Backsliding/Recidivism

We may not sense how largely our early years take hold of us, and drive us in the directions and approaches we find forming our lives.  Numerous times we hear persons say: I determined not to grow up being like my mother (or father) and now, when I think about it, I do think and act like she did – and I still don’t like it.  Most persons communicating about their parents are more positive, and those disappointed in some way prefer not to muddy the memory of their parents by communicating perceived omissions, or their own conduct related to family, conduct that followed separation from their parental homes.  My four children have followed the intense Christian faith of their mother and father, and there is nothing (I believe) that would take that from them – in model or word.  But, it is now their own, and they carry that forward to their own children.  Some might say they were so indoctrinated as to be bound to that faith without their permission, so to be removed from finding their own lives with or without personal and guiding faith in God.  Such an argument would hold for children nurtured by crude and earthy parents, so to be fortified against finding any demanding faith in God.  If the nurturing years are that strong, which of the two contexts is to be preferred?  Personal tendency to drop off some of the limitations of righteousness; to be influenced by inevitable change factors in self and society; to arrive at the point of self-responsibility; and, to respond to education, formal and informal, can dilute the power of nurturing no matter what it might be.  Ultimately persons take responsibility for self with appreciation to those who helped them to the point, perhaps with observations of conflict.  None of the above denies the influence factor of the nurturing years for later life thought and conduct.  Life is partly formed by the negations we make.  Not until one reaches maturity and has made commitments is the person found as self-approved – so to find peace.

We do well to know our backslidings and understand them.  In these Pages of four years related to days of collegiate education we have referred to recividism, a term used commonly in law enforcement.  The prisoner counseled about respect for persons and society, and fulfilling the penalty of incarceration turns again on release – to crime that, when found, will lead to further legal restriction.  He has backslidden from his tenuous promises to society and himself.  That backward trend may be more common than is a fresh start for appropriate thought and conduct following jail time.  I have, on occasion, slid back to the better thought and conduct that I should not have violated.  Recovery for the Christian is available in forgiveness of any prodigality in return to thought and life conduct known to be righteous (right) not only in God’s opinion but in the life contest.  We can detect the point in that whole societies may backslide to the point of failure.  They miss what they were meant to become when they emerged. Israel’s history illustrates the principles.  History is strewn with nations’ skeletal remains.  At this writing there is an intense debate going on in the halls of the United States Congress, and the country at large on the theme of support or departure from the ideals of the founding fathers, expressed in the Constitution, relative to the principles of government.  Has the nation, in its legal system, backslidden from its contracted definition?  One side argues that it must stay the course, improving the public application.  The other argues for change related to an adjusted model from that which preceded emerging patterns.  Keep ideals: change procedure.

The church faces similar tensions.  There are those who contend that Scripture relates to the Constitution of Christian life – to meet the ever present awareness that there is a spiritual context as well as a physical one for mankind.  There are those in the church who would amend some of the resolutions of Scripture that they believe are more fitting to modern life.  Reading church history carefully we find the ebb and flow of change that introduces tension for both majorities and minorities in determining what is right and wrong, but also in the understanding of the nature of God and his involvement with mankind.  In the belief that God is perfect, and the church is born to meet a need for the knowledge of God as noted in Christian Scripture, any disagreement or violation of Scripture by Christians is interpreted as backsliding.