What Does the Bible Say About Backsliding?

“The backslider in heart shall be filled with his own ways: and a good man shall be satisfied from himself.”

“For a just man falleth seven times, and riseth up again: but the wicked shall fall into mischief.”

“Therefore is judgment far from us, neither doth justice overtake us: we wait for light, but behold obscurity; for brightness, but we walk in darkness.”

“We grope for the wall like the blind, and we grope as if we had no eyes: we stumble at noonday as in the night; we are in desolate places as dead men.”

“We roar all like bears, and mourn sore like doves: we look for judgment, but there is none; for salvation, but it is far off from us.”

“For our transgressions are multiplied before thee, and our sins testify against us: for our transgressions are with us; and as for our iniquities, we know them;”

“In transgressing and lying against the LORD, and departing away from our God, speaking oppression and revolt, conceiving and uttering from the heart words of falsehood.”

“And judgment is turned away backward, and justice standeth afar off: for truth is fallen in the street, and equity cannot enter.”

“Thine own wickedness shall correct thee, and thy backslidings shall reprove thee: know therefore and see that it is an evil thing and bitter, that thou hast forsaken the LORD thy God, and that my fear is not in thee, saith the Lord GOD of hosts.”

“They say, If a man put away his wife, and she go from him, and become another man's, shall he return unto her again? shall not that land be greatly polluted? but thou hast played the harlot with many lovers; yet return again to me, saith the LORD. They say: Heb. Saying”

“Return, ye backsliding children, and I will heal your backslidings. Behold, we come unto thee; for thou art the LORD our God.”

“Why then is this people of Jerusalem slidden back by a perpetual backsliding? they hold fast deceit, they refuse to return.”

“O LORD, though our iniquities testify against us, do thou it for thy name's sake: for our backslidings are many; we have sinned against thee.”

“O the hope of Israel, the saviour thereof in time of trouble, why shouldest thou be as a stranger in the land, and as a wayfaring man that turneth aside to tarry for a night?”

“Why shouldest thou be as a man astonied, as a mighty man that cannot save? yet thou, O LORD, art in the midst of us, and we are called by thy name; leave us not. we: Heb. thy name is called upon us”

“And my people are bent to backsliding from me: though they called them to the most High, none at all would exalt him. none: Heb. together they exalted not”

“I will heal their backsliding, I will love them freely: for mine anger is turned away from him.”

“But he denied before them all, saying, I know not what thou sayest.”

“And when he was gone out into the porch, another maid saw him, and said unto them that were there, This fellow was also with Jesus of Nazareth.”

“And again he denied with an oath, I do not know the man.”

“And after a while came unto him they that stood by, and said to Peter, Surely thou also art one of them; for thy speech bewrayeth thee .”

“Then began he to curse and to swear, saying, I know not the man. And immediately the cock crew.”

“And Jesus said unto him, No man, having put his hand to the plough, and looking back , is fit for the kingdom of God.”

“O foolish Galatians, who hath bewitched you, that ye should not obey the truth, before whose eyes Jesus Christ hath been evidently set forth, crucified among you?”

“This only would I learn of you, Received ye the Spirit by the works of the law, or by the hearing of faith?”

“Are ye so foolish? having begun in the Spirit, are ye now made perfect by the flesh?”

“And you, that were sometime alienated and enemies in your mind by wicked works, yet now hath he reconciled in: or, by your mind in”

“In the body of his flesh through death, to present you holy and unblameable and unreproveable in his sight:”

“If ye continue in the faith grounded and settled, and be not moved away from the hope of the gospel, which ye have heard, and which was preached to every creature which is under heaven; whereof I Paul am made a minister;”

“For it is impossible for those who were once enlightened, and have tasted of the heavenly gift, and were made partakers of the Holy Ghost,”

“Now the just shall live by faith: but if any man draw back, my soul shall have no pleasure in him.”

“Nevertheless I have somewhat against thee, because thou hast left thy first love.”