Consider this from a really cool site:
Source:
http://www.kiva.net/%7Ekls/page2.html
Scientific investigation has repeatedly uncovered evidence of an ancient earth. The young earth creationists claim the evidence is being misrepresented but their view is not supported by mainstream science. Archbishop Ussher's chronology, based on Biblical genealogies has convincingly been shown to be in error as a guide for dating creation at 4004 BC. For believers this can be a source of great conflict. Most people think there are only two choices for Christians. They can hold to the traditional interpretation of Genesis and a young earth creation date, while rejecting science, or accept the evidence of an ancient earth as proof of common descent and reduce Genesis to a combination of myths & legends also known as allegory, and poetic writing.
Another option exists. Genesis can be read literally, and the evidence of an ancient earth rather than conflicting will actually support this view. Let's read Genesis again for the very first time...
DAY 1
In the beginning God created the heaven and the earth. And the earth was without form, and void; and darkness was upon the face of the deep. And the Spirit of God moved upon the face of the waters. And God said, Let there be light: and there was light. And God saw the light, that it was good: and God divided the light from the darkness. And God called the light Day, and the darkness he called Night. And the evening and the morning were the first day. Gen 1:1-5
Supporting Scripture
Bless the LORD, O my soul. O LORD my God, thou art very great; thou art clothed with honour and majesty. Who coverest thyself with light as with a garment: who stretchest out the heavens like a curtain: Psa 104:1-2
Through faith we understand that the worlds were framed by the word of God, so that things which are seen were not made of things which do appear. Heb 11:3
Before the big bang nothing of our universe existed, not even time or space. It truly was in the beginning when God caused the universe to explode out of nothing. One of the laws of physics is the law of causality which paraphrased says an effect can not be part of it's cause.
Translation - nothing cannot produce something anyway you look at it unless acted on by an outside force - in this case God. Space, time, matter, and energy spread out like a curtain at God's command. Why didn't the universe collapse immediately back upon itself due to the immense affects of gravity as physics tells us it could have? Obviously there was enough force to overcome gravity, but this would just as likely have resulted in no matter heavier than hydrogen ever forming in the universe. In the words of the philosopher why is there something instead of nothing (but hydrogen)? Genesis 1:2 tells us it is because the Spirit of God was hovering over creation and He chose to overcome the laws of physics which He set in motion by perfectly balancing the big bang event. In the big bang model of creation it is expected that photons would have been the first recognizable particles of matter to form. A photon is a particle of light. Imagine that! Many billions of years pass with stars forming and collecting into swirling galaxies. The newly forming sun condenses until the nuclear furnace ignites, light fills the solar system. - +15 billion to 5 billion years ago.
DAY 2
And God said, Let there be a firmament in the midst of the waters, and let it divide the waters from the waters. And God made the firmament, and divided the waters which were under the firmament from the waters which were above the firmament: and it was so. And God called the firmament Heaven. And the evening and the morning were the second day. Gen 1:6-8
God molded the planets of our solar system out of the elements of the cosmos - the leftovers of the gas cloud that formed our sun. This swirling cloud clumped and condensed into the individual planets. Day 2 expresses the work of God in forming and shaping one of these. The core of the gaseous ball that was to become the earth begins to cool until it solidifies. This distinctly separates the waters of the atmosphere from the waters of the earth - 5 billion to 4 billion years ago.
DAY 3
And God said, Let the waters under the heaven be gathered together unto one place, and let the dry land appear: and it was so. And God called the dry land Earth; and the gathering together of the waters called he Seas: and God saw that it was good. And God said, Let the earth bring forth grass, the herb yielding seed, and the fruit tree yielding fruit after his kind, whose seed is in itself, upon the earth: and it was so. And the earth brought forth grass, and herb yielding seed after his kind, and the tree yielding fruit, whose seed was in itself, after his kind: and God saw that it was good. And the evening and the morning were the third day.Gen 1:9-13
Supporting Scripture
But there went up a mist from the earth, and watered the whole face of the ground. Gen 2:6
Thou coveredst it with the deep as with a garment: the waters stood above the mountains. At thy rebuke they fled; at the voice of thy thunder they hasted away. Psa 104:6-7
Or who shut up the sea with doors, when it brake forth, as if it had issued out of the womb? When I made the cloud the garment thereof, and thick darkness a swaddlingband for it, And brake up for it my decreed place, and set bars and doors, And said, Hitherto shalt thou come, but no further: and here shall thy proud waves be stayed? Job 38:8-11
The earth takes shape like clay under a seal; its features stand out like those of a garment. Job 38:14 NIV
The earth continues to cool, steam begins to rise up out of the volcanic rock and forms a shallow sea over the earth. The dry ground is raised up out of the ocean, due to plate movement and volcanic activity. A heavy cloud cover envelops the earth. Life appears in the fossil records of the very earliest rocks that formed. - 4 billion to 1.5 billion years ago.
DAY 4
And God said, Let there be lights in the firmament of the heaven to divide the day from the night; and let them be for signs, and for seasons, and for days, and years: And let them be for lights in the firmament of the heaven to give light upon the earth: and it was so. And God made two great lights; the greater light to rule the day, and the lesser light to rule the night: he made the stars also. And God set them in the firmament of the heaven to give light upon the earth, And to rule over the day and over the night, and to divide the light from the darkness: and God saw that it was good. And the evening and the morning were the fourth day. Gen 1:14-19
Supporting Scripture
Where wast thou when I laid the foundations of the earth? declare, if thou hast understanding. Who hath laid the measures thereof, if thou knowest? or who hath stretched the line upon it? Whereupon are the foundations thereof fastened? or who laid the corner stone thereof; When the morning stars sang together, and all the sons of God shouted for joy? Job 38:4-7
A casual reading of Genesis suggests that the Sun, Moon and stars were made on day four. Taking all of scripture into account we see that these existed long before. What Hugh Ross points out in his books is that scripture records creation from the perspective of an earth bound observer. This observer would see the earth was enveloped in a heavy cloud of volcanic ash, steam and carbon dioxide. The light of the sun was visible but not the sun until this time as the cloud cover begins to clear. As the volcanic ash settles the single celled life forms in the ocean, including blue-green algae are at work cleansing the atmosphere until it is rich in oxygen, making air-breathing life possible. - 1.5 billion to 700 million years ago.
DAY 5
And God said, Let the waters bring forth abundantly the moving creature that hath life, and fowl that may fly above the earth in the open firmament of heaven. And God created great whales, and every living creature that moveth, which the waters brought forth abundantly, after their kind, and every winged fowl after his kind: and God saw that it was good. And God blessed them, saying, Be fruitful, and multiply, and fill the waters in the seas, and let fowl multiply in the earth. And the evening and the morning were the fifth day. Gen 1:20-23
During day five we see the filling of the seas and the skies. About 570 million years ago the single biggest period of creation takes place. Today we know this as the Cambrian explosion. Creatures with hard-shelled bodies like trilobites and shellfish were created, creatures with skeletons such as fish spread throughout the ocean depths. Soon after, the Earth sees the first creatures appearing on land, apparently brought forth by the sea: amphibians, reptiles, and insects. Another great explosion of life begins 225 million years ago as dinosaurs appear and they dominate for 160 million years. Note that the KJV translates the Hebrew tanniyn as whale. The translation used in the NIV is creature but it also means a marine or land monster i.e. a sea serpent or dragon. The NASB translates it sea monster as does the RSV and Darby versions. Young's Literal translation translates it simply as monster . Bet they never told you that in Sunday School or science class.
NOTE: The KJV uses dragon many times in the Old Testament. The dragons are not dinosaurs, as they were extinct millions of years before man was created. The dragons are probably crocodiles with an occasional hippopotamus, but they are not dinosaurs. The same Hebrew word is translated dragon and whale but Genesis 1:21 calls dinosaurs gadowl tanniyn or great monster. The only other place in scripture where this word combination is used is in Ezekiel 29:3, where in Ezekiel's prophesy great monster refers to Pharaoh king of Egypt.
Late in this day birds begin to fill the skies above the heads of the dinosaurs. - 700 million to 65 million years ago.
DAY 6
And God said, Let the earth bring forth the living creature after his kind, cattle, and creeping thing, and beast of the earth after his kind: and it was so. And God made the beast of the earth after his kind, and cattle after their kind, and every thing that creepeth upon the earth after his kind: and God saw that it was good. And God said, Let us make man in our image, after our likeness: and let them have dominion over the fish of the sea, and over the fowl of the air, and over the cattle, and over all the earth, and over every creeping thing that creepeth upon the earth. So God created man in his own image, in the image of God created he him; male and female created he them. And God blessed them, and God said unto them, Be fruitful, and multiply, and replenish the earth, and subdue it: and have dominion over the fish of the sea, and over the fowl of the air, and over every living thing that moveth upon the earth. And God said, Behold, I have given you every herb bearing seed, which is upon the face of all the earth, and every tree, in the which is the fruit of a tree yielding seed; to you it shall be for meat. And to every beast of the earth, and to every fowl of the air, and to every thing that creepeth upon the earth, wherein there is life, I have given every green herb for meat: and it was so. And God saw every thing that he had made, and, behold, it was very good. And the evening and the morning were the sixth day. Gen 1:24-31
Supporting Scripture
And the LORD God formed man of the dust of the ground, and breathed into his nostrils the breath of life; and man became a living soul. Gen 2:7
Day six begins as the dinosaurs become extinct. 65 million years ago mammals begin to rule the earth with the appearance of the grazing animals and wild beasts. True Man appears last with the creation of Adam and Eve. - 65 million to about 10,000 years ago.
What about prehistoric man? I believe they are included with the beasts of the earth just as monkeys and apes are beasts. No matter how intelligent they may or may not have been, there is no evidence that they were created in the image of God. There is no evidence that they had a spirit. The spirit is that part of man that acknowledges the Creator and longs for communion with Him. The Spirit can be suppressed but the result is restlessness and a lack of fulfillment.
DAY 7
Thus the heavens and the earth were finished, and all the host of them. And on the seventh day God ended his work which he had made; and he rested on the seventh day from all his work which he had made. And God blessed the seventh day, and sanctified it: because that in it he had rested from all his work which God created and made. Gen 2:1-3
We are now in day seven - the day of rest. Nothing new has been created since man appeared (More on this later).
The young-earth creationists say the 7 days are literal 24-hour days. The facts of the universe say they have interpreted scripture incorrectly. By realizing the days are long periods of time and establishing an earth bound point of view you can see that science and the Bible tell the same story in complete agreement.
I am new to this site and I hope you don't mind a visitor who is Jewish and who has proven to himself that the last 150 years of science prove God exists beyond a reasonable doubt, by the method of Mortimer J. Adler. Some of the confusion I have seen in the current discussion can be helped by reading Genesis and the Big Bang, by Gerald Schroeder, also his subsequest book, the Science of God, and a new translation of Genesis by Judah Landa entitled, In the Beginning Of. In the 13th Century, the Kabbalist Nahmanides derived a perfect description of the Big Bang from the first 6 verses of Genesis. Part of everyones' confusion is the little recognized fact that the original Hebrew vocabulary of the Five Books contained less than 3,000 base words, with prefixes and suffixes making up a total number of words less than 10,000. Words therefore had many meanings depending on the context. Yom does mean a day, but it actually can be used for any interval of time, and the proper view should recognize it measn the seven eons of God's time.