The God Who is Eternally Unchangeable!

Numbers 23:19, “God is not 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?” 

1Samuel 15:29, “Besides, the eternal God of Israel isn't a human being. He doesn't tell lies or change his mind." (CEV)

Malachi 3:6, “For I the LORD do not change; therefore you, O children of Jacob, are not consumed.” 

Hebrews 13:8, “Jesus Christ is the same yesterday and today and forever.” 

James 1:17,  “Every good gift and every perfect gift is from above, coming down from the Father of lights, with whom there is no variation or shadow due to change.” 

For us as 21st Century citizens, change seems to be the one constant in life. Times change, technology changes, the topography of the land changes, our bodies and the way they look changes, etc. It has been said that the only people who like change are babies with wet diapers. Almost everyone with any age on them can identify with the old fellow who had just turned 100 years of age and was being interviewed by a reporter. The reporter said, "You certainly have seen a lot of change in your lifetime, haven't." "Yep," replied the old man, "And I been against every one of them!"

The truth is deep within our beings is a desire for something that isn't fickle and fluctuating; that's the same yesterday, today, and forever, and the good news is this is found only in the God of the Bible!

When we refer to God as being immutable, we mean that he is unchanging in his person, perfections, purposes, and promises. He lives forever without mutation, alteration, variation, or fluctuation!"

1. Since God is Unchanging - Nothing that Matters has Changed!

In spite of all the changes that science and technology have produced, nothing that really matters has changed.

God's evaluation of the human heart is the same in every generation. It's still deceitful and desperately wicked. Despite having more knowledge and technological skills than all the previous generations combined, the 20th century used those abilities to kill more people than all the previous generations combined! 

God's offer of salvation in Christ is a constant. The work of the Holy Spirit in salvation is the same as it always has been. The statistics for death haven’t changed - it's still one for one. The certainty of life beyond the grave is unaffected by the changes in society. The Biblical definition of Truth remains the same despite all the public opinion polls.

2. Since God is Unchanging - Never Will He Need Improvement, Information, or be Inconsistent!

God's person, perfections, purposes, and promises never changes. He never is "less than" who He is. He never improves because there is no improvement possible . . . He is already perfect. God is always wise, always sovereign, always good, always just, always holy, always merciful, and always gracious, and always present. Whatever God is, he always is. He is all being and no becoming. There are no latent possibilities in God. Nothing can be added to or subtracted from God. He learns nothing and needs nothing. He does not grow. He does not improve. God does not change.

There are no "sometimes" attributes of God. All of his attributes are "always" attributes. He always is what he is. Daddy may say to the children in response to their question of "what's wrong with Mom today?" - "Well, Mom's just not herself today. She's having a bad day." God never has bad days when He's not himself!

How does this truth of God's immutability translate into day-to-day living? Practically it means that God will not ever leave you or forsake you because your behavior surprised Him and He regrets saving you because He didn't know what He was getting when He got you! It means that He will always take care of His own. He will always seek an eternal, ever-deepening, ever-maturing love relationship with you. He will always forgive the one who truly repents, and always save the one who trusts in Christ's atonement. He will always be your Rock and Fortress, your Shield and Defender, your Strong Tower.

3. Since God is Unchanging None of His Promises Will Fail!

Listen to some of these Promises and Purposes of God:

"The plans of the Lord stand firm forever, the purposes of his heart through all generations" (Psalm 33:11).

"The LORD Almighty has sworn, ‘Surely, as I have planned, so it will be, and as I have purposed, so it will stand’" (Isaiah 14:24).

Titus 1:2, "in hope of eternal life which God, who cannot lie, promised before time began,"

Hebrews 10:23, "Let us hold fast the confession of our hope without wavering, for He who promised is faithful."

1 John 2:25, "And this is the promise that He has promised us; eternal life."

Thus, when the unchanging, ever-faithful God promises to supply all our needs . . . He will do so (even though we may often confuse needs with wants, and not be able to recognize that what we asked for is what we got even though it doesn't look like it!).

When He promises to never leave us . . . He won't. (Even if we are like a light switch in our contact with Him - off and on!)

We can be confident in knowing that He who has begun a good work in you will complete it until the day of Jesus Christ; When He promises to finish the work He has started in us . . . He will. (Even though we may drift, become disobedient, come under His severe discipline, and get distracted from time to time in our Christian walk).

When He promises that everyone who comes to Him will not be cast away . . .He means it. (Even though we know that we deserve nothing but His wrath.)

The work which His goodness began, the arm of his strength will perform; His promises are yea and amen in Christ and have never failed us yet!

4. Since God is Unchanging - Nothing will Ever Cause His Love for You to Diminish!

God feels about us the same way He did when He sent Christ to the earth. The same love that motivated him then motivates him now. Jeremiah 31:3, "The LORD has appeared of old to me, saying: "Yes, I have loved you with an everlasting love; Therefore with lovingkindness I have drawn you."

John 17:23, "that the world may know that You have sent Me, and have loved them as You have loved Me."

The Bible is the love story of God with His people. It isn't the revelation of an outraged Judge who reluctantly shows kindness to criminals he finds despicable. It reveals the Relentless Pursuit of the Passionate Lover who pursues His people and treats them as a Bridegroom who promises to maintain honeymoon intensity, pleasures, energy, excitement, enthusiasm, and honeymoon enjoyment. He rejoices in them and sings over them.

When scripture declares that God is immutable, it doesn't mean that He is immobile. He is stable but not static. He isn't frozen in some sort of eternal pose. He isn't a cosmic iceberg. While He is never at the mercy of His creatures, neither is He detached from them. His wrath against sin is real and powerful. His compassion for sinners is also sincere and unending. His mercies are truly over all His works. And above all, His eternal love for His people is more real, more powerful, and more enduring than any earthly emotion that ever bore the label “love.” Un­like human love, God’s love is unfailing, unwavering, and eternally constant. This truth alone ought to convince us that God’s affections are not like human passions.

A middle-aged farmer and his wife were driving down the road in the old truck when the wife said to the husband, "Jeb, remember when we used to sit snuggled so close to each other when you were driving that we looked like one person with two heads? Remember when you used to put your arm around me and whisper in my ear sweet things while you where driving?"

He looked at his wife sitting next to the door on her side and said, "Sadie, it ain't me that's moved!"

If you've lost the former closeness and intimacy that you once had with God - You're the one that's moved!

God's dealings with His spiritual children are in some respects like those of an earthly father with his biological children. When they obey, they experience his pleasure. When they disobey, they face his justice. When they are hurt, they feel his compassion. He’s always the same father, but with many sides to his character, but all of those sides are shown from a heart of love for his children.

The same is true with God. What may seem to be an inconsistency with God is often simply God displaying another aspect of his character to us. Since we are so changeable, it shouldn’t surprise us that God seems to change in the display of who he is.

5. Since God is Unchanging - Never does the Future Hang in the Balance!

Psalm 115:3, “But our God is in heaven; He does whatever He pleases.”

Psalm 135:6, “Whatever the LORD pleases He does, In heaven and in earth, In the seas and in all deep places.”

Isaiah 46:10-11, “Declaring the end from the beginning, And from ancient times things that are not yet done, Saying, 'My counsel shall stand, And I will do all My pleasure,” Indeed I have spoken it; I will also bring it to pass. I have purposed it; I will also do it”.

But I hear someone object, "What about those passages where God repents, or says something never entered His mind, or comes down to find out something? Does this not seem to say that God changes?

A classic example is often used by those who believe that God changes his mind is in his dealings with the nation of the Ninevites. We read in Jonah 3:9-10, “Who knows,” asks the king of Ninevites? “God may change his mind and turn from his fierce anger, so that we may not perish. When God saw what they did, how they turned from their evil way, God changed his mind concerning the disaster that he had said he would do to them, and he did not do it.”

Often in the Old Testament God makes a prediction or declares his intent to accomplish something great and ominous and it is self-evident and unmistakably clear that it is conditional. God says he will act in a certain way or perform some deed, but it is qualified by certain conditions based upon what the people will do.

Sam Storms explains the Ninevites condition: “In the case of the Ninevites, God said that in 40 days he will bring judgment and destruction on the city. Obviously this is a conditional declaration. It is not an unqualified and unconditional declaration of purpose. We know this from three facts.

“First, if it weren’t conditional, there is no reason why God would have ever sent Jonah to preach to them in the first place.

“Second, if it weren’t conditional, he would have judged them immediately rather than giving them 40 days. Is it not obvious that the 40 days was an expression of God’s patience and kindness and longsuffering, as he gives the Ninevites time to reflect and hopefully repent?

“Third, Jonah himself obviously understood that this declaration or promise of judgment was conditional, or suspended on whether the Ninevites repented, or he would have gladly gone to Nineveh at the beginning. Nothing would have pleased Jonah more than to be the mouthpiece of God’s inevitable and unavoidable judgment against these Gentiles.

“God always acts in perfect harmony with his nature. God declares repeatedly in Scripture: I will punish the wicked, unless they repent. When the wicked repent, his treatment of them must change. God himself hasn’t changed. He is still the same God.

“Thus when the Ninevites changed and repented upon hearing the preaching of Jonah, God’s immutability required that he change in his treatment of them. God’s character didn’t change. God’s plan didn’t change. But God’s treatment of the Ninevites and his relationship to them changed because they changed.”

There are many today who teach that God is constantly changing his mind. They have revived an ancient heresy under a new name called open theism or free-will theism. According to them God must be changeable because He doesn't know any more about the future than we do, because the future isn't knowable until it becomes the present! To them God is always becoming something, always learning and getting new info. According to them, God must be very fast on His feet in order to stay one step ahead of us, and that without knowing what our next step will be. Their kinder, gentler God is the Great Cosmic Trouble-Shooter, always on maintenance calls trying to fix this, stop that, start them, etc..

He is the God of mood swings, of regrets, of surprises, of the "opps" - who says, "Well, I'll be - I never dreamed this is the way this would turn out!" Their God is the Big Worrier in the sky who invites us to join him in worrying about how things will turn out. It changes the verse in the hymn that sings "I don't know about tomorrow, but I know who holds tomorrow in His hands," to "I don't know what tomorrow holds but I know the One who doesn't know much about it either."

When human tragedy, injustice, suffering, or pain occurs, open theists stand ready with their words of comfort and pastoral counsel: "God is as grieved as you are about the difficulties and heartache you are experiencing, and he, too, wishes that things had worked out differently.

Here’s the truth: God is too wise to be mistaken; God is too good to be unkind. So when you don’t understand, when you can’t see his plan; When you can’t trace his hand, trust his heart.

But what about those passages in which God “finds out” something? They occur in judicial contexts. In Genesis 3:9, God asks Adam, “where are you?” This is not a request for information. In this verse, God begins His judicial cross-examination. Adam’s responses will confirm God's indictment, and God will respond in judgment and grace. But the same judicial context exists in other texts where God “comes down” to “find out” something.

God’s “remembering” and “forgetting” are also judicial catego­ries in Scripture, because they are covenant categories. For God to “re­member” His covenant simply means for Him to carry out its terms.

When God says that something “never entered my mind” (Jer.7:31, 19:5, 32:35) He is not confessing ignorance, but describing His standards for human behavior (still another judicial point). God is saying here that the horrible human sacrifice was utterly contrary to His holy standards.

6. Since God is Unchanging - Nobody Should be Waiting for A Better Deal!

Because many people believe everything changes they feel that when all is said and done . . . God will grade on a curve. Others think that God will give us another chance after death. Still others will believe that God will grant eternal life to everyone . . . regardless of what they believe.

The truth of God's unchangeableness is very bad news for rebellious sinners. God will not "change his mind" and let them slip into heaven. That means there is no escape from the hands of an all-seeing, all-knowing, all-powerful God!

“Here is terror for the wicked. Those who defy Him, break His laws, have no concern for His glory, but live their lives as though He did not exist, must not suppose that, when at the last they shall cry to Him for mercy, He will alter His will, revoke His word, and rescind His awful threatenings."

On the other hand, this is very good news for those who want to be saved! God’s nature does not change! God’s attitude toward seekers does not change. That’s why John 6:37 is such a comfort. Jesus said, in John 6:37, "All that the Father gives Me will come to Me, and the one who comes to Me I will by no means cast out."

A number of the great hymns of the faith stress the immutability of God.

Immortal, Invisible, God Only Wise:

To all life thou givest, to both great and small;
in all life thou livest, the true life of all;
we blossom and flourish as leaves on the tree,
and wither and perish but naught changeth thee.

Another hymn titled, Abide With Me, declares:

"Swift to its close ebbs out life's little day;
earth's joys grow dim, its glories pass away.
Change and decay in all around I see.
O thou who changest not, abide with me.