They were never of us, for if they were of us, they never would have left. But they left to prove they were never of us.
A dog returns to his vomit. Why? Because they are STILL a dog. They were not born again and made into a new creature.
Not everyone who comes to a church is saved, There are many people deacons and yes every pastors who went into it for false pretenses. They never experienced Gods true love because they were never born again.
The end result. Is they left. PROVING they were never of us
Many have gone back to sins they were once freed from. They claim that they still believe. But that is only when you corner them and ask them. They don't give anyone any indication that they are believers and they are in bondage to the sins they were once freed from.
There are many who were genuinely living a born again life, for many years and there is no way they could have lived the sanctified life and known the truths that they once espoused without that born again experience that they testified too. But as the decades rolled by they went through a divorce or something and started drinking and withdrew from church and started doing the things they used to do before they got saved. Now they visit the bars every night and hang around with sinners and pretend to be just like them.
This is real. Not a made up scenario. And the question that must be answered is "are they going to heaven because of their past experience even though they have backslidden?" Is their confession that they still believe enough to excuse their decadence and drunkeness? Of course not. We would tell them to repent before it is too late. But to tell them that they never were born again in the first place would be a desperate effort to make a false doctrine make sense to oneself. Don't you think?