What does backsliding mean? Can a Christian backslide?
Backsliding from What?
If you or someone else is said to have backslidden, this must mean they had to have slid forward in the first place, so what is backsliding? Some definitions include an occasion on which one backslides, especially in a moral sense, a falling back into sin or error, reverting to old, bad habits or lapsing in religious practices or going back into certain vices from a state of virtue, and even morality, which means to revert to a worse condition. Others see it as a falling away from faith in God and sliding back into their former life of sin. It could be understood to be a movement away from God, as the term implies, and going back, another way, toward the world and away from Christ. A few say it happens when someone stops attending church and cuts off all ties to God, or they fall into the previous lifestyle they lived in prior to being saved, and maybe even walking away from a ministry, however these are secular definitions, so do they match up with what the Bible says about backsliding? Can Christian’s backslide? Did Israel backslide and if so, what does that mean?
Israel’s Backsliding
Ancient Israel had a history of being disobedient, and there were times that the nation was living in obedience but it usually didn’t last long, so it was a cycle of being obedient, then, falling into disobedience causing them to fall into captivity, then repenting and being restored. If you look at the Book of Judges, you see that this was a continuous pattern or cycle that showed Israel being obedient, some would say backsliding, and then being brought into discipline by God in order for the nation to repent and return again to Him. That is what King Hezekiah said of ancient Israel; “For our fathers have been unfaithful and have done what was evil in the sight of the Lord our God. They have forsaken him and have turned away their faces from the habitation of the Lord and turned their backs” (2nd Chron 29:6) and “the officers of the priests and the people likewise were exceedingly unfaithful, following all the abominations of the nations. And they polluted the house of the Lord that he had made holy in Jerusalem” (2nd Chron 36:14). Jeremiah said “Your evil will chastise you, and your apostasy will reprove you. Know and see that it is evil and bitter for you to forsake the Lord your God” (Jer 2:19). King Solomon knew that “The backslider in heart will be filled with the fruit of his ways, and a good man will be filled with the fruit of his ways” (Prov 14:14). Jesus told the church at Ephesus to “Remember the height from which you have fallen! Repent and do the things you did at first” (Rev 2:5). Clearly, Israel was a backsliding people but did this mean they could never be saved?
Can Christians Backslide?
Can a Christian backslide? Maybe it’s better to ask, “If they slide forward in the first place” or, have they ever been brought to repentance and trust in Christ? A person that has never trusted in Christ has never slide forward in the first place, meaning that they have never been brought to repentance and faith in Christ. For the lost, it’s not backsliding…its business as usual, but for the believer in Christ, they can fall away from the truth, but do they stay away from the truth forever? That seems to contradict the Scriptures which teach “I give them eternal life, and they will never perish, and no one will snatch them out of my hand. My Father, who has given them to me, is greater than all, and no one is able to snatch them out of the Father’s hand” (John 10:28-29). There is no qualifier on this that says, “unless you fall away.” The author of Hebrews give us all a serious warning by writing that “if we go on sinning deliberately after receiving the knowledge of the truth, there no longer remains a sacrifice for sins, but a fearful expectation of judgment, and a fury of fire that will consume the adversaries” (Heb 10:26-27), so “How much worse punishment, do you think, will be deserved by the one who has trampled underfoot the Son of God, and has profaned the blood of the covenant by which he was sanctified, and has outraged the Spirit of grace” (Heb 10:29). Indeed, “It is a fearful thing to fall into the hands of the living God” (Heb 10:31). Some see this as the possibility of falling away or backsliding, but the author adds one more very important detail to his audience in the context of this chapter and tells them that “we are not of those who shrink back and are destroyed, but of those who have faith and preserve their souls” (Heb 10:39). He was speaking about another group of people, and not to the one he was expressly addressing, because he knew that they were “not of those who shrink back and are destroyed, but of those who have faith and preserve their souls” (Heb 10:39).
Saved, then Lost, then Saved?
The Apostle John talks about a group of people who left the church but were really never part of the church, as he wrote, “They went out from us, but they were not of us; for if they had been of us, they would have continued with us. But they went out, that it might become plain that they all are not of us” (1st John 2:19), so even though they were in the church they were not part of the church. All along, God has known that the wheat and tares would grow together in the church (Matt 12:34-3), but the difference is, the wheat would reproduce more wheat or fruit, but tares only make more tares, or more weeds. In other words, there would be false converts in the church, just as Jesus said in Matthew 7:22 that “On that day many will say to me, ‘Lord, Lord, did we not prophesy in your name, and cast out demons in your name, and do many mighty works in your name” and He says, “I never knew you; depart from me, you workers of lawlessness” (Matt 7:23). It’s not that He didn’t know them well enough or as good as He wanted to know them. He says, “I never knew you!” That’s a sign of judgment that those who claim to have done works in His name (Matt 25:42-44) were in fact, doing nothing or doing it to be seen by others, and so Jesus will say to them, “as you did not do it to one of the least of these, you did not do it to me” (Matt 25:45), which means “these will go away into eternal punishment, but the righteous into eternal life” (Matt 25:46).
Conclusion
If we can backslide then we can slide forward again, but the difference between ancient Israel and the church is that believers have access to the Spirit of God, and He lives in them and works through them in the sanctifying process, which by the way, takes a lifetime and will never be complete until the day of His return. If you are concerned about someone that has backslidden, or if you are worried about it yourself, then think about these words from Jesus; “All that the Father gives me will come to me, and whoever comes to me I will never cast out” (John 6:37), and here is the Father’s will for Jesus, “that I should lose nothing of all that he has given me, but raise it up on the last day” (John 6:39). Otherwise, what good shepherd leaves with 100 sheep but only returns with 99? Not the Good Shepherd.
About the Author
Jack Wellman is Pastor of the Mulvane Brethren Church in Mulvane Kansas. Jack is also the Senior Writer at What Christians Want To Know whose mission is to equip, encourage, and energize Christians and to address questions about the believer’s daily walk with God and the Bible. You can follow Jack on Google Plus or check out his book Teaching Children the Gospel available on Amazon.
