There is another kind of migration away from YECism. I was brought up in extremely conservative Lutheran environment, where the earth was absolutely known to be around 6000 years old, based on the absolute inerrancy of the bible, and YEC interpretation. Over time, in part from my study of physics, and after quite a few years of limited involvement with church, I came to appreciate that a major underlying rationale for the claim of biblical inerrancy, and the extension to claim absolute historical correctness to a modern interpretation of translated text, was an overwhelming desire for absolute certainty, in a world that God created in such a manner that there is no absolute certainty possible. The very act of measuring anything disturbs the item being measured. Yet we can measure accurately enough to do a lot of technology, and can even calculate the uncertainties, and develop methods to handle those uncertainties in a very predictable manner.
What does this mean for the present discussion? I am quite sure that God exists, that God did understand what He was doing when He created this universe. And, if so, understanding some basic facts about the universe can perhaps shed a bit of light on why God created this universe for us to live in, in the way it actually does exist.
I have a question for anyone who is attempting to derive a theological point from any source: Do you believe that God knew what He was doing, or did God’s intent for this universe get subverted? Now, here is a real conundrum: If God knew what He was doing, how could He possibly have allowed something to interfere in His universe in a manner that led to something other than what He wanted? And as we consider that question, let’s remember that this universe consists of the space and time that we experience. That is, time is a dimension of the created universe, so God, the creator, of necessity exists outside of the space and time of the created universe.
So God sees this universe from the outside, from above, below, right, left, front, back, and also from before, during, and after!
Since that is the case, God must know from His perspective everything that has happened, or will happen. And this means that this universe, the way it is working, is what God knew it would do. And I believe that God put us here, in this universe (including in detail each one of us reading this particular thread), intentionally. The world that God created includes having such uncertainty that people can believe in things that seem totally incompatible, such as YEC and TE. And my understanding of God’s universe includes the belief that God intentionally put us here for a finite period of time, and allows a lot of things to happen that are not good, in that He allows us to act according to how we want to act, and allows our actions to have real consequences in this world. I also believe that God has promised that e will ensure His intent is fulfilled, that “All things work together for good.” This doesn’t mean that every thing is good, but I believe that it does mean that what happens to me here on this earth is only things that God knew would happen, and that the interactions of even the bad things with the good things will turn out to be beneficial to me. Note, however, that the scope of consequences of our acts is limited. We as individuals can impact other things and people near us, but have more limited influence on things and people far away. Also, the scope of influence of the entire human race does not at present extend even to the nearest star, and will never extend in any significant way even to the center of our own galaxy. So God has placed us into a universe where we do have free will, our actions do have consequences, both intended and unintended (unintended because we cannot have perfect knowledge of our total environment, including everything that will happen as a result of our choices).
This is why I believe that God knew YECism would attract many followers, at least some of whom are just trying to find absolute certainty where there is no certainty possible. While I have personally come to believe that the universe is old, my understanding of God as Creator also makes it very clear: If I am willing to concede that God knew what He was doing, and that God has His reasons for putting us humans into this world, then there is no way to prove that God didn’t create the world 6000 years ago, with every single subatomic particle, including all the photons and gravitons that appear to be coming from places hundreds of millions of light years away, in exactly the same state (position, motion, and every other aspect) as if the universe had been created some 13 or 14 billion years ago in a Big Bang. Now, I really think that God did create a vast universe, with a whole lot of other places for intelligent beings to live, with whom we will never interact intimately, due to the physical reality of the universe God created. But if I concede that God is the only One who really knows what God did, then I cannot know for sure, and cannot prove by observations of the universe, when God created this universe in this manner, without knowing why He did what He did.
Before the YECs in this discussion jump onto my comment as “proof” that the biblical interpretation of a young earth is correct, I would ask you to note that to believe in the young earth, in contradiction with all the evidence that exists that indicates a much older universe, you must provide a reasonable explanation for why God would create a universe that seems to show something much different from what you think the bible means, when the bible says things that are subject to interpretation, as this discussion demonstrates. And you might do well to ask yourself why you are struggling so hard to hold onto a strange, unprovable claim that you have a source of absolute truth, truth in every possible interpretation of the term, when God created a universe of uncertainty.