Changing Land of Promise—Part XII – Fitting 3 Nephi 8 into the Geologic Time Scale

While evolution is being taught at every level in the education system today, and while there are promoters of such fiction everywhere, the fact of the matter is that the Lord has told us when and in what order the Earth was organized and how long it took. We have the word of several prophets over the past several thousand years to verify this information.    The Earth is 13,000 years old!
    However, that does not mean that the universe is not ageless, from everlasting to everlasting. But, age in this case is meaningful only as regards specific stages in a changing, yet never ending universe. 

This old 1850s barn was torn down and the wood used to build this (bottom) new house in Yulon, New York. The house is new, but much of the parts are quite old
    Like a builder using older parts to construct a new house, the Earth was organized with elements that have always been in existence, and some containing residue from earlier use. “Now, the word “create” used in the Old Testament regarding the origination of the Earth came from the word baurau which does not mean to create out of nothing; it means to organize; the same as a man would organize materials to build a ship. Hence, we infer that God had materials to organize the world out of chaos—chaotic matter, which is element, and in which dwells all the glory. Element had an existence from the time he had. The pure principles of element are principles which can never be destroyed; they may be organized and re-organized, but not destroyed. They hade no beginning, and can have no end (Joseph Smith, Teachings, pp350-352).
    “It was Jesus Christ, our Redeemer, who, under the direction of his Father, came down and organized matter and made this planet” (Joseph Fielding Smith, Doctrines of Salvation, Vol 1, pp74-77).

Thus, we find that some rocks that make up our organized Earth are very old. In fact, Felsic rocks found in the Canadian Shield of Australia date between 2.5 and 3.8 billion years. The oldest rocks have been found in the Acasta Gneiss of the Slave craton in Acasta, northwestern Canada, dated at 4.031 billion years. The Genesis Rock, obtained from the Moon by astronauts during the Apollo 15 mission, has been dated at 4.46 billion years. In fact, most of the evidence for an ancient Earth is contained in the rocks that form the Earth’s crust, however all this proves is that in the formation of the Earth, the materials used were old—not that the Earth itself was old.

This brand new home was built using 600,000 pounds of recycled parts, most coming from dismantled sections of Boston streets and highways. It is far more environmentally compatible, and much stronger than conventional built houses, with most of the parts obviously far older than the house itself
    In this way, the real prehistory of the earth pertains to its existence in a form or forms unknown prior to the remodeling process known as "the creation." In this sense, element, or matter, has and will always exist, however, it can be formed, molded, and organized into different “creations.” Consequently, the elements used were old—but do not signify the age of the Earth itself nor the period of time when it was organized.
    A truly meaningful age is thus that of mortal life on the earth.  It began on the "earth" and in the "seas" six to seven thousand years ago (5th and 6th days) according to the literal interpretation of biblical history and modern revelation. The scriptures are literal; they tell the true story of the creation and the time scale placed upon it by the Lord—beyond such eminent testimony there is really no need to go.
    As one President of the Church said, "So far as the philosophy and wisdom of the world are concerned, they mean nothing unless they conform to the revealed word of God. Any doctrine, whether it comes in the name of religion, science, philosophy, or whatever it may be, if it is in conflict with the revealed word of the Lord, will fail.  It may appear plausible.  It may be put before you in language that appeals and which you may not be able to answer.  It may appear to be established by evidence that you cannot controvert, but all you need to do is abide your time.  Time will level all things.  You will find that every doctrine, every principle, no matter how universally believed, if not in accord with the divine word of the Lord to his servants, will perish.  Nor is it necessary for us to stretch the word of the Lord, in a vain attempt to make it conform to these theories and teachings.  The word of the Lord shall not pass away unfulfilled, but these false doctrines and theories will all fail.  Truth, and only truth, will remain when all else has perished." (Joseph Fielding Smith, Conference Report, Oct. 1952, p60)

Evolution and the Geologic Time Scale are taught in all universities and colleges, while Biblical matters, time frames, etc., are forbidden
    An educated man, according to President Thomas S. Monson, is not one whose memory is trained to carry a few dates in history.  He is one who can accomplish things.  A man who cannot think is not an educated man, no matter how many college degrees he may have acquired. Thinking is the hardest work anyone can do, which is probably the reason why we have so few thinkers, and legions of followers who are willing to accept any amount of information fed them without verifying such matters for themselves.
    In the previous eleven posts, it has been shown how the events in 3 Nephi 8 affected the Earth, how the Biblical Time Frame and the Geologic Time Scale are organized, and why each exist. All that we have to do now, to show the reality of the Book of Mormon scriptural record and the South American Land of Promise, is to show when the events actually took place.
    When you take a fictitious date of 4.55 billion years for the Earth’s existence and condense it down into the 13,000 years of actual history of the Earth, you find that events considered to be billions and tens of millions of years old, and other matters supposedly taking millions upon millions of years to achieve, can actually fit into a few thousand years.
    When the Lord said he organized the Earth 13,000 years ago, we can accept that understanding; and when the Lord tells us that the Earth was covered with a Flood, then divided in Peleg’s time, we can place those events within the time frames Moses wrote. When the Lord created the destruction that is recorded in 3 Nephi 8-9 in a matter of three hours, we can see how that would fit within a 13,000 year time frame, and that such events would not only have occurred in the time of man, but within the past two thousand years.
    When an island is recorded in the scriptural record for the Nephites, we can see where that island existed about twenty-five hundred years ago and with the events described in 3 Nephi 8, could have been dramatically changed two thousand years ago. When Mormon tells us about the Nephite Sea East during the first 600 years of the Nephite nation, we can also see where that sea could have been altered, or even pushed back and be replaced by rising land about two thousand years ago. When Nephi, son of Lehi, Samuel, and Nephi the Disciple all tell us that mountains toppled into flat valleys, and other mountains came up where valleys had once been, we can see how that could have taken place two thousand years ago.

When we place the Lord in charge of the physical events described that brought this Earth into existence, altered it from time to time, and during the time frames written, we can see how that could have taken place, even though uninformed men on the matters of God cannot visualize such happenings and insist on believing and teaching just the opposite.
(See the next post, “Changing Land of Promise—Part XIII and Our Changing World,” for an understanding of how geologists determine age of rocks and thus the age of the Earth)