Worship

THE GREATEST STABILITY

by GLENN PEASE
02/08/22
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There is a store where we love to shop because they have so many unique things that you cannot find in other stores. But we get frustrated because when we find something we like a lot and return to get more, we discover that they do not have it anymore. Everything is always changing in that store and in the world. Nothing seems to stay the same. The gas prices can change during any day, and you can never know what a day will bring forth. There is no stability, and we long for something we love to stay put and not change. The only sure Rock on which we can count to remain the same is Jesus. As the text says, He is the same yesterday and today and forever. An unknown poet put it:

What’er may change in Him no change is seen,
A glorious sun that wanes not, nor declines;
Above the clouds and storms He walks serene,
And on His people’s inward darkness shines,
All may depart-I fret not nor repine,
While I my Saviors am, while He is mine.

The emphasis on His unchanging stability was a focus right off in the first chapter of Hebrews. It stresses that the entire universe that He created will wear out and be cast off like an old garment, but He will continue the same forever. 1:12 says, "You will roll them up like a robe; like a garment they will be changed. But you remain the same, and your years will never end." Everything that Jesus made as Creator has a time limit, for it was not created to be eternal. Only man, who is made in His image, was made to be eternal. We are ever changing because we are eternal spirits in physical bodies that change every second. Jesus is an eternal being in a body that has been made eternal because He defeated death. He is both eternal as God and Man. He is the eternal God-Man. He is the source of eternal stability. You build on the most solid of Rock when you put your trust in Jesus. He is the greatest stability in this universe. In Him alone do we have eternal security.

When the sun shall shine no more,
And all galaxies go dead,
He will shine just as before,
And be with us, as He said.

All that He made will decay,
And all things will cease to be
But He'll never pass away,
For He's ours eternally.

The greatest stability
Can in Him alone be found.
He is our security,
For He's the most solid ground.

The hymn writer wrote truth when he wrote, "On Christ the solid Rock I stand, all other ground is sinking sand." The early verses of Hebrews tells us that all the ground in the universe will change like old clothes and be cast away, but Jesus is ground that remains solid and secure for all eternity. All who trust in anything or anyone other than Jesus for their eternal destiny are putting their trust in sinking sand. He alone is the solid Rock that will be the same always. We need some certainty in a world that is so uncertain. We need stability in a world so filled with change. Someone captured the reality of the present world we live in with these words, "Nothing else and no one else is like Jesus. Everything and everyone else changes. People change; moods change; jobs change. Times change; fashions change; computers change. Leaders change; bosses change; interests change. In our age, technology has changed everything. And technology is changing so fast that we can't keep track of the changes. Products of new technology are obsolete by the there out the door. Such rapid-fire change frays the edges of our psyches, for we don't know where the next change is coming from, or even if we will notice it at all.”

It is sad indeed when people put their trust in the things that will pass away when He who will never pass away stands beckoning for them to come unto Him. Jesus wants us to have a solid foundation on which to stand in an ever changing world. He wants us to feel the security of a love that will never change. He will forgive us 70 times 7, which means endlessly, because He died for all sin, and so when we confess our sins, He is faithful and will forgive our sins, for He never changes and decides He will not forgive. He will never forsake us, for He promised to be with us always to the end of the world. No matter what life brings in terms of change, He will not change and cease to be our Friend, Savior, and Intercessor. This is the never changing good news that the world needs to hear, for in Jesus alone can man find the greatest stability. Again, the poet tries to communicate this truth:

From Time into Eternity

Like a candle burning and giving light,
Dispelling the darkness and enabling sight.
Will burn out.
Like a clock set and winding down,
Soon the alarm will begin to sound.
No more time.
Like a flower blooming, then fading away,
Its beauty swiftly passing from day to day.
Soon will be gone.
So is the life of man quickly spent,
In a short while it came and went.
To where?
A journey began in a moment of time.
What's it all about, is there a purpose divine?
Your eternal destination.
"It is appointed unto men once to die,
But after this the judgment:" My Oh My!
Why?
"For all have sinned, and come short
Of the glory of God;" It's a bad report!
God have mercy!
The Holy Bible reveals God's plan of salvation,
Only Christ can save you from eternal damnation!
Heaven or Hell?
Declare Jesus is your Lord and do what He has said,
Believe in your heart, God has raised Him from the dead!
From time into eternity...
John Roberto

In this message we want to look at just a few of the significant ways that Jesus will remain the same as He has ever been for now and for all eternity.It makes sense that everything and everyone else is changing, for change is the sign of imperfection. You do not change perfection, for any change in perfection would be a going back to imperfection. Nobody says of a project of any kind, "That is perfect, but lets change it." If they do say that they are lying about it being perfect, for they still see some way in which it can be perfected. Jesus was, is, and ever will be perfect, and that is why there has never been and can never be any need for change. Almost every product today is advertizing that they have a new and improved product. They are admitting that the old one was not the best. Their is no new and improved Lord and Savior for our day, for He was, is,and ever will be just the same perfect Lord and Savior He was when He walked this earth. Spurgeon said, "Jesus Christ was the perfect revelation of God. He was the express image of the Father's person, and the brightness of his glory. In previous ages, God had spoken to us by his prophets but in these last days he has spoken to us by his Son. Now as to that which was a complete revelation, it is blasphemous to suppose that there can be any more revealed than has been made known in the person and work of Jesus Christ the Son of God. He is God's ultimatum; last of all, he sends his Son. If you can conceive a brighter display of God than is to be seen in the Only-begotten, I thank God that I am unable to follow you in any such imagination. To me, he is the last, the highest, the grandest revelation of God." You do not change what is perfect, and so lets consider Him who is the same yesterday, today and forever.

I. HIS CHARACTER WILL NEVER CHANGE.

Jesus was the ideal man when He walked this earth because He was God incarnate. Now He has taken His manhood into heaven to reign forever with His eternal nature as God. He is now the God-Man, and combines the perfection of the divine and the human forever. Whatever is best about God and man is found in Jesus, and that is why He is always the greatest in every area in which their is competition to be great as God or man. When it comes to character there is none greater than Jesus. He was the greatest in character in time, and He will be for all eternity. We can count on Him now and forever to be the kind of person He was as we see Him revealed in the Gospels.

II. HIS COMPASSION WILL NEVER CHANGE.

The one thing that we know clearly about Jesus is that He cared about every person that crossed His path. It made no difference if they were immoral and worldly, or if they were righteous seekers of God's will. It made no difference to Him if they were loved or hated by society. It made no difference if they were women or men. It made no difference if they were Jews or Gentiles. It made no difference if they were educated or just common laborors. It made no difference if they were high in society or outcastes from society. Jesus never met a person He did not love. He loved even His enemies, and He longed for them to come to Him and be His friends. When Jesus said "come unto me" there were no exceptions. He had compassion for all people, and He wanted all to have the best that could be theirs in God's plan.

Charles Jefferson wrote of Jesus, "He says, "Come unto me and I will give you rest, I am the bread of life, I am the Light of the world, If any man thirst let him come unto me and drink, My peace I give unto you, You shall receive power, You shall rejoice." Bread and water, light and rest and peace and power and joy, are these not the seven elemental blessings which make human life complete?" This is what Jesus came to give man. He came that we might have life abundant for time and eternity. This is what motivated Jesus in eternity past, and this is what made Him come into history and die for mankind. This is what He wants today for all, and what He will want for all for all eternity. Jesus will never change in His love for man, and in His desire for all to have the best for which they were created. Everything about Jesus is Gospel, that is good news, for everything about Him is about what He wants to do in and for us.

III. HIS CONSISTENCY WILL NEVER CHANGE.

SPURGEON, "So also, once more, he is the same in his relationship to all his people. I like to think that, as Jesus was the Husband of his Church ages ago, he is her Husband still, for he hateth putting away. As he was the Brother born for adversity to his first disciples, he is our faithful Brother still. As he was a Friend that sticketh closer than a brother to those who were sorely tried in the medieval times, he is equally a Friend to us upon whom the ends of the earth have come. There is no difference whatever in the relationship of the Lord Jesus Christ to his people at any time. He is just as ready to comfort us to-night as he was to comfort those with whom he dwelt when here below. Sister Mary, he is as willing to come down to your Bethany, and help you in your sorrow about Lazarus, as he was when he came to Martha and Mary whom he loved. Jesus Christ is just as ready to wash your feet, my brother, after another day's weary travel through the foul ways of this world; he is as willing to take the basin, and the pitcher, and the towel, and to give us a loving cleansing, as he was when he washed his disciples' feet. Just what he was to them he is to us. Happy is it if you and I can truly say, "What he was to Peter, what he was to John, what he was to the Magdalen, that is Jesus Christ to me, 'the same yesterday, and to day, and for ever.'"

"Changes of position and of circumstances there have been in our Lord, but he is always the same in his great love to his people, whom he loved or ever the earth was. Before the first star was kindled, before the first living creature began to sing the praise of its Creator, he loved his Church with an everlasting love. He spied her in the glass of predestination, pictured her by his divine foreknowledge, and loved her with all his heart; and it was for this cause that he left his Father, and became one with her, that he might redeem her. It was for this cause that he went with her through all this vale of tears, discharged her debts, and bore her sins in his own body on the tree. For her sake he slept in the tomb, and with the same love that brought him down he has gone up again, and with the same heart beating true to the same blessed betrothment he has gone into the glory, waiting for the marriage-day when he shall come again, to receive his perfected spouse, who shall have made herself ready by his grace. Never for a moment, whether as God over all, blessed for ever, or as God and man in one divine person, or as dead and buried, or as risen and ascended, never has he changed in the love he bears to his chosen. He is "Jesus Christ the same yesterday, and to day, and for ever."

Spurgeon has been dealing with what is called by the theologians the immutability of God, and Jesus is God. He never changes in character, compassion and consistency, and the result is we can have perfect confidence in His promises, and rest secure in all He has told us of what is avilable to us for all eternity when we put our faith and trust in Him. Jesus is the Rock and He offers us the best place to stand for He is the greatest stablity in the universe.