The debate over earth’s history is not merely academic- it’s a clash of worldviews. Scripture offers a clear, eyewitness account of a global flood that reshaped the entire planet, depositing vast sedimentary layers across continents. Yet secular scientists have proposed an alternative storyline, one built entirely on naturalistic assumptions that deny God’s involvement. They operate within the only worldview they have been taught: naturalism. But this episode of Creation Today turns its focus to something even more concerning- Christians who profess belief in God while promoting millions and billions of years of earth history.

Host Eric Hovind names several well-known apologists and theologians who embrace an old earth: John Walton, John Lennox, J.P. Moreland, Gleason Archer, William Dembski, Hugh Ross, William Lane Craig, and others. These are respected voices, yet they advance a view of history that conflicts with Scripture’s plain teaching.

This article outlines some of the central points raised, but the episode itself- featuring Dr. Terry Mortenson- is worth watching in full. Dr. Mortenson traces the historical shift from biblical geology to secular geology and shows how certain theologians quietly replaced the authority of Scripture with the authority of naturalistic science.

A key issue, Dr. Mortenson explains, is that many Christian leaders who accept an old earth do not know where the idea originated. They often assume it arose from the evidence itself, but historically, that is not the case.

To understand the rise of long-age thinking, Dr. Mortenson begins with James Hutton. In 1797 Hutton proposed that erosion, sedimentation, and volcanic activity, operating slowly and uniformly, shaped the earth over immense periods of time. “The past history of our globe must be explained by what can be seen to be happening now,” he wrote, insisting that no supernatural actions be considered. Hutton’s aim was not only to promote naturalism but to push aside the biblical account entirely.

Charles Lyell advanced these ideas even further. Lyell openly stated his goal was to “free the science of geology from Moses.” His uniformitarianism—slow, gradual change over vast ages—quickly became the ruling framework for geology.

From Hutton and Lyell came three governing principles:

1. Nature is all that exists.
2. Everything must be explained by time, chance, and natural laws acting on matter.
3. Geological processes in the past always operated at the same rate and power as observed today.

Dr. Mortenson stresses that none of these principles can be proven scientifically. No laboratory experiment can establish them. They are philosophical and religious commitments- and they stand in direct opposition to Scripture.

Despite this, by the early 1800s there were many scriptural geologists who defended the global flood as the primary cause of the world’s sedimentary layers. But by 1840 the institutions of geology- universities, journals, and scientific societies- had embraced uniformitarianism, pushing biblical geology to the margins.

This intellectual shift had far-reaching consequences. When Charles Darwin sailed on the H.M.S. Beagle, he carried Lyell’s Principles of Geology with him. Darwin called it “a revolution in natural science,” and it was Lyell’s long ages that provided the necessary foundation for Darwin’s evolutionary theories.

Dr. Mortenson concludes that long ages were not discovered through science; they were imagined through the lens of atheistic worldviews. Radiometric dating, often cited as proof, is also built on naturalistic assumptions that cannot be verified.

Today, long-age thinking is taught from preschool through university. These ideas saturate public education, scientific institutions, and even seminaries. Many theologians who should be defending biblical truth instead absorb secular interpretations and then attempt to harmonize Scripture with them.

Eric Hovind is right: this is ultimately a battle of worldviews, not merely competing interpretations of data. When theologians adopt long ages, they may believe time is a minor issue, but it is not minor when it undermines the authority of Scripture.

Christians should not compromise the Bible to accommodate the assumptions of naturalistic science. Our authority is not the shifting theories of man but the unchanging Word of God.