“Once again the Israelites did evil in the eyes of the LORD, and because they did this evil the LORD gave Eglon king of Moab power over Israel.” – Judges 3:12
Billy Sunday was a major league baseball player who became a Christian and then became a well-known evangelist. In a message entitled “Backsliding” evangelist Billy said the following almost 100 years ago:
“This is an age of incompleteness of unfinished things. Life is full of half-done things. Education is begun and abandoned. Obedience to the law of God is begun and given up. People start in business and give up on it. They attempt to learn a trade and don’t do it thoroughly. A hound once started running after a stag and after running for a while it saw a fox and turned after it. A little farther along it saw a rabbit and ran after that, and finally wound up holing a field mouse. So it is with so many who enter the Christian life.”
Backsliding is a gradual process. It starts when your fervency and consistency in spending time alone with the Lord wanes. The solution to backsliding is to confess any sin in your life, repent from it and seek to grow closer to Jesus every day.
“It is a miserable thing to be a backslider. Of all unhappy things that can befall a man, I suppose ‘backsliding’ is the worst. A stranded ship, a broken-winged eagle, a garden overrun with weeds, a harp without strings, a church in ruins, all these are sad sights. But a backslider is a sadder sight still.” J. C. Ryle
“But now that you know God, or rather are known by God, how is it that you are turning back to those weak and miserable principles? Do you wish to be enslaved by them all over again?” Galatians 4:9