The Immutability of God
by
C. H. Spurgeon
Delivered on Sabbath
Morning, January 7th, 1855 at New Park Street
Chapel, Southwark, England
“I am the Lord, I change
not; therefore ye sons of Jacob are not consumed.”--
Malachi 3:6
It has been said by some
one that “the proper study of mankind is man.” I
will not oppose the idea, but I believe it is
equally true that the proper study of God’s elect is
God; the proper study of a Christian is the Godhead.
The highest science, the loftiest speculation, the
mightiest philosophy, which can ever engage the
attention of a child of God, is the name, the
nature, the person, the work, the doings, and the
existence of the great God whom he calls his Father.
There is something exceedingly improving to the mind
in a contemplation of the Divinity. It is a subject
so vast, that all our thoughts are lost in its
immensity; so deep, that our pride is drowned in its
infinity. Other subjects we can compass and grapple
with; in them we feel a kind of self-content, and go
our way with the thought, “Behold I am wise.” But
when we come to this master-science, finding that
our plumb-line cannot sound its depth, and that our
eagle eye cannot see its height, we turn away with
the thought, that vain man would be wise, but he is
like a wild ass’s colt; and with the solemn
exclamation, “I am but of yesterday, and know
nothing.” No subject of contemplation will tend more
to humble the mind, than thoughts of God. We shall
be obliged to feel—
“Great God, how infinite
art thou,
What worthless worms are
we!”
But while the subject
humbles the mind it also expands it. He who often
thinks of God, will have a larger mind than the man
who simply plods around this narrow globe. He may be
a naturalist, boasting of his ability to dissect a
beetle, anatomize a fly, or arrange insects and
animals in classes with well nigh unutterable names;
he may be a geologist, able to discourse of the
megatherium and the plesiosaurus, and all kinds of
extinct animals; he may imagine that his science,
whatever it is, ennobles and enlarges his mind. I
dare say it does, but after all, the most excellent
study for expanding the soul, is the science of
Christ, and him crucified, and the knowledge of the
Godhead in the glorious Trinity. Nothing will so
enlarge the intellect, nothing so magnify the whole
soul of man, as a devout, earnest, continued
investigation of the great subject of the Deity.
And, whilst humbling and expanding, this subject is
eminently consolatary. Oh, there is, in
contemplating Christ, a balm for every wound; in
musing on the Father, there is a quietus for every
grief; and in the influence of the Holy Ghost, there
is a balsam for every sore. Would you lose your
sorrows? Would you drown your cares? Then go, plunge
yourself in the Godhead’s deepest sea; be lost in
his immensity; and you shall come forth as from a
couch of rest, refreshed and invigorated. I know
nothing which can so comfort the soul; so calm the
swelling billows of grief and sorrow; so speak peace
to the winds of trial, as a devout musing upon the
subject of the Godhead. It is to that subject that I
invite you this morning. We shall present you with
one view of it,—that is the immutability of the
glorious Jehovah. “I am,” says my text, “Jehovah,”
(for so it should be translated) “I am Jehovah, I
change not: therefore ye sons of Jacob are not
consumed.”
There are three things
this morning. First of all, an unchanging God;
secondly, the persons who derive benefit from this
glorious attribute, “the sons of Jacob;” and
thirdly, the benefit they so derive, they “are not
consumed.’ We address ourselves to these points.
I. First of all, we have
set before us the doctrine of THE IMMUTABILITY OF
GOD. “I am God, I change not.” Here I shall
attempt to expound, or rather to enlarge the
thought, and then afterwards to bring a few
arguments to prove its truth.
1. I shall offer some
exposition of my text, by first saying, that God is
Jehovah, and he changes not in his essence. We
cannot tell you what Godhead is. We do not know what
substance that is which we call God. It is an
existence, it is a being; but what that is, we know
not. However, whatever it is, we call it his
essence, and that essence never changes. The
substance of mortal things is ever changing. The
mountains with their snow-white crowns, doff their
old diadems in summer, in rivers trickling down
their sides, while the storm cloud gives them
another coronation; the ocean, with its mighty
floods, loses its water when the sunbeams kiss the
waves, and snatch them in mists to heaven; even the
sun himself requires fresh fuel from the hand of the
Infinite Almighty, to replenish his ever burning
furnace. All creatures change. Man, especially as to
his body, is always undergoing revolution. Very
probably there is not a single particle in my body
which was in it a few years ago. This frame has been
worn away by activity, its atoms have been removed
by friction, fresh particles of matter have in the
mean time constantly accrued to my body, and so it
has been replenished; but its substance is altered.
The fabric of which this world is made is ever
passing away; like a stream of water, drops are
running away and others are following after, keeping
the river still full, but always changing in its
elements. But God is perpetually the same. He is not
composed of any substance or material, but is
spirit—pure, essential, and ethereal spirit—and
therefore he is immutable. He remains everlastingly
the same. There are no furrows on his eternal brow.
No age hath palsied him; no years have marked him
with the mementoes of their flight; he sees ages
pass, but with him it is ever now. He is the great I
AM—the Great Unchangeable. Mark you, his essence did
not undergo a change when it became united with the
manhood. When Christ in past years did gird himself
with mortal clay, the essence of his divinity was
not changed; flesh did not become God, nor did God
become flesh by a real actual change of nature; the
two were united in hypostatical union, but the
Godhead was still the same. It was the same when he
was a babe in the manager, as it was when he
stretched the curtains of heaven; it was the same
God that hung upon the cross, and whose blood flowed
down in a purple river, the self-same God that holds
the world upon his everlasting shoulders, and bears
in his hands the keys of death and hell. He never
has been changed in his essence, not even by his
incarnation; he remains everlastingly, eternally,
the one unchanging God, the Father of lights, with
whom there is no variableness, neither the shadow of
a change.
2. He changes not in his
attributes. Whatever the attributes of God were of
old, that they are now; and of each of them we may
sing “As it was in the beginning, is now, and ever
shall be, world without end, Amen.” Was he powerful?
Was he the mighty God when he spake the world out of
the womb of nonexistence? Was he the Omnipotent when
he piled the mountains and scooped out the hollow
places for the rolling deep? Yes, he was powerful
then, and his arm is unpalsied now, he is the same
giant in his might; the sap of his nourishment is
undried, and the strength of his soul stands the
same for ever. Was he wise when he constituted this
mighty globe, when he laid the foundations of the
universe? Had he wisdom when he planned the way of
our salvation, and when from all eternity he marked
out his awful plans? Yes, and he is wise now; he is
not less skillful, he has not less knowledge; his
eye which seeth all things is undimmed; his ear
which heareth all the cries, sighs, sobs, and groans
of his people, is not rendered heavy by the years
which he hath heard their prayers. He is unchanged
in his wisdom, he knows as much now as ever, neither
more nor less; he has the same consummate skill, and
the same infinite forecastings. He is unchanged,
blessed be his name, in his justice. just and holy
was he in the past; just and holy is he now. He is
unchanged in his truth; he has promised, and he
brings it to pass; he hath saith it, and it shall be
done. He varies not in the goodness, and generosity,
and benevolence of his nature. He is not become an
Almighty tyrant, whereas he was once an Almighty
Father; but his strong love stands like a granite
rock, unmoved by the hurricanes of our iniquity. And
blessed be his dear name, he is unchanged in his
love. When he first wrote the covenant, how full his
heart was with affection to his people. He knew that
his Son must die to ratify the articles of that
agreement. He knew right well that he must rend his
best beloved from his bowels, and send him down to
earth to bleed and die. He did not hesitate to sign
that mighty covenant; nor did he shun its
fulfillment. He loves as much now as he did then,
and when suns shall cease to shine, and moons to
show their feeble light, he still shall love on for
ever and for ever. Take any one attribute of God,
and I will write semper idem on it (always the
same). Take any one thing you can say of God now,
and it may be said not only in the dark past, but in
the bright future it shall always remain the same:
“I am Jehovah, I change not.”
3. Then again, God
changes not in his plans. That man began to build,
but was not able to finish, and therefore he changed
his plan, as every wise man would do in such a case;
he built upon a smaller foundation and commenced
again. But has it ever been said that God began to
build but was not able to finish? Nay. When he hath
boundless stores at his command, and when his own
right hand would create worlds as numerous as drops
of morning dew, shall he ever stay because he has
not power? and reverse, or alter, or disarrange his
plan, because he cannot carry it out? “But,” say
some, “perhaps God never had a plan.” Do you think
God is more foolish than yourself then, sir? Do you
go to work without a plan? “No,” say you, “I have
always a scheme.” So has God. Every man has his
plan, and God has a plan too. God is a master-mind;
he arranged everything in his gigantic intellect
long before he did it; and once having settled it,
mark you, he never alters it. “This shall be done,”
saith he, and the iron hand of destiny marks it
down, and it is brought to pass. “This is my
purpose,” and it stands, nor can earth or hell alter
it. “This is my decree,” saith he, promulgate it
angels; rend it down from the gate of heaven ye
devils; but ye cannot alter the decree; it shall be
done. God altereth not his plans; why should he? He
is Almighty, and therefore can perform his pleasure.
Why should he? He is the All-wise, and therefore
cannot have planned wrongly. Why should he? He is
the everlasting God, and therefore cannot die before
his plan is accomplished. Why should he change? Ye
worthless atoms of existence, ephemera of the day!
Ye creeping insects upon this bayleaf of existence!
ye may change your plans, but he shall never, never
change his. Then has he told me that his plan is to
save me? If so, I am safe.
“My name from the palms
of his hands
Eternity will not erase;
Impress’d on his heart it
remains,
In marks of indelible
grace.”
4. Yet again, God is
unchanging in his promises. Ah! we love to speak
about the sweet promises of God; but if we could
ever suppose that one of them could be changed, we
would not talk anything more about them. If I
thought that the notes of the bank of England could
not be cashed next week, I should decline to take
them; and if I thought that God’s promises would
never be fulfilled—if I thought that God would see
it right to alter some word in his promises—farewell
Scriptures! I want immutable things: and I find that
I have immutable promises when I turn to the Bible:
for, “by two immutable things in which it is
impossible for God to lie,” he hath signed,
confirmed, and sealed every promise of his. The
gospel is not “yea and nay,” it is not promising
today, and denying tomorrow; but the gospel is “yea,
yea,” to the glory of God. Believer! there was a
delightful promise which you had yesterday; and this
morning when you turned to the Bible the promise was
not sweet. Do you know why? Do you think the promise
had changed? Ah, no! You changed; that is where the
matter lies. You had been eating some of the grapes
of Sodom, and your mouth was thereby put out of
taste, and you could not detect the sweetness. But
there was the same honey there, depend upon it, the
same preciousness. “Oh!” says one child of God, “I
had built my house firmly once upon some stable
promises; there came a wind, and I said, O Lord, I
am cast down and I shall be lost.” Oh! the promises
were not cast down; the foundations were not
removed; it was your little “wood, hay, stubble”
hut, that you had been building. It was that which
fell down. You have been shaken on the rock, not the
rock under you. But let me tell you what is the best
way of living in the world. I have heard that a
gentleman said to a Negro, “I can’t think how it is
you are always so happy in the Lord and I am often
downcast.” “Why Massa,” said he, “I throw myself
flat down on the promise—there I lie; you stand on
the promise—you have a little to do with it, and
down you go when the wind comes, and then you cry,
‘Oh! I am down;’ whereas I go flat on the promise at
once, and that is why I fear no fall.” Then let us
always say, “Lord there is the promise; it is thy
business to fulfill it.” Down I go on the promise
flat! no standing up for me. That is where you
should go—prostrate on the promise; and remember,
every promise is a rock, an unchanging thing.
Therefore, at his feet cast yourself, and rest there
forever.
5. But now comes one
jarring note to spoil the theme. To some of you God
is unchanging in his threatenings. If every promise
stands fast, and every oath of the covenant is
fulfilled, hark thee, sinner!—mark the word—hear the
death-knell of thy carnal hopes; see the funeral of
thy fleshly trustings. Every threatening of God, as
well as every promise shall be fulfilled. Talk of
decrees! I will tell you of a decree: “He that
believeth not shall be damned.” That is a decree,
and a statute that can never change. Be as good as
you please, be as moral as you can, be as honest as
you will, walk as uprightly as you may,—there stands
the unchangeable threatening: “He that believeth not
shall be damned.” What sayest thou to that,
moralist? Oh, thou wishest thou couldst alter it,
and say, “He that does not live a holy life shall be
damned.” That will be true; but it does not say so.
It says, “He that believeth not.” Here is the stone
of stumbling, and the rock of offence; but you
cannot alter it. You must believe or be damned,
saith the Bible; and mark, that threat of God is an
unchangeable as God himself. And when a thousand
years of hell’s torments shall have passed away, you
shall look on high, and see written in burning
letters of fire, “He that believeth not shall be
damned.” “But, Lord, I am damned.” Nevertheless it
says ”shall be“ still. And when a million ages have
rolled away, and you are exhausted by your pains and
agonies, you shall turn up your eye and still read
“SHALL BE DAMNED,” unchanged, unaltered. And when
you shall have thought that eternity must have spun
out its last thread—that every particle of that
which we call eternity, must have run out, you shall
still see it written up there, “SHALL BE DAMNED.” O
terrific thought! How dare I utter it? But I must.
Ye must be warned, sirs, “lest ye also come into
this place of torment.” Ye must be told rough
things; for if God’s gospel is not a rough thing &
the law is a rough thing; Mount Sinai is a rough
thing. Woe unto the watchman that warns not the
ungodly! God is unchanging in his threatenings.
Beware, O sinner, for “it is a fearful thing to fall
into the hands of the living God.”
6. We must just hint at
one thought before we pass away and that is—God is
unchanging in the objects of his love—not only in
his love, but in the objects of it.
“If ever it should come
to pass,
That sheep of Christ
might fall away.
My fickle, feeble soul,
alas,
Would fall a thousand
times a day.”
If one dear saint of God
had perished, so might all; if one of the covenant
ones be lost, so may all be, and then there is no
gospel promise true; but the Bible is a lie, and
there is nothing in it worth my acceptance. I will
be an infidel at once, when I can believe that a
saint of God can ever fall finally. If God hath
loved me once, then he will love me for ever.
“Did Jesus once upon me
shine,
Then Jesus is for ever
mine.”
The objects of
everlasting love never change. Those whom God hath
called, he will justify; whom he has justified, he
will sanctify; and whom he sanctifies, he will
glorify.
1. Thus having taken a
great deal too much time, perhaps, in simply
expanding the thought of an unchanging God, I will
now try to prove that He is unchangeable. I am not
much of an argumentative preacher, but one argument
that I will mention is this: the very existence, and
being of a God, seem to me to imply immutability.
Let me think a moment. There is a God; this God
rules and governs all things; this God fashioned the
world: he upholds and maintains it. What kind of
being must he be? It does strike me that you cannot
think of a changeable God. I conceive that the
thought is so repugnant to common sense, that if you
for one moment think of a changing God, the words
seem to clash, and you are obliged to say, “Then he
must be a kind of man,” and get a Mormonite idea of
God. I imagine it is impossible to conceive of a
changing God; it is so to me. Others may be capable
of such an idea, but I could not entertain it. I
could no more think of a changing God, than I could
of a round square, or any other absurdity. The thing
seems so contrary, that I am obliged, when once I
say God, to include the idea of an unchanging being.
2. Well, I think that one
argument will be enough, but another good argument
may be found in the fact of God’s perfection. I
believe God to be a perfect being. Now, if he is a
perfect being, he cannot change. Do you not see
this? Suppose I am perfect today, if it were
possible for me to change, should I be perfect
tomorrow after the alteration? If I changed, I must
either change from a good state to a better—and then
if I could get better, I could not be perfect now—or
else from a better state to a worse—and if I were
worse, I should not be perfect then. If I am
perfect, I cannot be altered without being
imperfect. If I am perfect today, I must keep the
same tomorrow if I am to be perfect then. So, if God
is perfect, he must be the same; for change would
imply imperfection now, or imperfection then.
3. Again, there is the
fact of God’s infinity, which puts change out of the
question. God is an infinite being. What do you mean
by that? There is no man who can tell you what he
means by an infinite being. But there cannot be two
infinities. If one thing is infinite, there is no
room for anything else; for infinite means all. It
means not bounded, not finite, having no end. Well,
there cannot be two infinities. If God is infinite
today, and then should change and be infinite
tomorrow, there would be two infinities. But that
cannot be. Suppose he is infinite and then changes,
he must become finite, and could not be God; either
he is finite today and finite tomorrow, or infinite
today and finite tomorrow, or finite today and
infinite tomorrow—all of which suppositions are
equally absurd. The fact of his being an infinite
being at once quashes the thought of his being a
changeable being. Infinity has written on its very
brow the word “immutability.”
4. But then, dear
friends, let us look at the past: and there we shall
gather some proofs of God’s immutable nature. “Hath
he spoken, and hath he not done it? Hath he sworn,
and hath it not come to pass?” Can it not be said of
Jehovah, “He hath done all his will, and he hath
accomplished all his purpose?” Turn ye to Philistia;
ask where she is. God said, “Howl Ashdod, and ye
gates of Gaza, for ye shall fall;” and where are
they? Where is Edom? Ask Petra and its ruined walls.
Will they not echo back the truth that God hath
said, “Edom shall be a prey, and shall be
destroyed?” Where is Babel, and where Nineveh? Where
Moab and where Ammon? Where are the nations God hath
said he would destroy? Hath he not uprooted them and
cast out the remembrance of them from the earth? And
hath God cast off his people? Hath he once been
unmindful of his promise? Hath he once broken his
oath and covenant, or once departed from his plan?
Ah! no. Point to one instance in history where God
has changed! Ye cannot, sirs; for throughout all
history there stands the fact that God has been
immutable in his purposes. Methinks I hear some one
say, “I can remember one passage in Scripture where
God changed!” And so did I think once. The case I
mean, is that of the death of Hezekiah. Isaiah came
in and said, ‘Hezekiah, you must die, your disease
is incurable, set your house in order.’ He turned
his face to the wall and began to pray; and before
Isaiah was in the outer court, he was told to go
back and say, “Thou shalt live fifteen years more.”
You may think that proves that God changes; but
really I cannot see in it the slightest proof in the
world. How do you know that God did not know that?
Oh! but God did know it; he knew that Hezekiah would
live. Then he did not change, for if he knew that,
how could he change? That is what I want to know.
But do you know one little thing?—that Hezekiah’s
son Manasseh, was not born at that time, and that
had Hezekiah died, there would have been no
Manasseh, and no Josiah and no Christ, because
Christ came from that very line. You will find that
Manasseh was twelve years old when his father died;
so that he must have been born three years after
this. And do you not believe that God decreed the
birth of Manasseh, and foreknew it? Certainly. Then
he decreed that Isaiah should go and tell Hezekiah
that his disease was incurable, and then say also in
the same breath, “But I will cure it, and thou shalt
live.” He said that to stir up Hezekiah to prayer.
He spoke, in the first place as a man. “According to
all human probability your disease is incurable, and
you must die.” Then he waited till Hezekiah prayed;
then came a little “but” at the end of the sentence.
Isaiah had not finished the sentence. He said, “You
must put your house in order for there is no human
cure; but” (and then he walked out. Hezekiah prayed
a little, and then he came in again, and said) ”But
I will heal thee.” Where is there any contradiction
there, except in the brain of those who fight
against the Lord, and wish to make him a changeable
being.
II. Now secondly, let me
say a word on THE PERSONS TO WHOM THIS
UNCHANGEABLE GOD IS A BENEFIT. “I am God, I
change not; therefore ye sons of Jacob are not
consumed.” Now, who are “the sons of Jacob,” who can
rejoice in an immutable God?
1. First, they are the
sons of God’s election; for it is written, “Jacob
have I loved, and Esau have I hated, the children
being not yet born neither having done good nor
evil.” It was written, “The elder shall serve the
younger.” “The sons of Jacob”—
“Are the sons of God’s
election,
Who through sovereign
grace believe;
Be eternal destination
Grace and glory they
receive.”
God’s elect are here
meant by “the sons of Jacob,”—those whom he foreknew
and fore-ordained to everlasting salvation.
2. By “the sons of Jacob”
are meant, in the second place, persons who enjoy
peculiar rights and titles. Jacob, you know, had no
rights by birth; but he soon acquired them. He
changed a mess of pottage with his brother Esau, and
thus gained the birthright. I do not justify the
means; but he did also obtain the blessing, and so
acquired peculiar rights. By “the sons of Jacob”
here, are meant persons who have peculiar rights and
titles. Unto them that believe, he hath given the
right and power to become sons of God. They have an
interest in the blood of Christ; they have a right
to “enter in through the gates into the city;” they
have a title to eternal honors; they have a promise
to everlasting glory; they have a right to call
themselves sons of God. Oh! there are peculiar
rights and privileges belonging to the “sons of
Jacob.”
3. But, then next, these
“sons of Jacob” were men of peculiar manifestations.
Jacob had peculiar manifestations from his God, and
thus he was highly honored. Once at night-time he
lay down and slept; he had the hedges for his
curtains, the sky for his canopy, a stone for his
pillow, and the earth for his bed. Oh! then he had a
peculiar manifestation. There was a ladder, and he
saw the angels of God ascending and descending. He
thus had a manifestation of Christ Jesus, as the
ladder which reaches from earth to heaven, up and
down which angels came to bring us mercies. Then
what a manifestation there was at Mahanaim, when the
angels of God met him; and again at Peniel, when he
wrestled with God, and saw him face to face. Those
were peculiar manifestations; and this passage
refers to those who, like Jacob, have had peculiar
manifestations.
Now then, how many of you
have had personal manifestations? “Oh!” you say
“that is enthusiasm; that is fanaticism.” Well, it
is a blessed enthusiasm, too, for the sons of Jacob
have had peculiar manifestations. They have talked
with God as a man talketh with his friend; they have
whispered in the ear of Jehovah; Christ hath been
with them to sup with them, and they with Christ;
and the Holy Spirit hath shone into their souls with
such a mighty radiance, that they could not doubt
about special manifestations. The “sons of Jacob”
are the men, who enjoy these manifestations.
4. Then again, they are
men of peculiar trials. Ah! poor Jacob! I should not
choose Jacob’s lot if I had not the prospect of
Jacob’s blessing; for a hard lot his was. He had to
run away from his father’s house to Laban’s; and
then that surly old Laban cheated him all the years
he was there—cheated him of his wife, cheated him in
his wages, cheated him in his flocks, and cheated
him all through the story. By-and-bye he had to run
away from Laban, who pursued him and overtook him.
Next came Esau with four hundred men to cut him up
root and branch. Then there was a season of prayer,
and afterwards he wrestled, and had to go all his
life with his thigh out of joint. But a little
further on, Rachael, his dear beloved, died. Then
his daughter Dinah is led astray, and the sons
murder the Shechemites. Anon there is dear Joseph
sold into Egypt, and a famine comes. Then Reuben
goes up to his couch and pollutes it; Judah commits
incest with his own daughter-in-law; and all his
sons become a plague to him. At last Benjamin is
taken away; and the old man, almost broken-hearted,
cries, “Joseph is not, and Simeon is not, and ye
will take Benjamin away.” Never was man more tried
than Jacob, all through the one sin of cheating his
brother. All through his life God chastised him. But
I believe there are many who can sympathize with
dear old Jacob. They have had to pass through trials
very much like his. Well, cross-bearers! God says,
“I change not; therefore ye sons of Jacob are not
consumed.” Poor tried souls! ye are not consumed
because of the unchanging nature of your God. Now do
not get fretting, and say, with the self-conceit of
misery, “I am the man who hath seen affliction.” Why
“the Man of Sorrows” was afflicted more than you;
Jesus was indeed a mourner. You only see the skirts
of the garments of affliction. You never have trials
like his. You do not understand what troubles means;
you have hardly sipped the cup of trouble; you have
only had a drop or two, but Jesus drunk the dregs.
Fear not saith God, “I am the Lord, I change not;
therefore ye sons of Jacob,” men of peculiar trials,
“are not consumed.”
5. Then one more thought
about who are the “sons of Jacob,” for I should like
you to find out whether you are “sons of Jacob,”
yourselves. They are men of peculiar character; for
though there were some things about Jacob’s
character which we cannot commend, there are one or
two things which God commends. There was Jacob’s
faith, by which Jacob had his name written amongst
the mighty worthies who obtained not the promises on
earth, but shall obtain them in heaven. Are you men
of faith, beloved? Do you know what it is to walk by
faith, to live by faith, to get your temporary food
by faith, to live on spiritual manna—all by faith?
Is faith the rule of your life? if so, you are the
“sons of Jacob.”
Then Jacob was a man of
prayer—a man who wrestled, and groaned, and prayed.
There is a man up yonder who never prayed this
morning, before coming up to the house of God. Ah!
you poor heathen, don’t you pray? No! he says, “I
never thought of such a thing; for years I have not
prayed.” Well, I hope you may before you die. Live
and die without prayer, and you will pray long
enough when you get to hell. There is a woman: she
did not pray this morning; she was so busy sending
her children to the Sunday School, she had no time
to pray. No time to pray? Had you time to dress?
There is a time for every purpose under heaven, and
if you had purposed to pray, you would have prayed.
Sons of God cannot live without prayer. They are
wrestling Jacobs. They are men in whom the Holy
Ghost so works, they they can no more live without
prayer than I can live without breathing. They must
pray. Sirs, mark you, if you are living without
prayer, you are living without Christ; and dying
like that, your portion will be in the lake which
burneth with fire. God redeem you, God rescue you
from such a lot! But you who are “the sons of
Jacob,” take comfort, for God is immutable.
III. Thirdly, I can say
only a word about the other point—THE BENEFIT
WHICH THESE “SONS OF JACOB” RECEIVE FROM AN
UNCHANGING GOD. “Therefore ye sons Jacob are not
consumed.” “Consumed?” How? how can man be consumed?
Why, there are two ways. We might have been consumed
in hell. If God had been a changing God, the “sons
of Jacob” here this morning, might have been
consumed in hell; but for God’s unchanging love I
should have been a faggot in the fire. But there is
a way of being consumed in this world; there is such
a things as being condemned before you
die—“condemned already;” there is such a thing as
being alive, and yet being absolutely dead. We might
have been left to our own devices, and then where
should we have been now? Revelling with the
drunkard, blaspheming Almighty God. Oh? had he left
you, dearly beloved, had he been a changing God, ye
had been amongst the filthiest of the filthy, and
the vilest of the vile. Cannot you remember in your
life, seasons similar to those I have felt? I have
gone right to the edge of sin; some strong
temptation has taken hold of both my arms, so that I
could not wrestle with it. I have been pushed alone,
dragged as by an awful satanic power to the very
edge of some horrid precipice. I have looked down,
down, down, and seen my portion; I quivered on the
brink of ruin. I have been horrified, as, with my
hair upright, I have thought of the sin I was about
to commit, the horrible pit into which I was about
to fall. A strong arm hath saved me. I have started
back and cried, O God! could I have gone so near
sin, and yet come back again? Could I have walked
right up to the furnace and not fallen down, like
Nebuchadnezzar’s strong men, devoured by the very
heat? Oh! is it possible I should be here this
morning, when I think of the sins I have committed,
and the crimes which have crossed my wicked
imagination? Yes, I am here, unconsumed, because the
Lord changes not. Oh! if he had changed, we should
have been consumed in a dozen ways; if the Lord had
changed, you and I should have been consumed by
ourselves; for after all, Mr. Self is the worst
enemy a Christian has. We should have proved
suicides to our own souls; we should have mixed the
cup of poison for our own spirits, if the Lord had
not been an unchanging God, and dashed the cup out
of our hands when we were about to drink it. Then we
should have been consumed by God himself if he had
not been a changeless God. We call God a Father; but
there is not a father in this world who would not
have killed all his children long ago, so provoked
would he have been with them, if he had been half as
much troubled as God has been with his family. He
has the most troublesome family in the whole
world—unbelieving, ungrateful, disobedient,
forgetful, rebellious, wandering, murmuring, and
stiffnecked. Well it is that he is longsuffering, or
else he would have taken not only the rod, but the
sword to some of us long ago. But there was nothing
in us to love at first, so, there cannot be less
now. John Newton used to tell a whimsical story, and
laugh at it too, of a good woman who said, in order
to prove the doctrine of Election, “Ah! sir, the
Lord must have loved me before I was born, or else
he would not have seen anything in me to love
afterwards.” I am sure it is true in my case, and
true in respect most of God’s people; for there is
little to love in them after they are born, that if
he had not loved them before then, he would have
seen no reason to choose them after; but since he
loved them without works, he loves them without
works still; since their good works did not win his
affection, bad works cannot sever that affection;
since their righteousness did not bind his love to
them, so their wickedness cannot snap the golden
links. He loved them out of pure sovereign grace,
and he will love them still. But we should have been
consumed by the devil, and by our enemies—consumed
by the world, consumed by our sins, by our trials,
and in a hundred other ways, if God had ever
changed.
Well, now, time fails us,
and I can say but little. I have only just cursorily
touched on the text. I now hand it to you. May the
Lord help you “sons of Jacob” to take home this
portion of meat; digest it well, and feed upon it.
May the Holy Ghost sweetly apply the glorious things
that are written! And may you have “a feast of fat
things, of wines on the lees well refined!” Remember
God is the same, whatever is removed. Your friends
may be disaffected, your ministers may be taken
away, every thing may change, but God does not. Your
brethren may change and cast out your name as vile:
but God will love you still. Let your station in
life change, and your property be gone; let your
whole life be shaken, and you become weak and
sickly; let everything flee away—there is one place
where change cannot put his finger; there is one
name on which mutability can never be written; there
is one heart which never can alter; that heart is
God’s—that name Love.
“Trust him, he will ne’er
deceive you.
Though you hardly of him
deem;
He will never, never
leave you,
Nor will let you quite
leave him.”
** SOLI DEO GLORIA **
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