Does God Change His Mind?

Yesterday's tutorial discussion in Theology: Does God Change his mind? Does God "repent" (or relent)? Does God say one thing and do another?

The weight of biblical evidence seems to say that God doesn't change his mind:

God is not a man who lies, or a son of man who changes His mind. Does He speak and not act, or promise and not fulfill?

- Numbers 23:19

Furthermore, the Eternal One of Israel does not lie or change His mind, for He is not man who changes his mind.

- 1 Samuel 15:29

²⁶They will perish, but You will endure; all of them will wear out like clothing. You will change them like a garment, and they will pass away. ²⁷ But You are the same, and Your years will never end. ²⁸ Your servants' children will dwell securely, and their offspring will be established before You.

- Psalms 102:26-28

Because I, Yahweh, have not changed, you descendants of Jacob have not been destroyed.

- Malachi 3:6

Because God wanted to show His unchangeable purpose even more clearly to the heirs of the promise, He guaranteed it with an oath, 18 so that through two unchangeable things, in which it is impossible for God to lie, we who have fled for refuge might have strong encouragement to seize the hope set before us.

- Hebrews 6:17-18

Every generous act and every perfect gift is from above, coming down from the Father of lights; with Him there is no variation or shadow cast by turning.

- James 1:17

That's quite an impressive list. But as I read the context of each of these quotes, most of them seem questionable.

In Numbers, Balak, King of Moab, is trying to convince Balaam to curse the Israelites. Instead, Yahweh gives Balaam blessings to pronounce on the Israelites. Balak twice tries to change Balaam's (and Yahweh's) blessings into curses, and fails. In this context, Yahweh says through Balaam, that he's not fickle like a man, and so Balak can't (and won't) change Yahweh's mind.

Similarly, in Samuel, the prophet has pronounced, "Yahweh has rejected you from being king over Israel". Saul here is trying to get Yahweh to change his mind, and thus Samuel's response.

James 1:17 also seems to have changeable and fickle human nature in mind when contrasting with the unchangeability of God. Contrast v17 ("every generous and perfect gift comes from God...with Him there is no variation") with v5 ("if any of you lacks wisdom, he should ask God") and v6 ("ask in faith without doubting, for the doubter is like the surging sea.").

Psalm 102 is something different again. The superscription describes this as, "A prayer of an afflicted man. When he is faint and pours out his lament before the LORD." In his appeal to clemency from God, he appeals to God's unchangeability (v28) in light of his compassion (v13) and mercy (v19-20). So he is begging, "God, be who you have always been and save me." That's not to say it's a wrong observation, but he's not appealing to God to change a prior decision, like Hezekiah seems to be doing in 2 Kings 20:1-11.

Suddenly, the weight of biblical evidence doesn't look so heavy after all.