Avoiding Negative People

3-25-2009
God has called us to love our neighbor as ourselves. I truly believe in this teaching, yet I feel we get off course on a couple of fronts. First, we are called to love not judge, yet human beings, and sometimes especially Christians, can be extremely guilty of the later. The first point I want to make is LOVE one another. In Matthew 7: 1-6 we have a perfect message from Jesus telling us not to judge one another. Romans 12, Paul informs us there is only one judge, GOD, yet we continue to look down on people.
Here’s the second point, just because we are called to love one another that doesn’t mean you are going to like everyone. Not only are you not going to like everyone, there are some people you simply shouldn’t hang out with.
As an athlete, I competed on many teams throughout my career, and I can assure you, I didn’t hang out with every player I played with. While I was playing minor league baseball, there is one teammate of mine that I absolutely couldn’t stand being around because he was extremely negative about everything. Please understand, I know he had some great qualities, and I did all I could to plant the seed of kindness and love of Christ that I could without being overbearing, but I had a hard time showing God’s love while with this teammate of mine. What did I do? I stopped hanging out with him and simply started praying for him. God calls us to reach our hand down in the well to help the lost escape. We aren’t supposed to jump down in the well with them, and anytime I was around him, I felt like I was stuck in the well!
Negativity is contagious, so run from it! I believe you will become who you hang around no matter how in tune you are with your surroundings. We are all human, thus we are all sinners. The key is to love on these individuals and help them overcome their negativity without you becoming like them. Negativity clings to negativity. Complainers love to find other complainers to hang out with. I can assure you, where there is one bad apple, you will find more right next to them. Who sucks the life out of you? Stop hanging out with them. Who fills your energy tank up? Hang out with them. I love hanging out with positive people. I feed off of their energy, thus I am more productive and I have a much better outlook on life. You cannot put a price tag on positive people!
Application:
1. Read Matthew 7: 1-6
2. What steps do you need to take to distance yourself from people that bring you down?
3. What is it exactly that they do to make you feel this way?
4. Is there a chance that they aren’t negative, but you feel insecure around them?