οἱ λίθοι κράξουσιν (Luke 19:40)
There has been an idea proposed that the earth just appears to be old because of the Curse. This idea was put out there by the Young-Earth Creationists who, because of the overwhelming amount of evidence for the antiquity of earth, and because of a steadfast belief that the Bible teaches a young earth, felt a need to come up with a theory to harmonize Scripture and science. The theory is often backed up with the account of Jesus' miracle in John 2 when He transformed the water into wine at the wedding in Cana. The wine gave an appearance of being aged while the reader understands that it was made in an instant. While this seems reasonable at first glance, there is a great deal of difference between the two situations. Jesus' miracle at Cana was done to show His power and glory to the wedding guests. At the Creation, there were no witnesses to give God the glory, therefore no need for a miracle that would speed up the apparent age of the Creation. There was no deception involved in Jesus' miracle because the witnesses recognized it for what it was...a miracle. If there were no witnesses who knew the full story (as at the Creation), a false appearance of age would be nothing more than deception.
In actuality, to say that the earth merely has the appearance of age is to ignore any geologic evidence to the contrary, all for the sake of a biblical interpretation. This theory is completely unprovable and does more to hurt the Creationist's credibility than it does to promote the fact of a special Creation. One thing I want to make clear is that the earth does NOT appear old. It appears to have a history, and therefore it IS old. Consider the picture below...
This rock tells a story of its history (and not just with words). It is a block of marble that is currently part of a wall at the base of the stairs at the entrance to the Acropolis, in Athens. What can we deduce from this photo? Was it created instantly in place like this? Do its cracks and rough edges give the appearance of age and weathering but in actuality it's pretty young? Well, we know that marble is not deposited, it is a secondary rock created by adding heat and pressure to limestone. Next, rocks don't usually form naturally in blocks like this. It was probably cut and shaped. There is an inscription on the rock in Greek, but it's upside down. We weren't there when it was engraved, but we can deduce it most likely was NOT done upside down. Then we notice there are a few cracks. These cracks MUST have formed after the inscription because they cross-cut the letters.
Why am I showing this example? Because this could not have been the result of one event. Perhaps one event could account for the crack and the replacement upside down, but one event could not account for the deposition, metamorphosis, cutting, placement, inscription, removal, cracking and replacement. That simply is impossible regardless of the magnitude of the event. In fact, the more catastrophic the event, the more likely these separate events would blurr together unrecognizably. The rock tells a story of its history that can be logically deduced even though we weren't there to witness it because we know how certain things work in present-day. The same is true for any outcrop of rock. A geologist is equipped with a knowledge of how processes work today, and he or she uses that knowledge to make an educated interpretation as to the history of the rock.
One can travel to virtually anywhere on the planet and see the same type of historical documentation in the rock record. For many such examples, see the Flood Geology Challenges page. Since this is true, the geological record is not the product of a single event (i.e. the Flood). Therefore the earth must have gone through many more events in a history that spanned far longer than just a few thousand years. All of this can be deduced from observation alone without even invoking radiometric dating.
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