Every time I read someone complaining about Genesis I feel sad because it would seem that they never even made past the first couple of pages. A better "first

Every time I read someone complaining about Genesis I feel sad because it would seem that they never even made past the first couple of pages. A better "first time" reading plan would be to start in the book of John and through that and Acts, and Romans (they are all back to back). John shows Christ as God. Acts shows the founding of the church and the early works, including an interesting argument in Acts 15 about some thinking that in order to become "Christian", one must first convert to Judaism. And Romans gives a better understand of the position of the Jew, the moralist, and the Gentile before God. (and the book of Hebrews expounds on this more too) But back to your question. There are many views to the first couple of books in Genesis. Here is my take: In verse 3: "And God said, Let there be light: and there was light." Ok, "light" is created. Everything good there. 4 And God saw the light, that it was good: and God divided the light from the darkness. Yep, no light means, well no light. 5 And God called the light Day, and the darkness he called Night. And the evening and the morning were the first day. So "Day" and "Night" spelled with a proper capitalization. And we have the phrase "evening and the morning" mentioned with no context as to how long the "evening and the morning" are or how long a "Day" is. 14 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: 15 And let them be for lights in the firmament of the heaven to give light upon the earth: and it was so. Next up we clearly see the timing and "setting" of the mathematics behind our solar system, using the elements mentioned above "Day", and "Night", and even expounding into months and years. 16 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. 17 And God set them in the firmament of the heaven to give light upon the earth, This is not a separate event from the last verse, this is the solution to how our days and years are timed. Instead of "And God made two great lights", think of "And so God made two great lights". This is how I've always taken this chapter. Perhaps it is terrible, or perhaps not. But clearly, the days and evenings mentioned in the earlier verses are not in the same context or definition as we (people that live on Earth) would normally think of them as. This is also where "gap theory" comes in, but I personally reject that as well.