Please read articles 1-15 sequentially, otherwise they won't make sense.
Ruins of ancient Jericho
A BRIEF SUMMARY ON THE AGE OF THE EARTH. THERE IS MORE EVIDENCE TO COME IN ARTICLES 8 to 15.
The WHOLE word of God allows us to comprehend that the Earth is already 16,000 years old. Is this all the evidence we have? Not at all.
We shall be examining how this time-frame can be verified by the march of Israel around Jericho (whose walls fell down on the 7th circuit of Israel around the city – on the 7th day with 7 priests blowing the rams’ horns), by the Temple of Solomon and by the third Feast of the Lord – Tabernacles, which included the Day of Atonement. The blowing of the trumpets 10 days before the Day of Atonement and the 10 lampstands in Solomon’s temple all have their say.
As I claimed already earlier on we shall depend on the whole of the Scripture not just on Genesis Chapters 1 and 2, and a verse in the book of Exodus. Everything must be consistent and harmonious throughout and it certainly is.
There is an obvious pattern in what God created on each day during the Creation Week and then in comparing the pattern of events in the Creation Week and the Redemptive Week. All this is evidence that the word of God is divinely inspired and is only waiting for us to find its hidden truths. Watch for patterns within patterns or wheels within wheels, so to speak. God's patterns are hidden in layers upon layers like the construction of an onion or some of the modern archaeological picture books that detail the contents of a building with overlying transparent pages, each page adding to the whole.
We can confidently say that the Earth will be 17,000 years or 17 days-old when the Lord destroys all in a ball of fire and wraps up the old Universe with its stars and galaxies (2 Peter 3:10-12). There may be two such events. We shall not be surprised if that turns out to be the case. Three creations of the earth would fall within God's patterns of threes but that remains to be seen. In any case, in our resurrection bodies we shall remain untouched as were also Shadrach, Meshach and Abednego when they were thrown into a furnace made 7 times hotter than usual by an enraged King Nebuchadnezzar (Daniel 3:19-25; note that 7 is always associated with end-times). To everyone's shock, these three men walked in the midst of the fire with Jesus and then walked out of it, their clothes not even tainted with the smell of smoke. God always intended this scripture be used in the context I am presenting it to you now.
Sin and the old world will totally melt away, perhaps swallowed up into hell or perhaps collapse into a black hole of sorts. The New Earth and the New Heavens will replace the old for habitation by the righteous. This may be God’s third and final creation, a fitting association with the number 3.
‘through which the world that then was, being flooded by water, perished. But the present heavens and the earth, being kept in store by the same Word, are being kept for fire until the day of judgement and destruction of ungodly men. But, beloved, let not this one thing be hidden from you that one day is with the Lord as a thousand years and a thousand years as one day’ (2 Peter 3:6-8).
In the time of Noah
At the End
The predetermined lifespan of the Earth, if we include the 1000-year Millennium, is 17,000 years or 17 of God's days. There is a good reference on the significance of the number 17 on the web (and on all numbers in the Bible for that matter, though incomplete). ‘In the Bible the number 17 symbolizes "overcoming the enemy" and "complete victory". God overcame the sins of rebellious humans when he began to flood the earth through rain on the 17th of the second Hebrew month. Noah's ark and its eight passengers rested on the mountains of Ararat on the 17th of the seventh month (right in the middle of God's annual Holy period known as the Feast of Tabernacles). Jesus Christ gained a complete victory over death and the grave when God resurrected him near sunset on Nisan 17 (Saturday, April 8, 30 A.D.)’
‘The Lord is not slow concerning His promise, as some count slowness, but is long-suffering towards us, not purposing that any should perish, but that all should come to repentance. But the day of the Lord will come as a thief in the night in which the heavens will pass away with a rushing noise, and the elements will melt with fervent heat. And the earth and the works in it will be burned up. Then, all these things being about to be dissolved, what sort ought you to be in holy behaviour and godliness, looking for and rushing the coming of the Day of God, on account of which the heavens, being on fire, will melt away and the elements will melt burning with heat? But according to His promise, we look for new heavens and a new earth in which righteousness dwells. Therefore, beloved, looking for these things, be diligent, spotless, and without blemish, to be found by Him in peace’ (2Peter 3:9-14).
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