God Never Changes
- Raymond Melendez
- 4 days ago
- 7 min read
At TheGoodNewsCast.com, we believe that God's nature is unchanging. The Holy Spirit is a steady presence that guides, sustains, and continues to shed light in every season of life.
Exodus 13 opens with instruction on what the people must never forget. God tells Israel not to boast of their transformations. Instead, they are instructed to remember and testify of God's unchanging presence. From the start, God was with them and continues to be present. Their identity is rooted in the One who never changes.
God’s work stands in stark contrast to a popular slogan of our age: “Change is good.” The phrase carries an air of wisdom and optimism, appearing everywhere—from DIY culture to corporate playbooks to graduation speeches—offering the promise of something better through mere change. But its credibility is questionable; it has no roots in sacred texts or philosophy. Instead, it reflects a modern oversimplification of a far more complex reality, one that assumes every change is good.
The Holy Scriptures tell a different story. Though Israel’s departure from Egypt appeared to signal major changes, God intentionally shifted their focus away from that expectation and toward the steady work of the Holy Spirit. They were warned not to boast in things that change but to bear witness to God’s unchanging presence.
In a world eager for change, the book of Exodus offers a needed correction. It reveals that growth built on change is unstable, just as progress without remembrance inevitably collapses. When separated from truth, change can just as easily strip away what was meant for good. Israel was instructed to bear witness not by assessing their own changes, but by recalling God's unwavering grace in every situation.
God was present with them in their rise, their decline, and even before their story began. Long before modern culture celebrated change as "good," Scripture affirmed the truth: God is faithful and never changes. Our hope is not found in a world that changes, it is found in the unwavering presence of the One who remains the same.
First Fruits: The Beginning
From the beginning, God teaches the people how to live without losing sight of what never changes. In Exodus 13, the command to offer the firstborn, the first fruits, is a testimony that God remains the same. God's work unfolds, reveals, and manifests without contradiction or favoritism.
God warns the people about being proud of how much they have changed. Instead, they are to recognize their dependence on the One who remains the same. Alma's teachings in the Book of Mormon suggest that personal transformations that cease to progress become unstable.
“Counsel with the Lord in all thy doings.” Alma 37:37
The contrast between change and God's presence is not new to theology. Across cultures and centuries, theologists have wrestled with the same question: if everything changes, then what should we trust? The Greek philosopher Heraclitus observed that no one steps into the same river twice, because both the river and the person have changed (Plato Cratylus 402a). His point was that existence itself is constantly changing.
Buddhism teaches this concept through the doctrine of impermanence (anicca). Bodies age, emotions shift, relationships transform, and circumstances dissolve. According to its teachings, suffering arises not from change itself, but from clinging to the illusion that things remain the same (Bodhi 13). Buddhism does not praise change as good; it simply teaches awareness of it.
Hindu theology, particularly in the Bhagavad Gita, offers a similar distinction. The world is constantly changing, while the soul remains the same. It believes that wisdom comes from discerning what progresses and what remains constant (The Bhagavad Gita 2.16–2.20). Thus, growth is not measured by a transformation but by what constantly progresess while persisting in a seemingly changing world.
Together, these perspectives illuminate the wisdom behind God’s instruction to offer first fruits. By remembering these instructions, the people affirm that while life progressess and unfoldes over time, it does so in accordance with God's orignial intentions. The first fruit is not a transformed life; rather, it is a life that develops and matures gradually.
In a constantly changing world, the lesson from the first fruits remains consistent: what is good does not need to change. What is required is remembrance—of God's unwavering grace as life itself continues to progress.
Delivered and Freed
Exodus 13 reveals that Israel’s deliverance was a rescue from a far more subtle danger—the temptation to build identity on dominance. God did not free Israel so they might become a nation defined by racial purity, ethnic exclusivity, or religious superiority. History had already shown that such foundations inevitably collapse. Instead, God anchored Israel’s identity in their dependence on the One who treats them differently.
By instructing the people to remember the exodus and to offer their first fruits, God interrupts the notion that things should change. Their story begins with deliverance, then remembrance of where they came from. Their deliverance was never meant to separate God’s presence from the surrounding nations but to bear witness to a living Holy Spirit that constantly grows and expands.
True freedom does not remain stagnant; it progresses as it gains a deeper understanding of the surrounding world. Israel honors God not by clinging to their past identity, but by presenting their first fruits as evidence that God remains unchanged.
In the Hebrew Bible, change is often repetitive rather than progressive. Ecclesiastes highlights that there is "a time for everything," suggesting that change occures in due time.
The New Testament shifts the focus inward where change becomes a matter of the heart—repentance, humility, and love influencing the inner spirit. It teaches to celebrate a transformed life when it accompanies a repentant heart. Therefore, outward change without inner transformation is seen as meaningless.
The Qur’an emphasizes this same inward responsibility with striking clarity: people’s conditions do not change unless they have a change in heart. Here, change is necessary, even urgent, but never the same. It carries more weight and a heavier consequence.
Together these teachings share a single truth. Change is powerful, unavoidable, misunderstood, and often unstable. Exodus teaches that freedom does not redefine us but allows us to be a people who remember and offer God’s original intent.
Christ-Like Leadership
In Exodus 13, God instructs Israel to establish a day of remembrance so that neither they nor their children forget a foundational truth: God’s power is unstoppable. Once God’s will is set in motion, no empire can halt it. Pharaoh’s authority could not restrain it, fear could not reverse it, and time itself could not wear it down. What God ordains to continue will continue, because no greater force exists to bring it to rest.
Yet this declaration of power is paired with humility. God recognizes that life often unfolds beyond humanity's capacity to understand it. When life overwhelms, God provides through Christ—not to deliver us from sin, for that would deny God's presence in the world, but to deliver us from despair and hopelessness. Christ preserves life by speaking truthfully, especially when confusion threatens to take over. Without discipleship, leadership becomes dangerous. God warns that those who reject Christ's path are unfit to lead, because leadership severed from discipleship drifts away from God's intention. God's leaders remain followers of Christ even when progress seems slow and unclear.
Christ-like leadership stands in contrast to the modern celebration of change. The cheerful confidence behind the phrase “change is good” is largely a product of the Age of Enlightenment and the Industrial Revolution, when Western societies began equating change with progress—scientific discovery, technological innovation, social reform, and economic growth. By the nineteenth and twentieth centuries, this belief had become deeply ingrained. Voices like Winston Churchill helped cement the idea that change was good (Churchill).
“To improve is to change; to be perfect is to change often.” Winston Churchill
In contemporary culture, especially in business and do-it-yourself movements, the phrase “change is good” functions as a motivational slogan. It comforts people facing uncertainty, sees disruption as opportunity, and turns fear into optimism. But its strength is also its weakness. Not all change builds. Change can erode, distort, or destroy what is good.
Earlier traditions approached change with greater caution and wisdom. They understood that growth is not measured by change alone, but also by direction. Change without evolution becomes unstable, and life without remembrance leads to collapse. Exodus reminds us that God’s power does not depend on people's capacity to change. God's faithfulness remains the same, and remembrance of this truth increases our capacity to understand things as we develop and grow.
Christ-like leadership, then, is not about being a catalyst for change. It is about anchoring people in the light of truth so when the path forward is unclear, life is preserved and sees what God has set in motion, a plan that unfolds and maintains its original intent. In a world obsessed with change, Scripture offers the truth: not all change is good—but with God life is sustained as it continues to progress.
Cloud and Fire: God’s Perfect Timing
To remind the people that nothing is ever truly hopeless, God points them back to a surprising moment in history. Long before the Exodus, Joseph united Israel with Pharaoh’s Egypt to preserve life and uphold God’s glory. What appeared unlikely, even impossible, became the means through which God’s way endured. God's purposes unfold through unexpected relationships and paths.
Exodus 13 closes with a powerful image of that enduring guidance. God rescues the people and continues to guide them—using a pillar of cloud during the day and a pillar of fire at night. The heavens continue to guide us, and even in moments of despair, the fire of Christ shows that God’s presence remains. When life feels overwhelming or progress seems too slow, God urges the people to remember: God's power is unrivaled and is still unfolding, with perfect timing.
The phrase “change is good” is not a timeless truth handed down through sacred texts. It is a modern expression of hope, influenced by a reflection of a world where things constantly come and go. It captures only one side of a much deeper question—one that does not ask merely whether change is good, but why change what is good?
Scripture suggests that change, by itself, carries no guarantee. What gives it meaning is how it is guided and what it represents. God does not celebrate change; instead, God redeems moments of uncertainty through Christ, who reveals God's presence within them.
In times of uncertainty, God’s steady presence becomes the first fruits. The same God who guided Israel by cloud and fire continues to lead the way. Change cannot undo what God has set in motion. God’s timing is never late, and God’s faithfulness never fades.
Works Cited
Bodhi, Bhikkhu, translator. The Dhammapada. Shambhala Publications, 2005.
Churchill, Winston S. The Second World War. Vol. 4, Houghton Mifflin, 1950.
Plato. Cratylus. Translated by H. N. Fowler, Harvard University Press, 1921.
The Bhagavad Gita. Translated by Eknath Easwaran, Nilgiri Press, 2007.