“Jesus Christ is the same yesterday and today and forever.” Hebrews 13:8
There is an idea among some evangelicals that a change took place in Jesus when He walked on the earth. This train of thought teaches that Jesus gained a greater understanding of our sin nature by experiencing humanity, making Him less judgmental and more tolerant than His Father. However, today’s passage tells us that Jesus is unchanged from eternity past.
The same Jesus who was present at creation also walked the earth as a man. The same Jesus who was beaten, mocked, and abandoned, also died and rose from the grave. And, the same Jesus who turned a murderer into a missionary still changes lives today. Jesus is unchanged by time and culture. It’s dangerous to believe otherwise. If Jesus Christ is not who He has always been, then how can we depend on Him to do what He has always done?
The grace we experience under the New Covenant isn’t evidence that Jesus takes a more progressive view toward holiness or worldliness. In Him, grace and truth are perfectly balanced (John 1:14). He hates sin every bit as much as His Father. After all, it was His death and resurrection that established the New Covenant. Jesus didn’t come to lower the standard or to widen the way, but to equip us with His righteousness for the narrow way (Matthew 7:13-14). New Covenant grace is not God changing His mind; it’s God changing us.
That is the great juxtaposition of our Lord. He is forever the same, yet once He touches your life you are never the same. “Therefore, if anyone is in Christ, he is a new creature; the old things passed away; behold, new things have come” (2 Corinthians 5:17). Simply put, we are forever changed because Jesus is unchanged.
Read the next devotion in this series: Truth is Unchanged