For change to take place, there must be changes in quantity or quality. Shifts in relationships between measurable parts, of which God has none; for God is not made up of parts but is total oneness, wholeness, completeness, immeasurable unity.   

     We must not look at our world and ourselves and the ever constant and often tedious changes that so affect us, and apply such a nature to God. He-alone-is-God, and all that is created is not-God. That which is created contains within its design the possibility and necessity of change, especially all that is in our time/space existence. But God is eternally immutable, without variation or shadow of turning in any facet of His being. (James 1:17)

     To this, God Himself gives testimony. To assure the Israelites that His eternal covenant with them would always remain in effect, and that they would always exist as a race, God said to them, "For I am the LORD, I do not change; Therefore you are not consumed, O sons of Jacob" (Malachi 3:6). (Italics for emphasis.)

     God's promises remain sure and certain because of His unchangeableness. Since God neither changes nor ends, whatever He says remains eternally in effect, and His word eternally certain and framed in the halls of time. Said Joshua to the people at the end of his days, "There failed not ought of any good thing which the LORD had spoken unto the house of Israel; all came to pass" (Joshua 21:45).

     Once

     Once God said, "Let there be light" (Genesis 1:3), and there has been light ever since His words went forth. God never has to utter the words again. He does not have to stir Himself at each dawning of the sun to recreate light. The moon does not call forth new words from Him that it might shine upon us. The stars He sprinkled into the universe at the beginning, ever twinkle in their splendor without further command, and ever will. Light will remain so long as the earth exists, for the words of God are as immutable as the God who speaks them.

     In all ways, God's unchangeableness works to our great advantage, for we can be confident that as He was He is and ever will be. There are no surprises in God wrought by change. We know how He will be toward us in the future because we know how He has been toward us in the past. As He was, so He will ever be. And what is true of God is equally true of all in the Godhead: "Jesus Christ is the same yesterday, today, and forever" (Hebrews 13:8).

     At the same time, the fact that we, by contrast, are changeable creatures also works to our advantage. We are not fixed in our personality as psychologists claim. God did not set us in the concrete of our babyhood, forever destined to respond and react to all things according to that which theoretically formed our personality in infancy. We are changeable because our omnipotent and all-wise God made us so. We can change, by God's grace, from haters of God to lovers of God. From sinners to saints. From unsaved to saved. From baby Christians to mature Christians. From images of ourselves to images of Christ.

     Then one day there will come for us changeable creatures, followers of the Son of God, members of His mystical body, adopted sons of our holy Father, co-heirs with Jesus Christ, temples of the Holy Spirit, partakers of God's divine nature, those final and glorious changes promised by our unchangeable God!

     In response to "Satan's foul revolt," God planned within Himself an eternal purpose that He would work through Jesus Christ and His followers on a physical world that He would create. Because God is immutable, His plan and purpose have never changed and they affect everything that happens upon this earth. Each day they affect what is happening in and through you and me and every other member of the body of Christ.

     Because God made us changeable creatures and our lives are filled with change, we look continually for changes in the work of God. It is a constantly posed question: "What is God doing today?" "What do you see God doing in the next ten years?" "What do you think the next great move of the Holy Spirit will be?" "What's God doing in your life, your ministry, your Church?" "What's happening?"

     Only one thing is happening, the unchangeable focus of the work of our immutable God (John 6:29). And that work is the execution of the plan He formulated before time began; the continual development and administration of that plan by the Holy Spirit; the expansion of the work the Lord Jesus began in His days on earth in fulfillment of that plan. God is doing today, and will be doing tomorrow, those things required to bring forth the eternal purpose that He planned in Christ before the foundation of the world (Ephesians 3:10-11).

Nothing more—nothing less—nothing different!

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