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Is a Day In Genesis Like a Thousand Years?

 

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"2 Peter 3:8 states that “one day is with the Lord as a thousand years,” therefore the days of creation could be long periods of time.

Answer

  1. This passage has no creation context—it is not referring to Genesis or the six days of creation.
  2. This verse has what is called a “comparative article”—“as” or “like”— which is not found in Genesis 1. In other words, it is not saying a day is a thousand years; it is comparing a real, literal day to a real, literal thousand years. The context of this passage is the Second Coming of Christ. It is saying that, to God, a day is like a thousand years, because God is outside of time. God is not limited by natural processes and time as humans are. What may seem like a long time to us (e.g., waiting for the Second Coming), or a short time, is nothing to God, either way.
  3. The second part of the verse reads “and a thousand years as one day,” which, in essence, cancels out the first part of the verse for those who want to equate a day with a thousand years. Thus, it cannot be saying a day is a thousand years or vice versa.
  4. Psalm 90:4 states, “For a thousand years in your sight are as yesterday when it is past, and as a watch in the night.” Here a thousand years is being compared with a “watch in the night” (four hours). Because the phrase “watch in the night” is joined in a particular way to “yesterday,” it is saying that a thousand years is being compared with a short period of time—not simply to a day.
  5. If one used this passage to claim that “day” in the Bible means a thousand years, then, to be consistent, one would have to say that Jonah was in the belly of the fish three thousand years, or that Jesus has not yet risen from the dead after two thousand years in the grave. "
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