August 31, 2016

There is nothing new under the sun” (Ecclesiastes 1:9b). The sun rises, the earth turns, and people sin. Sun sets, clouds come, we rinse and repeat. As fond as we are of fantasizing that former means better, previous generations were no less evil than present ones, and our youth was just as wicked as today’s kids are. Our culture may fancy itself particularly creative, but we’re only rearranging deck chairs and recycling retired flavors. Greeks aborted and euthanized millennia ago, and Mesopotamians experimented with sexuality ages before. As Lutherans have sung for centuries,

All mankind fell in Adam’s fall; One common sin infects us all. From one to all the curse descends, And over all God’s wrath impends. (LSB 562)

The real problem isn’t novel crimes but corrupt nature. It’s not that these original sins haven’t been around long, but that original sin has been around all along.

In fact, as bad as it is that nothing’s changed, nothing’s better than the fact that nothing changes. The Almighty Maker remains more changeless than anything else:

“For I the Lord do not change; therefore you, O children of Jacob, are not consumed” (Malachi 3:6).

“[I]f we are faithless, he remains faithful—for he cannot deny himself”        (2 Timothy 2:13).

“But the steadfast love of the Lord is from everlasting to everlasting on those who fear him, and his righteousness to children’s children” (Psalm 103:17).

“Every good gift and every perfect gift is from above, coming down from the Father of lights with whom there is no variation or shadow due to change” (James 1:17).

“Jesus Christ is the same yesterday and today and forever” (Hebrews 13:8).

Great is Thy faithfulness, O God my Father; There is no shadow of turning with Thee. Thou changest not: Thy compassions, they fail not; As Thou hast been, Thou forever wilt be. (LSB 809)

I AM. Alpha and Omega. He was, and is, and is to come. It is finished. Once for all. As it was in the beginning, is now, and will be forever. We cannot be uncreated, unforgiven, unaccepted, unreconciled, unbaptized, unjustified, or uncalled any more than Jesus can be unborn, uncrucified, or unresurrected. His rising again and ascending into heaven ensures that His cross’s atonement will align and assimilate everything, and sooner rather than later. 

Prayer: O God, You make the minds of Your faithful to be of one will. Grant that we may love what You have commanded and desire what You have promised, that among the many changes of this world our hearts may be fixed where true joys are found; through Jesus Christ, our Lord. Amen.