Lesson 3–2: The Danger—Spiritual Retreat/Reversion

p. 129Ephesians 4:17–19 2 Samuel 15–17

The Christian life is a life of absolutes. At every moment, we are either spiritual—controlled by the Spirit and running toward the goal set before us, or else we are carnal—controlled by the flesh and running away from the goal.

When we sin, we can always get back on track by confession and correction. But the longer we refuse to confess, the farther adrift we go, and the harder it becomes to turn away from the distractions and entanglements that are so attractive to the natural man. If our spiritual digression—our carnality—is unchecked by confession, it will lead us into the more dangerous and destructive state of spiritual retreat. This condition is illustrated by the Israelites who, after being delivered from Egypt, wanted to turn back to their former state (see Heb. 3:7–15; 10:38).

In his letter to the Ephesian believers, Paul outlines seven steps in the downward spiral of spiritual retreat or reversion. Reversion is defined as “the act of reverting or returning; return to a place … practice, belief … return to a former state or condition” (The New Century Dictionary).

“So this I say, and affirm together with the Lord, that you walk no longer just as the Gentiles also walk, in the futility of their mind, being darkened in their understanding, excluded from the life of God, because of the ignorance that is in them, because of the hardness of their heart; and they, having become callous, have given themselves over to sensuality, for the practice of every kind of impurity with greediness.” (Eph. 4:17–19)

p. 130The first step of turning back (Heb. 10:38) is negative volition to the Word of God, apart from which there is no spiritual growth (2 Pet. 3:18; 2 Tim. 2:15; 3:16–17). To walk as the Gentiles walk means to walk in unbelief. It is possible for believers to live as practical atheists. When we are bitter or jealous, when we indulge in self-pity or fear, when we do not actively believe that God is in control—in these conditions of mind, we are saying no to the Word of God. When we give in to these kinds of mental attitudes, we are choosing to be energized not by the Holy Spirit, but by the sin nature. We are stepping off the path of growth and turning back— reverting—to the ways of our natural, unregenerate selves.

The second step is creation of a “vacuum” in the soul. When Paul points to “the futility of their mind,” he uses the word mataiotes. This can be translated “futility” or “vanity”; it refers to that which is empty or devoid of truth. When we turn negative toward the Word, we establish a vacuum in our soul. But the soul was not meant to be empty, so when we reject the truth, we will inevitably accept lies. Our soul, like a vacuum cleaner, sucks up the filth around us. We will start to believe false doctrines and to live by rationalism instead of by faith. The longer we stay out of fellowship with God, the easier it becomes to stay away from the Word, to neglect the Bible study that is designed to be our food and drink.

The third step is the blackout of the soul—“having their understanding darkened,” Paul says. The soul, which was designed by God to function on the Word, actually shuts down. The way we think, our understanding, becomes shady as the things we have learned begin to slip away. We can no longer recall doctrines we once knew and understood. The light of the Word is being extinguished from our conscience, leaving behind—inevitably— only darkness.

The fourth step is alienation from grace. We are “excluded from the life of God.” Having exchanged the truth of the Creator for the lies of the creature, having forsaken the light of the Word for the darkness of the world, we are cut off from the power of Christ. We are estranged from His abundant life. The Greek apallotrioomai means “to be alienated, estranged, shut out from fellowship and intimacy.” Aside from God, there is no other source of grace.

Outside of fellowship with Him, we become everything that is the opposite of gracious.

p. 131The fifth step is the build-up of scar tissue of the soul. As we continuously set our hearts against God, we intensify the process of scarring our souls. Apalgeo means “to cease to feel; to become insensitive, apathetic, past feeling.” In the perfect tense and active voice, it could be translated here “having cast off all feeling.” It is not that we have become calloused because of some outside force, but that we have calloused ourselves. As a result of our own negative choices, our sensitivity to the Spirit of God is gone, leaving a hunger in the soul that cannot be satisfied.

The sixth step is a frantic search for happiness. When Paul says the Gentiles have “given themselves over” to sensuality, he uses the same words that are used to describe the betrayal of Judas. Paradidomi means “to give over into one’s power or use.” When we reach this point, we have betrayed ourselves—sold ourselves out, delivered ourselves up—to sensuality. Now we are in a crazed search for something to satisfy our starving souls. We have turned to the world for fulfillment instead of to Christ. And our search for happiness becomes more and more degrading as the hunger of our soul intensifies. Chasing after the instant fix, the rush, the now, we are bartering soul for body. But the body is never satisfied, and so the search can only become more and more frantic.

The seventh step is arrival at the point of implacability. When Paul talks about the practice of “impurity with greediness,” he uses the word pleonexia. It means “insatiability.” When we reach this point, there is nothing that can make us happy, nothing that can satisfy us. No power, no wealth, no friendship, no physical pleasure is ever enough to satisfy us. The intensified scarring process has destroyed our capacity for appreciation. The prophet, Jeremiah, compares the implacable person, whose soul is shattered, to a ruined vessel, a broken cistern. “They have … [rejected] the fountain of living water to hew for themselves cisterns, broken cisterns that can hold no water” (Jer. 2:13). When our soul becomes a ruined vessel, we have destroyed our ability to enjoy the normal functions of life.

At every step of this downward slide, God administers discipline designed to turn us around. If we refuse to heed His warnings and accept His correction, choosing instead to continue p. 133to harden ourselves, He will discipline us with increasing harshness. God takes no joy in giving pain; but as a loving Father, He takes less joy in seeing His children waste their lives. He will continue to discipline us until we turn back to Him or until we reach the point at which He knows recovery has become impossible. At this point, He will call us home to Heaven in what the Bible calls “the sin unto death” (1 John 5:16). Dying the sin unto death is the most miserable and shameful way a Christian can end his race.

In 2 Samuel 15–17, we have the story of a man who died the sin unto death. His name was Ahithophel. He was a cherished friend of King David, a mature believer who was on his way to becoming one of the greatest spiritual heroes of his time. His reversionism was of the most subtle kind. He did not—like David—fall into sensuality and lasciviousness. The temptations Ahithophel gave himself over to were arrogance, self-righteousness, and passing judgment on another believer.

Who was this man Ahithophel? A native of Giloh, a town in the hill country of Judah, Ahithophel was counselor to King David. He knew the Word of God and had the understanding and wisdom that can only come from application of the Word. Second Samuel 16:23 tells us that the advice of Ahithophel “was as if one inquired of the word of God.” This man was like an encyclopedia of the Word, and his advice was trusted by both David and his son, Absalom.

In 2 Samuel 15:12, Ahithophel joins in Absalom’s conspiracy against David. Absalom was a handsome man with great strengths and tremendous charisma. He had stolen the hearts of the men of Israel by magnifying and amplifying the sin of his own father (2 Sam. 15: 1–6).

On the day that Absalom called for him, Ahithophel was in Giloh offering sacrifices, so we know that he was still involved in religious activity. From the outside, Ahithophel appeared to be anything but a reversionist, so how could he be so far out of line that he would join in a conspiracy against the greatest believer of his age, whom God Himself called “A MAN AFTER MY HEART” (Acts 13:22)?

A comparison of 2 Samuel 23:34 with 2 Samuel 11:3 gives us an idea of how Ahithophel had come to this choice. Ahithophel had a son named Eliam. Eliam had a daughter named Bathsheba. Ahithophel was the grandfather of Bathsheba. Now the plot begins p. 134to thicken. We begin to understand what has happened in the heart of Ahithophel. The king seduced his granddaughter; she became pregnant; he murdered her husband. Ahithophel’s son-in-law Uriah, a valiant warrior, one of David’s own mighty men, is dead. His granddaughter is the talk of the town, and David does not appear to be suffering for his sins.

Ahithophel’s spiritual retreat must have started in the most subtle way. He took offense at David’s sin—he got personal, self-righteous, judgmental. When he saw David apparently getting off scot-free, did he decide to help God bring about justice?

David was a sinner. He obviously had a lascivious trend in his sin nature. Ahithophel was a sinner. He obviously had a legalistic trend in his sin nature. The difference between them was that David understood grace. He had been in reversionism, but he had accepted correction and been restored through confession. He knew how to receive grace from God, and he knew how to extend grace to others.

At least ten years passed between David’s great sin and Absalom’s revolt. All that time, Ahithophel must have secretly nursed his bitterness.

When David learns that Absalom has won the hearts of the people, he leaves Jerusalem willingly. He does not want to see the city besieged and innocent people killed. Though his heart is broken over the treachery of his son, he knows that God had made him king and that when God gives and then sees fit to take away, it is only for greater blessing. David walks out of the city with nothing, willing to entrust himself entirely to the grace of God.

“And David went up the ascent of the Mount of Olives, and wept as he went, and his head was covered and he walked barefoot. Then all the people who were with him each covered his head and went up weeping as they went. Now someone told David, saying, ‘Ahithophel is among the conspirators with Absalom.’ And David said, ‘O LORD, I pray, make the counsel of Ahithophel foolishness.’ It happened as David was coming to the summit, where God was worshiped, that behold, Hushai the Archite met him with his coat torn and dust on his head. David said to him, ‘If you pass over with me, then you will be a burden to me. But if you return to the city, and say to Absalom, “I will be your servant, O king; as I have been your father’s servant in time past, so I will p. 135now be your servant,” then you can thwart the counsel of Ahithophel for me ...’” (2 Sam. 15:30–37) As he begins to ascend the Mount of Olives, David is told that his friend, Ahithophel, is among the conspirators. A thousand years later at almost the same spot, the Lord Jesus Christ would be betrayed by His friend, Judas, in the Garden of Gethsemane.

David responds to the heartbreaking news with a prayer. God immediately responds to David’s prayer by sending to him Hushai, a man of loyalty.

Look at the difference between Ahithophel and Hushai. Ahithophel had taken his eyes off the Word of God and gotten his eyes on David, a man who—like all other men—had feet of clay. When David fell, Ahithophel forgot the Word and fell into self-righteous arrogance and reversionism.

Hushai, on the other hand, had kept his eyes on the Word. He understood that our part is to make the Word of God the issue in life, give people the right to accept or to reject it, and then let God deal with those people and their decisions. It is not our job to convict or to judge any other believer. Those are rights reserved by God; He is capable of convicting and correcting His children.

Hushai knew that God could take care of David. He knew, too, that loyalty demanded that he remain faithful to the divinely appointed king. Where did Hushai learn this kind of loyalty to authority? Where did he learn how to serve even a king in reversionism, entrusting him to God, knowing that God would deal p. 136with His child? He learned it by watching David in the wilderness and in the mountains, hounded by King Saul, who was in a state of spiritual retreat. He watched David trust the Lord, and he learned from what he saw. Hushai became one of the most noble and honorable people in his generation.

In 2 Samuel 17, Ahithophel advises Absalom to give him 12,000 men so that he can kill David that night. “I will come upon him while he is weary and exhausted,” Ahithophel said, “and [will] terrify him so that all the people who are with him will flee. Then I will strike down the king alone” (2 Sam. 17:2).

Absalom likes Ahithophel’s idea, but he wants to hear what Hushai has to say. Hushai reminds Absalom how fierce are David and his mighty men and how skilled in strategy. He tells Absalom to wait and not attack until he has gathered more troops.

Ahithophel has given the better advice. He has not lost his accuracy, even in spiritual retreat. Had Absalom followed that advice, David would have been defeated. But God answers the prayer of David—David the adulterer, the murderer, but David the corrected believer. Absalom took Hushai’s advice, “for the LORD had ordained to thwart the good counsel of Ahithophel” (2 Sam. 17:14). Ahithophel had become an enemy of God. He was warring now not against David, but against God.

Hushai sends spies to David telling him that he has time to cross the river, head into the wilderness, and gain strength for a counter-p. 137attack. Because Absalom did not listen to Ahithophel, David and all his household were saved.

“Now when Ahithophel saw that his counsel was not followed, he saddled his donkey and arose and went to his home, to his city, and set his house in order, and strangled himself; thus he died and was buried in the grave of his father.” (2 Sam. 17:23)

The instant his counsel was rejected, Ahithophel knew that David would triumph. He knew that he would have to face the king, and he could not stand the thought. He could not handle the consequences of his own arrogant choices. He died, just like Judas a thousand years later, by his own hand.

Because the king’s son, Absalom, emphasized and magnified the sin of his father, God determined to “bring calamity on Absalom” (2 Sam. 17:14). He judged Absalom with what David deserved. Because Ahithophel joined the conspiracy, he, too, would die the death that he sought for David.

Ahithophel’s treachery was not a sudden thing. He had made decision after decision to set his focus on David, to let David’s failure become a stumbling block in his life. David’s reversion into lasciviousness could have led him to the sin unto death, but he accepted correction and turned back to God. Ahithophel’s reversion into legalism did lead to death because he refused to respond to the discipline that God is faithful to set before all of us when we sin.