The ancient Greek Philosopher, Heraclitus, is credited with saying, “The only constant in life is change.” When I look back across the five decades of my life, I see how true this is. In my lifetime, we’ve gone from rotary phones to hand-held computers called smart phones. We’ve moved from five channel televisions with dials to wall-sized screens that come with instant movies and hundreds of channels – oh, and remote controls that work with our voices!
Things change.
Despite the world’s improvements and discoveries, some changes are much less welcome. Alterations to our health, relationships, careers, and living conditions can turn our worlds inside-out, raise our stress levels, and lower our abilities to trust. Bodies we assumed would keep moving a hundred miles per hour give out. People we thought we could trust prove to be the opposite. Jobs we believed would be ours for a lifetime tank in a moment. Cross-country moves throw us into a world of new…
And, we resist.
Some seasons hit us with one wave of change after another, building within us a longing for stability like never before. And there are days we wonder if anyone or anything remains reliable and worthy of our trust.
It’s easy to resent.
So, maybe it’s not surprising that we can take all the turbulent shifting of life and impose it onto God. Because people are fickle, it’s our tendency to believe God is too. When our bodies let us down, it’s easy to assume the same of God. When everything we’ve known flips upside-down, we’re tempted to believe God also changes with the wind.
But, here’s where knowing who God is helps us cease imposing our assumptions and automatic responses onto God. Because the truth is – God is immutable. He never changes. As such, He can always be trusted.
Doubt
Amidst all the fluctuations of life, our defenses go up. All our resistance and resentment build walls, and our hearts choose never to trust again. Because our own broken tendencies cause us to relate to God with insecurity and suspicion, we doubt God’s reliability; we turn the trust-valve off, choosing instead to put our hope in ourselves.
Dig
Sometimes our way of thinking about God is obvious. Maybe we’re angry at Him, and we’re happy to say so. Other times, our truer feelings about God remain hidden – even from ourselves. We fail to see that we’ve transferred our beliefs about unreliable humans onto our Creator.
Looking back on my year of ‘Old Testament’ in seminary, I wonder if this might have been the case for my professor. Her teaching methods stirred tensions within most of us in the class from the beginning, but it was when she had us read the story of King Saul through a lens I’d never considered that I felt something was amiss.
As we read Saul’s story (essentially, 1 Samuel 9-31), she pulled phrases out of context to ‘prove’ her point – that God had put His favor on the people’s choice for king then changed His mind, unfairly revoking His Spirit from Saul. Dismissing Saul’s sins and unbelief, she painted God out to be the ‘bad guy’ in the narrative and, instead, demonstrated God’s actions as cruel and fickle. In the end, her ‘unspoken’ message was that God couldn’t be counted on because He makes decisions based on His whim. Perhaps her own life experiences caused her to believe that God cannot be trusted, so she tried to teach us to believe the same.
Dig Deeper
There’s a deeper truth about who God is when we read Saul’s story in the context of God’s greater story across all of Scripture: it’s the reality that God is totally unchanging. He says so Himself, and Jesus is our proof:
“I am the Lord, and I do not change.”
Malachi 3:6 NLT
“Jesus Christ is the same yesterday and today and forever.”
Hebrews 13:8
As a result of His unchanging character, God becomes the One we can rely on, take refuge in, and put our whole trust in:
“[God] never changes or casts a shifting shadow.”
James 1:17 NLT
“This I declare about the LORD: He alone is my refuge, my place of safety; he is my God, and I trust him.”
Psalm 91:2 NLT
Discovery
Part of my professor’s point is well-made. God did, in fact, take His favor and Spirit from Saul (1 Samuel 16:14). But not because His motives were based on shifting emotions or caprice. God rejected King Saul because he proved to be disobedient and disloyal to God. He led with more concern about what the people around Him thought than what God told him to do (1 Samuel 13:8-14, note vv.11-12; 15:1-31, note vv.12 and 24).1
Of course, King David also proved to be a fallible man, especially when he committed adultery and murder (2 Samuel 11)! But, the difference between Saul and David is vast – when David sought forgiveness, it was with a true, repentant heart (Acts 13:22). Saul’s ‘confession’ reminds me more of a temperamental teen’s apology – more sorry he was caught than truly contrite.
But guess who remained constant and faithful through the ups and downs of all Israel’s kings? God! He never backed out of the covenant. He consistently received repentance and offered forgiveness. He defeated enemies. His plan never strayed, and He ultimately sent the promised forever King of Kings who was free of all flaws and full of all power (2 Samuel 7:16; 2 Corinthians 1:20).
In the stories of Israel’s first two kings, we’re given clear pictures of how inconstant we humans are. We intend to obey, but then peer pressure pushes us away from what we know is right. We desire to remain constant in our devotion to God until something shiny distracts us. We want to abide in Christ, but busyness wears us down until He’s what we let go of in order to ‘get it all done’.
God, in His Triune Self, never ever changes. Not only does the Bible document this truth about Him but the fact that He is perfect means He never makes mistakes – He has no need of change! The fact that He is unlimited by time and is completely omniscient means He always knows the outcome. He knows the beginning to the end (Isaiah 46:10), so change is unnecessary.2
My Old Testament professor had it wrong. God is not the one who changed His mind – in fact, His very character is unchangeable. It was Saul himself who let the pride of success reshape his heart toward God. God may have been described as regretting that He’d appointed Saul as king (1 Samuel 15:10-11), but that’s not a statement of God changing, rather His sorrow over sin’s ability to change us…for the worse.3
Saul’s disobedience marks the end of God’s Spirit on him, and it’s a direct consequence of sin. Saul couldn’t be trusted with the mantle of responsibility given to him because he proved that he would rather rely on himself than God.
And, in case we’re still tempted to believe the worst of God, Samuel makes it abundantly clear that God was not the one who changed in this relationship:
“He who is the Glory of Israel does not lie or change his mind; for he is not a human being, that he should change his mind.”
1 Samuel 15:29
We don’t need to doubt God’s trustworthiness – He is constant and unchanging. He is our Promise Keeper and our reliable source of grace and truth, mercy and hope, love and strength. David constantly referred to God as his Rock, that solid, permanent place to always land. As such, God makes the best hiding place (Psalm 32:7). When the gales blow and threaten to push us off course, we can reach for the Rock, our Firm Foundation – our Refuge.
Friends, instead of doubting God’s motives or believing He has abandoned us in a state of fickle disinterest, let’s grab hold of the Rock. Let’s remember and trust that God never changes. He always keeps His word. He will never be one to pull the wool over our eyes or the carpet out from under our feet. God is the only constant. And, He longs for us to rely on Him. Because He sent us a forever King to demonstrate just how worthy of our trust He is, we can live assured that our immutable God will help us navigate every change in life.
Father God, You are the Alpha and Omega – the One who was, who is, and who is to come. You have no beginning and no end. From “once upon a time” to “kingdom come,” You are God! And because You are pure perfection and omniscience, change is impossible for You! Your character is as immutable as your mind, and we couldn’t be more grateful to anchor ourselves in You, our Rock and our Refuge. How much relief we feel as we consider how steady and constant You are – especially as we live in a world overflowing with turmoil and change. Lord Jesus, the fact that You are the same yesterday, today, and for always means we’ve given our hearts, minds, bodies, and souls to the One who will steward our lives consistently and unswervingly. You don’t change your mind. Or the rules. You don’t get distracted. Or forget about us. You stand alone as the one human ever who remains immutable and perfect and completely trustworthy. And we thank You that every time we doubt your motives or constancy that You are quick to forgive us. Thank You for your grace! Holy Spirit, You are our God-given tether that keeps us tied to our forever King. You are the arrow that points us back to the Rock at every turn. You are the voice that whispers, “This is the way; walk in it,” and as we obey, we find the Refuge we seek. Help us, we pray to remain unchanging in our devotion to God. Help us to return to Him again and again when we stray. In Jesus’ name we pray, amen.
(Inspired by Revelation 1:8; Psalm 90:2 NIV & MSG; Malachi 3:6; Psalm 18:2; Isaiah 26:4; Hebrews 13:8-9 NIV & MSG; Matthew 5:17-18; Luke 12:6-7; 1 John 1:9; Romans 8:16; John 15:26; Isaiah 30:21; Psalm 91:2)
Resources: I love sharing with you the books, podcasts, articles, and anything else that has inspired, encouraged, or taught me. These are humble offerings with no expectations.
- 1 – This article unpacks the life of Saul, including his disobedience, pride, and fall.
- 2 – This article offers more detail on the idea of God’s immutability, His unchanging character.
- 3 – This article unpacks some of the more nuanced ideas of God immutability.
- Our Backpack of God’s Attributes is our virtual bag for collecting every characteristic of God we find in all our hunting. We’re loading up all we discover about Him. So far:
- God is Worthy — He deserves all glory and honor and praise.**
- God is Glorious — He displays His greatness and worth.**
- God is Transcendent — He is not like humans. He is infinitely higher in being and action.**
- God is Truthful — Whatever God speaks or does is truth and reality.**
- God is Incomprehensible — God is beyond our understanding. We can comprehend Him in part but not in whole.**
- God is Love — God feels and displays infinite, unconditional affection toward His children. His love for them does not depend on their worth, response, or merit.**
- God is Gracious — The LORD is gracious and compassionate, slow to anger and rich in love (Psalm 145:8).
- God is Good — God is what is best and gives us what is best. He is incapable of doing harm.**
- God is Comforter — the God of all comfort, who comforts us in all our troubles, so that we can comfort those in any trouble with the comfort we ourselves receive from God (2 Corinthians 1:3-4).
- God is Deliverer — God rescues and saves His children.**
- God is Redeemer — Do not fear, for I have redeemed you; I have summoned you by name; you are mine (Isaiah 43:1-2).
- God is Omnipotent — God holds all the power. Nothing is too hard for God.**
- God is Almighty — What God wills, He can accomplish.** “For in him all things were created: things in heaven and on earth, visible and invisible, whether thrones or powers or rulers or authorities; all things have been created through him and for him” (Colossians 1:16).
- God is Infinite — God has no limits in His person or His power.**
- God is Sovereign — “O Sovereign Lord! You made the heavens and earth by your strong hand and powerful arm. Nothing is too hard for you” (Jeremiah 32:17).
- God is Just — God is fair in all His actions and judgments. He cannot over-punish or under-punish.**
- God is Righteous — God is always good and right.**
- God is Wrathful — God hates all unrighteousness.**
- God is Merciful — God does not give His children the punishment they deserve.**
- God is Patient/Long-Suffering — God is untiring and bears with His children.**
- God is Provider — God meets the needs of His children.**
- God is Omnipresent — God is fully present everywhere.**
- God is Compassionate — God cares for His children and Acts on their behalf.**
- God is Wise — God knows what is best and acts accordingly. He cannot choose wrongly.**
- God is Omniscient — God knows everything: past, present, and future; all potential and real outcomes; all things micro and macro.**
- God is Generous — God gives what is best and beyond what is deserved.**
- God is Immutable/Unchanging — God never changes. He is the same yesterday, today, and tomorrow.**
- God is Trustworthy — “Trust in the Lord forever, for the Lord, the Lord himself, is the Rock eternal.” Isaiah 26:4
- God is our Refuge — God is a place of safety and protection for His children.**
- **many thanks to Jen Wilkin and her list, “Attributes of God,” present at the back of every study
- Friends, life changes. And often those changes challenge our faith in God. I’m living in one of those seasons, and I’m forever grateful for worship songs that remind me each time I hit ‘repeat’ that God is constant — always, always God. Thank you, Chris Tomlin, for so many songs that sing such truths — as in “Always.” And, of course, it’s in our “Hidden Treasures” playlist.
- Well, plans are ever-changing. So the next issue of our newsletter, The Abiding Life, will actually come out THIS week! I still have an announcement to share — and you’ll hear it first in the newsletter! You can subscribe here.
Rhythms: As my newsletter’s title infers, we seek to develop an abiding life in this space — a place where we can get informed but also be transformed as we learn to abide in God’s presence throughout our days. I like to think that developing rhythms is one way to aid us in our desire to become more Christlike.
- Praise, our summer rhythm, is the speaking of truths about WHO GOD IS. It lifts our eyes off our circumstances and back onto the One who can walk us through them. And the Psalms are packed with poems that will lead us through this ritual of reflection and remembrance — until it becomes a rhythm that we fall into naturally.
- The constancy of change can exhaust us, deplete us — sometimes to the point of crumbling under its weight. I’ve been feeling it in my bones lately, and I’m so so grateful for God’s Word that pours forth from faithful friends who keep reminding me that God is my Rock and Refuge amidst all the chaos.
- So — this week, let’s read Psalm 91. This is a well-known Psalm — especially the first two verses. So, how about we choose various translations of it to read this week so that we can pull out all the subtleties and nuances of what it means for God to be our Refuge. May the truths of this Psalm build our faith and trust in the One who never changes!!
- And while it’s not a spiritual practice or rhythm, I invite you to share this site. Summer is a great time to ask someone else to join us here — it is a shared journey of faith, for sure!
Featured Photo by Levi XU on Unsplash. “All the Bits and Pieces” photo by Zrng N Gharib on Unsplash.
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