“Patient endurance is what you need now, so that you will continue to do God’s will. Then you will receive all that He has promised. ‘For in just a little while, the Coming One will come and not delay. And My righteous ones will live by faith. But I will take no pleasure in anyone who turns away.’ But we are not like those who turn away from God to their own destruction. We are the faithful ones, whose souls will be saved.” (Hebrews 10:36-38 NLT)
To not recognize that a person who has professed faith in Christ can turn their back on God and walk away is naïve and blind to reality. The man who led me to Christ turned his back on God, his wife, his life as a believer and entered a life of sinful rebellion until his dying day. I recently had a lengthy conversation with a man who told me he’d followed the Lord for 30 years, but now professes to be an atheist.
The question in this whole issue of backsliding isn’t whether it happens, but in what ways is God’s view of a person who deliberately walks away from Him affected. Do they lose their salvation? Did they ever have salvation in the first place?
Proverbs 14 compares different paths taken by different people in different contexts. Verse 14 says: “Backsliders get what they deserve; good people receive their reward.” At our core we’re all sinners saved by grace who choose each day whom we will follow. In my mind it’s literally impossible for me to understand how anyone who truly knows, loves, and is loved by the Lord could walk away from Him. But the question before us is – Can that happen? Of course it can and it does, but what are the implications?
The question with which I wrestle is: “What part does free will play in our relationship with God?” Do we walk into a relationship with the Lord Jesus as an act of our will, but at some point, lose our ability to follow our will to walk away? The story of the Prodigal son illustrates that the wayward one found his way home, but the “prodigal” who never left home didn’t. The Father allowed each son to make his own choices. What if the prodigal had chosen not to come home? What if the son who stayed home learned to rejoice in the gift of his father and the home they shared?
There are ample Scriptures to support those who believe once you’re born again you can’t lose your salvation, but there are also verses that suggest that there are those who believe people can and do lose their salvation. I have books in my library that support ad infinitum both views, but that isn’t the point of this post.
My point is in the life of virtually every believer I’ve ever met, including myself, we go through seasons, long and short, when we wonder what happened – to us, to others, to God, to the world. Our head swims and our souls ache with pain we can’t explain. Some agony of spirit is brought about by our own sin, some by the sin of those we love, but for me, those seasons have always brought me closer to the Lord, they haven’t pushed me away, they’ve caused me to see in myself greater need of and desire for my Savior, not the opposite.
In each of our lives there are times and perhaps even seasons when we “backslide,” when we drift from God. Hardships, loss, the uncertainties of life, health, the world, drive us into shells that harden over time and make it increasingly more difficult to hear the voice of God. These are seasons of decision. Will I trust the Lord to draw me out of this mire of indifference and distance from Himself, or will He allow me to continue to drift from Him? Let’s not stop here but continue our “conversation” in tomorrow’s post.
Food for thought.
Blessings, Ed 😊
Walking With Jesus 