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A NEW WAY TO PLAY MONOPOLY

A few months ago on a TV ad for Pepsi, we all saw a future Grandpa Shaquille O'Neal telling his grandchildren how the NBA made things tough for him back in the 1990s by introducing MOVABLE hoops. Do you remember that? This basketball hoop was mounted on a movable kind of platform that was lurching all over the place while high-flying Shaquille tried to sink a long jump shot.

Well, it was cute. But there's something inside us that rebels at the thought. Basketball hoops have ALWAYS been exactly at ten feet high down at the end of the NBA court, "this 94 by 50 hunk of wood," as Laker announcer Chick Hearn describes it. It's always 94 feet from end to end, the free throw line's ALWAYS 15 feet out, and a game's ALWAYS 48 minutes. The Lakers and Houston Rockets don't show up some night and then have the officials tell them, "Hey, we're in a cranky mood. Tonight we're cutting things off after three quarters. Thirty-six minutes is all you get."

Most games survive and thrive because of the fixed AND PREDICTABLE nature of the rules. Have you ever played in a game where someone introduced their own personal variation? Maybe in Monopoly all the taxes collected went into the center, and if you hit FREE PARKING you could have the whole pot. Of course, that's such a common variation, most people think it IS one of the rules. But have you ever played Monopoly with someone who wanted to allow selling back houses and hotels at FULL price? Which, of course, ruins the whole game. You just can't play that way, you protest. Houses go back in at HALF-price; "that's the way we've always done it." We NEED that kind of reliable constancy.

Well, this isn't Basketball Week here on the Voice of Prophecy. But we DO want to look at a much deeper topic that springs out of our Shaquille O'Neal illustration. And that topic is God Himself.

When it comes to God are the baskets ALWAYS set at ten feet? Does the size of the playing floor change from millennium to millennium . . . or does the Almighty keep it at a predictable 94 by 50? Here in 1995 is He like He was in the year 1895? Or the year 95? Or 1995 B.C.?

In the book of Malachi chapter three we find six words that ought to be engraved on our hearts. Here it is in the New International Version:

"I the Lord . . . DO . . . NOT . . . CHANGE."
In the King James, it's much the same:

"I am the Lord, I change not."

Now, friend, how do we react to this very straightforward statement? Does it stand for all time? Are there exceptions? And if it IS true, are we glad about it? Is it good news that God doesn't change?

A number of months ago we began a five-week series of programs, and we started off with the premise, the biblical ASSUMPTION, that God IS good. And if He IS good, then the fact that He doesn't change — is also good. The IMMUTABILITY of God, meaning His unchanging nature — is good news.

In the book we want to share with you this week, THE KNOWLEDGE OF THE HOLY by A. W. Tozer, he HAS a chapter entitled "The Immutability of God." That may be a new word to you, and this chapter's six pages have some hard-to-grasp thoughts in them, but let me tell you something: we can rejoice over the fact that God never changes.

Let me read to you just a tiny bit of Tozer's thinking. Listen:

"To say that God is immutable is to say that He never differs from Himself. The concept of a growing or developing God is not found in the Scriptures. It seems to me impossible to think of God as varying from Himself in any way. Here is why:
And then he continues: "For a moral being to change it would be necessary that the change be in one of three directions. He must go from better to worse OR from worse to better; OR, granted that the moral quality remain stable, he must change within himself, as from immature to mature or from one order of being to another. It should be clear that God can move in none of these directions. His perfections forever rule out any such possibility."

There's much more — and I want to add my voice to Ken's here. PLEASE let us send you a copy of this very thought-provoking book. But do you agree with Tozer's premises? Certainly we don't serve a God who is going from good to not-quite-so-good. And we aren't serving a God who's getting better and better, meaning that at one point, He wasn't really a very good God. And I see real wisdom AND biblical truth in Tozer's suggestion that God isn't even changing in a morally neutral way: getting smarter or more mature or more thoughtful as the centuries go by.

It would be frightening to think of God saying to one of His angels: "Yes, thanks for pointing that out. I wasn't really aware of that." Or: "You know, I hadn't thought of that. That's a new idea to Me."

One of the dumber prayers I ever heard of was a man who got up in church and said, "And Lord, as Thou didst read in the New York Times this morning . . ." Friend, God doesn't need to read the New York Times in order to know what's happening on this planet. He knows. His store of knowledge doesn't change; thank God He's not up in heaven trying to get smarter, trying to learn on the job.

You know, when Jeannie and I were over in Utrecht, Holland just a few weeks ago for our denomination's worldwide General Conference session, there was the expected amount of confusion. People who were in charge of this or that had only just arrived a day or two ahead of us. They were still kind of jet-lagged themselves, trying to look through boxes and find the equipment or operating manuals or computer disks they needed.

And time after time, we heard people confess: "Well, I just got here. I don't really know what's going on yet." I'm so thankful that we have a heavenly Father who has ALWAYS been there. His setup has ALWAYS been in place; His plan of salvation has ALWAYS been functional. He's not like a high school home ec teacher who's assigned in August to teach algebra during the coming school year and frantically stays two days ahead of the students. God never changes; friend, what He knows today He's ALWAYS known.

As you hear this in early August, the Susan Smith trial there in Union, South Carolina may just be wrapping up. And it looks like the O. J. Simpson saga may still have a few weeks or even a month or two left before the jury begins to deliberate. I'm so thankful that from a divine point of view, God has nothing to learn from these cases. He's really the only One who knows "the truth, the whole truth, and nothing but the truth." He's the only One who can be sure to do the right thing when it comes to punishment and judgment.

A news report just came across my desk last week, stating that Susan Smith has accepted Christ into her life and been baptized. She knows what she did was wrong and she's ready to accept her punishment, the story said. And I accept it as good news that our all-knowing and unchanging God knows that story; He knows Susan Smith's heart. Reporters might get a story wrong; you and I might watch the evening news on TV and misunderstand. But God has nothing to learn from today's headlines.

Let me share a point that we're going to return to all this week. It's found in the New Testament book of Hebrews, chapter 13, verse 8. Listen:

"Jesus Christ is the same yesterday . . . and today . . . and forever."

I can't tell you how badly I NEED that news. I CLING to that good news. When it comes to Jesus, nothing HAS changed; nothing ever WILL change. Jesus Christ, MY Redeemer, is always the same.

What does that mean? His plan of salvation is always the same. We'll talk about that this week. But His plan, the Calvary Plan, has the same ground rules it ever had. There's nothing transitory or shifting or mysterious about the Cross of Christ. It — like He — is always the same. I can get to it; YOU can get to it.

The ATTITUDES of Jesus Christ never change — and we'll explore that beautiful truth as well. Jesus feels about me as He has ALWAYS felt about His children. Jesus never changes His MIND; He never changes in His FEELINGS. And that's good news.

The strengths and abilities of Jesus Christ and God the Father never change. What they used to be able to do . . . they can STILL do. Their past performances are an indication of their future plans. And THAT'S good news.

There are surprises that come from the hand of our unchanging God. There are delights that spring from His heart of love; there are expressions that catch us wonderfully off-guard. And we'll talk about some of those this week. But when we need to know something that's FOR SURE — God is there.

Friend, do you need an unchanging God and an unchanging Savior today? You may be driving to work and by the time you get there, the job is gone. You may go home tonight and find that you've lost a spouse or a child. An earthquake may destroy your property; a heat wave may steal from you your loved ones. This world is caused by tragedies brought on by change. So little of what we have is rock-solid sure.

But you can always turn to God and KNOW exactly what you're getting.