Drawing Back — E.A. Johnston

Abraham's Faith Tested by God

As you go deeper with God, in a serious seeking of a deeper experience of Him, God will challenge your faith. I believe that's in my Bible, friends. In Genesis chapter 22, Abraham's faith was tried of God.

A Pastor's Retreat from Revival

God asked Abraham for his son Isaac as a sacrifice, and Abraham trusted God and offered him up. Several decades ago, back when God was still afoot in the land in seasons of revival, I knew a pastor who had a season of incredible revival come to his church.

God literally transformed the life of that man's church with his manifest presence, which was so thick you could cut it with a knife. This pastor related that he was alone in the sanctuary with God during this time of revival, and God asked him for something concerning a member of the pastor's family.

The pastor never publicly revealed how he responded to God, to God's testing his faith that day. But as the years went by, it was obvious to all who knew him that this man had evidently drawn back from God.

He had pulled away from a deeper walk with God. Many years later, I visited this pastor's so-called new church, and I was shocked by what I saw. Stepping into his church was like stepping into the hallway of hell.

It was purposely dark in the church sanctuary, which he had turned into a nightclub, strung with colored beads for curtains, black paint on the walls, and stacked with huge sound amplifiers for his metal rock band.

This pastor no longer wore a suit and tie, but dressed in sloppy casual attire. And his sermon was just utter nonsense and blasphemy against a holy and righteous God. This man had fallen into such spiritual apostasy that he resorted to cheap bathroom humor to shock his congregation into embarrassing laughs.

The Sermon's Warning Against Drawing Back

This man's ministry had once been so powerful, but now it had become so sad. This pastor, who was once an inspiration to me, became a dire warning to me. My message this evening, friends, is entitled Drawing Back, and I think it's a warning to each of us not to play games with Almighty God.

If you intend to get serious with God, friend, then you better stay serious with Him. If God challenges you in your personal life, it's an opportunity to go further with Him in a deeper experience of Him.

If you draw back, you will miss that deeper experience of God, and depending on how far away you draw back, it may throw you into an apostasy as well. There is a passage in my Bible, in the book of Hebrews, which has a dire warning to us as it stands out in black print on white paper.

Hebrews 10 and the Danger of Perdition

It is Hebrews 10 and verses 38 through 39. Here now is the word of God, and may the Spirit of the Lord attend the reading of His holy word. Now the just shall live by faith, but if any man draw back, my soul shall have no pleasure in him.

Testing the Reality of Christian Profession

But we are not of them who draw back unto perdition, but of them that believe to the saving of the soul. I believe God tries the faith of those who lay claim to His Son. I don't believe God will allow any hypocrites into His holy heaven.

Sometimes God will allow a person to remain inside the doors of a church for years in their profession of Christianity. All who know them would say of them, this person is surely a believer. They look good on the outside, but a day will come, sooner or later, where God will test their faith.

The testing may come through a deeper seeking of God, like my pastor friend who was privileged to have revival come to his church. And as he was going along with God, he was challenged by God concerning his faith.

God asked him for something that was dear to him, and he drew back. And that one step back led to another step back, as this man slowly but surely backed away from God, until he became a fulfillment of our text today.

Now the just shall live by faith, but if any man draw back, my soul shall have no pleasure in him. But we are not of them who draw back unto perdition. God may allow you to live as a good church member, friend, for years, and a day will come when he will try your faith by trial and tribulations to see if you will keep on going forward with him in your profession of faith towards him.

Financial Crisis, Illness, and Grief as Tests of Faith

Your testing may come in the form of a financial crisis. God may allow you to have your financial security pulled out from under you, like a rug is suddenly snatched out from beneath one where you're standing, and now you have nothing to stand on but God himself.

Your time of testing may come in the form of physical illness or grief that is unexpected and unwanted, the skies you know it has become dark, foreboding, and it's the trial of your life, and your faith in God is being tested.

Prosperity, Sexual Temptation, and Adultery

Or your time of testing may come in a season of prosperity and great success. Your testing comes by way of sexual infidelity. I had a friend in church years ago who this very thing played out in his life.

He was a leader at church, and he had a good reputation in our community as a Christian man. He was married with three children, and his business was prospering. He'd just built a fine new home out in the country with a lot of acreage, and he bought himself an expensive sports car.

Everything was going his way until he hired a pretty new secretary that was half his age. Pretty soon, this so-called Christian man was knee-deep in adultery, and his marital infidelity cost him his marriage of 20 years, cost him his children for two of them when they were teenagers became train wrecks themselves, and it cost him his good Christian testimony at church.

The Devil's Opposition and the Choice to Persevere

The last time I saw him, he was flying to Russia to bring back another girlfriend as he had gone from one relationship to another. I can promise you two things, friends, when it comes to being a follower of Christ Jesus.

Number one, the devil will be actively against you, and he will do all he can to trip you up and make you fall. Secondly, there will come a time in your life, it may be brief or it may be long, but the God of heaven in whom you profess will try your faith.

He will test your love for him. If you drop back, it will reveal your spiritual condition, and it may be an opportunity to get to the Christ you never have truly known for the saving of your soul, or it may be a testing of your faith to where you turn away from God, you step back, and you keep stepping back until you draw back onto perdition in the devil's hell.

God's Glory in the Face of Human Testing

But either way, God will be God, and he will receive glory. Let us pray.