ODJ: What Never Changes

November 23, 2017 

READ: Hebrews 13:8-16 

Jesus Christ is the same yesterday, today and forever. So do not be attracted by strange, new ideas (vv.8-9).

Quartz timing is a term we often hear mentioned in reference to watches and clocks. But most of us don’t have the faintest idea of what it means. In a quartz watch, the battery sends an electric signal through a tiny piece of quartz which vibrates at a very precise frequency, exactly 32,768 times per second. The watch uses that fixed vibration rate to keep time. Because the vibration rate is always the same and never changes, quartz timepieces are highly dependable—much more accurate time-keepers than many other types of clocks.

Far more reliable than the constant vibration rate of a piece of quartz, the writer of Hebrews tells us that Jesus is “the same yesterday, today and forever” (Hebrews 13:8). Although this truth on its own is an important aspect of the character of Christ, Jesus’ perfect, timeless nature would have been especially important to the early church, which was deeply divided by different approaches to eating certain foods. The writer of Hebrews told believers in Jesus that they shouldn’t obsess over new rules about food that wouldn’t help anyone (v.9). It was far better for them to focus on the unchanging and gracious character of Christ instead.

Today, social media is often filled with all the latest fads: the best way to train your mind, the most effective way to organise your closet and the diet that cavemen ate! While interesting to consider, we usually need not place much attention on those things, because they haven’t stood the test of time. But we can always build our lives around the gracious character of Jesus—the One who never changes and against whom the storms of life can’t prevail (Matthew 7:24).

—Peter Chin

365-day-plan: Romans 12:1-21