Change is Constant - God is Eternal

I would hate to be the complaint department at Facebook right about now.  They tweaked their networking site to handle newsfeeds, emails, and other minor things differently and the complaints started popping up on statuses everywhere.  The emotions seemed to range from minor irritation to "I'm leaving facebook forever!"  I couldn't help but chuckle at the irony at how a generation that has seen so much change in their lifetime can get so upset when a free service that is voluntary to use is changed.  Perhaps as a minister this struck me particularly funny because so often it's the "old folks" that get portrayed as sticks in the mud and the young adults are the proponents of "change" and "progress."  Now it seems the shoe is on the other foot.  Let's see how it fits.

Our Generation isn't the only Generation to see Major Change

A few years ago I officiated a funeral for a lady who was 98 years old.   In her lifetime she had seen some significant changes.  As a young girl she remembered traveling to California... by stagecoach.  Her generation saw the invention of the airplane, and the subsequent revolution in travel it would affect.  She saw a World War, a Great Depression, and another World War.  Alaska and Hawaii added their stars to our flag in her middle years.  She witnessed how the interstate system shrunk a continent and how rock and roll united a generation.  Her eyes saw race riots in the 60's and her ears heard the dream of Martin Luther King Jr.  She witnessed a nation divided by war in Vietnam, then divided again by war in Iraq.  She saw the walls of communism fall in Berlin and the Twin Towers fall in New York as terrorism replaced communism as the chief enemy of the United States.  Yet, remarkably, she adapted to each and every change, and even when life was tough, she survived and adapted.  One of the elders asked her to reflect on her life and teach him a lesson she learned.  Her voice, feeble with age but strong with conviction whispered, "Change is constant, but God is eternal."

Adapting to a Changing World

Our generation (I speak to my peeps who are 35 and under) has seen a fair amount of change.  September 11 forever changed how we travel and how we view safety and security.  The internet has dramatically altered how we communicate and gain information.   Cell phones have morphed from a brick with an antenna that only the rich could afford to devices that perform hundreds of functions and nearly everyone has one in their pocket.  Blogs have given a voice to the undervalued and the overrated.  Televisions are no longer large cubes on a tabletop, but flat screens on a wall that can double as portals into the worldwide web.  Just this past spring, revolutions in Arab nations have altered the politics of the Middle-East.  Yet we adapt.  We change.  We cope.

So why do we get so upset when something as insignificant as Facebook changes?  Because, we desperately desire something to be constant.  Why does the older generation resist change in the church?  Because, through wars, depressions, recessions, civil rights movements and political upheavals, the church has been a constant to them.  What we need to realize, in both technology and in the local church, change is a constant.  When we need to cling to something that is never going to leave us, forsake us, or abuse us, we need to realize that we don't need a something but a someone.  God is that eternal constant.  God is the "anchor for the soul" (see Hebrews 6).  God is eternal.

The next time something changes and it unnerves you, remind yourself of Who is your anchor, because change is a constant, but God is eternal.