Biblical Timeline of Earth's Existence

Question proposed by Stephen Ball, PhD

Concerning the age of the Earth, the Bible’s genealogical records combined with the Genesis 1 account of creation are used to estimate an age for the Earth and universe of about 6000 years, with a bit of uncertainty on the completeness of the genealogical records, allowing for a few thousand years more. This young age is repeatedly confirmed by numerous studies done by proponents of 4 Creation Science. Yet the vast majority of the scientific community claims there is abundant scientific evidence that points to an age of 4.6 billion years for the Earth and about 14 billion years for the entire universe. Who is right?

This biblical timeline has always bothered ever since my first Science class where I learned how old the universe was based upon verified scientific evidence...  not heresay or speculation or what was written in a book.

All of my talks with ministers, pastors, priests, or members of the clergy have all tried to explain that this discrepancy should be taken with a grain of salt and if God thought it was important, that he would have explained it...   

That answer was always unsatisfactory to me.

The other issue that has always bother is that the Bible says God is perfect and therefore does not make mistakes...

If God is perfect why didn't HE explain or use the real number of years in how old the universe was/is instead of his 6,000 years?  That omission sounds like a mistake to me.  Surely God is smart enough to have realized that someday science would discovery the true age of the universe and prove the Bible wrong.

However, the Bible does not really talk about the age of the universe directly.  In order to get the 6,000 years, one has to add together the geneological records of the Bible with the Genesis account of creation.  Therefore, the 6,000 is not really from the word of God and must have another explanation.

To that I say BS.

The Bible was put together by man...  and when it was put together, no one was really concerned about the age of the universe. 

Does God's omission keep him from making a mistake?