Wednesday, March 8 (3:8)

2 Peter: But do not ignore this one fact, beloved, that with the Lord one day is like a thousand years, and a thousand years are like one day.

Diplomystus from the Green River Formation

In college, I majored in geology. My dad was a geologist, and his dad, though he never graduated from college, was a geologist. His dad, my great-grandfather, had a love of the natural world, and though he never went to college, he was a coal miner and later a graphite miner, so he had to know something about the natural world.

During college, I spent a summer working for the Field Museum in Chicago and traveled to Kemmerer, Wyoming, to dig fossil fish. My senior thesis was about one of the layers found in the Green River Formation.

I later worked for the Denver Museum of Natural History (now the Denver Museum of Nature and Science) and published a paper on the type specimens of that museum. I was also a working exhibit where I talked about the Triassic dinosaur that was encased in plaster. I told passersby about how the fossil was found, excavated, and placed in a plaster cast to preserve the integrity of the bones and the surrounding rock. It was then shipped to the museum where the fossil would be prepared, meaning the rock would be removed, leaving only the fossilized bone.

Once, whilst delivering my schpeal, a creationist with a booming voice loudly proclaimed, "This sign reads that this fish is from the Cretaceous Period, some 55 million years ago. Nowhere in the Bible does it read that anything is a million years old. God created the earth in six days, and on the seventh, He rested. That is all we need to know."

That was my first experience with a creationist (though it wouldn't be my last), and I have since realized that our time is not the same as God's time. Of course, there have always been debates regarding science versus religion, but I believe you can't have one without the other. I believe you can't have science without believing in a higher power (God), which makes all things possible, including science.

I recall science trying to explain Moses parting the Red Sea as a great wind blowing the waters, creating dry land so the Israelites could cross, etc. I've since learned to take what the Bible says as fact. If God created Heaven and Earth, why couldn't He part the Red Sea? Why couldn't a virgin conceive the Christ child? Why couldn't He raise Jesus up on the third day? God doesn't need science to explain what She's doing. God can do all things at whatever time She wants. As Peter says, "But do not ignore this one fact, beloved, that with the Lord one day is like a thousand years, and a thousand years are like one day."

Today, may we believe in the miracles God provides in our everyday lives.