I would like to begin by saying that this article is not a judgement, not on those who have left the church, nor on those who are struggling with their faith. I wrote it to explore a verse in the most human way I know how, and to perhaps shed light on a part of Christian life that we don’t often talk about.

In his last recorded letter to Timothy, Paul asks him to “Be diligent to come to me quickly, for Demas has forsaken me, having loved this present world.” (2 Timothy 4:9-10)

So often we use this passage to illustrate how the love of the things of the world can lead to falling away from God. This is a solid, if indirect, conclusion. But what does it actually say?

“Demas has forsaken me, having loved this present world.”

This phrase is in the midst of a set of verses that begs Timothy to come to him quickly because of how alone and in need he is. It is set at the end of a letter written under the shadow of Paul’s coming death. If ever there was an awful time to forsake Paul, it was now. But Demas had no thought for Paul. He loved the things of this world.

So often, we think of Christianity as an individual endeavor. It is true that in the end, we have the sole responsibility of giving our lives to Christ; Christ Himself says, “To him who overcomes, I will give to eat from the tree of life” (Rev 2:7). However, Paul himself says of the church, “None of us lives to himself, and no one dies to himself” (Rom. 14:7). Christianity is not a solitary journey. We are a body, “joined and knit together by what every joint supplies” (Eph. 5:16). When the relationship of a group is so close as to be knit together like a body, one’s successes and failures inevitably don’t just affect oneself. The other members share in the joy or pain of the one member, as 1 Corinthians 12:25-26 describes. And when a part of the body is ripped out….

When we fall away from the faith, we do not just fall away from God. We abandon our brethren. Paul does not say that Demas fell away from God, though the context implies that this is true. He tells Timothy that he has been abandoned. He is not experiencing a distant disappointment for the moral failures of Demas. He is feeling his own hurt that someone he cares about chose not to reciprocate his love, but instead to love the world. He loved Demas, and he still loves Demas. He would not be Paul if he did not. And to be hurt by someone you love is immeasurably painful.

As I stated at the beginning, this article is not written as a judgement on those who have left the church, nor is it written to condemn those who are struggling in the faith. It’s written to express the reality of what leaving the church is. Often we have mixed feelings when someone leaves the church. We had a connection with them that we no longer have. How ought we to feel toward them? As Christians, we grieve for their soul, but we can also grieve for what we lost. Paul did. Maybe it’s not just permissible, but right for us to do so.