The Unchanging Ancient In Modern Times

“For I am the Lord, I do not change; Therefore you are not consumed, O sons of Jacob. Yet from the days of your fathers you have gone away from My ordinances And have not kept them. Return to Me, and I will return to you,” Says the Lord of hosts. “But you said, ‘In what way shall we return?’" Malachi 3:6-7 (NKJ)

God's patience with mankind has been long suffering from the time of Adam in the Garden Of Eden, but it doesn't last forever. Not only will the age of mankind on this earth finally come to judgment as God has said, but every human being is subject to God's timing and plan for their individual life and may find their time cut well short of their own plans at any time.

"The Lord isn’t really being slow about his promise, as some people think. No, he is being patient for your sake. He does not want anyone to be destroyed, but wants everyone to repent. But the day of the Lord will come as unexpectedly as a thief. Then the heavens will pass away with a terrible noise, and the very elements themselves will disappear in fire, and the earth and everything on it will be found to deserve judgment." 2 Peter 3:9,10 (NLT)

Given that God Himself tells us that He does not change, I hold some very real concern for the lack of respect shown to The Lord by so many that disregard the things that He's said even in the far past of the Old Testament. Although we may be saved through Christ and are no longer under certain aspects of the Old Testament laws, within those passages of scripture, our God tells us much about Himself if we're paying attention - what He likes and loves, what He dislikes, and even what He hates. Those things don't change because He doesn't change. So when I consider where things are today in modern culture, I have deep concern about how many people may have put modern culture in their own lives under subjection to the things that God has declared previously and have not just disregarded them as something only for the time in which He spoke them. There may be some things that would fall under that heading, but many are not. They're just as "new" if you will, as the day that He spoke them - because He Does Not Change.

As an example, consider the following passage and then think about how many of the very things it speaks of are a more commonly regarded part of worldly society. We have phone and internet psychics, obsessions with "the supernatural", the taking of liberties with scripture and so many things that don't raise as much alarm as they should. Much of society is either ignorant of what God has said, has disregarded it, or has become passive in response to it. If we profess to be children of God, but continually and willfully offend Him, I begin to wonder about the strength of our relationship with Him and our professions...

“When you enter the land the LORD your God is giving you, be very careful not to imitate the detestable customs of the nations living there. For example, never sacrifice your son or daughter as a burnt offering. And do not let your people practice fortune-telling, or use sorcery, or interpret omens, or engage in witchcraft, or cast spells, or function as mediums or psychics, or call forth the spirits of the dead. Anyone who does these things is detestable to the LORD. It is because the other nations have done these detestable things that the LORD your God will drive them out ahead of you. But you must be blameless before the LORD your God. The nations you are about to displace consult sorcerers and fortune-tellers, but the LORD your God forbids you to do such things.”  Deuteronomy 18:9-14

Now, the reason that I said that I don't think that they raise as much alarm among people as they should begins to make sense when you consider what God has already said in Deuteronomy chapter 13. He leaves little room to misinterpret how He feels about such things and given that He does not change, His feelings about them hasn't changed either. God was giving instruction to Israel about clearing out the evil that was in the land that they were to occupy, so there is obviously a part of this scripture that was for that moment in time, but note how much God detests the things that He instructed Israel to eradicate. His feelings about such things are no different today than they were then because He does not change. His response to those things is very telling.

“If there arises among you a prophet or a dreamer of dreams, and he gives you a sign or a wonder, and the sign or the wonder comes to pass, of which he spoke to you, saying, ‘Let us go after other gods’—which you have not known—‘and let us serve them,’ you shall not listen to the words of that prophet or that dreamer of dreams, for the Lord your God is testing you to know whether you love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul. You shall walk after the Lord your God and fear Him, and keep His commandments and obey His voice; you shall serve Him and hold fast to Him. But that prophet or that dreamer of dreams shall be put to death, because he has spoken in order to turn you away from the Lord your God, who brought you out of the land of Egypt and redeemed you from the house of bondage, to entice you from the way in which the Lord your God commanded you to walk. So you shall put away the evil from your midst.

“If your brother, the son of your mother, your son or your daughter, the wife of your bosom, or your friend who is as your own soul, secretly entices you, saying, ‘Let us go and serve other gods,’ which you have not known, neither you nor your fathers, of the gods of the people which are all around you, near to you or far off from you, from one end of the earth to the other end of the earth, you shall not consent to him or listen to him, nor shall your eye pity him, nor shall you spare him or conceal him; but you shall surely kill him; your hand shall be first against him to put him to death, and afterward the hand of all the people. And you shall stone him with stones until he dies, because he sought to entice you away from the Lord your God, who brought you out of the land of Egypt, from the house of bondage. So all Israel shall hear and fear, and not again do such wickedness as this among you.

“If you hear someone in one of your cities, which the Lord your God gives you to dwell in, saying, ‘Corrupt men have gone out from among you and enticed the inhabitants of their city, saying, “Let us go and serve other gods” ’—which you have not known— then you shall inquire, search out, and ask diligently. And if it is indeed true and certain that such an abomination was committed among you, you shall surely strike the inhabitants of that city with the edge of the sword, utterly destroying it, all that is in it and its livestock—with the edge of the sword. And you shall gather all its plunder into the middle of the street, and completely burn with fire the city and all its plunder, for the Lord your God. It shall be a heap forever; it shall not be built again. So none of the accursed things shall remain in your hand, that the Lord may turn from the fierceness of His anger and show you mercy, have compassion on you and multiply you, just as He swore to your fathers, because you have listened to the voice of the Lord your God, to keep all His commandments which I command you today, to do what is right in the eyes of the Lord your God."  Deuteronomy 13 (NKJ)

Some food for thought about the unchanging Ancient Of Days in "modern" times and those who claim to be His. Our own treachery toward God may be without forethought, but the stench of it will be no less offensive to God's nostrils on the altar of our lives. Our diligent guard against those things that are offensive to Him allows greater closeness in relationship with Him and allows His greater blessing on our lives. No good father rewards his children for continuing bad behavior and I'm convinced that The Father Of All Father's is no different. And those who so deeply love Him are not likely so tempted to willingly offend Him. As I said ... food for thought.

"He has shown you, O man, what is good; And what does the LORD require of you But to do justly, To love mercy, And to walk humbly with your God?" Micah 6:8 (NKJ)

“And now, Israel, what does the Lord your God require of you, but to fear the Lord your God, to walk in all His ways and to love Him, to serve the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul, and to keep the commandments of the Lord and His statutes which I command you today for your good? Indeed heaven and the highest heavens belong to the Lord your God, also the earth with all that is in it."  Deuteronomy 10:12-14 (NKJ)