Scriptures: 2 Timothy 4:9-10, Philemon 23-24, Colossians 4:14, Proverbs 14:14, 1 John 2:15

People leave Christ and the church. They just walk away. Deeply committed and involved one week--seemingly gone the next. In the mid-1900s preachers would call them "backsliders". People who began with Christ earnestly and with purpose, but along the way slid back into the soft velvet of the world. In this message, Dr. Merritt recounts an experience Paul had with a young disciple named Demas. He was a man with great potential and a great future for the Kingdom, and yet he took a wrong turn and went spiritually "AWOL". A look at his story shows us how we can avoid the same pitfalls that would lead us away from our commitment to Christ.

"Even though Demas at one time was standing on the top of the mountain of spiritual zeal, he fell into the valley of carnal worldliness. There are some of you here right now who may be standing on a spiritual mountaintop, but I want to tell you before you know it you can backslide to the bottom of the valley. I want to make something very plain. If you’re away from God, if you’re not living for the Lord, I don’t care what kind of religious experience you had in your life, if you are happy being away from God, you are lost and need to be saved." --Dr. Merritt

Keywords: Rome, Colosseum, Mammertine Prison, darkness, Demas, Jerome Green, rejection, backslider, mission, vision, purpose, devotion, Christ, work, testimony, soldier, army, Christian, friendship, witness, ashamed, Thessalonica