1 Kings 14:21 Now Rehoboam the son of Solomon reigned in Judah. Rehoboam was forty-one years old when he began to reign, and he reigned seventeen years in Jerusalem, the city that the Lord had chosen out of all the tribes of Israel, to put his name there. His mother’s name was Naamah the Ammonite. And Judah did what was evil in the sight of the Lord, and they provoked him to jealousy with their sins that they committed, more than all that their fathers had done. For they also built for themselves high places and pillars and Asherim on every high hill and under every green tree, and there were also male cult prostitutes in the land. They did according to all the abominations of the nations that the Lord drove out before the people of Israel.
Ezekiel 16:47-48 Not only did you walk in their ways and do according to their abominations; within a very little time you were more corrupt than they in all your ways.
Romans 1:24-27 Therefore God gave them up in the lusts of their hearts to impurity, to the dishonoring of their bodies among themselves, because they exchanged the truth about God for a lie and worshiped and served the creature rather than the Creator, who is blessed forever!
Deuteronomy 32:18-21 You were unmindful of the Rock that bore you, and you forgot the God who gave you birth. “The LORD saw it and spurned them, because of the provocation of his sons and his daughters. And he said, ‘I will hide my face from them; I will see what their end will be, for they are a perverse generation, children in whom is no faithfulness. They have made me jealous with what is no god; they have provoked me to anger with their idols. So I will make them jealous with those who are no people; I will provoke them to anger with a foolish nation.
Do you ever wonder how people get so far away from God that they replace serving, honoring, following, and obeying Him with something else? It is not as though God changed who He was or His steadfast love and holiness changed. God is the same yesterday, today, and forever. What changes in the lives of people that they no longer have a heart, mind, and soul for the one and only true God. I have an idea it was a slow decline over time. They allowed the very evil and wayward thinking of the people God drove out before them to find it’s wake back. It is not as though they woke one day and said: “I am going to do this really stupid thing I know is wrong against God”. No, it was more like a slow steady decline and turning of their heart and mind away from God and His word. They spent less and less time thinking about Him and more and more about themselves. They spent more time listening to those who have no heart for God than time in God’s word.
Acceptance of false teaching and sinful living is the beginning of the fall. Some may think since it is just the beginning of the fall it is not that bad. If you jump off of a cliff there is really no difference in the ending from the beginning. The outcome is the same, it is just the little bit of time between. It is not as though you can grab onto anything while you are in midair on a free fall. Such are the lives of many who spend little to no time in God’s word and their heart and mind are listening to that which does not serve, honor, or glorify God. It is a slow heating of the water and nothing aware of how hot it is getting before you are dead.
There is no one holding you back from serving, honoring, glorifying, following, and obeying God but you. You choose each day.