The apostle James tells us that with God there is no variableness, neither shadow of turning (1:17).  This attribute is spoken of as His immutability (See Heb. 6:17-18).  It is one of those glorious traits that make Him what He is, and which makes Him so precious to those who are blessed, as was Isaiah, to see Him "high and lifted up" (Isaiah. 6:1).  Man is mutable; that is, he is changeable.  Not only is he capable of change, but he is a subject of change.  He is ever changing.  Every moment of his life even his body is changing, making ready for the grave.  But God is immutable, that is, He changes not.

    He makes this assertion of Himself in Malachi 3:6, "I am the Lord, I change not..." And Job says, "He is in one mind and who can turn him? And what his soul desireth, even that he doeth" (23:13).  God put into the mouth of Balaam to say to Balak, "God is not a man, that he should lie; neither the son of man, that he should repent: hath he not said, and shall he not do it? Or hath he spoken, and shall he not make it good?" (Numbers 23:19).

    It is to this grand attribute of immutability that we owe our preservation in Christ.  "I am the Lord, I change not; therefore (for this reason) ye sons of Jacob (spiritual Israel) are not consumed."  It is not because of any ability on our part to "hold out faithful" as some would mistakenly tell us, but it is owing to the fact that God does not change, and therefore, "having loved his own...he loved them unto the end" (John 13:1).  "Hath God cast away his people?  God forbid...God hath not cast away his people which he foreknew" (Rom. 11:12).

    We are very fickle, capricious, weak and unstable in our very nature, and if our home in heaven depended upon our steadfastness, none of us would ever inhabit that blessed abode.  But because "the gifts and calling of God are without repentance," on His part (Rom. 11:29) none of His people will ever be cast away in a final and eternal sense.    ---Elder Ralph Harris