After coming to Christ, they realize they cannot live in the ways that they used to. Smoking, drinking, sex, constant crime cannot be a part of their day-to-day routine. So they choose to shed off their past, throw it away and leave it. Thinking that everything will be okay after that.

But we fail to realize how much of ourself we must get rid of. It has been our nature to sin our whole lives; all that has been done is merely taking off branches and twigs off a tree when it can grow right back in time. The way to solve this issue is to completely uproot this tree; remove it from where it was deeply rooted in. In other words you must surrender your self. Your self is all what you are made up of; your dreams and goals, the way you are emotionally, your belongings, how you think, etc. If you don't get rid of that, no matter how perfect you think you are for leaving your past, what dwells on th inside of you will surely show itself again and will consume you. 

 

 

Repent, then, and turn to God, so that your sins may be wiped out,

that times of refreshing may come from the Lord

Acts 3:19 NIV

That seek of further help, for something you couldn't do alone will make all the difference.

Remove self and "I say, walk by the Spirit, and you will not gratify the desires of the flesh." - Galatians 5:16 ESV

How to do that? 

And those who belong to Christ Jesus have crucified the flesh with its passions and desires.

Galatians 5:24 ESV
For whoever would save his life will lose it, but whoever loses his life for my sake and the gospel's will save it.

Therefore, if anyone is in Christ, he is a new creation. The old has passed away; behold, the new has come.

We are deceived by believing we are alright when living in sin.
Or that sin doesn't exist. But think about times of being hungover, the disgusting feeling you have after smoking too many cigarettes, reexamine your perception of love since your days of sleeping around and although you see its destruction in your life, you continue to do it. It's first nature, but it's just as much solveable. 

Second deception is to believe just living a better life than we used to and calling it a 'good life' is sufficient. Everyone wants to go to Heaven, but it's the Lord's House. How can you go in someone's house without acknowledging the owner? That makes you two strangers and when you arrive "he will reply, 'I tell you, I don't know you or where you come from. Get away from me, all you who do evil.'"-Luke 13:27 NLT
For "Know you not that the unrighteous shall not inherit the kingdom of God? Be not deceived: neither fornicators, nor idolaters, nor adulterers, nor effeminate, nor abusers of themselves with mankind, Nor thieves, nor covetous, nor drunkards, nor revilers, nor extortioners, shall inherit the kingdom of God. And such were some of you: but you are washed, but you are sanctified, but you are justified in the name of the Lord Jesus Christ, and by the Spirit of our God." -1 Corinthians 6:9-11