Unimprovable (Friday Devotional)

“Do not add to what I command you and do not subtract from it, but keep the commands of the Lord your God that I give you.”

- Deuteronomy 4:2

Fifteen years ago, it seemed like every grocery store was installing self-checkout machines, cashier-less stations where you could scan, bag, and pay for your own items without ever needing to speak to another person. When I first saw one, I thought it was not only a cool idea, but a technological marvel, the Next Big Thing in shopping.

Then I tried to use one. It turns out that the failsafe on all of these machines was to alert a manager anytime a self-checker did something incorrectly. If you didn’t put your item in a bag in a timely fashion—ding!—here came the manager. If your barcode accidentally scanned twice and you needed correct the error—ding!—here came the manager. If your credit card didn’t scan on the first try—ding!—here came the manager. On any given day, it seemed like 75% of self-checkout purchases wound up being overseen by a harried store manager. Within a few years, the machines vanished without fanfare, not to reappear for a decade. A modernization designed to save time for customers and employees alike had ended up doing the opposite.

Those ahead-of-their-time self-checkout machines illustrated a point we are often loath to admit: innovation doesn’t always equal improvement. That’s a principle we’d do well to remember when it comes to what we believe about God and how we practice our faith. Because we’ve had the gospel for nearly 2,000 years, there is a natural tendency to get restless with it, to want something new and innovative to replace the ancient words of Jesus and the apostles. Guided by this restlessness, the temptation is to interpret Scripture through the lens of your own agendas instead of making God’s Word the foundation of what you believe.

But since the days of Moses, God has warned us, “Do not add to what I command you and do not subtract from it.” Cultural values are always shifting, but the wisdom of God’s Word abides, as useful for teaching, reproof, correction, and training in righteousness as when it was first given to the church. From an abundance of grace, God has given us what we need to live for Him, and we don’t have to go searching for something new to replace or supplement it. In a constantly changing world, find your foundation in the one whose power and love are unchanging.