Father, we thank you for that word which is a living word. It is, as we confess, a light unto our path and a lamp to our feet. And we pray that it would indeed encourage us tonight to put our trust again and to keep our trust in you, the changeless God. It is in Jesus' name we ask it. Amen. You may be seated. Our first reading this evening comes from Psalm 102. And you all can find that, I know, real fast because that's in the middle of the Bible. And our second reading, which I will have later on in the message, comes from Malachi chapter 3. And that's a very small book, but it's the very last book in the New Testament. I mean, in the Old Testament. So it's just before Matthew. And maybe you want to find that a minute. If you are a note taker, I'm happy to see that my outline was in the bulletin. But there is an additional point under two, and that's ABC, and that is God's promises do not change. God's promises do not change. Some of you may remember that a number of weeks ago, or maybe it's months already, I preached on a couple of the attributes of God, His holiness and His sovereignty. And tonight we're going to be looking at the changelessness of God, another attribute, another characteristic of God. And if you remember, I said I was indebted to J.I. Packer, who wrote a book called Knowing God. And in that book Knowing God, I think in the first chapter or so, he said that the secret of victorious living is to know God. And not simply that there is a God, but to know God in all of His perfections. And you see that reiterated in different places. I think Psalm 910 says, those who know your name will put your trust in you, for you have never forsaken those who do. And so there are other passages like that. And so tonight we're going to be looking at the changelessness of God, sometimes called His immutability. In Psalm 102, if you thought about the verse that we sang in the song just a moment ago, you probably noticed it talked about God's changelessness. And I want to begin reading at Psalm 102 verse 25. In the beginning you laid the foundations of the earth and the heavens are the work of your hands. I'm sorry, I should read that in your version. Of old you laid the foundation of the earth and the heavens are the work of your hands. They will perish, but you will remain. They will all wear out like a garment. You will change them like a robe and they will pass away. But you are the same and your years have no end. The children of your servants shall dwell secure. their offspring shall be established before you. It's at that point we stop reading God's Word this evening. We make some wonderful statements about the Bible. We talk about it being the light upon our path and a lamp to our feet. We talk about the Bible being sweeter than honey and more precious than gold. And yet there are many times, I think, when we read the Bible, we don't experience that, perhaps. And perhaps it is no wonder we don't experience it, because so many times we read it, as J.I. Packer says, as pure history. And if we read it as pure history, then of course it is history, but it is not simply pure history, it is divine history. If we read it just as mere history, then we say, what in the world do we have in common with those people of those days. They didn't have TV. They didn't have cell phones. They didn't have airplanes. They didn't have satellites. They couldn't text. They didn't have television. There were no freeways. There were no supermarkets. I mean, it was an entirely different world, and how can we relate to that world? It was a world that wars were fought with bows and arrows and slingshots. and spears and sticks and swords. And Jerusalem was a center of religious activity. And prophets, strange prophets, addressed sometimes very strangely, would come and go with strange messages and sometimes very strange powers. And we read all these things and they in a way don't really affect us. They don't really help us much. I don't know if you've ever felt like that. But perhaps you have. You say, how can I relate to that? It's not something that we experience. And how can the words of a shepherd, as the elder read tonight, how can the words of a shepherd who lived in a tent have any bearing on our life? And then J.R. Packer says it is because they had the same God. The very same God, and that God doesn't change. God is the same God that spoke to the world, spoke to Noah at the time of the flood, and warned the world of that flood. It is the same God who spoke to Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob. It is the same God who sent the stone and David's sling into the head of Elijah, into the head of the prophet. It is the same God who fed Elijah with the ravens. It is the very same God that we worship today. When we pray to our God, we are praying to the same God that Hezekiah prayed to when he asked for 15 years more of life and God granted it to him. And in that way we can We can relate to everything that the Bible tells us because God is the same today, yesterday, and forever. And as we will see in Malachi later on, Malachi 3 verse 6, he says, I, the Lord, change not. And then if I can turn you once again back to Psalm 102, let me just reread that for you. In the beginning you laid the foundations of the earth, and the heavens are the work of your hands. They will perish. but you remain. They will all wear out like a garment, like clothing, you will change them and they will be discarded, but you remain the same and your years will never end. How can we comprehend that? How can we comprehend that? Because everything that we know changes. The psalmist here speaks about years, and he speaks about clothes, and he speaks about the world changing. And those are the things that we are familiar with. I mean, everything changes. We think about clothes. Skirts go up and skirts go down. Shorts go up, shorts go down. Pants only go down. When I went through our scrapbook some time back, I saw a picture of myself at five years old. Cute kid. You knew I'd say that, didn't you? Anyhow, this cute kid was on his first day of school, going to first grade, five years old. He was wearing a bib overall, a striped bib overall. And he had a pail, it looked like a little sand pail, and that was his lunch pail. And he even had the tag that was kept on the back pocket of those overalls because they were brand new, and he was very proud of those. And my great-grandkids see that and they laugh and say, that's weird, Grandpa, we don't wear overalls to school. We wear shorts maybe, and we have backpacks, and we have hot lunches. Things have changed, haven't they? And maybe some of you children can look at your parents when they were married. And your dad maybe has long, long hair. You look and you say, that's weird. And today, of course, that is weird because bald is beautiful and everybody is shaving their heads. It changes. Customs change. Everything seems to change. But God doesn't change. He doesn't change. Sometimes we ask, when did God start? How old is God? Who made God? We say that as little children. Who made God? And we have to say, nobody made God. God was always there. God was always the same. God never, ever changed. This psalm speaks about the foundations of the earth changing. And we see some of that today, don't we? We see the landscape changing. We see where there used to be fields and now there are housing, suburbs, Walmarts. We see where once there were rivers, now there are lakes because they were dammed up. And then tonight we came to church and I saw Mount Baker. I said, now there's one thing that doesn't change. It looks exactly the same as it looked to Captain Cook and Vancouver and the Indians and Lewis and Clark. And whoever saw it centuries and centuries ago, there's one thing that doesn't change, but mountains change, don't they? You think, look at Mount St. Helens. Mount St. Helens doesn't look anything like it used to look 40 years ago. It has completely changed because it blew its lid. So even the mountains change, and the psalmist is saying the stars will change because it's going to change everything. The stars at Columbus, guided his ships by, one day will be changed. But God doesn't change. That's the amazing thing that the psalmist thinks about. All these changes, but God is the same. And that's why we call God immutable. Now that's a big word, children, immutable. But if you take it apart, like all big words, you'll see one word that's mutable. And we know about mutants, don't we? I'm getting a little bit beyond my expertise, but I think when it comes to video games, for example, if you get so many points for a certain character, he mutates. He gets on more powers and so on. So that's a mutant. He mutates. God doesn't change. God never mutates. He is the same yesterday, today, and forever. He is immutable. God doesn't change in any way. And that is the first thing that I want to have you notice, the fact of God's changelessness. That's what the Bible tells us. I, the Lord, do not change. And you find that throughout the scriptures, that testimony. Then you look at the areas of God's changelessness. I want to say his character does not change. Maybe that's not a good word to use, but I'm going to use it anyhow. because my vocabulary is limited, but anyhow his character doesn't change. When we talked about the holiness of God, I said that holiness could describe every attribute of God. His love is holy. His wisdom is holy. His wrath is holy. His acts are holy. His words are holy. Everything about God is holy. And you could probably say the same thing, in fact you can say the same thing about God's changelessness. That characteristic, that attribute can describe all of God. His love is changeless, His word is changeless, His wrath is changeless, His promises are changeless, and so on and so forth. And we're going to look at some of those. The first thing let's look at is that God, in terms of God's character, is that His wisdom doesn't change. God's wisdom doesn't change. God doesn't get smarter. God doesn't get smarter. And that's hard for us to understand because we are supposed to get smarter every day, aren't we? We go to school, we hope we learn something every day. And even when we're not in school, we should be learning things. But God doesn't learn things. God knows it all. And he has always known it all. Because you see, if he started to learn things, he would be imperfect, wouldn't he? Because then he would have been dumb about some things. And that would be that he was imperfect then, but God is perfect. So he isn't learning anything. He is wise all the time. He doesn't get smarter, he doesn't learn. His love doesn't change. Now that's a wonderful thing to think about. If you think about that, children, your love changes. Your mother says to you on a rainy day, will you quit bugging your sister, Billy? And Billy says, well, that's what sisters are for. And she says, no, that's not what sisters are for. Why don't you call your friend Johnny? And you say, Johnny's not my friend anymore. We had a fight, or whatever. And you see your love for Johnny has changed, your love for your friend has changed, but God's love never changes. It is always the same. And that's why it's a wonderful thing to come here on a day of baptism. You had baptism a couple weeks ago, I understand. Your pastor had a wonderful sermon, someone told me, who was a visitor here. But why do we bother the whole congregation with the baptism of a child? I mean, it takes time in our worship service. Why should we do that? It's not just because we want everybody to see how cute the baby is, because all babies aren't cute. They're all precious, but not cute. Why do we do it in church? Why do we take everybody's time? The baby doesn't know what's going on. But you know what's going on. And you are to remember that you were baptized. That's why it's done in church, or one of the reasons. And you are to remember that once you were that small and God came to you and spoke to you about his love. And he wants you to remember that. And he not only spoke to you as a baby, before you even knew him about his love, but he made an oath. There is a sign in the seal on your head. God said, I will be your God. I will wash your sins away. Turn to me. You be my child. I am your God. I love you. I promise you that. And so as adults, maybe we We come to church that Sunday, or as teenagers, and we wonder, I would like to make a profession of faith, but my life isn't what it ought to be. And then you see this baptism, and you say, but God has promised. God has promised to save me. God made that promise. And he signed it with a seal. What a wonderful thing. that God's love doesn't change, that his word stays the same all the time. We think about Moses when he is called to deliver Israel from Egypt. He's making all kinds of excuses why he can't do it because he stutters and all of this other stuff. And finally he says to God, okay, okay, who am I going to tell the people sent me? In Exodus chapter three, then God said, tell them the I am sent you. Isn't that a strange thing that God calls himself, that's the name that God calls himself? He says, tell them I am sent you. What was that about? God was reminding Moses to tell the people of Israel that the changeless God sent him. That the God who made a promise to Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob sent him. That the God who doesn't change, who remembers his covenant, who remembers the covenant that he made 430 years ago, that that God sent him. And that God doesn't change. He is, I am. He's not a God. Children, we can talk about what I was. When I was, let's say, when I was in school, I was short, and now I'm tall. Or when I was young, I had crooked teeth, and we went to the orthodontist, and now my teeth are straight. That's how it was, and this is how I am. Or I got my braces, my teeth in braces, and they will be straight. But God doesn't talk like that. God is always, I am. God is the same yesterday, today, and forever. He doesn't change. That's what that name Yahweh or Jehovah is to represent, by the way. In your Bibles, I think in the ESV, that word Yahweh or the I am name of God, is the word LORD, all in capital letters, or the word GOD, all in capital letters. The psalm that Harry read tonight, Psalm 23, the LORD, all in capital letters. The LORD is my shepherd. Jehovah, Yahweh is my shepherd. The changeless one is my shepherd. That's how he starts. And that's how he can know that God's mercy and grace will pursue him all the days of his life. Because God is changeless and he has made those promises to him. You see the wonderful thing about God is that he doesn't change. And then of course we read our Bibles and we find passages that seem to indicate maybe God does change. Once in a while we read that God repents, God relents. I'm not going to explain all those passages this evening or even pretend that I can, but I will try to give you some help. God often speaks in terms of human language, so we could understand him better. He speaks about his right arm. God doesn't have arms, God is a spirit. God is spirit. But he speaks about his right hand, arm. because that's what we understand, that's his strength. Or you think about Jonah, when Jonah had to go to the Ninevites and he preached to the Ninevites. He had 40 days and Nineveh will be destroyed. And then what happened? Nineveh repented. The king repented and all the people repented and God relented. And Jonah said, I knew that would happen because you're that kind of a God. Did God really change his mind? Or did he have to forgive them? Because he promised that if anyone confesses their sins, he is faithful and righteous to forgive them for their sins and to cleanse them from all unrighteousness. And so if God did not forgive them, if God did not change his threat of judgment, he would have been a liar. And why did God send Jonah there in the first place? He didn't send a prophet to Sodom or to a lot of the other Gentile cities. Why to Nineveh? Because God was threatening Nineveh so that they would repent and he would point to Israel and say, God's mercy is even great toward the Gentiles. At least that is one way that you certainly can understand that God repented in that passage. Or you think about the time when Moses is standing before God. And he is on the mountain. And on that mountain, God notices that the people below are living in sin. And what does he do? He tells Moses, get out of the way because I want to go down and I want to punish them. And Moses doesn't get out of the way. Instead, Moses stands his ground and he starts to pray. And what happens? God doesn't punish Israel. God doesn't destroy Israel. Because God has promised to hear the pleas of a Savior. And Moses is a picture of Christ who comes to us, who stands before our God coming in judgment, And he stands before that God and he prays for his people. So you see, it may seem from time to time that God repents, but he uses that language in human ways so that we can understand it better. There's another wonderful thing about God is that his mood doesn't change. Sometimes you young people want to ask your mother something or your dad something and your mother will say, well don't ask him now, he's had a kind of a bad afternoon. Or don't ask your mother right now, she's had a hectic afternoon. Ask her later. We never have to wonder whether God has had a bad hair day. Whether God is in a bad mood. Because God promises always to hear us. And He promises always to have His ear attentive to our prayers. God is changeless. And His love toward His people is always the same. I mentioned already, in some ways we've already talked about that, God's Word doesn't change. I want to read Malachi 6. A moment. I'm sorry, Malachi 3, starting at verse 6. This is what we read in Malachi 3, beginning at verse 6. For I, the Lord, do not change. Therefore you, O children of Jacob, are not consumed. From the days of your fathers you have turned aside from my statues and have not kept them. Return to me and I will return to you, says the Lord of Hosts. But you say, how shall we return? Will a man rob God? Yet you are robbing me. But you say, how have we robbed you? In your ties and contributions. You are cursed with a curse, for you are robbing me, the whole nation of you. Bring the full tithes into the storehouse, that there may be food in my house, and thereby put me to the test, says the Lord of hosts. And you notice that Lord is, in all those instances, is all capitalized. He's a changeless God. Put me to the test, says the Lord of hosts, if I will not open the windows of heaven for you and pour down for you a blessing until there is no more need. What was happening there? Well, apparently the people were thinking that God's word had changed, at least when it came to their tithes and their offerings. And because God's word had changed, they thought, Because they thought God's Word had changed, they thought they could start skimping on their tithes. They perhaps thought it was a different age. You know, we do that with God's Word, don't we? God says something in the Bible, and they say, well, that was a different time, different circumstances. It doesn't count today, and we are quick to do that. And that's probably what they do, because that's how God's people shortchange His Word. But he comes to them and he says, if you are to enjoy my fellowship, you are to be obeyers of my word and not slackers. And I want to bring that up tonight, not because I think any of you are slackers in terms of your giving, but that's what we do with God's word. We act as if God's word is changeable. I don't care what it is, whether it's creation or whether it's Christ's resurrection, there are some who can begin to question that and question that enough so that we finally begin to question that ourselves. That's what the New Testament warns us about when it warns us about false prophets. False prophets aren't those who preach from the Quran. Well, there are false prophets too. But the dangerous false prophets are those who preach from the Bible. They are dangerous because they wear sheep's clothing, they look like sheep, and they preach from the Bible. But what makes them false prophets is that they change the changeless Word of God. And there is nothing in the scripture that the church Some in the church do not try to whittle away to make it more compatible with what's happening in the world today. And I don't care what it is, what you think about. Or you can think about marriage. I'm often amazed, sometimes happily so, but I'm often amazed when I used to marry a lot of young couples and they would come to me and they would say, can we write our own vows? And I would say, sure, write your own vows. And then I would often be very happy to see how biblical those vows were, but sometimes I'd be very disappointed, because somehow or other, the headship principle in there was missing. And if I would point that out, they would say, yes, we know that, but it's different today, because women have just as much education as men, and sometimes more. And there are wives that are smarter than their husbands, and there are wives that make more money than their husbands. And so it is a partnership today, because it's a different age. And you see how very suddenly we've whittled what God has said in his word. We do that as preachers. Evangelical preachers today, and I must include myself in that, evangelical preachers today do not preach about hell and judgment like we used to. That doesn't attract people. It doesn't make any difference that the Bible speaks about that and then the people say, well, you know, that's the Old Testament. God doesn't change. He is the same in the New Testament. Read the book of Revelation if you don't think he's a God of judgment. And we say, well, it's a much better approach to approach people and say, God loves you and has a wonderful plan for your life. and outside of the theological difficulties with it. Think how different that is from how John the Baptist approached people. You brood of vipers, who warned you to flee from the wrath to come? Bring forth fruits worthy of repentance and so on and so forth. So you see how little by little we whittled the word of God down. how it is with marriage and the homosexual lifestyle today. Suddenly churches are debating whether to ordain and whether to marry same-sex people or have homosexuals at the, not celibate, but practicing homosexuals at the communion table. And suddenly churches are questioning that, debating that. we begin to wonder what's changed in the Bible. When Malachi 3 says, I the Lord change not. When Psalm 102 says, my word does not change. But we are willing to begin to question it and finally say, oh, well now we understand that it is not the homosexual lifestyle that's bad, but it is the promiscuous lifestyle that's bad. And so we can move right along with society today, and we have no problems. We have the same thing with the Fourth Commandment. Somehow or other, Christians think that there are nine commandments. They talk about ten commandments, but they only practice them when they really think about nine of them, because the Sabbath commandment is no longer observed. Somehow or other, we think that, hmm, I guess that doesn't apply anymore. Does what? God's word abide forever? He doesn't repent of it. His words are the same yesterday, today, and forever. Jesus said in John chapter 10, scripture cannot be broken. And when he quotes scripture, he even His authority even comes on the tense of a verb, whether it's active or passive or whatever. God's Word does not change. But that brings us to that part that I didn't have in your bulletin, God's promises don't change either. And that's a wonderful thought, isn't it? God's promises do not change. Aren't you happy about that? We break our promises, don't we, children? Your parents break their promises sometimes. We break our promises when we say, well, if I can go with my friend today, then I'll practice my piano tomorrow two times, or my horn, or whatever. And then tomorrow comes, and we only do it one time. So we've broken our promise. Mother says to you, I'm going to buy you a new dress, or new shoes, or something. And then when the time comes, she says, I'm sorry, we can't do that because we can't afford it this week. But mother, you promised. You promised. But mother has to break her promise. But God never breaks his promise. Has God promised you something? Has God promised that if we seek him, we shall surely find him? And maybe you are struggling with faith? And you are wondering whether God will hear your prayers? My friend, God has promised it. God has promised, if you seek me, you will find me. And don't let go of that promise until God fulfills that promise in your life. Maybe you have recently committed a sin that is just weighing heavily on you. It was deliberate. It was disgusting. It was a sin that when you think about it, you say, I can't imagine. I can't imagine I did that. I can't imagine I committed that sin. And the problem is, of course, is that you imagine yourself to be much better than you are, and therefore you dare not go to God, because you thought you were better than that. But the sin is so disgusting and so terrible, you hardly dare to go to God, and then I come to you with this promise, God comes to you with this promise, that if you confess your sins, I am faithful and righteous to forgive you and to cleanse you from all iniquity. And you take that to God. You see, but I've done that and I don't feel forgiven. I don't care how you feel. What has God said? And when you begin to take that promise and you hold onto it, you must feel better. Or you call God a liar, you see. What a wonderful thing it is that God's promises don't change. Sometimes we feel forsaken by God, and there may be reasons in our life for that. Maybe God hasn't forsaken us, but we have forsaken Him. But if that's how we are feeling, then we go to God on the basis of His promise, where He has said, I will never leave you. I will never leave you. Yea, though you walk through the valley of the shadow of death, I will fear no evil because you have promised to be with me. Those are the wonderful promises of God, of a God who is changeless, who is immutable. I don't know what promise of God you need today. We go through life with many difficulties, many trials, and as you get older and older, You love the song standing on the promises that cannot fail. You love that song even more than you used to. But I don't know what promise you need today. Is there something you need for hope? Then you must remember that you're going to a changeless God. And you take that promise and you do not let go of it until you have accepted it for yourself. that God has made that promise and God is not a liar. And then you go on living for Him with joy. Amen. Heavenly Father, we give you thanks today once again for reminding us of your wonderful changelessness. There is a certain amount of fear that can develop from that because you have warned us that there is only judgment that awaits those who do not put their trust in Jesus. And that does not change. That warning does not change. But your promise, your promise to us as your covenant people, beginning at the very beginning of our life, when we were babies, or whenever we were brought to the baptismal font, that you already promised us there that you would be our God, and may we take that promise to you and rest assured that all things will work together for good to those who are called according to your name. We give you praise in Jesus' name, amen.