam was 130 years old.

Enosh was born when Seth was 105. Kanan or Kenan was born when Enoch was 90.

Mahala was born when Kenan was 70.

Jared was born when Mahal 65. Enoch was born when Jared was 162. Methuselah was born when Enoch was 65. Lamech was born was when Methuselah was 187 and was born when Lamech was 182.

That gets us to Noah. Adam to Noah. Add up all those years that we just noted.

And according to this genealogy, how many years went by between the creation of Adam and the birth of Noah?

“Add up all those years and you get the number of years between the creation of Adam and the birth of Noah.”

Very good. This guy’s quick with the math. 156.

56 years.

And we do the same thing with the Genesis 11 genealogy. And I won’t walk through all of that, but you just start with the life of Noah, end with the birth of Abram out of all those ages given in the passage or the ages of when they fathered their next descendant.

What’s the total number of years between Noah and Abram?

952 years. I won’t ask you to do that calculation, but you can double check it if you want later. 952 years. Add together those two sets.

56 plus 9528.

From Adam to the Present: About 6,000 Years

There’s Chris again. 2008 years from Adam to Abram, the creation of Adam, birth of Abram. You say, “Well, that only gets us to the patriarchs.” We’re a long way from that today. Can we still calculate the age of the earth? Well, yes.

Because we can connect this information with other other information given to us in the Bible and also that we can connect with more or less reliable history. About how many years ago was Jesus born?

Yeah, about 2000. If he was born probably 4 BC, it’d be exactly 226 years.

I’ll give the other thing in just a second.

And some of you might know how many years went by from Abram to Jesus. It’s about 2,000 years. Numbers drawn from biblical events. It’s aligned with other historical records. It’s affirmed by most scholars.

So if we have from Adam to Abram 2,000 approximately 2,000 years. From Abram to Christ approximately 2,000 years. And Christ to the present approximately 2,000 years. Then how old is the earth?

It’s about 6,000 years.

About 6,000 years. There it is. The age of the earth plainly revealed in the true history of the Bible.

And we’re not the first ones to see this. Our brethren in the early church affirmed the same thing. Even when they had people coming to say, “Hey the Egyptian civilization is 50,000 years old, 100,000 years old.” They’re like, “That’s not it’s not what the Bible says. Earth is younger than that.” Now, 6,000 years, it’s relatively young compared to estimates of a million, billion, all that. That’s still a decent amount of time.

It’s still a long time, but it’s amazing that God tells us so that we can know how old the earth is. I mean, that’s something that we would want to know, right? People are still trying to figure that out today.

But God says, “I’ll tell you.” And we need him to tell us because what? He’s the only one who was there.

“God tells us how old the earth is because He’s the only one who was there.”

He’s the only one who’s there who survived today.

He’s the only one who could tell us, and he did. But someone else will say, “Hey, what about all the scientific evidence of billions of years? What about the variously dated rocks that were discovered that show how old the Earth really is?” Well, here’s what we got to talk about.

Radioisotope Dating Explained

Modern scientific dating methods.

Most of the dating methods used to establish an old Earth timeline or some kind of radioisotope dating. Now what exactly is radioisotope or radiometric dating?

Let me try to explain in simple terms.

Starting with uniformitarian assumptions that is the earth was always as it is now. No big catastrophes, no things that really alter the earth a lot. Start with unifor uniformitarian assumptions and what appears to be the oldest rocks or meteorites we have. Scientists draw a sample of the chemicals present within the rock and they analyze it. And some of the chemicals within a rock are radioactive, meaning that they are unstable. They spontaneously degrade into other substances. For example, some isotopes or types of uranium atoms decay and they form lead.

That is part of the radioactive uranium 238 isotope breaks off and what’s left becomes the molecularly stable 206 lead atom.

And by the way, this is why radioactivity is so dangerous for us because you basically got pieces of an atom flying off at various velocities and puncturing the cells and DNA of your body. And that’s usually not good for you. You don’t want to be be near radioactive substances.

Anyways, this breakdown of radioactive materials, it happens at a repeatable observable rate today. And scientists call this breakdown, this rate an element’s halflife. How long it takes for a half of radioactive atoms present in a certain sample to turn into stable atoms.

Now, the idea of radioisotope dating is to use the ratio of the radioactive element to the stable element present in the rock or the ratio of a parent isotope to a daughter isotope to estimate its age. So, for example, a rock with a lot of uranium in it would be considered relatively young because it hasn’t had a lot of time to break down into lead yet. But a rock with a lot of lead in it and very little uranium would be considered very old since the rate of decay of uranium is very slow. So must it must be that lots of time has passed by to change uranium into lead. That is basically how radioisotope dating works. Not always with uranium. It can be with various kinds of substances. Now this system sounds pretty reasonable and like a great gateway to figure out how old things are. But if you’re just listening to that brief description, you may notice there are certain assumptions about rocks and about how they change over time for this type of dating to work. So let’s now watch a short video that overviews radioisotope dating. And as you listen, note what three key assumptions are used to make this dating system work. This is about three minutes.

“The idea is to use the ratio of the radioactive element to the stable element to estimate the rock’s age.”

Nearly every textbook in science magazine teaches that the earth is billions of years old. And the primary dating method used for determining this is what is called radioisotope dating or radiometric dating. Now, this is a reliable method for measuring absolute ages of rocks and the age of the earth.

Right. Huh. First off, many scientists now regard the age of the earth to be between 4.55 and 4.6 billion years old.

Okay. So, if this method is reliable and accurate, why the 50 million-year discrepancy? That seems like a lot, but let’s get into some details here and see what’s going on. Keep in mind that there’s all kinds of scientific jargon on this topic, and so we’ll just present a very straightforward, simplified version of the process. Radiometric dating is the process of estimating the ages of rocks based on the decay of radioactive elements in them. Basically, there are certain kinds of atoms in nature that are unstable and spontaneously decay into other kinds of atoms. For instance, uranium will radioactively decay through a series of steps until it becomes the stable element called lead. The original element is called the parent element and the end result is called the daughter element. Radioisotope dating is commonly used to date ignous rocks, rocks which formed when hot molten material cooled and solidified. The dating clock started when the rock cooled. During the molten state, it is assumed that the intense heat forced any gaseous daughter elements to escape. It is assumed that once the rock cooled, no more atoms escaped and any daughter element now found in the rock is a result of radioactive decay since that rock formed. The decay rate is measured in terms of half-life. That is the length of time it takes half of the remaining atoms of a radioactive parent element to decay. Now, of course, that can be measured in a laboratory and it is assumed that since we know the decay rate, we can calculate backwards and come up with the age of the rock. But is that all there is to it? Here’s where it gets tricky. It’s true. We can measure a decay rate using observational science.

But there’s another kind of science that is required to accurately calculate dates for rocks and that is what we call historical science. Historical science deals with the things in the past and therefore it cannot be repeated and tested. Dating methods require both types of science because in order to get accurate rock dates, one would have to accurately know both the decay rate and the initial conditions of the rock sample. Right? Since radioisotope dating uses both types of science, we can’t directly measure the ages of rocks.

There are assumptions involved. For instance, how do we know what the initial conditions were in the rock sample? How do we know the amounts of parent or daughter elements now in that sample haven’t been altered by other processes in the past? How does someone know the decay rate has remained constant since the rock formed? The answer is they don’t. Let’s simplify here and talk about a typical hourglass.

Let’s say you walk into a room and you see an hourglass with sand at the top and sand at the bottom and some sand sprinkling from the top chamber to the bottom. Well, observational science would allow us to see and measure the sand and then calculate how long the hourglass has been running, right? We could make our sand measurements and then calculate when the hourglass was turned over, right? Well, those calculations could be wrong because we may have failed to consider some major assumptions like, was there any sand at the bottom when the hourglass was turned over? Has any sand been added or taken out of the hourglass? Has the sand always been falling at a constant rate?

Since we did not observe the initial conditions when the hourglass started and we haven’t been watching the sand all the time since then, we must make assumptions. All three of those assumptions can affect our time calculations. Now, of course, there’s more to understanding all of this, but enough said.

Okay, that is a simplified explanation of radiometric dating, but I think a useful one. So, you’ve got it from two versions. I gave you my explanation. We got another one from Answers in Genesis.

Three Assumptions of Radiometric Dating

You can see that there are three main assumptions in radiometric dating which are not necessarily justified.

Those assumptions are that we know the starting conditions of the parent daughter ratio of whatever rock we’re sampling. It is assumed that when the rocks were formed or when they cooled that only the parent element was present and no daughter element was present alongside.

This assumption of course is not provable unless one was there to observe the initial conditions. We’re talking about the creation of the world. We weren’t there or even just the distant past. Another assumption is that all the daughter element present in the rock came from the parent element. It is assumed that all the lead present in a rock for example that has at least some uranium in it is from the breakdown of uranium atoms into lead. But again, that assumption is not provable unless you were there to observe the rock the entire time it was decaying.

“The assumption of known starting conditions is not provable unless one was there to observe them.”

And then the assumption is that the rate of decay has remained constant. It has never changed. You say, “Well, how could that assumption be wrong?” Scientists would probably balk at the idea that certain conditions or certain times resulted in a rate of decay that is different to the ones we observe today.

But you already probably noticed from Genesis 5 and 11, the earth was different centuries ago.

People lived 900 plus years. There may be some things that we don’t even know about that would have affected decay rates so that they’re not the same as they are today.

Could it be that the rate was different at certain times in Earth’s history?

Uniformitarianism vs. Biblical History

There’s much more to the radiometric dating issue, but please get this basic fact. The only way to get millions or billions of years from radiometric dating is if you start with uniformitarian assumptions, presupposing that the world always has been the way that it is today and that nothing globally anomalous or catastrophic has happened to explain the rocks or the fossil record. But as I’ve tried to present to you before from the previous Sunday school lessons, that is not a fair assumption according to the Bible.

The Bible actually flatly contradicts that assumption in 1 Peter or 2 Peter 3:es 3-7.

I’ll just read that to you. 2 Peter 3:es 3-7.

This is in the context of people denying the coming judgment of God. Know this first of all, that in the last days mockers will come with their mocking, following after their own lust and saying, “Where is the promise of his coming? Forever since the fathers fell asleep, all continues just as it was from the beginning of creation.

Nothing changes. That’s uniformitarianism.

But Peter goes on, “For when they maintain this, it escapes their notice that by the word of God, the heavens existed long ago and the earth was formed out of water and by water through which the world at that time was destroyed, being flooded with water. But by his word, the present heavens and earth are being reserved for fire, kept for the day of judgment and the destruction of ungodly men.

So the history of mankind in the earth is not a uniformitarian one. There have been some major changes to the earth that are recorded in the Bible. So if you are calculating things based on the past, the ancient past, without taking that into account, you’re going to be wrong. You’re going to be off. And the further back you go, the more chance you’re going to be off and the more off you’re going to be.

It is poignant to consider that considering how anti-unifor the Bible is, it’s not surprising that uniformitarianism as a scientific foundation, it was first popularized in the early 1800s by gene by geologist who denied the Bible.

You don’t get uniformitarianism from the Bible. You get it from people who deny the Bible. That’s telling.

“You don’t get uniformitarianism from the Bible. You get it from people who deny the Bible. That’s telling.”

So I say again, Christians today ought to reject scientific interpretations like those often accompanying radometric dating that are based off of anti-biblical presuppositions, assumptions that do not keep the Bible’s true history in mind.

There are problems with radiometric dating. There are even several examples of this kind of dating applied to rocks in which the initial conditions were known. But the interpretation according to uniformitarian assumptions, it produced wildly inaccurate results. We knew when the rock was formed. We knew the conditions. But somebody who tried to apply radiometric gating according to uniformitarian assumptions, they got it all wrong. Now don’t misunderstand. I’m not saying that radiometric gating has no use, that it can never be helpful.

Actually can be helpful for studying the recent past, but it is mostly useless for studying origins, especially when you are engaging anti-biblical assumptions.

The Real Issue: Biblical Authority

Of course, as Christians, we are not simply trying to go out there and convince people that radiometric dating is not useful for determining the age of the earth. What we’re really most concerned about is the gospel.

We want to make sure that ultimately we are pointing people to the word of God and the gospel, not simply better science. Yes, that can be part of the discussion and getting rid of certain objections to the gospel, but the gospel is not radiometric dating or anti-rait dating. It’s about Christ in the gospel or Christ and salvation. So to summarize what we’ve seen today, despite its controversy in today’s church, the age of the earth need not be such a debated question. The Bible based on its own clear time details in Genesis genealogies and elsewhere. It presents a young earth of about 6,000 years. The Genesis 5 and 11 genealogies do not contain gaps, nor do they need to be reinterpreted due to scientific dating systems that investigate the distant past according to faulty assumptions.

So the real issue here is just as Dr.

Mortonson had said earlier in our lesson, it’s about biblical authority.

Will we believe the straightforward word of God or will we constantly challenge it and reinterpret it in order to fit it with another authority, man’s autonomous reasoning, man’s scientific theories and interpretations as a battleground revealing what we think of the Bible’s authority. The age of the earth is an important question.

“Will we believe the straightforward word of God or will we constantly reinterpret it to fit another authority?”

It’s not an issue to part fellowship over. You believe in an old earth or if you meet somebody that believes in an old earth, you can still have great fellowship with them. But it is an issue that needs critical examination because it is ultimately spiritually harmful.

It it makes you inconsistent with how you treat the authority of the Bible.

And I’ve even seen firsthand how people at least one person I know who compromised in this area and it led to more compromises in the way he viewed the Bible.

So this may be something that challenges your own beliefs. Sorry I didn’t leave time for questions today, but if you have questions about it, further objections, something like that, come talk to me afterwards or send me an email. Actually, in two weeks time, we will be giving some Q&A time. So, I’ve not been given a lot of time for questions in our lessons. So, you’ll have much more time in two weeks where we can talk about those things that you maybe have been wanting to talk about.

But that is it for today. We are coming near the end of our sevenweek creation series, creation foundation series and our last lesson which is next week and then we have the bonus Q&A lesson after that. Next week we’re going to talk about what it means to be stewards of God’s creation and even how to respond to environmentalist movements today.

I think that will be useful. Let’s close in prayer.

Closing Prayer

Lord, we do believe your word. It doesn’t make us unreasonable. Doesn’t make us unscientific. No, we love science and we do believe in sound reasoning, but it has to be according to the foundation of your sure word. Lord, autonomous human reasoning, reasoning that goes against your Bible or that ignores your Bible, that’s how we get into error. But Lord, when we reason according to your word, that’s how we think rightly. So help us to do that, God. Help us not to be ashamed of your scriptures but to stand up for it in Jesus name.

Amen. All right.

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