Behold Your Unchanging God
Change is all around us. The seasons change. Even there is change from night to day as the sun rises and falls. As humans, we change. Our bodies change (I won’t elaborate on this!), sometimes our beliefs change, and our disposition changes. Our attitudes to certain things change. We develop. There was once a time I didn’t know my ABC’s or how to speak a three letter word, now I am reading the works of brilliant theologians to write this very blog. We change.
When we thing of God though, he doesn’t change. When we begin to talk about God’s attributes, there are two kinda of attributes of God that theologians talk about. They are called incommunicable attributes, and communicable attributes. Incommunicable, means they are not communicated, which means these attributes of God are not reflected in his image bearers. They are things only true of himself. For example, his omnipresence is incommunicable, but his the love of God is a communicable attribute. Humans, image bears of God cannot reflect God’s omnipresence, but we can reflect his love.
When we think of God’s unchangeableness, or as theologians call it, his immutability, this is an incommunicable attribute. While we change frequently, God doesn’t.
This is not a hard attribute to affirm. We sing this regularly in churches across the globe:
Great is Thy Faithfulness, O God My Father,
There is no shadow of turning with Thee;
Thou changest not, thy compassions, they fail not.
As thou has been, thou forever wilt be.
This famous hymn communicates the theological truth of God’s immutability or unchangeableness. How then is God unchanging?
God is unchanging in his Divine Essence. God has been God for eternity. He cannot become more or less God than he already is. While some cult’s may teach that God was once a man who became a god, that is completely false. In fact, Christianity is the opposite, God, in there person of Jesus, took on flesh, and became man.
God is unchanging in his character. Numbers 23:19 says, “God is not a man that he should lie, or a son of man, that he should change his mind. HAs he said, and will he not do it? Or has he spoken, and will he not fulfill it. Hebrews 13:8 tells us that “Jesus Christ, is the same yesterday and today, and forever.” Even though Jesus took on flesh, his divine nature, and moral character never changed. God’s love is perfect. He cannot grow more loving, and he does not become less loving. God is perfectly holy. He cannot be more holy than he is, because he is infinitely holy. and God will not be less holy, because God cannot sin.
God’s plans and purposes are unchanging. “And the Glory of Israel will not lie or have regret, for he is not a man, that he should have regret.” If we understand the Bible wrongly, it may look like God has one way of salvation, through the law, and then when that didn’t work, he went to plan B and sent Jesus to bear the curse of the law. But when we really understand God’s Word, we know that even from Genesis 3:15, the gospel has been God’s plan from the beginning. Jesus is the fulfillment of promises made to Abraham, before the Law was even given. God’s plan and his ways are unchanging.
The Unchanging God who Relents
In Geneis 6:6, it speaks of the Lord “regretting” that he made man, and it grieved him to his heart? As if he realized he made a mistake, it seems. Other verses seems to indicate a change of mind in God.
“Now therefore mend your ways and your deeds, and obey the voice of the Lord your God, and the Lord will relent of the disaster that he has pronounced against you.” Jeremiah 26:13
“And God sent the angel to Jerusalem to destroy it, but as he was about to destroy it, the Lord saw, and he relented from the calamity. And he said to the angel who was working destruction, “It is enough; now stay your hand.” 1 Chronicles 21:15
“And rend your hearts and not your garments. Return to the Lord your God, for he is gracious and merciful. slow to anger and abounding in steadfast love, and he relents over disaster.” Joel 2:13
It is actually interesting to look at these passages, because as we see God is not changing in his character, he is not changing in his position against sin. What is changing is his response to humans as the turn from their sin. Wayne Grudem accurately writes, “ God’s unchangeableness does not mean he will not act nor feel differently in response to different situations.” God responds different to rebellion than he does repentance. When we trust in Jesus by faith, while God’s mercy is poured out upon us and not his wrath, God has not stopped being God. He continues to be holy, just, and merciful all at the same time.
Comfort from God’s Unchangeableness
Listen to these Words from AW Tozer:
What peace it brings to the CHristian’s heart to realize that our Heavenly Father never differs from Himself. In coming to Him at any time we need not wonder whether we shall find him in a receptive mood. His is always receptive to misery and need, as well as to love and faith. He does not keep office hours not set aside periods when He will see no one. Neither does He change his mind about anything. Today, this moment, He feels toward His creatures, toward babies, toward the sick, the fallen, the sinful, exactly as he did when He sent His only-begotten Son into the world to die for mankind.
God never changes moods or cools off in his affections or loses enthusiasm. His attitude toward sin is now the same as it was when he drive out the sinful man from the eastward garden, and His attitude toward the sinner the same as when he stretched forth his hands and cried, “Come unto me, all ye that labour and are heavy laden, and I will give you rest.”
AW Pink comforts us with the unchangeableness of God this way:
Human nature cannot be relied upon, but God can! However unstable I may be, however fickle my friends may prove, God changes not. If he varied as we do, if he willed one thing today and another tomorrow, if He were controlled by caprice, who could confide in Him? But all praise to his glorious name, He is ever the same. His purpose is fixed, His will is stable, His word is sure. Here then is a rock on which we may fix our feet, while the mighty torrent is sweeping away everything around us.
Encouragement to Pray:
Stephen Charnock, a 17th century puritan in his excellent work “The Existence and Attributes of God writes, “What comfort would it be to pray to a god that, like a chameleon, changed color every moment? Who would put pu a petition to an earthly prince that was so mutable to grant a petition one day, and deny it another?”
God’s unchangeableness means he is faithful, reliable, and he can be trusted. We can take our needs before him because he does not change.
A Warning to the Wicked
AW Pink writes again giving a serious warning:
Those who defy Him, who break His laws, who have no concern for His glory, but who live their lives as though He existed not, must not suppose that, when at last they shall cry to Him for mercy, He will alter His will, revoke His word, and rescind his awful threatenings. God will not deny Himself to gratify their lusts. God is holy, unchangingly so. Therefore God hates sin, eternally hates it.
If you are rejecting God and trampling upon his gospel, don’t expect him to change in the end and give you a free pass. He won’t be like me. Sometimes I cave to my daughter, “Fine you can have a popsicle,” when previously she was not allowed. God is not like me. God’s character does not change, his holiness is eternal, and his will cannot be thwarted.
Behold, your Unchanging God.
