GOD’S UNCHANGEABLENESS THROUGHOUT ETERNITY
Isaiah 48:12. I am He; I am the first, I also am the last
Having called on the Jews in Babylon to attend to what He was now about to say by His servant the Prophet, God begins by asserting that He is the same, the true and only God, who existed before all things, and therefore was able to accomplish all His purposes and promises of deliverance. The text introduces us to a subject of tremendous import—God’s unchangeableness throughout eternity. “The eternity and immutability of God are in their own nature inseparable, and are so generally united in the Holy Scriptures, that the passages which declare the one, declare or imply the other also.”
I. GOD IS ETERNAL.
1. Reason itself claims this attribute for God. Nor was it unknown even to the heathens. Proclus, a follower of Plato, proved God to be eternal, because He exists of Himself. Thales defined God to be a being that is without beginning and end; before all things; and who was never born (H. E. I. 2253; P. D. 1492, 2536).
2. What reason teaches, the Scriptures assert. They represent God’s eternity to be—
(1.) An eternity of duration, “I am He; I am the first, I also am the last” (Psalms 90:2). Not merely everlasting, but eternal! He had no beginning, even as He shall have no end. This is the difference between the eternity of God and that of the angels and of “the spirits of just men made perfect.” They are, by the will of God, never to end; but, by His will also, they came into being. But to His being there was no beginning!
(2.) An eternity of perfection. There has been in Him no development of excellence, as in Him there will be no diminution of it. “From everlasting to everlasting, Thou art GOD!” All that is involved in that great name He always was, and always will be! (See pp. 187, 188, and outlines on Isaiah 57:15).
II. GOD IS UNCHANGEABLE—eternally unchangeable. “I am He,”—the same yesterday, to-day, and for ever.
1. Unchangeableness is an essential perfection of God. If He were subject to “variableness or the shadow of turning,” He would not be a perfect and eternal being, &c. When, therefore, it is said that God repents or alters His purpose, it must not be supposed that His nature changes, but that the Holy Spirit accommodates His language to the general comprehensions of men, &c. (H. E. I. 2254–2256). He continues always the same—
(1.) In His existence He cannot cease to be (Psalms 102:27).
(2.) In His nature or essence—He cannot cease to be what He is in every perfection.
(3.) In His purposes (Isaiah 46:10; Isaiah 14:24).
(4.) In His promises to His people; in His threatening against the wicked; and in all His predictions (Numbers 23:19).
2. All these declarations are in harmony with the teachings of Scripture and the conclusions of Reason.
(1.) Scripture (Malachi 3:6; Psalms 33:11; Isaiah 44:10; James 1:17), &c.
(2.) Reason. As God is self-existent—caused by none, so He can be changed by none. As He preceded all and caused all, so His sovereign will determined the relations which all things are permitted to sustain to Him. As He is infinite in duration, He cannot know succession or change. As He is infinite in all perfection of knowledge, &c., therefore He cannot change; for nothing can be added to or taken from the infinite—any change would make Him less than infinite before or after.
The unchangeableness of God is confirmed
(1.) by the stability of His natural government;
(2.) by His moral government and the identity of the several dispensations of grace. But it does not exclude the exercise of dispositions and affections, nor involve a stoical indifference to the welfare of His creatures generally, or the character which may be assumed by moral agents. Nor does it involve uniformity of action or relation, much less fatalism, &c. (H. E. I. 3750–3753).
III. SOME PRACTICAL LESSONS WHICH THIS GREAT SUBJECT TEACHES.
1. It assures us of the essential Divinity of the Christ. The application to our Lord Jesus Christ of the terms here used by God to describe Himself, places His Deity beyond doubt (Revelation 1:8; Revelation 1:17; Revelation 22:13; and many other passages which express or imply eternity). Hold fast the vital fact of our Lord’s Divinity. That gone, all is gone. “A divine Christ is the central sun of Christianity; quench it, and all is confusion, worse confounded.” Revelation 1:8 did more than any other passage towards preventing Dr. Doddridge from assenting to the Socinian theory, which reduces our Lord to a deified creature.
2. It assures us of the fulfilment of God’s promises, and the accomplishment of His plans. (Jeremiah 10:10; Daniel 4:34; Isaiah 60:19; 2 Peter 3:8-9).
3. It affords “strong consolation” amid all the trying changes of this mortal state. To this eternal and unchanging God we may commit ourselves with unwavering confidence, assured that He is both able and willing to sustain, &c.
4. It should stimulate us to seek stability of character. (Ephesians 5:1; Psalms 77:7; Psalms 108:1). How reasonable and weighty is the admonition which follows the declaration of our Saviour’s unchangeableness in Hebrews 13:9.
5. It should alarm the impenitent. What folly and audacity is there in rebellion against God, since an eternal being is offended thereby! How dreadful to lie under the displeasure of an eternal God! (Jeremiah 10:10.) We are charged by this glorious Being with a message of reconciliation to you (2 Corinthians 5:18-21).—Alfred Tucker.