The opening chapter of the Bible is potentially the most studied chapter of all. It gives a short summary of creation that some would argue encompasses 14 billion years and others just 6 days. In regard to the time frame, we should note that the sun and moon were not created until the fourth day, and so the length of the first 3 days (days of God) is arguably way longer than 72 hours (that would be 3 solar days). Also, there is the ‘gap theory’ that argues that in verse 1 God created the heavens and the earth and so they must have looked great; yet by verse 2 they are looking out of shape and empty. Therefore, there is a gap of completely unknown length between Genesis 1:1 and Genesis 1:2 and then from verse 3 we have an account of the restoration of the already ancient heaven and earth.
In 1927 a Belgian Catholic priest, Georges Lemaitre put forward the first theory explaining a universe that came out of nothing. It was immediately mocked by scientists of his day as it sounded too much like Genesis 1. It was termed with some hostility by another leading scientist as ‘a big bang theory’ and is now familiar to us as the “Big Bang Theory”, and has long been the most widely accepted theory. What is not so well taught is that the possibility of the explosion happening at just the rate so that it would neither implode nor fragment, but continuously expand, is one in a trillion trillion trillion trillion! But even that tiniest of possibilities pales into insignificance when compared to the probability that the slowly expanding universe would do so in such a way as to produce an arrangement for planet earth to support life. These are the agreed calculations of brilliant physicists many of whom still choose to deny the existence of God! [For these arguments in more detail read chapter 2, God makes sense of human existence in Unbelievable? By Justin Brierley. SPCK Publishing 2017 ISBN 978-0-282-07798-4
Heavenly Father, I thank You for creating this immeasurable universe, our galaxy the Milky Way with billions of stars and the planet earth where I live. What a wonder-working God You are. I worship You my Creator and the Sustainer of all things.