I do believe that in 6 days God made the current skies "and all that in them is" meaning modern birds, the earth with current biome including man, and the seas and whales etc.
Ex 20:11
11 For in six days the Lord made heaven and earth, the sea, and all that in them is, and rested the seventh day:
Genesis 1:1 In the beginning God created the heaven and the earth.
The Hebrew for "heaven" is actually plural or "shamayim". The Bible lists 3 heavens.
1) earth's atmosphere 2) the cosmos 3) God's throne.
So you believe that in Exodus 20:11 there was more than the skies of earth involved, since it was plural?
Can Creationists believe that by Gen 1:2 we have 1) an earth 2) with its atmosphere 3) and the cosmos?
I suppose we can, but should we? What you described from current science theory fits very well with a first day without the atmosphere or the cosmos as we see it today. And if Genesis says the same thing, why would you want to come up with a different theory? Not that there's anything wrong with that, but why try so hard to read something else into Genesis?
So what is God doing for the further 7 days?
Tweaking and adding to what is already there.
Day 1 - God clears the thick atmosphere THAT WAS ALREADY THERE, so that the sun THAT WAS ALREADY THERE can shine through.
Day 2 - God lifts the cloud THAT WAS ALREADY THERE, raising it high above the sea THAT WAS ALREADY THERE creating clear sky (firmament) between.
Day 3 - God raises land THAT WAS ALREADY THERE causing it to poke out of the sea THAT WAS ALREADY THERE. God then populates the land with plants.
Day 4 - God appoints the sun, moon and stars THAT WERE ALREADY THERE to mark out days, months, years and Feast Days.
Day 5 - God populates the sky THAT WAS ALREADY THERE with birds, and God populates the seas THAT WERE ALREADY THERE, with fish.
Day 6 - God populates the land THAT WAS ALREADY THERE with land animals and man.
Day 7 - God rests, creating the Sabbath.
Now put this together with Ps 104:30.
I firmly believe Ps 104 is describing a renewing of earth in 6 days, 6000 years ago after a mass extinction.
24 O Lord, how manifold are thy works! in wisdom hast thou made them all: the earth is full of thy riches.
25 So is this great and wide sea, wherein are things creeping innumerable, both small and
great beasts.
26 There go the ships: there is that
leviathan, whom thou hast made to play therein.
[ancient biome with giant animals such as dinosaurs, plesiosaurus][/quote]I think you misplaced your emphasis. Let me try again for you:
26 There go the
ships: there is that leviathan, whom thou hast made to play therein. [ancient biome with giant animals such as dinosaurs, plesiosaurus]
[with ships!!!!!!!]
27 These wait all upon thee; that thou mayest give them their meat in due season.
28 That thou givest them they gather: thou openest thine hand, they are filled with good.
29 Thou hidest thy face, they are troubled: thou takest away their breath, they die, and return to their dust. [mass extinction, fossilised]
I'm not sure how you can equate fossilization with returning to dust. Unless they were fossilized before they were created and then they fossilized after they died.
30 Thou sendest forth thy spirit [Gen 1:2], they are created:[Gen 1] and thou renewest the face of the earth.
I guess it could be talking about a great cataclysm--after ships and leviathan shared the seas, perhaps (either that or the ships and leviathan share the seas in the day of the psalmist, which seems more likely to me from the text). We certainly know of a great cataclysm in Genesis that required renewal of the order of earth starting from when the waters were above the mountains. Do you need another one?
In which era do you think the ships and leviathan shared the seas? Was it the one before the 7 days? Or the one between the seven days and Noah's flood, or the one after Noah's flood (in which the psalmist lived)? I personally vote for the third option, which tells us that some kind of creature (described more fully in Job 41), that is much more similar to fossils we have found than to anything extant today (that we know of), was at one time in the sea at the same time as ships of men after Noah's flood, which you confirmed was around 4.4 thousand years ago.
But what about the other two options--That Leviathan was around between 6000 and 4400 years ago or prior to the cataclysm that happened before the seven days of creation. In any of these cases you have to deal with a scripture/scientist inconsistency. Why put the burden of reconciliation on scripture by trying to find a different interpretation than is the most readily apparent?