I was listening to a recent Alex O’ Connor podcast with Emily Qureshi-Hurst, and she said something interesting. I believe it was to the extent of why God would need to create such an old universe for the end goal to have Jesus die on a cross for us humans and no other creature, when humans have only been alive for such a minute period of time compared to the age of the universe. Why not have a young-earth creationist view and make the earth in 6 days and have humans inhabit it immediately? Why would millions of years of evolution and animal suffering have to occur?
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Well I think you have a lot of potential answers to this, but I’ll go with the simplest I’ve heard and am fond of. It goes something like this:
Have you ever read Genesis 1. I mean really read Genesis 1. Line by Line. The text says that God created all these things - the sun, moon, and stars, the earth, and all kinds of animals and it was good. Pause on that thought. It was good. God thought creation, before humans ever existed was good. In other words, God delighted in creation for billions of years before humans came into existence. And scientists too, when we study vast timescales, landscapes, and our cosmic history are brought into the same fascination and awe as the Creator.
Okay I’m sure that could be said more poetically, but it’s the best I can do at the moment. Creation is amazing and God enjoyed it for billions of years before humans.
Or take something more poetic:
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“This strange, savage, gorgeous world is the way it is because, incomprehensibly, that is his style. The Gospel of the Incarnation is preached not so that we can tell people that the world now means something it didn’t mean before but that they may finally learn what it has been about all along. –Robert Capon in Hunting the Divine Fox
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We do seem to have a tendency to make ourselves the center of the universe. 
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I would agree with the notion that creation is amazing, but I guess I’m still having a hard time wrapping my head around how animal suffering can be “good”, especially if they don’t have the same spirit we do that would bring about self-improvement they can carry on with to the afterlife.
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Your post raises a lot of good and tough questions. To touch on one of them—the age of the universe, I think a couple of passages of scripture are relevant. For example, the passages that tell us a thousand years are like a day to the Lord and Galatians 4:4:
4But when the set time had fully come, God sent his Son, born of a woman, born under the law, 5to redeem those under the law, that we might receive adoption to sonship.
Now I don’t know why God chose to create this way vs some other way but I think the universe is just the right age for the reasons enumerated below.
[1] The existence of life depends on the amount of stuff or mass in our universe. If there was too much stuff the universe would have collapsed back on itself after the big bang. This leads to no life. If there was too little stuff or mass then the expansion would have been so great gravity would not have been able to coalesce matter into stars and galaxies. Again, this leads to no life.
Our universe seems to have Goldilocks properties: not too much and not too little – just enough mass and energy to support the development of life.
[2] The age of our universe is also just right. If the universe’s history was compressed into a single year, Jesus may have only arrived 5 seconds ago, but that was exactly when he needed to. The big bang did not produce any heavy elements. We were left with primordial hydrogen, helium and lithium. Elements like carbon and oxygen needed time to form and they did so in stars through nucleosynthesis (see the image below). Higher elements on the periodic table were formed in the cores of stars that exploded in a supernova eruption once their fuel was exhausted. Our sun is thought to be a third-generation star. Granted the elements in our universe–those elements absolutely necessary for life-- needed to go through several star cycles in order to be produced, our universe could not be much younger than it is right now to sustain us. We needed a third generation star and time for advanced life and the environment suitable for it to develop.
[3] The size of our universe is related to the amount of stuff (mass) in our universe and also how long it has been expanding for. As we saw in the previous two examples, both of these are just right for the development of advanced life.
John Polkinghorne wrote:
The size of the universe is essentially a function of its age. We need time to create second-generation stars, and then for life to evolve, so 13.7 billion years seems about right. If all the 10^22 stars of the observable universe were not there, we would not be here to be daunted by cosmic immensity. In many respects there is no difference between 14 thousand years, 14 million years, and 14 billion years: they are all immense to us and all equally comprehensible to God.
The truth is the universe could not be much smaller and support advanced life.
Astrophysicist Michale G. Strauss said:
“Since this is the youngest universe to support life like us, it is also the smallest universe that can support life like us.” He also sums things up with a poignant rocket analogy:
Sometimes critics of the Christian God will argue that since they wouldn’t do something in a certain way then God wouldn’t do it that way either, and so God must not exist. In the case of the universe they argue it would be ridiculous to create such a vast universe with very few places in the universe that are hospitable to life. But the critics are missing some important points. First, though vast, the universe is the smallest it can be to do the job of hosting a life-supporting planet as discussed above. Second, if the goal of the creator is to make a home for humans who do have significance, the infrastructure for that home must be adequate. The critics don’t see the overall picture of the purpose of the universe. Let me give you an example. When I was growing up I was fascinated by the space program which had the goal of sending humans to the moon and bringing them back to earth safely. To make such a mission possible, the most powerful rocket ever made was built: the Saturn V. On top of this rocket that stood 36 stories high was a little tiny command module with barely enough room for three astronauts to sit in. Out of the entire rocket only a tiny fraction of the infrastructure was hospitable to life in space. So I guess the rest of the Saturn V was a colossal waste of space and indicates the lack of any real designer. The size and scope of the Saturn V was exactly what was required to send humans to the moon just as the size and scope of our universe is exactly what is required for us to live. Both the universe and the Saturn V are exquisitely designed to support life in only a tiny region of its entirety. But there is no wasted space. We live in a small big universe.
It is also important to note this is a pretty subjective complaint against the universe. For all we know, God may have made the universe insanely large and old as a testament to his power and glory. Or to give us something to do and think about.
Animal suffering and evolution are a much more difficult question. Why God chose to have life basically require the destruction of other life is troubling. I find Alex O’ Connor expresses a lot of the same questions I have and I can appreciate his point of view. I think animal suffering is a major sticking point for him… at least I gleaned that from his debate with Trent Horn.
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Great are the mysteries
… But your question seems short sighted .
why bother with a universe at all ? Why not simply create a self aware entity with free will and immortality, morality , and and equality instantly? Why bother with any of this soap opera , just cut to the chase .
My conclusion, there must be something fulfilling in the journey for God .
Perhaps its the joy of raising children, including all the heartbreak and struggles .something that can only be learned through trial and victory.
When I strip away all the traditions and anecdotes, if there isnt something inherently valuable in this process , the created universe seems pointless and inefficient.
I appreciate the thorough response! Animal suffering has been a thorn on my side as well ever since watching Alex O’ Connors stuff. I’ve read CS Lewis’ The Problem of Pain but either it was too academic/flew past my head or it wasn’t sufficient enough for me, so I’m still searching for an answer on this topic. I think the grand scale of time is what’s throwing me off the most.
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He obviously has no choice. Eternally, infinitely, instantiated nature is the only breeding ground for supernature.
Same old chestnut.
Suffering!
How many times has this been discussed, reasoned, agonised over, and any sort of justification denied or refused?
it is the whole reason the garden narrative exists! We seem to need an explanation for evil and suffering!
Perhaps there isn’t one? or more likely, perhaps there isn’t a way to remove or exclude it!
Unsatisfactory? Yes. Unavoidable? In the world we have, also yes.
Never mind, I am sure we can chew this one over again, and again, and again, for eternity.
Richard
Like all the nut fodder on this site Richard!
And it obviously isn’t avoidable, and there’s no moral justification for it, but apart from that, agreed! It’s perichoretic to existence.
In transcendence we wouldn’t need to address it, as all would be well for all.
And more importantly, why would God create the universe to look billions of years old, on Wednesday 26th October 4004 BCE? Above the strangely pre-existing Earth? Why does He perform the ultimate act of maskirovka, and obliterate all traces of Himself? Go to inordinate, unbelievable lengths to make it all look as if He had nothing to do with it?
I don’t think that is true at all. That seems to be the result of mechanistic models of God, meaning it is a post-Newtonian and enlightenment fueled view some impose on the universe. I’d say for most Christians, the heavens declare the glory of God.
Vinnie
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If you just believe, without knowing, then all things are certain. Existence, order, the heavens, life, mind, all demand, prove, intent to the believer.
And as YEC is true, that’s what He did. To test our faith.
Depends who is looking, and how they are looking.
Richard
The rational. Including the minimally fundamentalist. Those who believe that eternal, infinite, undesigned nature cannot exist without being instantiated by intent.
That would be one view of many, something scientists seem to resist as possible.
Richard
Not non-knowledge believing ones. Knowledge believing ones, the majority, only necessarily exclude the possibility by definition.
Ouch
Long live the Science God.
Holder of all that is true
Unquestionable, and inerrant
All must bow down and acknowledge
No other view or understanding is permitted
Scientism reigns
Richard
And with that, we demonstrate that the God envisioned by philosophy is probably not the same as the one that others call Jehovah. 
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If the point is human habitation, why not have the universe consist of only the solar system and the stars visible to the Adam and the patriarchs? While such an arrangement would not work to produce the Earth by means of stellar synthesis and modern cosmology, simply instantaneously poofing it into existence as YEC believes would seem possible. The billions of galaxies, presently visible to technology unavailable though prior human history, are unnecessary and superfluous in terms of utility focused on humans.
We now know the universe to be mind-boggling vast in both space and time, and these are not independent observations. There is much more that exists than is immediate in terms of age and proximity. The extent of time before humans presents no more of a theological challenge than the extent of space itself. If the scale of the universe is not problematic for God’s omnipresence, why should the age of the universe be a problem for God’s eternity?
Time defines the size of our observable universe.
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