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Bible preaching from the pulpit of Choice Hills Baptist Church in Greenville, South Carolina
Okay, very good. Well, we will, what we'll do is we will open our Bible and I'm sure all of you
forgotten what we're studying, so I'm gonna bring you back up to speed. For the last little bit,
we've been going through a series called Our Great God, and in this series we have been covering
the various attributes of God, and so we've gone through I think three already. We're on the fourth,
if I'm not mistaken, and so last time we met three weeks ago we were on the subject of God's
immutability, and so we covered it the first time, that is part one, and we're going to
continue that. Maybe we'll finish today, maybe it will be next week before we finish, but
we're talking about where the title of our lesson series here is Our God is Immutable. Our God is
Immutable. So what we're going to do is we're going to pause and pray, and then I'll do a brief
review to bring us up to speed where we are, because just as a reminder, and then we'll continue
in our study, and we will likely be in, let's see, where should we start? Exodus. We'll start in the
book of Exodus, and so if you want to go ahead and start turning there, Exodus chapter 32 is where
we'll begin today. All right, let's pray together, and then we'll dive in here. Our Father, thank you
for your people, for the church of God, thank you for how that you are working in the hearts of your
people, and I pray, I pray that you would revive us, Lord, revive us, and Lord, put in us a great
fervency and desire for you, for your word, for your will, for service to you. I pray, Lord, that
the temperatures and the current events and the illnesses, Lord, that those things would not affect
us spiritually, that we would not have spiritual coldness, we would not have spiritual illness,
but Lord, we would be, we would be desirous to live for you and to love you, Lord. Lord, uplift us,
Lord, you know the past few weeks we have not been able to meet regularly in our church services, and
Lord, it's been difficult not having the exhortation, not having the fellowship, and the
blessing of one another's presence with us, so Lord, I pray that you would revive us and
strengthen us, and Lord, make up according to your power, make up for lost time, and in our Sunday
school time now, I pray that you would bless it, and you would guide us, and help us to understand,
and stand in awe of who you are, because Lord, you are a great God, there is none like you,
and Lord, help us to see and understand that ever more clearly, and Lord, for the kids in
their Sunday school class, bless and help them, strengthen them, and give them wisdom,
and help the kids to understand and grow in their knowledge of you as well.
We commit these things to you, and ask your blessing of our study of your word in Jesus' name,
amen. Okay, well, we are going to be in Exodus 32 in just a minute, just as a reminder, can somebody
give me a good definition for immutable? What does immutable mean? Anybody? Yes, ma'am.
Unchanging? All right, any others? I mean, that's right, obviously. Any other
ideas you might want to mention? Everybody's kind of quiet today.
Can I? Maybe we need to stand up and do some jumping jacks. Maybe that's what we need to do.
Some of you are like, not going to happen. So, immutability is the definition we looked at in
our classes, not subject to or susceptible of change, unchangeable, unalterable, and
changeless. Now, we saw how the immutability is related to God's eternity,
and it is related because, well, first of all, the scripture makes that comparison as well,
but immutability means if God ever changes, just as a reminder, if God ever changes,
then he can't be eternal, because at the moment that he changes, from that moment, he dwells
in time, because there was a period before when he was one way, and then he changed into another
way, and that excludes his dwelling in eternity. And so, the fact that God dwells in eternity
also means that he is unchangeable. And so, we also saw how the immutability or the unchangeableness
of God is an essential and defining attribute of God, of the nature of God. Nothing can be called
God if it is not immutable. And so, one other thing we saw from scripture is one characteristic
of the created things, creatures, is the fact that all creatures, no matter, there is nothing,
absolutely nothing in God's creation, not any atom, not any person, or anything in between,
there is absolutely nothing that does not change that God has created. Every single thing changes,
and the only exception to that, of course, is God himself, which that makes it a defining
characteristic. And we also saw how the immutability applies to God's various attributes.
Not only is God himself immutable, but the various other attributes of God also do not change,
because he does not change. And last time we were here, we looked at not a problem passage,
but a subject that is often brought up when we talk about God's immutability, that God does
not change, which is the subject of repenting. Repenting, that's where we were last week.
We saw in Genesis chapter 6 regarding the flood, as well as in Deuteronomy chapter 32,
how that the Lord repents himself. That's the term used, he repented himself. Which is, and this is
an aspect of English, actually, that comes out. So in English, the word repent just means to change,
right? That's what the idea means, to change one's mind or to change. But when you say,
in English, when you say, repents himself, repents himself in that kind of reflexive way,
what you're actually describing is the idea of grief and sorrow over something that has happened.
And so you've done something, and it has not turned out as you hoped, or as you expected,
maybe we would say, and we would say we repent ourselves. And the example that we looked at in
Matthew 27 was Judas Iscariot. He sold the Lord for silver, and then after the fact, the Bible says,
he repented himself, and then went back and cast the silver at the feet of the elders, and then
he hanged himself. Everybody remember that? Well, he repented himself means that after he had betrayed
and turned over the Lord Jesus, he felt regret and sorrow for that fact. Well, okay, so we understand
that. That's a very human thing. But that same term is applied to God. When God created the
world and humanity went into sin and evil wholesale, and then the Lord decided to judge
humanity with the flood, he said, I repent that I have made man upon the earth. And so that expresses
God's grief and God's sorrow. So obviously the question that comes up is, how can God be sorry
for something that he knew very well would happen? And that goes back to the foreknowledge of God,
which I think we've already studied. But actually we haven't gotten to omniscience yet, but we
definitely touched on it for sure, especially with eternity. And so the question is, how can God be
regretful or sorry over something that he knew would happen? And this, the last thing we were
talking about before in our last lesson was this paradox. And so, yes, God knows all things. Yes,
God dwells in eternity. But yes, we also see that the Lord speaks to us about his feelings
in human terms so that we can understand. And so the fact that the Bible says that God repents
himself does not indicate God changes. It does not indicate God changes. He's relating to us
an emotion that we understand in terms that we understand. And so now we go to the second facet
of God's repentance. So the first one is this, when we say repent in English, when we're talking about
that, we say the first one is one can repent himself. But the second is the idea of repenting
from an action, that is turning from or changing one's mind. And this is also applied to God. We'll
see this in Exodus 32. If you'll turn there, if you're not already there, Exodus 32 and verse number 14.
Actually, let's start in verse number 11, Exodus 32 verse number 11. The Bible says this,
And Moses besought the Lord his God, and said, Lord, why doth thy wrath wax hot against thy people,
which thou hast brought forth out of the land of Egypt with great power and with a mighty hand?
Wherefore should the Egyptians speak and say, For Mischief did he bring them out to slay them in the
mountains and to consume them from the face of the earth? Turn from thy fierce wrath, and repent
of this evil against thy people. Now notice here the Lord is asking, I'm sorry, Moses is asking the
Lord to repent. Now, and this is an important truth which we'll circle back to in just a minute.
You know, when you talk about theology of the way God is, you have the kind of theoretical part of
that, and then you have the practical part of that. All right, some people that believe in certain
doctrines, primarily Calvinistic doctrines, they put a heavy emphasis on the theoretical part. In
other words, they're going to harp on the fact that God knows everything. And of course, they would say
he ordains everything and those kinds of things, which the God knows everything is true. That is a
fact. All right. But then the problem with that is then they take it in a practical way to a place
that is not scriptural. And so the idea is, if God knows everything, then it then affects someone's
prayers. It affects what they ask of God. Now, I think probably, although I can't prove this, I think
probably Moses, in Exodus 32, Moses probably understood that God knows all things. In fact,
I didn't study this previously, this question, but we could probably find a verse somewhere where
Moses describes God's, the fact that God knows all things. We could probably find a verse somewhere
in one of the first five books of the Bible that says that. So Moses probably knew that God was
omniscient, yet that does not stop him from asking God to repent. You see what I'm saying? That's the
theoretical, theological part, and then the practical, theological part. And so Moses boldly
comes to God and says, God, please repent. It wasn't like, well, the Lord, you already know what's
going to happen, so what will be will be, as they say, what's the word? Geisera sera, right?
Barney Fife's famous statement. What will be will be, what will be will be. That is that idea,
what will be will be. In fact, okay, just as a cultural thing, because I know some of you
probably enjoy old-timey movies and TV shows that I also enjoy from like the 1800s, I like that period
for some reason. Well, you hear this. How many of you know Anne of Green Gables?
Anne of Green Gables, it's the great, albeit Canadian, but nevertheless still a great series,
right? One of the themes, I'm not trying to make too big of an emphasis on this, but I'm not trying
to make too big of an emphasis on this, but one of the themes that comes out, the set in the late
1800s, early 1900s, one of the themes that comes out in that and in many other movies, TV shows in
that period is this. What God has ordained, there's nothing you can do to change it.
It's, huh? Yeah, exactly. Yeah, exactly. And that period of time, especially in the United States,
there was a very strong Calvinistic influences in a lot of churches, in a lot of churches. Well,
it comes out, well, what will be will be. And in Anne of Green Gables, there's actually a line where
that's stated multiple times. The idea is, well, what will be will be. You know, fate has
determined it. God has determined it. You can kind of switch them out. But that is not what Moses said.
What I'm trying to show you is that is not a scriptural view. The fact that God knows all
things in advance should not ever lead us to think that it is no use in trying or calling upon God.
That is beyond scriptural permission. That is a wrong use of a Bible truth. Does that make sense?
Okay, going back here, this is the proof of it. And this is one of many. This is one of many. Moses
who knew God, he knew God better than we know God in the sense of at least he interacted with God in
that way. Of course, he didn't know God in the same way that we do with through Christ and all yet.
But he asks God to repent. So this idea that everything was already established and what will
be will be was not in his mind. He was like, no, Lord, change. That's what he's saying. Lord,
change this. Change what you're going to do. I for one rejoice in the fact that I can go to God,
who knows all things, and ask God to do something different.
And it matters. It does matter. And so that's exactly what Moses does. In verse number 13,
look at what it says, continuing, Remember Abraham, Isaac, and Israel, thy servants,
to whom thou swearst thine own self, and sayest unto them, I will multiply your seed as the stars
of heaven, and all this land that I have spoken of will I give unto your seed,
and they shall inherit it forever. And the Lord repented of the evil which he thought to do unto
his people. So I know this creates a little bit of a paradox, but the point stands, which is
the scriptures unambiguously say that what God intended to do or resolved to do previously,
he chose to change his mind and do something different. Okay, everybody see that? Can it give
me a nod? Everybody see that? It's important that we acknowledge that even if we can't
fully reconcile the two, right? And again, I keep on going back to this based upon our first,
our first part of our series, which is God is incomprehensible. We expect these kinds of
difficult questions from a God who is beyond our comprehension. So we're happy with that. That's
fine. All right. Look at Jeremiah, if you would. Jeremiah chapter 18.
Jeremiah chapter 18.
Brother Burgess, good to see you, brother.
How much snow do you guys end up getting? Eight inches?
Whoa. Chris Justice did not report that.
So we're in Jeremiah 18. Look at verse number eight. Bible says this.
Just pick up at verse number seven. At what instant I shall speak concerning a nation
and concerning a kingdom to pluck up and to pull down and to destroy it. I notice he says,
I speak that I'm going to do this. I speak that I'm going to do this. I speak that I'm going to do
this. I speak that I'm going to do this. So the Lord says, you're done. You're done. I'm done with
you. I'm going to, I'm going to destroy a nation. So that's what the verse, verse seven says. Verse
eight continues. If that nation against whom I have pronounced turned from their evil, I will repent
of the evil that I thought to do unto them. So listen to what this verse is saying. Verse eight
says God did actually think to do this. God was actually intending on doing it. Now here's the
problem with some of the Calvinistic doctrines on this point. Here's the problem. See, someone of
that persuasion would look at this and would say, well, God knew the whole time, God determined the
whole time that he was going to make this pronouncement while all the while decreeing
that he would not do that thing. The problem with that is that it creates a contradiction.
It creates a situation in which God is making pronouncements that are insincere.
God said, I pronounce that I'm going to do this thing. I intend, I'm thinking, verse eight,
I thought to do it. In other words, at this moment, God is going to destroy Sodom and Gomorrah.
Right? And he says so in advance. He tells them, does God mean what he says or not?
And then in verse eight says, if they turn, verse eight says that, he says, I won't do it.
I will not do the thing that I thought to do. And so the problem is if you take the persuasion that
from the beginning, from before the foundation of the world, God determined that he was not
going to destroy Sodom as in my example here, then he made a pronouncement that he did not mean.
Now, can I reconcile this altogether with the fact of God's omniscience? No,
I can't. But I'm also not going to, I'm also not going to create my own
manufactured contradiction in pursuit of a particular system of doctrine.
There's another example where this comes up as well, which is in Calvinistic doctrine is
when you talk about limited atonement and the call of God. So the question is this,
if Christ only died for the elect, right? Not for all men, but if he only died for those who would
believe, we know that he gives an open invitation to everyone generally, but is that invitation sincere?
If it's utterly impossible and he himself has not decreed that all will be, that it is possible for
all to be saved. In other words, he has chosen only a certain, a few by his eternal decree. I'm using
the terminology that's used. Then is the invitation actually sincere? In other words,
there's a parallel between what I'm saying here and in that idea. And it creates a contradiction
where the Lord is saying things that he has no intention of doing at all. Saying things to us
that are not actually true, not in time and not in eternity. Does that make sense? Does everybody
understand kind of what I'm saying here? When the Lord says, come unto me all you that labor in a
heavy laden and I will give you rest. Look unto me and be saved all the ends of the earth for I'm God
and there is none else. When the Lord says that, is that sincere? Does he intend that for every
person or is it just a play? Just kind of words. You see what I'm saying? And that's one of the
issues with that and it kind of touches and overlaps on what we're looking at here. But
notice, continue in verse number eight, if that nation against whom I have pronounced turn from
their evil, I will repent of the evil that I thought to do unto them. And at what instant
I shall speak concerning a nation and concerning a kingdom to build and to plan it, if it do evil
in my sight, that it obey not my voice, then I will repent of the good wherewith I said I would
benefit them. Again, the Lord says he would repent whether it's to the good or to the evil,
depending on people's response. Okay, but we have to be careful here. There's one,
I covered one side of the ditch, one ditch on the side of the road rather, but there's another ditch.
The other ditch is to view God only in human terms. To view God as somehow biting his nails,
nervous somehow about what we will do. That's also something that's not really described in
Scripture at all. What you see here is that the Lord lays out what I think are sincere,
verse seven, verse nine, what are sincere warnings and sincere statements of his intentions.
And then he chooses in his wisdom to make decisions and take actions contingent upon
man's choice. That's what I'm trying to show you. That doesn't mean that God's a nail biter.
It doesn't mean that he's somehow subject to us, but in that case he chose to set his determination
upon what man did. We have to be careful we understand both parts of this and don't go to the
extreme on either side. So we can clearly see based upon those two verses and the two verses,
we can clearly see based upon those two verses and there's others as well, that God repents in
the sense of number one, he repents himself, shows grief and sorrow and regret. That's what it says.
And then also we see that God repents in the sense of he changes his previously determined course of
action and often to withhold judgment from a person who turns from their evil. And indeed,
think about this, we should give God thanks that he is able to and indeed does repent.
Because if God never repented of the evil he intended to do to sinners, think of Israel,
when Israel makes this golden calf and Moses comes down and is God's like, I'm done with these
people. I'm wiping them off the face of the earth and I'm going to start a new nation with you,
Moses. And Moses, he intercedes for Israel and he tries to convince God to repent. That's what we
just read. If it was impossible for God to change his mind and take a different course of action,
then Moses' prayer would have been useless and that also means there would never be any hope for
any of us. So the fact that God changes his mind means that God has determined indeed to throw
sinners into the lake of fire. He is determined to judge and he will indeed, he will judge.
But to the sinner who comes to him and trusts in the Savior he provided, he changes his mind and
gives forgiveness and he repents of the evil that he planned to do.
And so it gives us great hope. God's capacity to change his mind and his course of action
is the reason that we're saved. Look at Jeremiah, I'm sorry, Jonah, not Jeremiah, Jonah.
Look at the book of Jonah, chapter three.
So Jonah reluctantly and begrudgingly preaches to the Ninevites
and tells them, yet forty days and Ninevus shall be overthrown. That raises our question we just
covered, right? Did God know that Nineveh, however you want to say it, the Southerner would always
say Ninevah, but however you say it, when God decreed that that city would be destroyed,
was that sincere? But also did God know that it wouldn't be destroyed at that time? Yes.
You see how there's tension, right? There's tension between those two facts.
Verse number six, Jonah has preached, yet forty days and Ninevus shall be overthrown. Verse six
says, for word came unto the king of Ninevus, and he arose from his throne, and he laid his robe from
him and covered him with sackcloth and sat in ashes. And he caused it to be proclaimed and
published through Nineveh by the decree of the king and his nobles, saying,
Let neither man nor beast, herd nor flock, taste anything. Let them not feed nor drink water,
but let man and beast be covered with sackcloth and cry mightily unto God.
Yea, let them turn everyone from his evil way and from the violence that is in their hands.
Who can tell if God will turn and repent and turn away from his fierce anger that we perish not?
And so there was hope that this king hoped that God would and could repent, and he did.
Right? And notice salvation came as a result of this man believing that God would change his mind.
And indeed God did. Indeed God did. And so you can see this related to salvation,
the salvation of the Ninevites here.
Now, as I said, the term repent in our English language is multifaceted. That's what we've been
looking at and covering. So whether we say God repents himself, which we see, or God repents of
a course of action, which we also see, neither one of those uses of the term indicates that God
himself changes. God himself, that is his essence, his nature, his attributes, or his character.
None of those things are subject to repentance or to change. So I mean, and this is true in
humanity as well. A person can change his mind without his character. A person can change his
So I mean, and this is true in humanity as well. A person can change his mind without his character
and personality changing. Just because you change your mind on a course of action does not mean
that you yourself are changing.
All right.
So as we've seen, as we've seen in our study thus far about repentance, because this is all touches
on God's repentance, we see that God's eternal foreknowledge is hard to be reconciled with the
scriptural truth of his repenting in time. But God has chosen to interact with us in time,
because we are in time. If he interacted with us in the realm in which we lived,
we wouldn't be able to interact with him at all. But he chooses to interact with us in time.
The Bible is a human book. That is, it is given by God to talk to human beings.
So it uses time. God uses time to talk to human beings. So it uses time. God uses time to talk
to human beings. It uses time. God doesn't talk to us on this level. He talks to us on the level
in which we live. Otherwise, we wouldn't get it at all. Now, he does talk about some things that
are on the higher level where he dwells for sure, as we've seen. But the Lord speaks to us in terms
that we understand. Think about this. And we're just philosophizing here a little bit. Have you
ever thought about what would happen if the Lord dealt with us from his perspective only and not
in from our perspective in time? Think about the sins and falls and stumbles that you are yet to do
in the future. That God knows in his foreknowledge you're going to do. I'm going to do.
A year from now, we're going to hugely make a terrible decision, a sinful decision a year from
now. What if God dealt with us now based upon that decision then? Does he do that? No. No.
Now, I'm not trying to say, I'm not asserting that that has been determined by God that that
will come to pass. I'm not saying that at all because I don't believe that God determines
sinful things that he forbids from coming to pass. But if the Lord knew in his foreknowledge that
fact and he judged us now based upon that, that would be a hard thing to deal with, would it not?
But the Lord doesn't do that. So he deals with us in time. He deals with us in time. If indeed we do
that thing, we get to that. He will judge us then. But now he deals with us as we are now.
He deals with us as we are now. And that's a great blessing because, again, there is hope that
with God's grace maybe we won't do that thing from our human perspective, right?
So God has chosen to create this world bound within time. And things change as a result
of time. And as I said, we have to be careful that our that the theological truths we find in
scripture aren't used as an excuse to not deal with God as he reveals himself in time.
Because by doing that, what happens is, and this absolutely happens,
by doing that we lose touch with with practical, the practical part of our faith, and we can't do
that. All the theology that we talk about, and we try to think through and meditate upon about the
Lord and what he knows and all these things, that's all fine and good in theory. That's all
fine and good when we just think about theology. But those things all have practical effect.
So that practical part is supposed to be consistent with the theological part.
It's supposed to go together. And that's why when we study each one of these attributes of God,
we try to look at the practical aspects as well. Okay, now let's move on, kind of turn the page.
So we looked at the theology of the immutability of God. We have a few minutes
to look at the New Testament now. If you would go to Hebrews chapter one.
Does anybody have a comment you'd like to make that I've been rambling on all this time haven't
provided you an opportunity to anybody yes sir
your view of God
for example
yes
yes that's absolutely true it's absolutely true not dry dead theological truths but living
real theological things that that affect one's life all right anybody anybody else have something
you want to add
intended
to be
yeah
deeper than what that intended statement was intended to be yeah that's that's so that's so
true and theological debates usually are usually come from that it comes from it's what's called
systematic theology in other words taking actual statements of scripture and deducing from them
systems well the problem is once you're once you have the system and you you wear the badge and
you've got the label now you have to defend it and once you have to defend it and and and to be fair
we do this too to some degree right i mean we we there's a system i believe in right but
we strive to be honest with the scripture right we hope to be not seek to simply defend the system
because it is our preferred system i'm sure everybody i'm sure people that believe
on the other side of that probably say the same thing but uh but again it's we're giving
account to god for it and so that's good enough so exactly right and not some other whatever
ain't going there all right let's go to hebrews chapter one verse number
verse number eight now follow this closely if you would we've already studied psalm 102
and in just a minute we've in the context of the immutability immutability of god and in the context
of hebrews chapter one psalm 102 the part that we looked at remember the vesture getting old
decaying folded up that kind of thing having the requirement to change clothes because the clothes
get old all right we studied that already in psalm 102 now in hebrews one that passage is now
going to be quoted but the context is a little different all right hebrews one verse eight
but unto the son this to jesus of course he saith thy throne oh god is forever and ever
a scepter of righteousness is the scepter of thy kingdom thou hast hated thou hast loved righteousness
and hated iniquity therefore god even thy god hath anointed thee with the oil of gladness above
thy fellows so the person to whom this is addressed is the son that's jesus now follow the context
and thou lord in the beginning has laid the foundations laid the foundation of the earth
and the heavens are the works of thy hands they shall perish now this is the familiar part to us
but thou remainest and they shall all wax old as death a garment and as a vesture shalt
thou fold them up and they shall be changed but thou art the same and thy years shall not fail
now okay so you can say well now he's no longer talking to the son in that passage
but keep going but to which of the angels said he at any time sit on my right hand until i make
thine enemies thy footstool are they not all ministering spirits sent forth to minister
for them who shall be heirs of salvation so notice verses eight through fourteen are actually
referring in context based upon the the whole chapter to the son so what what here's here's
here's what goes on when we looked at psalm 102 that wasn't evident when you looked at psalm 102
you saw that god never changes and and he he endures forever that's what we saw and what what
the writer of hebrew does is he takes that and brings it into hebraeus one about the son and
applies it to jesus that's the amazing thing and this is not the only place he does this go to
hebrews chapter 13
hebrews 13 verse number eight
hebrews 13 verse eight says this jesus christ the same yesterday and today and forever so in chapter
one he quotes psalm 102 to describe the immutability of god and applies it to jesus
the son and then he reiterates that in chapter 13 verse eight by saying by stating the immutability
of jesus christ you see that okay remember i know i'm repeating myself but there's a reason we're
kind of doing it systematically as we go through these characteristics every characteristic that
we have examined about god so far we're on the fourth has been true of jesus as revealed in the
bible do you see that immutability is no different immutability is also applied to jesus now remember
i said in the review a minute ago that immutability like eternity like self-existence is a defining
characteristic of god in other words god is god as a result of this characteristic and here it is
applied now to jesus once again we're building an edifice a a doctrinal and biblical edifice
showing without any question at all that jesus is indeed god in the flesh because all of these
characteristics and this is not it we're going to go through others that are also be applied to jesus
so this again we don't look we don't we don't have to look for proof texts to prove that who jesus is
it is a an entire temple of truth built brick by brick where all the essential attributes of god
are applied to him it is undeniable from a scriptural perspective jesus is immutable
jesus is therefore the one true god manifest in the flesh all right and that is how immutability
is related to jesus christ i'm sure there's other ways as well but that's the way we're looking at
all right let's pray