Divine Immutability

God is depicted in Scripture as a Rock (Deut. 32:4), and his word as something that outlasts all created things (Mat. 24:35). We sing songs about Christ being our Solid Rock, as if he were our foundation, or the Word of God as if it were a firm foundation. But how easily do our hymns stand the test of our real belief? Charnock conceived of immutability as a “center wherein they all unite” [1]. In other words, a divine attribute that makes sense of many of the others for us. Note that this does not mean that it is ontologically more foundational, as that would overthrow divine simplicity and consequently all the rest would fall afterwards. However, immutability is a “bridge” attribute, or, in other words, one which modern Evangelicals have been conditioned to think they believe in, but which, in the genuine article, implies many of the same threats to our sense of divine immanence in modern religion. If various entailments of immutability can be persuasive, then there is a chance of our brethren “crossing over” to those less familiar classical attributes as well.

Defining Immutability 

Divine immutability is best summarized by Shedd: “the unchangeableness of [God’s] essence, attributes, purposes, and consciousness” [2]. So this is an absolute immutability. This not only denies that God does change, but also that God has any ability to change. Far from being some sort of real, ontological “inability” in God, we must understand that to change is to either suffer defect, if it is a change for the worse, or else to have previously been defective, if it is a change for the better. Consequently, this defect per se is no power.

This truth also implies that both God’s incommunicable attributes and communicable attributes are unchangeable. And this further means that both God’s natural attributes and what we might terms his personal attributes are also unchangeable. He must have no “new nature, new thoughts, new will, new purpose, or new place” [3]. We will see a consequence to this that puts divine immutability on a collision course with modern theology. Over the past century and a half, theologians have set about to answer popular concerns over God’s relatability to us. The trouble with this is that, even where it is motivated by serious answers to pain and suffering, God will not be better for us by being less of himself.

Immutability in Scripture and Tradition

Divine immutability is taught in Scripture, first about his essence: “I the LORD do not change” (Mal. 3:6). Or elsewhere, “[The heavens] will perish, but you will remain; they will all wear out like a garment. You will change them like a robe, and they will pass away, but you are the same, and your years have no end (Ps. 102:26-27; cf. Heb. 1:11-12). In Charnock’s exposition of this text there is immediate application to this doctrine:

“The design of the penman is to confirm the church in the truth of the divine promises; that though the foundations of the world should be ripped up, and the heavens clatter together, and the whole fabric of them and unpinned and fall to pieces, the firmest parts of it dissolved; yet the church should continue in its stability, because it stands not upon the changeableness of creatures, but is built upon the immutable rock of the truth of God, which is as little subject to change, as his essence” [4].

He builds off of the contrast in the verse itself. Everything in the world exhibits change; and yet the appearance of things stands firm. Yes, “individuals corrupt, but the species and kinds remain.” The “heavens and earth” are highlighted because out of all changeable things, they are the least changeable, existing, relatively speaking, as they always have. There is a kind of lesser to greater logic that the Psalmist calls our attention to through poetry. And He is called “the Father of lights, with whom there is no variation or shadow due to change” (Jas. 1:17).

But the Scriptures are equally clear that the divine decree is immutable: “My counsel shall stand, and I will accomplish all my purpose’ (Isa. 46:10).

The counsel of the Lord stands forever, the plans of his heart to all generations (Ps. 33:11) 

The Lord has sworn and will not change his mind, “You are a priest forever after the order of Melchizedek” (Ps. 110:4) 

God is not man, that he should lie, or a son of man, that he should change his mind. Has he said, and will he not do it? Or has he spoken, and will he not fulfill it? (Num. 23:19) 

The immutability of God has been consistently affirmed by all the great Christian thinkers, creeds, and confessions. The Westminster Confession says that God is “immutable,'“ and also that He is “working all things according to the counsel of his own immutable and most righteous will” [5]. In the next section on the decree it goes further: “God from all eternity did, by the most wise and holy counsel of his own will, freely and unchangeably ordain whatsoever comes to pass” [6].

Applying immutability both to God’s essence and God’s decrees, as follows from divine simplicity, was shared by everyone from Augustine to Thomas, from Turretin to Bavinck. And Berkhof adds that, “He is devoid of all change, not only in His being, but also His perfections, and in His purposes and promises” [7].

Objections to Immutability

We will begin by looking at two objections faced by Thomas in the Summa,

It seems that God is not altogether immutable. For whatever moves itself is in some way mutable. But, as Augustine says (Gen. ad lit. viii. 20), The Creator Spirit moves Himself neither by time, nor by place. Therefore God is in some way mutable.

It seems that to be immutable does not belong to God alone. For the Philosopher says (Metaph ii.), that matter is in everything which is moved. But, according to some, certain created substances, as angels and souls have not matter. Therefore to be immutable does not belong to God alone [8].

Thomas’s response to the first is to remind that, “everything which is in any way changed, is in some way in potentiality. Hence it is evident that it is impossible for God to be in any way changeable.” Properly speaking “movement” does not belong to God, and Thomas interprets Augustine as dealing with a Platonic way of speaking of all divine operations as “movements.” So the objection is founded in an anachronism of sorts.

Again not many Evangelicals would think they have any objections to this divine attribute. Nevertheless many suspect there is sleight of hand at work when theologians invoke words like anthropomorphism. For instance, it would seem straightforward that God “repented of the evil …” (Ex. 32:10-14; cf. Judg 2:18; 10:16). To repent in the New Testament goes all the way down to mind-change, as the Greek word suggests, but often the English word is a suitable translation for a mere “turning.” Now a thing that “turns” is a thing on an axis, or a thing that may face one way or another. It would have to have position in space. Obviously this is not true of God, who is without body. Thus when the Scriptures say that God turns, or repents, the only metaphysical “change” occurring is outside of God. Turretin argues, that, 

Repentance is attributed to God after the manner of men … but must be understood after the manner of God … not with respect to his counsel, but to the event; not in reference to his will, but to the thing willed; not to affection and internal grief, but to the effect and external work because he does what a penitent man usually does” [9].

And as to God’s reason for utilizing such speech to reveal something of himself, Clement of Alexandria wrote that, “deity cannot be described as it really is, but only as human beings, themselves fettered to the flesh, are capable of hearing; the prophets therefore adopted the language of anthropomorphism as saving concession to the weakness of human understanding” [10].

One objection that has been around for centuries is to suppose that either Creation or the Incarnation implies change in God since before there was not, in God, what there is now. And the change is seen to be “in God,” either as a relational attribute in the case of creation, or by union with the Godhead in the case of the Incarnation. Therefore, it seems, there is change in God. Turretin replied to this in his day: “Creation did not produce a change in God, but in creatures,” and likewise with the Incarnation, it was “not by a conversion of the Word … into flesh, but by an assumption of the flesh to the hypostasis of the Word” [11]. This is based on a simple but unassailable truth: “It is one thing to change the will; another to will the change of anything” [12].

But on the matter of the Incarnation, the reply of Turretin may be suspected as a distinction without a difference. A person is a thing. Thus to unite the human nature to the person just is to have, in whatever we call the union, a real thing that is different than it was apart from the union. However, the burden of proof to show contradiction would be to explain what this union is. We have seen (1) that all effects are occurring ad extra; and (2) the Incarnation—in both its material and immaterial (“reasonable soul”) dimensions—are effects.

Charnock added his voice to this difficulty: “There was no change in the divine nature of the Son, when he assumed human nature;” that is, “by assuming or by acting, not by being acted upon.” On the contrary, “there was an union between the two natures, but no change of the Deity into the humanity, or of the humanity into the Deity.” As to Paul’s meaning in Philippians 2:7, of the Son’s emptying himself: “The glory of his divinity was not extinguished nor diminished, though it was obscured or darkened, under the veil of our infirmities; but there was no more change in the hiding of it, than there is in the body of the sun when it is shadowed by the interposition of a cloud” [13].

Thus the whole of the Incarnation is an ad extra effect and relation. Mascall wrote, “like creation, the relation of incarnation is real in the creature but logical in God” [14]. Shedd adds to this that in the Incarnation, divine essence “was not transmuted into a human nature, but assumed a human nature into union with itself” [15].

We mentioned Ware’s dichotomy between relational attributes in God and absolute (or essential) attributes in God. One place that Ware says this, ironically enough, is in his commendable argument against the Open Theists.

Divine immutability is best understood as involving God’s unchangeable nature (ontological immutability) and promise (ethical immutability), but … Scripture does not lead us to think of God as unchangeable in every respect (absolute immutability). Importantly God is changeable in relationship with his creation, particularly with human and angelic moral creatures he has made to live in relationship with him. In this relational mutability, God does not change in his essential nature, purpose, will, knowledge, or wisdom; but he does interact with his people in the experience of their lives as these unfold in time. God actually enters into relationship with his people, while knowing from eternity all that they will face [16].

Now Dolezal gives two basic responses: “First, it is incoherent to say that God is ontologically immutable while denying that He is absolutely immutable … This is because relational and accidental states of being are no less ontological—that is, existentially actual—than one’s nature or essence … Second, when Ware says that God ‘actually enters into relationship with His people,’ he means that God is somehow moving along with them in a correlative sense in which He has voluntarily opened Himself up to being affected (i.e., acted upon) and thus changed by the creature” [17]. At the end of the day, Ware is in agreement with Open Theists that something in God is changed via his relationship and reaction to the creature; but he disagrees with Open Theists as to the source of that change. For Open Theists it is the future actions of free moral agents, while for Ware it is God’s own free choice. 

Implications of Immutability 

Reason confirms this attribute of God since a necessary and independent being cannot change. A change is either an addition or a subtraction. Put in moral terms, a change is either an improvement or a depreciation in value. And we have already disproven any prior cause or actuality here. Bavinck comments that, “A natural implication of God’s aseity is his immutability … The difference between the Creator and the creature hinges on the contrast between being and becoming” [18]. Turretin says, “All causes of change are removed from him” [19], which must include error, ignorance, or inconstancy of will.

When it comes to adherents to modern religion, perhaps the most troubling implication of immutability may be summarized by this formal argument:

1. All that is in God is God.

2. All of God’s will is in (of) God.

3. All of God is immutable.

∴ All of God’s will is immutable. 

Now to say that “All of God’s will is immutable” is the same as to say that “All of God’s decrees are immutable.” To put a finer point on it, that means that God’s determination to do all that he does cannot ever change: not by anything in time, not by anything in eternity. Bavinck adds that, “In him there is no change in time, for he is eternal; nor in location, for he is omnipresent; nor in essence, for he is pure being.” [20]. This gets us squarely into the controversial and practical matter of God’s willing and ours. For a deeper analysis of that, we will have to wait for our section on the divine will.

Then there is the last objection fielded by Charnock, that being that any change in the divine law implies change in the divine. On the contrary, the “change of laws of God argues no change in God, when God abrogates some laws which he had settled in the church, and enacts others.” This difficulty may not usually be on our radar screen. However, with respect to the ceremonial law, “the abrogation of it was no less an execution of his decree, that the establishment of it for a season was” [21].

In this we must account for the design in both the unity and diversity of the law. Turretin is a profound Reformed source on the rationale for this in the law itself, as he made the distinction between those laws more directly reflecting the immutable character of God (natural) versus those with a changeable, arbitrary (positive) element [22].

Note that if God’s will cannot change, then it follows that both the blessings and curses of his covenant cannot change. Here may be the secret to so many of the objections to this doctrine; but equally a clue to its great comfort:

So when God desired to show more convincingly to the heirs of the promise the unchangeable character of his purpose, he guaranteed it with an oath, so that by two unchangeable things, in which it is impossible for God to lie, we who have fled for refuge might have strong encouragement to hold fast to the hope set before us (Heb. 6:17-18).

In practical application of this truth, Charnock brought his congregation, and readers through the past few centuries, full circle back to thoughts of his opening text in Psalm 102:25-26. All that is most unchanging in this world—the mountains and the sky—and God outlasts them all. He speaks of the comfort brought about by immutability, as the “covenant stands unchangeable … Perseverance is ascertained … [and] By this eternal happiness is insured” [23]. Then the final use is for exhortation.

“Let a sense of the changeableness and uncertainty of all other things besides God, be upon us,” he argues. If we take that to heart, our thoughts will not dwell on these things, our trust will not be in them, and we will prefer God over such mutable things. It will teach us “patience under such providences as declare his unchangeable will” and call us “to imitate God in this perfection, by striving to be immovable in goodness” [24].

He concludes in speaking about the reasonableness, glory, and happiness of this truth. Again we see that there are fitting ways for the saints to imitate immutability. We must remain immovable in laboring for Christ (1 Corinthians 15:58), abiding in the true doctrine (2 John 9), and holding fast our profession of faith together (Hebrews 10:23, 25). As in doctrine, so in the practice, the logical traffic runs both ways. Not only does God’s immutability build those spiritual fruits and virtues in us that mirror his other attributes, but as we relate to the others, so we become more or less like him in immutability: “the nearer we come to him, the more stability we shall have in ourselves; the further from him, the more liable to change” [25].

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1. Stephen Charnock. Discourses Upon the Existence and Attributes of God, Volume I (Grand Rapids: Baker Books, 1979), 318.

2. Shedd, Dogmatic Theology, 284.

3. Charnock. Discourses, I.317.

4. Charnock. Discourses, I.310-11.

5. Westminster Confession of Faith, II.1

6. Westminster Confession of Faith, III.1

7. Berkhof, Systematic Theology, 58

8. Aquinas, Summa Theologica, I. Q.9, Art. 1

9. Turretin, Institutes, I.3.11.11.

10. Clement of Alexandria, cited in Prestige, God in Patristic Thought, 8.

11. Turretin, Institutes, I.3.11.5, 6.

12. Turretin, Institutes, I.3.11.7.

13. Charnock. Discourses, I.339, 340.

14. Mascall, Christ, the Christian, and the Church, 17.

15. Shedd, Dogmatic Theology, 285.

16. Ware, God’s Lesser Glory, 73.

17. Dolezal, All That is In God, 25, 26.

18. Bavinck, Reformed Dogmatics, II.153, 156.

19. Turretin, Institutes, I.3.xi.4.

20. Bavinck, Reformed Dogmatics, II.156.

21. Charnock. Discourses, I.346.

22. Turretin, Institutes, II.11.1.4; II.11.2

23. Charnock. Discourses, I.354, 55, 56.

24. Charnock. Discourses, I.356, 59, 60.

25. Charnock. Discourses, I.362.