As I understand it, the universe is approx. 14 billion years old. Light from the farthest observed galaxies took several million or billion years to reach us. Now my question is: If it takes for example, 500 million years for light from a certain galaxy to reach us it is 500 million light years away. So it stands to reason that the light originated 500 million light years away 500 million years ago. According to the expanding universe theory, 500 million years ago the universe was significantly smaller than today. Therefore that light was closer to us when it originated and it wouldn't take 500 million years to get here. Can someone help me wrap my ignorant mind around this? Thank you.