Backsliders

More passages on this topic

From Nave’s Topical Bible (1896), a historical reference index. The groupings are Nave’s; the verses are shown in the text used across this site.

General scriptures concerning

• Leviticus 26:14–42 If, however, you fail to obey Me and to carry out all these commandments, and if you reject My statutes, despise My ordinances, and neglect to carry out all My commandments, and so break My covenant, then this is what I will do to you: I will bring upon you sudden terror, wasting disease, and fever…
• Deuteronomy 4:9 Only be on your guard and diligently watch yourselves, so that you do not forget the things your eyes have seen, and so that they do not slip from your heart as long as you live. Teach them to your children and grandchildren.
• Deuteronomy 8:11–14 Be careful not to forget the LORD your God by failing to keep His commandments and ordinances and statutes, which I am giving you this day. Otherwise, when you eat and are satisfied, when you build fine houses in which to dwell, and when your herds and flocks grow large and your silver and gold inc…
• Deuteronomy 28:15–68 If, however, you do not obey the LORD your God by carefully following all His commandments and statutes I am giving you today, all these curses will come upon you and overtake you: You will be cursed in the city and cursed in the country. Your basket and kneading bowl will be cursed. The fruit of y…
• Deuteronomy 29:18–28 Make sure there is no man or woman, clan or tribe among you today whose heart turns away from the LORD our God to go and worship the gods of those nations. Make sure there is no root among you that bears such poisonous and bitter fruit, because when such a person hears the words of this oath, he in…
• Deuteronomy 32:15–30 But Jeshurun grew fat and kicked— becoming fat, bloated, and gorged. He abandoned the God who made him and scorned the Rock of his salvation. They provoked His jealousy with foreign gods; they enraged Him with abominations. They sacrificed to demons, not to God, to gods they had not known, to newly…
• Joshua 24:20–27 If you forsake the LORD and serve foreign gods, He will turn and bring disaster on you and consume you, even after He has been good to you.” “No!” replied the people. “We will serve the LORD!” Then Joshua told them, “You are witnesses against yourselves that you have chosen to serve the LORD.”
• 1 Kings 9:6–9 But if indeed you or your sons turn away from following Me and do not keep the commandments and statutes I have set before you, and if you go off to serve and worship other gods, then I will cut off Israel from the land that I have given them, and I will banish from My presence this temple I have s…
• 2 Chronicles 15:2–4 So he went out to meet Asa and said to him, “Listen to me, Asa and all Judah and Benjamin. The LORD is with you when you are with Him. If you seek Him, He will be found by you, but if you forsake Him, He will forsake you. For many years Israel has been without the true God, without a priest to inst…
• Ezra 8:22 For I was ashamed to ask the king for an escort of soldiers and horsemen to protect us from our enemies on the road, since we had told him, “The hand of our God is gracious to all who seek Him, but His great anger is against all who forsake Him.”

See Apostasy

See BACKSLIDING OF ISRAEL, below

See CHURCH, BACKSLIDDEN

See Reprobacy

Instances of

Saul

• 1 Samuel 15:11 “I regret that I have made Saul king, for he has turned away from following Me and has not carried out My instructions.” And Samuel was distressed and cried out to the LORD all that night.
• 1 Samuel 15:26–28 “I will not return with you,” Samuel replied. “For you have rejected the word of the LORD, and He has rejected you as king over Israel.” As Samuel turned to go, Saul grabbed the hem of his robe, and it tore. So Samuel said to him, “The LORD has torn the kingdom of Israel from you today and has give…

Solomon

• 1 Kings 11:4–40 For when Solomon grew old, his wives turned his heart after other gods, and he was not wholeheartedly devoted to the LORD his God, as his father David had been. Solomon followed Ashtoreth the goddess of the Sidonians and Milcom the abomination of the Ammonites. So Solomon did evil in the sight of t…
• Nehemiah 13:26 Did not King Solomon of Israel sin in matters like this? There was not a king like him among many nations, and he was loved by his God, who made him king over all Israel— yet foreign women drew him into sin.

Amon

• 2 Kings 21:22–23 He abandoned the LORD, the God of his fathers, and did not walk in the way of the LORD. Then the servants of Amon conspired against him and killed the king in his palace.

Rehoboam

• 2 Chronicles 12:1–2 After Rehoboam had established his sovereignty and royal power, he and all Israel with him forsook the Law of the LORD. In the fifth year of Rehoboam’s reign, because they had been unfaithful to the LORD, Shishak king of Egypt attacked Jerusalem

Asa

• 2 Chronicles 16:7–9 At that time Hanani the seer came to King Asa of Judah and told him, “Because you have relied on the king of Aram and not on the LORD your God, the army of the king of Aram has escaped from your hand. Were not the Cushites and Libyans a vast army with many chariots and horsemen? Yet because you rel…

Joash

• 2 Chronicles 24:24 Although the Aramean army had come with only a few men, the LORD delivered into their hand a very great army. Because Judah had forsaken the LORD, the God of their fathers, judgment was executed on Joash.

Amaziah

• 2 Chronicles 25:27 From the time that Amaziah turned from following the LORD, a conspiracy was formed against him in Jerusalem, and he fled to Lachish. But men were sent after him to Lachish, and they killed him there.

Syrians

• Isaiah 17:10–11 For you have forgotten the God of your salvation and failed to remember the Rock of your refuge. Therefore, though you cultivate delightful plots and set out cuttings from exotic vines — though on the day you plant you make them grow, and on that morning you help your seed sprout — yet the harvest…

Jonah

• Jonah 1:3 Jonah, however, got up to flee to Tarshish, away from the presence of the LORD. He went down to Joppa and found a ship bound for Tarshish. So he paid the fare and went aboard to sail for Tarshish, away from the presence of the LORD.

The disciples

• Matthew 26:56 But this has all happened so that the writings of the prophets would be fulfilled.” Then all the disciples deserted Him and fled.
• John 6:66 From that time on many of His disciples turned back and no longer walked with Him.

Peter

• Matthew 26:69–75 Meanwhile, Peter was sitting out in the courtyard, and a servant girl came up to him. “You also were with Jesus the Galilean,” she said. But he denied it before them all: “I do not know what you are talking about.” When Peter had gone out to the gateway, another servant girl saw him and said to the…

Corinthian Christians

• 1 Corinthians 5:1–8 It is actually reported that there is sexual immorality among you, and of a kind that is intolerable even among pagans: A man has his father’s wife. And you are proud! Shouldn’t you rather have been stricken with grief and have removed from your fellowship the man who did this? Although I am absent…
• 2 Corinthians 12:20–21 For I am afraid that when I come, I may not find you as I wish, and you may not find me as you wish. I fear that there may be quarreling, jealousy, rage, rivalry, slander, gossip, arrogance, and disorder. I am afraid that when I come again, my God will humble me before you, and I will be grieved ov…

Galatians

• Galatians 1:6 I am amazed how quickly you are deserting the One who called you by the grace of Christ and are turning to a different gospel —
• Galatians 3:1 O foolish Galatians! Who has bewitched you? Before your very eyes Jesus Christ was clearly portrayed as crucified.
• Galatians 4:9–11 But now that you know God, or rather are known by God, how is it that you are turning back to those weak and worthless principles? Do you wish to be enslaved by them all over again? You are observing special days and months and seasons and years! I fear for you, that my efforts for you may have bee…
• Galatians 5:6–7 For in Christ Jesus neither circumcision nor uncircumcision has any value. What matters is faith expressing itself through love. You were running so well. Who has obstructed you from obeying the truth?

Hymenaeus and Alexander

• 1 Timothy 1:19–20 holding on to faith and a good conscience, which some have rejected and thereby shipwrecked their faith. Among them are Hymenaeus and Alexander, whom I have handed over to Satan to be taught not to blaspheme.

Phygellus and Hermogenes

• 2 Timothy 1:15 You know that everyone in the province of Asia has deserted me, including Phygelus and Hermogenes.

Demas

• 2 Timothy 4:10 because Demas, in his love of this world, has deserted me and gone to Thessalonica. Crescens has gone to Galatia, and Titus to Dalmatia.

Churches of Asia

• 1 Timothy 5:15 For some have already turned aside to follow Satan.
• Revelation 2:4 But I have this against you: You have abandoned your first love.
• Revelation 2:14–15 But I have a few things against you, because some of you hold to the teaching of Balaam, who taught Balak to place a stumbling block before the Israelites so they would eat food sacrificed to idols and commit sexual immorality. In the same way, some of you also hold to the teaching of the Nicolaita…
• Revelation 2:20 But I have this against you: You tolerate that woman Jezebel, who calls herself a prophetess. By her teaching she misleads My servants to be sexually immoral and to eat food sacrificed to idols.
• Revelation 3:2–3 Wake up and strengthen what remains, which is about to die; for I have found your deeds incomplete in the sight of My God. Remember, then, what you have received and heard. Keep it and repent. If you do not wake up, I will come like a thief, and you will not know the hour when I will come upon you.
• Revelation 3:15–18 I know your deeds; you are neither cold nor hot. How I wish you were one or the other! So because you are lukewarm — neither hot nor cold — I am about to vomit you out of My mouth! You say, ‘I am rich; I have grown wealthy and need nothing.’ But you do not realize that you are wretched, pitiful, po…

Promises to

• Leviticus 26:40–42 But if they will confess their iniquity and that of their fathers in the unfaithfulness that they practiced against Me, by which they have also walked in hostility toward Me— and I acted with hostility toward them and brought them into the land of their enemies— and if their uncircumcised hearts wi…
• Deuteronomy 4:29–30 But if from there you will seek the LORD your God, you will find Him if you seek Him with all your heart and with all your soul. When you are in distress and all these things have happened to you, then in later days you will return to the LORD your God and listen to His voice.
• Deuteronomy 30:1–10 “When all these things come upon you— the blessings and curses I have set before you— and you call them to mind in all the nations to which the LORD your God has banished you, and when you and your children return to the LORD your God and obey His voice with all your heart and all your soul accordi…
• Deuteronomy 32:26 I would have said that I would cut them to pieces and blot out their memory from mankind,
• Deuteronomy 32:28–29 Israel is a nation devoid of counsel, with no understanding among them. If only they were wise, they would understand it; they would comprehend their fate.
• 1 Kings 8:33–53 When Your people Israel are defeated before an enemy because they have sinned against You, and they return to You and confess Your name, praying and pleading with You in this temple, then may You hear from heaven and forgive the sin of Your people Israel. May You restore them to the land You gave t…
• 2 Chronicles 30:9 For if you return to the LORD, your brothers and sons will receive mercy in the presence of their captors and will return to this land. For the LORD your God is gracious and merciful; He will not turn His face away from you if you return to Him.”
• Job 22:23–30 If you return to the Almighty, you will be restored. If you remove injustice from your tents and consign your gold to the dust and the gold of Ophir to the stones of the ravines, then the Almighty will be your gold and the finest silver for you. Surely then you will delight in the Almighty and lift…
• Psalm 17:5 My steps have held to Your paths; my feet have not slipped.
• Psalm 56:13 For You have delivered my soul from death, and my feet from stumbling, that I may walk before God in the light of life.

See Penitence

See Penitent

See Seekers

Return of

• Psalm 80:3–7 Restore us, O God, and cause Your face to shine upon us, that we may be saved. O LORD God of Hosts, how long will Your anger smolder against the prayers of Your people? You fed them with the bread of tears and made them drink the full measure of their tears. You make us contend with our neighbors…
• Psalm 80:14–19 Return, O God of Hosts, we pray! Look down from heaven and see! Attend to this vine— the root Your right hand has planted, the son You have raised up for Yourself. Your vine has been cut down and burned; they perish at the rebuke of Your countenance. Let Your hand be upon the man at Your right hand…
• Isaiah 17:7 In that day men will look to their Maker and turn their eyes to the Holy One of Israel.
• Isaiah 29:24 Then the wayward in spirit will come to understanding, and those who grumble will accept instruction.”
• Isaiah 31:6–7 Return to the One against whom you have so blatantly rebelled, O children of Israel. For on that day, every one of you will reject the idols of silver and gold that your own hands have sinfully made.
• Jeremiah 50:4–6 “In those days and at that time, declares the LORD, the children of Israel and the children of Judah will come together, weeping as they come, and will seek the LORD their God. They will ask the way to Zion and turn their faces toward it. They will come and join themselves to the LORD in an everlas…
• Hosea 3:5 Afterward, the people of Israel will return and seek the LORD their God and David their king. They will come trembling to the LORD and to His goodness in the last days.
• Hosea 6:1–3 Come, let us return to the LORD. For He has torn us to pieces, but He will heal us; He has wounded us, but He will bind up our wounds. After two days He will revive us; on the third day He will raise us up, that we may live in His presence. So let us know — let us press on to know the LORD. As sure…

Instances of

Jews

• Ezra 6:16–21 Then the people of Israel — the priests, the Levites, and the rest of the exiles — celebrated the dedication of the house of God with joy. For the dedication of the house of God they offered a hundred bulls, two hundred rams, four hundred lambs, and a sin offering for all Israel of twelve male goat…
• Ezra 10 While Ezra prayed and made this confession, weeping and falling facedown before the house of God, a very large assembly of Israelites — men, women, and children — gathered around him, and the people wept bitterly as well. Then Shecaniah son of Jehiel, an Elamite, said to Ezra: “We have been unfaith… (whole chapter)

Jonah

• Jonah 2 From inside the fish, Jonah prayed to the LORD his God, saying: “In my distress I called to the LORD, and He answered me. From the belly of Sheol I called for help, and You heard my voice. For You cast me into the deep, into the heart of the seas, and the current swirled about me; all Your breakers… (whole chapter)
• Jonah 3 Then the word of the LORD came to Jonah a second time: “Get up! Go to the great city of Nineveh and proclaim to it the message that I give you.” This time Jonah got up and went to Nineveh, in accordance with the word of the LORD. Now Nineveh was an exceedingly great city, requiring a three-day jour… (whole chapter)

Peter

• Matthew 26:75 Then Peter remembered the word that Jesus had spoken: “Before the rooster crows, you will deny Me three times.” And he went outside and wept bitterly.
• Mark 14:72 And immediately the rooster crowed a second time. Then Peter remembered the word that Jesus had spoken to him: “Before the rooster crows twice, you will deny Me three times.” And he broke down and wept.
• Luke 22:62 And he went outside and wept bitterly.

Thomas

• John 20:27–29 Then Jesus said to Thomas, “Put your finger here and look at My hands. Reach out your hand and put it into My side. Stop doubting and believe.” Thomas replied, “My Lord and my God!” Jesus said to him, “Because you have seen Me, you have believed; blessed are those who have not seen and yet have bel…

Backsliding of Israel

• Exodus 17:7 He named the place Massah and Meribah because the Israelites quarreled, and because they tested the LORD, saying, “Is the LORD among us or not?”
• Numbers 14:43 For there the Amalekites and Canaanites will face you, and you will fall by the sword. Because you have turned away from the LORD, He will not be with you.”
• Deuteronomy 4:25–31 After you have children and grandchildren and you have been in the land a long time, if you then act corruptly and make an idol of any form— doing evil in the sight of the LORD your God and provoking Him to anger— I call heaven and earth as witnesses against you this day that you will quickly peris…
• Deuteronomy 31:16–30 And the LORD said to Moses, “You will soon rest with your fathers, and these people will rise up and prostitute themselves with the foreign gods of the land they are entering. They will forsake Me and break the covenant I have made with them. On that day My anger will burn against them, and I will…
• Deuteronomy 32:5–6 His people have acted corruptly toward Him; the blemish on them is not that of His children, but of a perverse and crooked generation. Is this how you repay the LORD, O foolish and senseless people? Is He not your Father and Creator? Has He not made you and established you?
• Deuteronomy 32:15 But Jeshurun grew fat and kicked— becoming fat, bloated, and gorged. He abandoned the God who made him and scorned the Rock of his salvation.
• Deuteronomy 32:18 You ignored the Rock who brought you forth; you forgot the God who gave you birth.
• Judges 2:12 Thus they forsook the LORD, the God of their fathers, who had brought them out of the land of Egypt, and they followed after various gods of the peoples around them. They bowed down to them and provoked the LORD to anger,
• Judges 10:12–14 Sidonians, Amalekites, and Maonites oppressed you and you cried out to Me, did I not save you from their hands? But you have forsaken Me and served other gods, so I will no longer save you. Go and cry out to the gods you have chosen. Let them save you in your time of trouble.”
• 2 Chronicles 24:20 Then the Spirit of God came upon Zechariah son of Jehoiada the priest, who stood up before the people and said to them, “This is what God says: ‘Why do you transgress the commandments of the LORD so that you cannot prosper? Because you have forsaken the LORD, He has forsaken you.’”

Instances of Israel's Backsliding

At Meribah

• Exodus 17:1–7 Then the whole congregation of Israel left the Desert of Sin, moving from place to place as the LORD commanded. They camped at Rephidim, but there was no water for the people to drink. So the people contended with Moses, “Give us water to drink.” “Why do you contend with me?” Moses replied. “Why do…

When Aaron made the golden calf

• Exodus 32 Now when the people saw that Moses was delayed in coming down from the mountain, they gathered around Aaron and said, “Come, make us gods who will go before us. As for this Moses who brought us up out of the land of Egypt, we do not know what has happened to him!” So Aaron told them, “Take off the… (whole chapter)

After Joshua's death

• Judges 2 Now the angel of the LORD went up from Gilgal to Bochim and said, “I brought you up out of Egypt and led you into the land that I had promised to your fathers, and I said, ‘I will never break My covenant with you, and you are not to make a covenant with the people of this land, but you shall tear d… (whole chapter)

During Asa's reign

• 2 Chronicles 15 Now the Spirit of God came upon Azariah son of Oded. So he went out to meet Asa and said to him, “Listen to me, Asa and all Judah and Benjamin. The LORD is with you when you are with Him. If you seek Him, He will be found by you, but if you forsake Him, He will forsake you. For many years Israel ha… (whole chapter)

Hezekiah's reign

• 2 Chronicles 30:2–12 For the king and his officials and the whole assembly in Jerusalem had decided to keep the Passover in the second month, since they had been unable to keep it at the regular time, because not enough priests had consecrated themselves and the people had not been gathered in Jerusalem. This plan plea…