Okay, if you believe that in the beginning God created heaven and earth and the earth was waste and void, and God said let there be light, and there was light, and all that. Then how old is the earth?

Billons and Billons years old.. LOL
i know it started once the dinosars were here,and who knows what was before them

Well, of course that's what I believe too, because I believe in evolution. :) But when I was researching dinosaurs to teach my 5 year old about, I came across a Christian site that said the earth was only about 6000 years old and that humans and dinosaurs co-exsisted. :huh: I was just wondering if that was something that most Christians believed.

I dont really know what I believe. I believe it was billions of years ago. But I also believe there were "humans" or a form of them around. Plus, if Adam and Eve were the first beings wouldn't the dinosaurs eat them?

i can ask my friend who is a bible lovin guy.. man is he a bible lovin.. LOL

I believe Earth is billions of years old.

some people just don't believe the science that proves it.

The bible says nothing about how old the earth is. It's another one of God's mysteries that we don't find out until we reach heaven. :)

Ahhhh, thank you Rachel! I knew you could help. :) I wonder where that site got 6000 years? It's like they picked some random number. :wacko:

Your welcome Lisa! :)

Wow. Good question!! LOL

I believe the age of the Earth is in its THOUSANDS...

I agree with Rachel. It's not something that the Bible places a heavy emphasis on. As our priest likes to point out, Genesis is more of a poetic telling of Creation, rather than a literal, scientific account :)

Hmm... I just got done doing a research paper on Evolution vs. Creationism and all of the information I gathered said the whole "The Earth is 6,000 years old" thing on the Creationism side. :chick:

Really? Only thousands? Not millions or billions? What about carbon dating?

I've been out of school for too long! I used to know the answer to why Christians believe the earth is only that old.

Carbon dating though only goes back so long..it measures the amount of carbon left in organic material..and at some point it just runs out...it can't prove anything is billions of years old.

I do remember though that scientists expected the moon to have feet of moon dust on it because of it's age..and it ended up being a fraction of an inch...proving the moon to be much younger than originally predicted.

Sorry I can't give anything conclusive. I'll have to do some research.

Well, some Christians have figured that by tracing back lineages, you can make a guess as to how old the Earth is. The best answer to that so far has been 6,000 years. But I want to stress that not all Christians believe this.

Young Earth Creationists: they believe that the Earth is somewhere around 6,000 years old.

Old Earth Creationists: they believe that when God created the Earth, it was aged, so to speak. This view falls more in-line with carbon dating, though they are strict Creationists.

Most vocal proponents of strict Creationism tend to be rabidly anti-evolution, almost to the point of extremism. Their viewpoint is limited, and quite often offensive, and it is a wide-open target for evolutionary debate. But as I mentioned before, this is not an across-the-board Christian perspective on creation and evolution.

Theistic Evolution teaches that God used evolution as a tool in creation. Where they differ from evolution is their belief that God still orchestrated major events, such as the creation of plants, land animals, etc. and most importantly: man. Christian proponents of Intelligent Design would most likely fall into this category.

Deists believe that God created the Earth (in a 'Big Bang' sense) and then allowed evolution to happen without interference. At some point, man (once he had evolved) was given the 'Divine spark', but Deists believe in a very hands-off God. This is not a Christian perspective.

Then there are people like me, who for the most part, don't really care :D. If you don't mind, I'm going to post a brief explanation from an Orthodox priest, who fairly well sums up the Orthodox perspective:

let me just say...as a student of Biology, I disagree with the mischaracterization of Charles Darwin and his teachings. He gets blamed for a lot of things that he didn't say or do. But I still agree with the basics of the above quote.

Thank you Emily! It's all very interesting to me. :)

I'm not sure what I'd be "labeled" but I don't believe in a hands off God, BUT..there is no denying there is some evolution....or in my opinion adaptation is a better word. BUT to me it only makes my faith in GOd stronger. He created life that is capable of changing as needed to survive!

I personally could care less how old the earth is, I believe man was created with the ability to think, communicate and make decisions based on right and wrong. But..even with humans, it is a fact that we've changed as well, in size and other small ways. These things make my faith stronger not weaker. God created science, so I've never understood why many Christians are strictly "creation" or "science"

I've found so many amazing things that have strengthened my faith as a result of studying evolution :dunno: I don't see the dichotomy between "creation" and "evolution", but then again I'm getting my Minor in Biology, so I'm a bit biased :D

in the beginning there wasn't any sin, so everything got along together.. i dont know about after sin..guess i need to read a little :D

I'm Catholic so I was taught to believe in creationism so obviously I think that has some part in it but there's no denying evolution occured somewhere too. I was asked this question on a biology test, just as an opinion question and I said that it was a combination of both cuz creationism can't explain everything really but I dont think evolution can either.

Well it's obvious dinosaurs once existed millions of years ago, and then they all got killed off by the ice age, maybe that is when God found this "waste and void" planet with nothing on it anymore because everything died lol and decided to put people on it, thus, making it civilized... haha, I have no idea.... :(

i thought it was a metor shower that killed them

Maybe,.... lol. I thought there was a meteor shower that caused the ice age and they all froze to death, thus preserving their skeltons?

I really have no idea.... :innocent:

neither do i. LOL i just heard about the Metor Shower. and that was it. like on Dinosar. and Land before TIme. LOL :lol:

the bible lists geneologies from adam to the flood, and from the flood to Jesus. then we have dating from there. so tho this can't be exact, this is how they get an idea.