Hebrews 6:18

6:18 so that we who have found refuge in him ¹  may find strong encouragement to hold fast to the hope set before us through two unchangeable things, since it is impossible for God to lie.

Job 23:13-14

23:13 But he is unchangeable, ²  and who can change ³  him?

Whatever he ⁴  has desired, he does.

23:14 For he fulfills his decree against me, ⁵ 

and many such things are his plans. ⁶ 

Psalms 33:11

33:11 The Lord’s decisions stand forever;

his plans abide throughout the ages. ⁷ 

Proverbs 19:21

19:21 There are many plans ⁸  in a person’s mind, ⁹ 

but it ¹⁰  is the counsel ¹¹  of the Lord which will stand.

Isaiah 14:24

14:24 ¹² The Lord who commands armies makes this solemn vow:

“Be sure of this:

Just as I have intended, so it will be;

just as I have planned, it will happen.

Isaiah 14:26-27

14:26 This is the plan I have devised for the whole earth;

my hand is ready to strike all the nations.” ¹³ 

14:27 Indeed, ¹⁴  the Lord who commands armies has a plan,

and who can possibly frustrate it?

His hand is ready to strike,

and who can possibly stop it? ¹⁵ 

Isaiah 46:10

46:10 who announces the end from the beginning

and reveals beforehand ¹⁶  what has not yet occurred,

who says, ‘My plan will be realized,

I will accomplish what I desire,’

Isaiah 54:9-10

54:9 “As far as I am concerned, this is like in Noah’s time, ¹⁷ 

when I vowed that the waters of Noah’s flood ¹⁸  would never again cover the earth.

In the same way I have vowed that I will not be angry at you or shout at you.

54:10 Even if the mountains are removed

and the hills displaced,

my devotion will not be removed from you,

nor will my covenant of friendship ¹⁹  be displaced,”

says the Lord, the one who has compassion on you.

Isaiah 55:11

55:11 In the same way, the promise that I make

does not return to me, having accomplished nothing. ²⁰ 

No, it is realized as I desire

and is fulfilled as I intend.” ²¹ 

Jeremiah 33:20-21

33:20 “I, Lord, make the following promise: ²²  ‘I have made a covenant with the day ²³  and with the night that they will always come at their proper times. Only if you people ²⁴  could break that covenant 33:21 could my covenant with my servant David and my covenant with the Levites ever be broken. So David will by all means always have a descendant to occupy his throne as king and the Levites will by all means always have priests who will minister before me. ²⁵ 

Jeremiah 33:25-26

33:25 But I, the Lord, make the following promise: ²⁶  I have made a covenant governing the coming of day and night. I have established the fixed laws governing heaven and earth. 33:26 Just as surely as I have done this, so surely will I never reject the descendants of Jacob. Nor will I ever refuse to choose one of my servant David’s descendants to rule over the descendants of Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob. Indeed, ²⁷  I will restore them ²⁸  and show mercy to them.”

Malachi 3:6

Resistance to the Lord through Selfishness

3:6 “Since, I, the Lord, do not go back on my promises, ²⁹  you, sons of Jacob, have not perished.

Romans 11:29

11:29 For the gifts and the call of God are irrevocable.

James 1:17

1:17 All generous giving and every perfect gift ³⁰  is from above, coming down ³¹  from the Father of lights, with whom there is no variation or the slightest hint of change. ³² 

[6:18]  ¹ tn Grk “have taken refuge”; the basis of that refuge is implied in the preceding verse.

[23:13]  ² tc The MT has “But he [is] in one.” Many add the word “mind” to capture the point that God is resolute and unchanging. Some commentators find this too difficult, and so change the text from בְאֶחָד (bÿ’ekhad, here “unchangeable”) to בָחָר (bakhar, “he has chosen”). The wording in the text is idiomatic and should be retained. R. Gordis (Job, 262) translates it “he is one, i.e., unchangeable, fixed, determined.” The preposition בּ (bet) is a bet essentiae – “and he [is] as one,” or “he is one” (see GKC 379 §119.i).

[23:13]  ³ tn Heb “cause him to return.”

[23:13]  ⁴ tn Or “his soul.”

[23:14]  ⁵ tn The text has “my decree,” which means “the decree [plan] for/against me.” The suffix is objective, equivalent to a dative of disadvantage. The Syriac and the Vulgate actually have “his decree.” R. Gordis (Job, 262) suggests taking it in the same sense as in Job 14:5: “my limit.”.

[23:14]  ⁶ tn Heb “and many such [things] are with him.”

[33:11]  ⁷ tn Heb “the thoughts of his heart for generation to generation.” The verb “abides” is supplied in the translation. The Lord’s “decisions” and “plans” here refer to his decrees and purposes.

[19:21]  ⁸ sn The plans (from the Hebrew verb חָשַׁב [khashav], “to think; to reckon; to devise”) in the human heart are many. But only those which God approves will succeed.

[19:21]  ⁹ tn Heb “in the heart of a man” (cf. NAB, NIV). Here “heart” is used for the seat of thoughts, plans, and reasoning, so the translation uses “mind.” In contemporary English “heart” is more often associated with the seat of emotion than with the seat of planning and reasoning.

[19:21]  ¹⁰ tn Heb “but the counsel of the Lord, it will stand.” The construction draws attention to the “counsel of the Lord”; it is an independent nominative absolute, and the resumptive independent pronoun is the formal subject of the verb.

[19:21]  ¹¹ tn The antithetical parallelism pairs “counsel” with “plans.” “Counsel of the Lord” (עֲצַת יְהוָה, ’atsat yehvah) is literally “advice” or “counsel” with the connotation of “plan” in this context (cf. NIV, NRSV, NLT “purpose”; NCV “plan”; TEV “the Lord’s will”).

[14:24]  ¹² sn Having announced the downfall of the Chaldean empire, the Lord appends to this prophecy a solemn reminder that the Assyrians, the major Mesopotamian power of Isaiah’s day, would be annihilated, foreshadowing what would subsequently happen to Babylon and the other hostile nations.

[14:26]  ¹³ tn Heb “and this is the hand that is outstretched over all the nations.”

[14:27]  ¹⁴ tn Or “For” (KJV, NASB, NIV, NRSV).

[14:27]  ¹⁵ tn Heb “His hand is outstretched and who will turn it back?”

[46:10]  ¹⁶ tn Or “from long ago”; KJV, NASB, NIV, NRSV “from ancient times.”

[54:9]  ¹⁷ tc The Hebrew text reads literally, “For [or “indeed”] the waters of Noah [is] this to me.” כִּי־מֵי (ki-me, “for the waters of”) should be emended to כְּמֵי (kÿmey, “like the days of”), which is supported by the Qumran scroll 1QIsa^a and all the ancient versions except LXX.

[54:9]  ¹⁸ tn Heb “the waters of Noah” (so NAB, NIV, NRSV).

[54:10]  ¹⁹ tn Heb “peace” (so many English versions); NLT “of blessing.”

[55:11]  ²⁰ tn Heb “so is the word which goes out from my mouth, it does not return to empty.” “Word” refers here to divine promises, like the ones made just prior to and after this (see vv. 7b, 12-13).

[55:11]  ²¹ tn Heb “but it accomplishes what I desire, and succeeds [on the mission] which I send it.”

[33:20]  ²² tn Heb “Thus says the Lord.” However, the Lord is speaking so the first person introduction has again been adopted. The content of the verse shows that it is a promise to David (vv. 21-22) and the Levites based on a contrary to fact condition (v. 20). See further the translator’s note at the end of the next verse for explanation of the English structure adopted here.

[33:20]  ²³ tn The word יוֹמָם (yomam) is normally an adverb meaning “daytime, by day, daily.” However, here and in v. 25 and in Jer 15:9 it means “day, daytime” (cf. BDB 401 s.v. יוֹמָם 1).

[33:20]  ²⁴ tn Heb “you.” The pronoun is plural as in 32:36, 43; 33:10.

[33:21]  ²⁵ tn The very complex and elliptical syntax of the original Hebrew of vv. 20-21 has been broken down to better conform with contemporary English style. The text reads somewhat literally (after the addition of a couple of phrases which have been left out by ellipsis): “Thus says the Lord, ‘If you can break my covenant with the day and my covenant with the night so that there is not to be daytime and night in their proper time then also my covenant can be broken with my servant David so that there is not to him a son reigning upon his throne [and also my covenant can be broken] with the Levites [so there are not] priests who minister to me.” The two phrases in brackets are elliptical, the first serving double duty for the prepositional phrase “with the Levites” as well as “with David” and the second serving double duty with the noun “priests” which parallels “a son.” The noun “priests” is not serving here as appositional because that phrase is always “the priests, the Levites,” never “the Levites, the priests.”

[33:25]  ²⁶ tn Heb “Thus says the Lord.” See the translator’s note at the beginning of v. 20 for the style adopted here. Here the promise is in v. 26 following the contrary to fact condition in v. 25. The Hebrew text of vv. 25-26 reads: “Thus says the Lord, “If I have not established my covenant with day and night [and] the laws/statutes of heaven and earth, also I could reject the seed of Jacob and David my servant from taking from his seed as rulers over the seed of Abraham…” The syntax of the original is a little awkward because it involves the verbs “establish” and “reject” governing two objects, the first governing two similar objects “my covenant” and “the regulations” and the second governing two dissimilar objects “the seed of Jacob” and “my servant David from taking [so as not to take].” The translation has sought to remove these awkward syntactical constructions and also break down the long complex original sentence in such a way as to retain its original intent, i.e., the guarantee of the continuance of the seed of Jacob and of the rule of a line of David’s descendants over them based on the fixed order of God’s creation decrees.

[33:26]  ²⁷ tn The Hebrew particle כִּי (ki) is probably intensive here as it has been on a number of occasions in the book of Jeremiah (see BDB 472 s.v. כִּי 1.e for the category).

[33:26]  ²⁸ tn Or “I will make them prosperous once again,” or “I will bring them back from captivity.”

[3:6]  ²⁹ tn Heb “do not change.” This refers to God’s ongoing commitment to his covenant promises to Israel.

[1:17]  ³⁰ tn The first phrase refers to the action of giving and the second to what is given.

[1:17]  ³¹ tn Or “All generous giving and every perfect gift from above is coming down.”

[1:17]  ³² tn Grk “variation or shadow of turning” (referring to the motions of heavenly bodies causing variations of light and darkness).