The Changeless Christ
Hebrews 13:8
Sunday June 25, 2000 A.M.
Hebrews 13:8
8 Jesus Christ the same yesterday, and to day, and for ever.
Look at the Stability that statement give a person!
We are living in a changing world.
Anyone who has lived through the last fifty years has seen more changes, more dramatic changes, than were made in all of the centuries before that time.
The man of one hundred years ago never dreamed of a "horseless carriage, an automobile that would run eighty or ninety or more miles per hour.
The thought of a jet plane flying through the air at six hundred or more miles per hour would have been beyond his wildest dreams.
And the thought of a building over one hundred stories high would have overwhelmed him.
Just a few years ago there was no such thing as a television set carrying a picture into your living room of something that happened on the other side of the world.
Even radio is not old.
And think of men orbiting the world at 17,500 miles per hour and men walking on the moon after a few days’ trip in a space ship.
On every side remarkable changes are being made, and the end is not in sight.
Men are changing, the world is changing, customs are changing.
But there is ONE who never changes,
"Jesus Christ, the same yesterday and today and forever."
SOME THINGS THAT CHANGE
Nature changes.
We are living in a beautiful world, created by a God who has an eye for beauty.
One section of the world is made beautiful by the mountains, another by the plains, another by the sea.
None of it is static, it is always changing. We never see the same clouds twice, and the skies are always different.
In the spring the leaves turn green, in the summer everything is in full bloom, in the autumn the leaves turn red and russet and brown and fall from the trees, in the winter the limbs are bare.
The mountains change, the valleys change, the rivers ever move on their way to the sea.
Some time ago I went back to my- birthplace where I spent my boyhood days. It seemed that all the landscape had changed.
The hill that I once felt was a mile high was not very high at all, and the field where I once picked corn was filled with businesses.
The home that I was born in and I thought was so big seemed not big at all.
God covers the surface of the earth with flowers. He forms the mountains.
He guides the streams.
He tints the golden sunsets and gives babbling music to the brook and the roar to the mighty ocean.
It’s a beautiful world but it’s always changing.
Fashions and customs change.
Just look at some of your pictures of years ago and you’ll laugh at the unusual dresses, the pegged pants, the high collars.
An automobile of 1930 vintage is nothing like the sleek car of today. Even the house built fifty years ago is vastly, different from the one built today.
Once we rode over dirt trails in ox carts, today we fly high in fantastic speed in fabulous jets.
Today we have telephones and e-mail and computers and television bringing us sights and sounds from around the world.
Just yesterday evening I heard about a man that is 120 years old.
He didn’t take his first airplane ride until he was 105, can you even begin to imagine the changes that he has seen in his lifetime.
The world and all in it is always changing.
Nations change.
Call the roll of the great nations of the world.
The Egypt of the Pharaohs, the Rome of the Caesars, Assyria, Babylon they have all gone.
A map of Europe is vastly changed from the map of fifty years ago, and new nations are constantly emerging in Africa and Asia.
Rulers are being deposed and others take their place, only to last a short time.
But there is one ruler who never changes, Jesus Christ.
Science changes.
Billions of dollars are being spent on research, and scientists are discovering new truths every day.
A textbook that is ten years old is out of date.
Yet some men pin their faith to an ever changing science instead of a changeless God.
Medical Science changes.
Once people were bled as a cure for certain diseases, later they were boiled, then later they were frozen.
Nothing has changed like the treatments given now by our physicians.
Once the tubercular patient was kept in an airtight room, later he was allowed to be in the fresh air, today tuberculosis has been virtually conquered, as has infantile paralysis.
The biologists tell us that our bodies change entirely every seven years.
Families change.
A daughter marries and leaves the old home nest to live in a distant state or a foreign country.
A son marries a wife and she spends more time with her family that they do with you.
My father was born in Indiana, but his family moved to Ohio when he was a small boy and that is where he lived all the rest of his life.
My brother lived most of his Life in Ohio and I thought that he would never leave, but he did.
When he retired he moved to Texas.
Why?
Because his daughter had gotten married and she and her husband had moved to Texas and My brother and his wife wanted to be close to their daughter.
Divorce often breaks up a family.
A Couple that has lived together forty years separates and goes their different ways.
Death breaks up families.
When the family reunion is held each year there are empty places because death has intervened during the year.
It is good to know that those who trusted Jesus have gone to a home that never changes.
I hope that children that come from broken homes, would want to live for the Lord Jesus Christ more than anyone else in the world because that will put the stability in there lives that they have been look for.
The stability that only Jesus Christ can give!
Friends change.
You live in a certain place for a few years, and you make some very close friends.
You visit their home often, and they often visit your home. Nearly every week you have a meal with them or go on an outing with them.
Then they are suddenly transferred to another section of the country. For many months letters fly back and forth between you, and often when you miss them so much you pick up the phone and call them.
But as the months go by the letters become farther and farther apart, you make new friends and the old friends are practically forgotten.
But there is one Friend who never changes.
He is Jesus, the Friend who forever sticks closer than anyone else in the world.
THE ONE WHO NEVER CHANGES
In a changing world we can thank God for a Savior who never changes.
He is and always will be the same as He was in all eternity past.
He never changes in His character.
We are sometimes good and often bad but, He is always good.
He is Jesus Christ, the Bright and Morning Star.
He has all the virtues of the best of men without any of their vices.
We are forced to say with Pilate, "I find in him no fault at all" (John 18:38).
For 2000 years men have been trying to destroy His character, yet they are gone and He stands like the Rock of Gibraltar in His character.
A man by the name of Voltaire once said than In 100 years the name of Christ will be forever forgotten.
But Christ lives on and Voltaire’s name is known by only a few.
The very house in which he spoke these words is now a Bible warehouse.
Torn Paine wrote The Age of Reason, in which he argued against Christ, but in 1609 he died a drunkard’s death while Jesus Christ is still marching on.
Charles Bradlaugh of England was a wealthy atheist who used his money in an effort to destroy men’s faith in Jesus Christ.
But on a cold, gray November morning he was buried without a prayer, without a song, without a word of eulogy, but Jesus Christ still lives on.
See the stability that I am talking about, He is still the same.
In our own country Robert Ingersoll, a flaming orator, scoffed at Christ and Christianity.
Today men think less and less of Robert Ingersoll and more and more of Jesus Christ!
Look at the way Madelyn Murray O’Hare has done in this country, putting prayer out of schools and now she wants all religion off of the television.
And try as she might.
She might be able to convince the courts of this land to do away with religion.
But she can never take Jesus Christ out of your heart, once you have accepted Him as your personal Saviour!
And what’s even more today she is nowhere to be found and her son is doing a movement for Christ!
Every attempt to destroy the character of Christ has failed.
His critics go down to dusky death while He lives on, not in temples of wood and stone but in the hearts of men.
He is as far above all His critics as the heavens are above the earth.
He is the one great stainless character of all the ages.
He never changes in His love.
His love is a great love.
Go to the cross and watch Him as He bleeds His life away for us.
Why did He do it?
No one forced Him to give His life away.
He did it because He loved us so much.
"Greater love hath no man than this, that a man lay down his life for his friends" (John 15:13).
But His love was so great that He laid down His life for those who were not His friends, He laid it down for the sake of those who had rebelled against Him and broke His laws.
He laid down His LOVE for all of us, the good, the bad and the ones out there that try to turn others against Him!
His LOVE is an undying LOVE!
His LOVE has STABILITY!
His love is a universal love.
On the cross He was loving those who loved Him, yes, but He was also loving those who hated Him and brought about His death.
He loved those who laid the stripes on His back, those who spat in His face, those who plucked out His beard, those who nailed Him to the cross.
Today you can find all kinds of men in the world the rich, the poor, the great, the small, the educated, and the ignorant but you’ll never find a person whom Jesus does not love.
His love is a pardoning love.
Hear Him as in the hour of death He looks on His executioners and says, "Father, forgive them; for they know not what they do" (Luke 23:34).
And we go back to Isaiah 1:18 to hear these gracious words,
"Come now, and let us reason together, saith the LORD though your sins be as scarlet, they shall be as white as snow; though they be red like crimson, they shall be as wool."
He pardons and saves all who come to Him by faith.
After they become Christians do they ever sin again?
Yes, many-times, but there is a sweet remedy for those who have sinned.
We find it in 1 John 1:9, "If we confess our sins, he is faithful and just to forgive us our sins, and to cleanse us from all unrighteousness."
He never changes in His Power.
He said in Matthew 28:18, "All power is given unto me in heaven and in earth." He still has that power and there is nothing like it.
Have you ever stopped to think about that statement?
ALL POWER! He has ALL POWER!
Saten just thinks that he has power, but we know that GOD has ALL POWER.
He could stop this world anytime that He feels like it!
He has All Power!
He has power to save.
One day a man was riding down the Damascus Road. Where was he going?
He was rushing toward the city to find some Christians so that he might kill them.
It was his greatest desire to stamp out Christianity and blot the name of Jesus from off the face of the earth.
Can Christ save such a man?
Can He transform him and make a new man of him?
Yes, He can. He used His power to save that man and made him the greatest Christian and preacher the world has ever seen!
Who was this man? Paul the apostle!
Paul the man who wrote most of the books in the New Testament.
The man that did a better job of praying than most of us will ever be able to do.
A man that lived the rest of his life doing for the Lord Jesus Christ!
Several years ago there was a ship that had sunk in a northern harbor, obstructing maritime traffic.
Several attempts were made to raise the ship but they all failed.
Then the ship company’ offered a prize of $1,000 to anyone who would come forth with a successful plan to raise the vessel.
Among others one man came forth and made his suggestion.
He instructed the company to bring several barges and anchor them just above the sunken ship.
Then several workmen were sent down to fasten one end of some great chains to the ship and the other end to the barges.
This was done at low tide. "Now," said the man, "let’s wait until the tide comes in."
Before long the mighty tide came rolling in, driven by the strong horses of the ocean.
As the tide came in the barges began to lift, inch by inch. The great chains began to strain and lift, and before long the ship left the bottom of the harbor and was brought to the place where it could be towed away.
In like manner our souls were sunk in sin, but God’s grace, like a mighty tide, came through Jesus Christ to lift us up and make us new creatures in Him.
God’s grace has the power to bring about things that we even at times think to be impossible!
Do you know that just like I told Lisa last night God does His best work when we think it to be impossible!
He has power to keep.
When He saves us He never lets us go.
Someday He’ll present us spotless before the throne of God.
He saves from sin, and He never lets us go.
The only we can get away from Jesus Christ is to go ourselves on our own free will, Jesus will never be the one to let go!
In spite of all that’s wrong in these little lives of ours, He’ll bring us through, and one day in His likeness we’ll join Him in glory.
When Jesus puts His hand around you and God puts His hand over you, there are not enough forces on earth or powers in heaven or devils in hell to snatch you away from Him.
Thank God, He not only saves, He keeps.
There are two great Scriptures here that illustrate this point. Let us look in, John 10:28-30
28 And I give unto them eternal life; and they shall never perish, neither shall any man pluck them out of my hand.
29 My Father, which gave them me, is greater than all; and no man is able to pluck them out of my Father’s hand.
30 I and my Father are one.
If we say that a person can be lost after he has been genuinely saved, we say that Satan is stronger than God and is able to snatch us out of God’s keeping.
Satan cannot snatch us away, but we can leave on our own free will, God will not hold you against your own will.
He only wants those of us, that are wanting, to live for Him!
And listen to John 5:24, "Verily, verily, I say unto you, He that heareth my word, and believeth on Him that sent me, hath everlasting life, and shall not come into condemnation; but is passed from death unto life."
If we have everlasting life, it means that we have life forever, and that’s a life that begins with Christ and goes on endlessly.
He has power to help you daily.
He can help you in sickness, He can help you when trouble comes, He can help you when sorrow is breaking your heart.
There are times when no one can help you but Jesus.
"He hath said, I will never leave thee, nor forsake thee" (Heb. 13:5).
Lazarus was a good friend of Jesus.
He lived in Bethany with his two sisters, Mary and Martha.
It was a home where Jesus loved to visit.
Would He love to visit in your home if He were here in the flesh today?
Well, one time when Jesus was away on a preaching mission, Lazarus died very suddenly.
The sisters of course were heartbroken.
They had sent for Jesus, but when He arrived back in Bethany, Lazarus had been in the tomb four days.
Could Jesus do anything for these sorrowing sisters in a situation like this?
Yes, His heart went out to them in such sympathy that He wept, then He went to the grave and called Lazarus back to life and to the arms of his sisters.
If He could help them in their distress, surely He can help us also.
Jesus was on a ship asleep one night when a fierce storm arose.
His disciples were greatly frightened.
Finally they went to Jesus and awoke Him, saying,
"Carest thou not that we perish?"
Immediately He arose and rebuked the storm with the command, "Peace, be still."
And often when the storms of life beat about us we can call on Him and He’ll give us peace.
He’ll go with us everywhere through life, and when we come to the end of the way He’ll still be there.
He never changes in His purpose.
His purpose is to save men.
He came to earth to bridge the chasm between God and man.
He came to die for the lost, that through His death they might live forever.
He came to be the ladder covering the distance between lost men and a Holy God.
And He bridged that chasm and erected that ladder when He bled His life away for us on Calvary’s cross.
Paul said in 1Timothy 1:14-16
14 And the grace of our Lord was exceeding abundant with faith and love which is in Christ Jesus.
15 This is a faithful saying, and worthy of all acceptation, that Christ Jesus came into the world to save sinners; of whom I am chief.
16 Howbeit for this cause I obtained mercy, that in me first Jesus Christ might shew forth all longsuffering, for a pattern to them which should hereafter believe on him to life everlasting.
That’s His big business, to save people.
He stands in the marketplace of life and says,
"Whosoever will, let him take the water of life freely"
(Rev. 22:17).
And He says, "Him that cometh to me I’ll in no wise cast out" (John 6:37).
It is true that Jesus came into the world to reveal to us what God is like and to set an example for us and to inspire us to love one another and serve one another.
But the main purpose of His coming was to save us.
The preacher who minimizes that great fact in his preaching has left out the heart of the gospel.
His purpose also is to use us in the salvation of others.
You say that you are doing the Lord’s work, but this is not true unless the ultimate end of all your work is the salvation of others.
Jesus said, "As my Father hath sent me, even so send I you" (John 20:21).
It is His purpose for us to tell all people everywhere about Him, about what He did for them and can do for them.
Paul said, in, Philippians 1:21-30
21 For to me to live is Christ, and to die is gain.
22 But if I live in the flesh, this is the fruit of my labour: yet what I shall choose I wot not.
23 For I am in a strait betwixt two, having a desire to depart, and to be with Christ; which is far better:
24 Nevertheless to abide in the flesh is more needful for you.
25 And having this confidence, I know that I shall abide and continue with you all for your furtherance and joy of faith;
26 That your rejoicing may be more abundant in Jesus Christ for me by my coming to you again.
27 Only let your conversation be as it becometh the gospel of Christ: that whether I come and see you, or else be absent, I may hear of your affairs, that ye stand fast in one spirit, with one mind striving together for the faith of the gospel;
28 And in nothing terrified by your adversaries: which is to them an evident token of perdition, but to you of salvation, and that of God.
29 For unto you it is given in the behalf of Christ, not only to believe on him, but also to suffer for his sake;
30 Having the same conflict which ye saw in me, and now hear to be in me.
He meant that he wanted Christ to live over again in him.
He said that we were not our own but that we belonged to Christ.
Our hands, our feet, our brains, our hearts are to be His forever and are to be used for Him always.
The average Christian comes to church when he feels like it, gives a little money and a little service!
But what is he doing to see that others come to know Christ?
Above all else, His purpose is to use us in the work of redemption.
Some years ago there was a tragic fire in the Winecoff Hotel in Atlanta. More than one hundred people lost their lives.
Some perished because of suffocation, some who saw no way of rescue leaped from the windows and were killed by their fall to the pavement below.
But just two blocks away there was a fire station with its trained personnel and equipment.
The appalling thing, however, was that when the fire trucks arrived their equipment was inadequate.
Their ladders were too short to reach the people stranded on the upper floors, so those people died.
But let me tell you that the arms of Christ are long enough and strong enough to reach down to the lowest depths and lift men up to eternal life.
And you and I can have a vital part in this glorious work.
So let us give the best that we have of life and love and service and substance to this great Savior who is the same yesterday, today, and forever.
We need to remember when Peter and the other disciples were out in a boat and it was late at night, and Peter looked out across the water to see someone walking towards them on the water.
Peter saw that it was Jesus and Peter called out to Jesus and said is that you Lord?
And Jesus said yes Peter it is I. Peter said your walking on the water can I walk on the water too?
Jesus said to Peter, come on, come on and Peter jumped out of the boat and started walking towards Jesus on the water.
And all of a sudden the waves started to roll and a storm came along and Peter looked down at the water and he started to sink.
And he called out to Jesus, save me and Jesus reached down and lifted Peter up to safety.
Do you know that the same thing goes for us, as long as we keep our eyes on Jesus we will be ok.
But just as soon as we take our eyes off of Jesus the storms of like will kick up and low and behold we will start to sink!
Don’t let that happen to you, keep your eyes upon Jesus and let Him take you troubles away.
I want to ask you this morning if there is anyone here that has allowed Satan to cause you to take your eyes off of Jesus won’t you come to the alter to day and rededicate your lives to Jesus!
You know He is waiting for you to come home.
Do you know for a lost soul to come home to Jesus causes all of heaven to rejoice and sing praises.
