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There’s a been a lot of talk on the internet the past few weeks as some notable Christians have made public statements that they are falling away from the faith. I’ve been praying for them.

I thought it might be helpful to have a quick chat about what the Bible says about Christians falling away from faith in Jesus and how Christians should respond to people who are struggling with or walk away from their faith.

Can a Genuine Christian Fall Away from Faith in Christ?

You might know that the conversation around whether a Christian can lose their salvation or not is hot topic to debate in Christian circles. Bible-believing Christians wrestle with understanding this and come to different conclusions. When Jesus-followers walk away from their faith, is it because they genuinely knew Him as Savior and then rejected Him, or is it just that they were never His follower in the first place?

Here’s what I see in the Bible. Scripture teaches that both are possible. Sometimes when a Christian either claims faith in Jesus but the way they live doesn’t show any evidence of it or they claim faith in Christ and then reject it to return to a life of sin, it’s because that person was never actually a Christian in the first place. (1 John 2:1-6 // 1 John 3:4-10) They may have been exposed to Christian faith and adopted some of the lingo and practices but never actually committed their lives to Jesus. (Matthew 7:21-27)

And sometimes when a Christian claims faith in Christ and then rejects it, it is genuinely the case they did know God at one point and for whatever variety of reasons have rejected God and fallen away from the faith.

Each situation will be different, but I believe the bottom line is this: the Bible teaches that it’s possible for a genuine believer in Jesus to fall away from faith in Him. I don’t believe, biblically, that salvation can be casually or involuntarily lost (I’ll unpack that in a minute), but I do believe that a Christian can choose to forfeit their salvation. (Matthew 24:13 // Hebrews 10:23-39 // 2 Peter 1:8-11; 2:20-21 // Jude 22-23)

I do believe that while God makes salvation available to us and draws our hearts to Him through the Holy Spirit, the decision to receive salvation and follow Jesus is a choice God leaves up to us (John 1:12-13). He pursues us, He offers us the free gift of salvation, eternal life and relationship with Jesus, but He has given each of us free will with which to choose Him or reject Him. And just as a person may choose to believe in Jesus and follow Him, a person can choose to walk away from Jesus and their faith in Him.

Now, there’s an extreme to this viewpoint, one that was the cause of much unnecessary fear in my heart early on in my walk with God. It says that even if your faith in Jesus is biblical and genuine, if you aren’t completely perfect in holiness and you have any unresolved sin in your life, you are in danger of going to Hell if you were to die right this second.

It’s the idea that you are a sincere follower of Jesus, but if you tell a lie to someone and then, God-forbid, happen to die tragically that day before you repent to God for that sin, then your salvation is nullified and you will be separated from God for eternity because you didn’t have a chance to ask God’s forgiveness for that one sin. That’s not biblical truth.

What that view fails to understand is that there’s a difference between these two things: 1) rejecting Christ and willfully living in rebellion against Him and 2) genuinely following Christ but being in a process of spiritually maturity.

The former would mean you have not been forgiven of your sins, have not yet been given eternal life and don’t yet have a relationship with Jesus. The latter means you will sin and make mistakes right alongside obeying Jesus’ Word and living for Him, but you are walking with Christ letting Him transform you more and more to be like Him every day. Rejecting Jesus will keep you out of Heaven. Being a flawed, but genuinely growing Christian will not.

Even as we grow spiritually, as Christians we will all die with some measure of imperfection or unresolved sin in our lives. The Bible teaches that we are works in progress and Jesus, who began the work in us at our salvation will continue His work in us until it is finally finished on the day of His return. (Philippians 1:6)

None of us is going to be completely perfect and sinless on this side of Jesus’ return, but we are all called to progressively be transformed more and more throughout our lives, turning from sin, walking in His ways and getting to know Him better as He works in us. (Luke 9:23 // Ephesians 4:11-16)

“And I am certain that God, who began the good work within you, will continue his work until it is finally finished on the day when Christ Jesus returns.” (Philippians 1:6)

 ^“I don’t mean to say that I have already achieved these things or that I have already reached perfection. But I press on to possess that perfection for which Christ Jesus first possessed me…”

(Philippians 3:12-14)

If you’re a Christian, you do need to take your faith in Jesus seriously. It is possible to fall away, although that won’t imminently happen just because you had a weak moment, or a rough day, or are having a season of wrestling with your faith. We all experience those, and Jesus is right there with us in the midst of it.

You do need to have a healthy fear (respect, reverence, awe) of God, but you don’t need to live in unnecessary fear of losing your salvation. You get to joyfully embrace a lifelong journey of growing as a follower of Jesus, knowing that He loves you, He’s patient and faithful to His work in you, and He is really good at pursuing us even when our hearts may stray. Even if we do stray at times, as long as we are alive_even to our very last breath–we can always come back to Jesus. (Luke 23:39-43)

Is It Okay for a Christian to Wrestle with Their Faith?

Have you ever heard people say that you shouldn’t doubt God or question Him? I’ve already done a whole blog post about why that’s not true according to the Bible, so you can head there for full context. But the reality is, we live in a broken world and life is hard. There are trials and sorrows. Jesus gave us a heads up about this! (John 16:33)

We all deal with daily challenges and longer seasons of hardship. The beautiful thing about following Jesus is that He welcomes our vulnerability, He is close to us in our pain and our questions and He can handle our angry prayers.

The Bible is filled with stories of people who wrestled with their faith for intellectual and theological reasons (John 3:1-20 // John 6:60-69), practical reasons (Mark 10:17-22), and because of emotional pain or hard situations in life (John 11:17-29). I’ve been through several seasons of wrestling with my faith throughout my life.

Run to God in the midst of the wrestle and just be real with Him. It’s not irreverent. If anything it will help deepen your relationship with God when you come out the other side. Let people in your life into your wrestle. When we’re feeling weak and questioning, we all need to people to love us, support us, process with us and gracefully help point us to Jesus.

And just a note: If you’re not a Christian, know that it’s okay for seekers to wrestle with faith too. It’s okay to have doubts and ask questions and search out what the truth of Christianity actually is. The cool thing about searching and asking questions is that Jesus loves to meet people and reveal Himself to us in those places. And it will help to anchor your decision to follow Jesus even more whenever that time happens to come for you. More on what it means to be a Christian here.

How Christians Should Respond to Believers Who Fall Away

The most disheartening thing I saw online in response to Joshua and Marty’s posts was how condemning Christians were towards them in comments sections.

Here’s some perspective from the Bible each of us needs to remember as we respond when fellow Christians fall away or struggle with their faith.

1. Compassion

Jesus’ first response to people who were spiritually confused, living in sin or ignorant of faith in Him was compassion. Ours should be too.

“Jesus traveled through all the towns and villages of that area, teaching in the synagogues and announcing the Good News about the Kingdom. And he healed every kind of disease and illness. When he saw the crowds, he had compassion on them because they were confused and helpless, like sheep without a shepherd.” (Matthew 9:35-36)

If compassion is not our first response to people like this, we’re not responding like Jesus and that’s not okay. If our hearts don’t break for spiritually searching, confused and struggling people like Jesus’ heart breaks for them, you and I need to take a step back and ask Him to align our hearts with His before we worry about giving an opinion about someone else’s spiritual condition.

2. Hope

Jesus is really good at pursuing straying people.

“If a man has a hundred sheep and one of them gets lost, what will he do? Won’t he leave the ninety-nine others in the wilderness and go to search for the one that is lost until he finds it? And when he has found it, he will joyfully carry it home on his shoulders…”

(Luke 15:4-7)

Even when we stray from faith or haven’t found faith in God yet in the first place–even when we think our lives are better off without Him–God is able and faithful to pursue our hearts in our wanderings. They may have considered themselves to have left God, but God hasn’t left them. God never stops loving them, never stops wooing their hearts, never stops giving them opportunities to return to Him. (Psalm 103:8-18) God is really good at seeking and saving those who are lost. (Luke 19:10)

Are you looking with anticipation for the return of those who have strayed like God is? Are you praying for God to do this work in their lives? Are you ready to shower them with compassion upon their return and welcome them back into the family of God? Are you ready to shower them with compassion even while they are still wandering? Are you ready to celebrate and rejoice alongside God when they come back to Him? (Luke 15:11-32)

3. Humility

Be humble. You’re not exempt from falling off of the right path either.

“Dear brothers and sisters, if another believer is overcome by some sin, you who are godly should gently and humbly help that person back onto the right path. And be careful not to fall into the same temptation yourself. Share each other’s burdens, and in this way obey the law of Christ.” (Galatians 6:1-2)

When fellow believers are struggling with faith or stumbling in sin, we are called to humbly and gently come alongside them and help them back onto the right path. But there’s an important warning in that verse for us: be careful not to fall into the same temptation yourself.

We should each be humble and gentle as we speak to and about professed Christians who are in seasons of wrestling or staying from the faith. You and I are not exempt from experiencing seasons of struggling with faith, from potentially straying from God, or from the trials of life taking a toll on our faith. Part of having faith is understanding that faith will be tested at times.  (1 Peter 1:6-7)

I used to think I would never experience something like that and the last several years of my life have presented me with plenty of wake-up calls to realize that I’m not that strong. (Read God Can Handle Your Angry Prayers and What God Has Been Teaching Me Through One of The Hardest Transition Seasons of My Life for more on that)

There have been plenty of really hard seasons of asking tough questions about my faith, wrestling with how my Christian beliefs come to bear on the world, being so overwhelmed by hard circumstances in life that I’m unmotivated to seek God, and being so disheartened by the way I see my fellow Christians treating each other, treating non-Christians, and misrepresenting Christ in the world that I’ve had frequent moments of not wanting to be associated with Christianity.

Friends, let’s pray fervently for ourselves and for those who are searching. Let’s humbly love and walk alongside them in their process in hopes that they return to Jesus or find Him for the first time. May we be like God, who desires every person to be saved and come to understand the truth.

***Here are some responses from Christian leaders I found helpful: Mike Bickle – Part 1 and Part 2, Greg Laurie and John Cooper from Skillet.

Your Turn: Take some time today to pray for people in your life who are searching for or struggling with their faith. Ask God how He can use you to show His love to them and act on what He shows you. Discuss this post in the comments below.

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