For much of his life, St. Augustine was a loyal citizen of Rome. Although it was a secular state, he believed it provided the only tolerable framework for human society. For Augustine, as for most Romans, the fall of the Roman Empire was simply unthinkable.

Yet by the beginning of the fifth century, the decadence that had long afflicted Rome had spread throughout the empire. In A.D. 410, when Augustine was fifty-six years old, news reached him that Rome had been sacked. It was undoubtedly one of the most dramatic moments of his life. Even so, Augustine found hope in the truth that every earthly kingdom will one day come to an end and that God alone is sovereign over history.

Many historians regard English historian Edward Gibbon’s six-volume work, The History of the Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire, as the most comprehensive study ever written on Rome’s collapse.

According to Gibbon, the Roman Empire succumbed to barbarian invasion because it had gradually grown weak and had lost its civic virtue. He identified five characteristics that marked Rome in its final years:

First, a growing love of spectacle and luxury. Second, a widening gap between the very rich and the very poor. Third, an obsession with sex. Fourth, a decline in the arts, where novelty masqueraded as originality. Fifth, an increasing desire to live off the state.

Does this sound familiar?

Another who wrote extensively about the rise and fall of civilizations was the great British historian Arnold Toynbee.

In the 1940s, Toynbee undertook a monumental study of twenty-one world civilizations, ranging from ancient Rome to imperial China and from Babylon to the Aztecs. His insights into history and the forces shaping civilizations remain remarkably relevant today.

Toynbee concluded that civilizations in decline experience what he called a “schism of the soul.” They are seldom destroyed simply by outside forces. As societies disintegrate, people lose their commitment to moral truth and increasingly yield to their impulses at the expense of creativity and character. They also fall into what Toynbee called “truancy”—an escape from reality through distraction, entertainment, and the avoidance of life’s deeper responsibilities.

History seems to reveal a recurring pattern. Civilizations begin with a strong foundation of law and moral order. That foundation enables them to grow, prosper, and flourish. Yet over time, as prosperity breeds complacency, they decline and eventually perish through what Toynbee described as “cultural suicide.”

We see this same pattern in the history of God’s people in the Old Testament. God led Israel into the Promised Land, where they prospered and experienced His blessing. Yet, over time, prosperity led to pride, and pride led them away from God. As the prophet Hosea records:

“As they had their pasture, they became satisfied, and being satisfied, their heart became proud; therefore they forgot Me.”
—Hosea 13:6

The Nobel Prize-winning author Alexander Solzhenitsyn observed this same pattern in the history of his own nation:

“Over a half century ago, while I was still a child, I recall hearing a number of old people offer the following explanation for the great disasters that had befallen Russia: ‘Men have forgotten God; that’s why all this has happened.’

Since then I have spent well-nigh fifty years working on the history of our revolution. In the process I have read hundreds of books, collected hundreds of personal testimonies, and have already contributed eight volumes of my own toward the effort of clearing away the rubble left by that upheaval. But if I were asked today to formulate as concisely as possible the main cause of the ruinous revolution that swallowed up some sixty million of our people, I could not put it more accurately than to repeat: ‘Men have forgotten God; that’s why all this has happened.'”

The psalmist tells us that God is the fountain of life. He is the source of all truth and wisdom. Scripture sets before us a clear choice as we seek to live our lives and build our families, communities, and nations:

“I call heaven and earth to witness against you today, that I have set before you life and death, blessing and curse. Therefore choose life, that you and your descendants may live, by loving the Lord your God, obeying His voice, and holding fast to Him, for He is your life…”
—Deuteronomy 30:19–20

Richard E Simmons III is the founder and Executive Director of The Center for Executive Leadership and a best-selling author.