God Changes Not…

Posted on by

Way back in October 2011 I wrote a little about the hymn Ev’rything Changes that I sang as a very young child at primary school.

I don’t have much memory before 1985, the reasons for which I’ll relate another time, but one thing did stick. Every time we sang that chorus, Bernard Ward – our terrifying headmaster (who was actually a REALLY nice gentleman in the proper sense of the word) would emphasise the same point.

God changes not.

My life is in a transition at the moment. I’m writing this entry from a hotel in a town four days ago I’d never heard of (Colesberg, South Africa if you’re interested) on my way to take my wife for a job interview which, should she be successful, will mean moving away from Cape Town for a minimum six month period. In addition to this I’m caught in the throes of trying to formally register Eagle’s Wing Ministries as a legal entity Faith Based Organisation so it can grow.

In the last four months I’ve seen growth and had contact from more places than I’d ever had before, and from two countries I had to google to find out where they were! It’s exciting times as I can feel God leading this change in my life simply by being true to the call He placed in my heart 30 years ago.

I’ve changed a lot in 30 years.

God hasn’t.

Much in my life changed. Deaths, births, weddings, cancer, emigration to name just a few. But the call in my heart to make this ministry a reality has never changed because God placed it there.

I can’t do it alone, and I’ve had many offers from people all over the globe wanting EWM to visit or partner with them. Thank you all so much for those letters. I’m praying right now for guidance for where to step first is. I’m certain God has it planned, and has had from the beginning.

There are resources the ministry will need to advance – primarily able and willing bodies – so we can move together.

Eagle’s Wing Ministries is changing. We are evolving into the butterfly God made the caterpillar to become.

And what makes it possible is the unchanging nature of God.

We forget as times change and we see reality TV shows like Survivor, The Amazing Race and the Republican Party debates dominate the airwaves that people’s ideals shift. A political wind can decimate a Christian community – like ISIS has.

Pseudo-martyrs can turn people genuinely suffering for their belief in the Biblical Jesus into nothing more than a footnote on page 30 reporting their execution.

The enemy changes the picture we see. Remember the scene in the original “Matrix” film where Neo sees the cat and then sees it again because the Matrix changed something? What if our perception of reality is shaped by something other than our own experience. It’s been said that simply putting a film crew in with a combat unit changes how that unit behaves on the field. The pictures tell the story the editor wants to show.

We need desperately to return to the uncut raw footage of the Gospel. I don’t read Aramaic or Greek so I use about a dozen translations when I’m researching to find the whole meaning of a passage. The simple translation of a single word can alter the meaning of an entire phrase.

But God doesn’t change.

He is the same today as he was 2000 years ago on the cross and as He will be in 2000 years from now.

God. Changes. Not.

Everything changes…

Posted on by
When I was at primary school – under 11 – we had assembly most days. There would be a hymn and a short talk, usually from Mr Ward, the Headmaster. One hymn that has never left my head goes like this:
“Ev’rything changes,
But God changes not;
The power never changes
That lies in His thought:
Chorus: Splendours three, from God proceeding,
May we ever love them true,
Goodness, Truth, and Beauty heeding
Ev’ry day, in all we do.
Truth never changes,
And Beauty’s her dress,
And Good never changes,
Which those two express:
Perfect together
And lovely apart,
These three cannot wither;
They spring from God’s heart:
Some things are screening
God’s glory below;
But this is the meaning
Of all that we know:”
The meaning in this little hymn is lost on many. Yet it’s based on scripture. Hebrews 13:8 to be precise.
I was reminded of it again earlier today when a friend said to me that we should remember the world is changing, and we need to change with it.
That is a lie.
We need to base ourselves on something better than the current whims of the world.
At one point in Holland, tulip bulbs were worth more than houses. Then the world changed and they weren’t any more. In the Roman empire at one point tin was the most valuable metal. Things changed. Through the whole of history only one thing has remained constant. God.
God’s values don’t ebb and flow with the tide of popular opinion. He will always hate Sin, no matter how it is dressed. Even when the world’s view is that it isn’t sin any more.
I remember reading a story of a man in his late 90’s who applied to be re-patriated to England from Australia. He had been in the country for decades, and had never left since his arrival almost 70 years previously. When asked why he now wished to go back to England, he reportedly replied that as a young man when he arrived he was informed the penalty for homosexuality was death, by the time he was 40 it was 20 years hard labour, by 60 it was a fine, and it was legalised a little while after that. When the debate about gay marriage began he decided to leave before it became compulsory…
The world changed, but God didn’t.
Sodom and Gomorrah had the opinion of the modern world regarding sexual sin. God judged them. The Greek and Roman empires both fell as they became more and more obsessed with appearances than substance. Israel fell into the trap more than once in scripture. The world’s views change constantly, like shifting sands. We build on them at our peril.