Why Do We Keep Falling Back into Old Habits?

By Pastor John Erickson

Have you ever worked really hard to change something in your life, made some genuine progress, and then looked up one day to discover you were doing the exact same thing again?

Maybe it's a habit you were trying to break. A way of speaking to your family. A spiritual practice you were committed to. A pattern you thought you had left behind.

You were doing so well.

And then, somehow, you're right back where you started.

I wish I could tell you that doesn't happen to people who follow Jesus. But if you read the Bible, it's difficult to avoid the conclusion that regression is a very real part of the story.

Just look at Nehemiah.

The Walls Were Finished. So Why Wasn't Everything Fixed?

Across the books of Ezra and Nehemiah, God's people return from exile and work to restore their life together.

Zerubbabel helps rebuild the temple. Ezra teaches the Scriptures. Nehemiah organizes the rebuilding of the city's walls.

By almost any external measure, the work is impressive.

Nehemiah's people rebuild the walls in fifty-two days. There are celebrations, public readings of Scripture, commitments, and plans for maintaining their worship.

You'd think this would be the happy ending.

But then chapter 13 happens.

After Nehemiah spends time away from Jerusalem and returns, he finds that so much of the reform has unraveled. The temple has been misused. The Levites are no longer being supported. Sabbath practices have fallen apart. Some of the community has returned to patterns Nehemiah had tried to correct.

Everything looks great on the outside-until it doesn't.

Regression Is a Real Part of the Journey

Here's the first thing that stands out to me: people don't always move forward in a straight line.

I wish spiritual growth worked like a video game. You reach level ten and you never have to think about levels one through nine again.

But that's not how it works.

We grow. We struggle. Sometimes we fall into familiar patterns. We repent. We return. We learn to trust God again.

In pastoral conversations, I have heard people say they feel they should be farther along than this. They thought a particular struggle would be behind them by now. That disappointment can become another burden on top of the struggle itself.

I do not want to answer that with a shrug or with shame. We can be honest about failure while still expecting God to keep working.

That doesn't mean sin is harmless or that change is impossible. It means we need humility about our own growth and patience with other people.

Think about Peter. In Luke 22:32, Jesus tells him that he has prayed for him and that when Peter turns back, he is to strengthen his brothers.

Jesus sees the coming failure. He also sees the possibility of restoration.

That's good news for those of us who have ever had to begin again.

Success in God's Eyes May Look Different

The book also challenges how we measure success.

I love systems. I like making things work efficiently. Give me a process with too many steps and I will immediately start thinking about how to improve it.

That's useful. But we can confuse an efficient system with a transformed person.

When I was in college, I was involved with my parents in a church plant in Rancho Santa Margarita. When I was home, I would go up a mountain at six in the morning to pray over the city and for our church. We prayed with real hope about what God would do.

A few years later, that church plant closed. From the perspective of the organization we were trying to build, it looked like failure.

Around the same time, another Foursquare church was being planted nearby. People were reached and disciples were made through that congregation. Years later, talking with my dad and someone else who had been part of our plant, we began to see our prayers differently. What if God had been doing the work we hoped for, just through something other than the church we wanted to succeed?

That conversation helped me loosen my grip on one definition of success. I cannot trace every connection or claim to know all God was doing. But his work was clearly larger than our particular organization.

Our effort wasn't meaningless just because our preferred outcome didn't happen.

Sometimes God's work is bigger than the measurements we use.

Better Systems Cannot Replace a New Heart

Nehemiah had structures. He had leaders. He had clear expectations for the community. Those things were important.

But the final chapter exposes the limits of any system: you cannot organize people into having new hearts.

You can create accountability and healthy rhythms. You can teach and lead. You can build a beautiful church building or a very efficient ministry.

And still, something deep inside us needs transformation.

Ezekiel 36:26 describes God's promise to give his people a new heart and a new spirit-to replace a heart of stone with a heart of flesh.

That's the change we're really after.

Not simply getting people to comply when somebody is watching. Not creating a polished religious product. Becoming people whose hearts are increasingly responsive to God.

Start Again, but Don't Stop at the Surface

If you find yourself falling back into an old habit, don't pretend it isn't happening.

Confess it. Get help if you need it. Make practical changes. Invite trusted people to speak into your life.

But don't stop with rearranging the outside.

Ask what is happening in your heart.

What are you trusting? What are you afraid of? What are you trying to control? Where have you started treating religious activity as a substitute for being with Jesus?

God isn't calling us to pretend we're perfect. He invites us to be transformed.

And when we stumble, we can turn toward him again.

Because the story of Nehemiah doesn't leave me with great confidence in human systems or flawless leaders.

It leaves me longing for the God who can do what those things cannot: give us new hearts.