IPhone recent calls list reappears after clear

Unfortunately, there's no way to change the Recent calls timestamps.

You will either have to wait past the 1/12/13 or you could consider deleting those numbers. Course, you would obviously lose the phone numbers, and that data, but it would keep your true recent calls on top before it starts working again on 1/12/13.

It appears to be indeed changing time on the iPhone that has caused this issue, as I was able to repeat it easily. In testing it, I switched off "automatic" time, and change the date to tomorrow. After that, I made a phone call and then changed it back to set the time automatically. The phone call that I made during the manual time change indicated that I made the call tomorrow. 1/10/13, in this case.

So, your iPhone uses local time - the time that displays on the phone at the top of the screen - to log, order, and display recent calls.

Another solution I found to this problem:

Open Settings -> Phone -> Show Caller ID

It'll take some seconds to load the and show a loading indicator, after that is done the phone will be able to make and receive calls