I am the Lord, and I do not change. [Malachi 3:6a (NLT)]
Our fast-paced world is ever-changing and once ordinary items like slide rules, cassette tapes, boom boxes, floppy discs, dial phones, film, and VCRs are relics. My kids don’t use maps, write checks, or have a land line and my grands have never used a library card catalogue, set of encyclopedias, dictionary, carbon paper, or typewriter. We no longer need to get up to change channels, turn the lights on or off, or see who’s at the door. Our camera, maps, calculator, credit cards, compass, note pad, address book, plane tickets, and Bible all fit into our cell phones and everything on our phones (along with a fitness tracker and heart monitor) fits into a watch!
The world is in a constant state of flux! 38 different models of the iPhone have been released since its introduction in 2007 (with a new generation expected in the fall)! Since its introduction in 1985, there have been 49 versions of the Windows operating system. What with chatbots, artificial intelligence, the metaverse and internet of things, chatbots, NFTs, cryptocurrency, 3-D printers, and reality that can be extended, augmented, or virtual, by the time I’ve caught up to the latest technology, I’m already behind the times!
In theory, all those changes are supposed to be for the better but new doesn’t necessarily mean better (as the Coca-Cola company learned when they tried to change their drink formula in 1985). Unfortunately, the updated and improved version can be worse than its predecessor (which is what most tech people would say about Windows ME, Vista, and Windows 8)!
The Greek philosopher Heraclitus said, “The only thing constant is change,” and, despite my previous rant, I disagree. The one unchanging constant in our lives is God and His unchangeability is called immutability. Unlike things that can be modified like iPhones, Windows, and Coke, something immutable cannot change. Regardless of technology, innovative trends, style, or the passage of time, God’s truth, purpose, promises, and character remain the same. God needs no updates because He is the very essence of perfection—He can’t become more or less, greater or smaller, or any better than He already is!
God’s immutability doesn’t mean that He is a static, impersonal, remote, disinterested being. Although He is unchanging, we are not deists who think of God as an indifferent uninvolved clockmaker who made a clock, wound it up, and then ignored it. He is actively involved in all of His creation and regularly interacts with everything and everyone in it.
Rather than impassive and distant, God is enmeshed in our lives. He walked and talked with Adam and cared enough to give him a companion in Eve! He made covenants with Noah and Abraham and revealed Himself to people like Moses, David, Elijah, Paul, Peter, and John. The God who walked in Eden with Adam, hung a rainbow in the sky for Noah, wrestled with Jacob, etched His law onto stone tablets for Moses, sent manna from heaven, and blinded Paul on the road to Damascus is the very same God who walks with us today!
Although God’s interaction with us may change (as it did when He evicted Adam and Eve from Eden, permitted Satan to plague Job, or allowed Judah to be taken into captivity), God’s nature never changes! Timeless and eternal, God was and always will be holy, unlimited, all-powerful, ever-present, all-knowing, all-loving, and divine. Fortunately, the original 1.01 version of God (introduced at the beginning of time) is all we need or want! Thank you, O Lord, for being the one constant in our lives.
It is well for us that, amidst all the variableness of life, there is One whom change cannot affect; One whose heart can never alter, and on whose brow mutability can make no furrows. [Charles Spurgeon]
Jesus Christ is the same yesterday, today, and forever. [Hebrews 13:8 (NLT)]
Whatever is good and perfect is a gift coming down to us from God our Father, who created all the lights in the heavens. He never changes or casts a shifting shadow. [James 1:17 (NLT)]
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I’ve heard it said that no one is truly educated without a passing knowledge of Greek mythology, the works of William Shakespeare, and the Bible. The people who compete on the game show Jeopardy, however, are supposed to have more than a passing knowledge of those subjects and many more. Last month, however, all three Jeopardy contestants were baffled when the $200 clue wanted to know what came between “Our Father which art in Heaven” and “be thy name” in Matthew 6:9. None of the contestants even ventured a guess and, after an embarrassing silence, host Mayim Bialik supplied the answer: “What is ‘hallowed’?”
The Israelites had just crossed the Jordan River and were preparing to conquer Canaan when Joshua came upon an armed man. Joshua was a stranger in a foreign land and, as Israel’s general, he may have been scrutinizing Jericho’s defenses to determine his plan of attack. I wonder if Joshua brandished his sword (while shaking in his sandals) as he queried, “Friend or foe?” The man, however, was neither ally nor adversary. Identifying himself as the commander-in-chief of the Lord’s army, his loyalty was to neither side. His allegiance was to God and the only side he was on was God’s! God wasn’t on Israel’s side any more than He was on Canaan’s. Israel, however, was on God’s side because their conquest of Jericho was part of His master plan of redemption. It was because they were on God’s side that the fortified city’s walls collapsed.
I think Satan chuckles every time he sees another division in Christ’s church. He probably shouted with glee when the Southern Baptist Convention recently expelled five congregations (including the mega Saddleback church) and when the no-longer-united United Methodists lost 1,800 congregations and found themselves embroiled in lawsuits with many of those congregations. Although Methodist Bishop Tom Berlin sadly noted that, “The path of anger and hostility is not the Christian way,” it seems to have become the way of Christ’s church in the 21st century! While today’s issues are different, they are no less divisive than an issue that threatened the very existence of the early church.
Immediately after the Parable of the Mustard Seed, Jesus compared the Kingdom of Heaven to the yeast a woman added to “three measures of flour” when making bread. While “measures” seems vague, the original word used wasn’t. It was seah (about a peck and a half of flour) and three seahs were over 167 cups (nearly 50 pounds) of flour. This was an enormous amount of flour for just “a little yeast” and, as He did in the previous parable, Jesus used hyperbole to emphasize the power of something very small. The question in this parable is whether the yeast is a metaphor for a bad or a good thing.
I appeal to you, dear brothers and sisters, by the authority of our Lord Jesus Christ, to live in harmony with each other. Let there be no divisions in the church. Rather, be of one mind, united in thought and purpose. [1 Corinthians 1:10 (NLT)]
