18 Bible Verses About Removing People From Your Life

Proverbs 13:20

“Walk with the wise and become wise, for a companion of fools suffers harm.”

Reflection: The proverb sets two companions side by side and gives each an outcome: walking with the wise makes a person wise, and keeping company with fools brings harm. The verse before it says what marks the fool: “fools detest turning from evil.” The verse after it continues the contrast: “Trouble pursues the sinner, but the righteous are rewarded with good things.”

1 Corinthians 15:33

“Do not be misled: ‘Bad company corrupts good character.’”

Reflection: Paul places this saying in the middle of his argument for the resurrection. Some in Corinth were saying “that there is no resurrection of the dead” (15:12), and Paul quotes the attitude that follows from it: “Let us eat and drink, for tomorrow we die” (15:32). In context the bad company appears to be those who deny the resurrection (15:12, 15:34), and the next verse tells the church to “come back to your senses” because “there are some who are ignorant of God.”

Psalm 1:1

“Blessed is the one who does not walk in step with the wicked or stand in the way that sinners take or sit in the company of mockers.”

Reflection: The opening verse of the Psalter describes the blessed person by three things he does not do, moving from walking with the wicked to standing in the sinners’ way to sitting with mockers. Verse 2 gives the alternative: his “delight is in the law of the Lord,” and he meditates on it day and night. Verse 3 compares that person to a tree planted by streams of water.

Proverbs 22:24-25

“Do not make friends with a hot-tempered person, do not associate with one easily angered, or you may learn their ways and get yourself ensnared.”

Reflection: This is the third of the “sayings of the wise” that begin at Proverbs 22:17. The reason it gives for avoiding a hot-tempered friend concerns the one who keeps the friendship: “you may learn their ways and get yourself ensnared.”

Proverbs 20:19

“A gossip betrays a confidence; so avoid anyone who talks too much.”

Reflection: The proverb draws its own conclusion with “so”: because a gossip betrays a confidence, a person who talks too much is someone to avoid.

Proverbs 24:1-2

“Do not envy the wicked, do not desire their company; for their hearts plot violence, and their lips talk about making trouble.”

Reflection: Another of the sayings of the wise, this one starts with envy before it reaches company: the wicked may look enviable, but their hearts “plot violence” and their lips “talk about making trouble.” The warning is against wanting their company as much as keeping it.

2 Corinthians 6:14

“Do not be yoked together with unbelievers. For what do righteousness and wickedness have in common? Or what fellowship can light have with darkness?”

Reflection: A yoke joins two animals so that they pull the same load. Paul follows the command with a run of questions (light and darkness, Christ and Belial, the temple of God and idols) and then quotes the Lord in verse 17: “Come out from them and be separate.” The passage does not name marriage or business; it speaks of being yoked. Just before it, in verses 11-13, Paul asks the Corinthians to open wide their hearts to him.

Genesis 13:8-9

“So Abram said to Lot, ‘Let’s not have any quarreling between you and me, or between your herders and mine, for we are close relatives. Is not the whole land before you? Let’s part company. If you go to the left, I’ll go to the right; if you go to the right, I’ll go to the left.’”

Reflection: Quarrelling had broken out between Abram’s herders and Lot’s (13:7), and verse 6 says “the land could not support them while they stayed together.” Abram asks that there be no quarrelling “for we are close relatives,” and proposes the separation himself. He lets Lot choose first, Lot takes the plain of the Jordan, and verse 11 records that “the two men parted company.”

Acts 15:39

“They had such a sharp disagreement that they parted company. Barnabas took Mark and sailed for Cyprus,”

Reflection: The disagreement was over John Mark, who “had deserted them in Pamphylia and had not continued with them in the work” (15:38). Barnabas wanted to take him again and Paul refused. Each man then went on with a new partner: Barnabas with Mark to Cyprus, Paul with Silas through Syria and Cilicia, “strengthening the churches.” In 2 Timothy 4:11 Paul asks for Mark to be brought to him, “because he is helpful to me in my ministry.”

Matthew 10:14

“If anyone will not welcome you or listen to your words, leave that home or town and shake the dust off your feet.”

Reflection: Jesus gives this instruction to the twelve when he sends them out (10:5). They are to stay with a worthy person in each town, and if a home is not deserving, “let your peace return to you” (10:13). Shaking the dust off their feet is what they do on leaving a home or town that will not welcome them or listen; they are not told to argue or to stay.

Romans 12:18

“If it is possible, as far as it depends on you, live at peace with everyone.”

Reflection: Paul attaches two conditions to the command: “if it is possible” and “as far as it depends on you.” The wording allows that peace with everyone may not be possible and limits a person’s responsibility to their own part. The verse before it says, “Do not repay anyone evil for evil.”

Matthew 18:15-17

“…if they still refuse to listen, tell it to the church; and if they refuse to listen even to the church, treat them as you would a pagan or a tax collector.”

Reflection: Jesus gives three steps before any separation: a private conversation, then one or two others as witnesses (citing the rule of two or three witnesses in Deuteronomy 19:15), then the whole church. Only after the person refuses to listen to the church are they to be treated “as you would a pagan or a tax collector.” The verses that follow speak of binding and loosing, and then Peter asks how often he must forgive; Jesus answers, “not seven times, but seventy-seven times” (18:22).

Titus 3:10-11

“Warn a divisive person once, and then warn them a second time. After that, have nothing to do with them. You may be sure that such people are warped and sinful; they are self-condemned.”

Reflection: Paul writes to Titus, whom he had left in Crete to appoint elders and “put in order what was left unfinished” (1:5). Titus is to warn the divisive person twice before having nothing more to do with them. The verse before tells Titus to “avoid foolish controversies and genealogies and arguments and quarrels about the law, because these are unprofitable and useless.”

Romans 16:17

“I urge you, brothers and sisters, to watch out for those who cause divisions and put obstacles in your way that are contrary to the teaching you have learned. Keep away from them.”

Reflection: This warning comes in the closing chapter of Romans, after Paul commends Phoebe and greets Priscilla, Aquila and others. The people to watch for are those whose divisions run “contrary to the teaching you have learned.” The next verse says what they are like: they serve “their own appetites,” and “by smooth talk and flattery they deceive the minds of naive people.”

1 Corinthians 5:11

“But now I am writing to you that you must not associate with anyone who claims to be a brother or sister but is sexually immoral or greedy, an idolater or slanderer, a drunkard or swindler. Do not even eat with such people.”

Reflection: The chapter opens with a man in the Corinthian church sleeping with his father’s wife (5:1), and Paul tells the church to put him out of its fellowship. In verses 9-10 he corrects a misreading of an earlier letter: he did not mean the immoral people of this world, “in that case you would have to leave this world.” The rule is for “anyone who claims to be a brother or sister,” and verses 12-13 add that God judges those outside the church.

2 Thessalonians 3:14-15

“Take special note of anyone who does not obey our instruction in this letter. Do not associate with them, in order that they may feel ashamed. Yet do not regard them as an enemy, but warn them as you would a fellow believer.”

Reflection: The instruction Paul has in view concerns believers who are “idle and disruptive” (3:6, 3:11) and will not work for their own food. The verse gives a purpose for keeping away from them, “in order that they may feel ashamed,” and then a limit: they are not to be regarded as an enemy but warned “as you would a fellow believer.”

2 Timothy 3:1-5

“But mark this: There will be terrible times in the last days. People will be lovers of themselves, lovers of money, boastful, proud, abusive, disobedient to their parents, ungrateful, unholy, without love, unforgiving, slanderous, without self-control, brutal, not lovers of the good, treacherous, rash, conceited, lovers of pleasure rather than lovers of God—having a form of godliness but denying its power. Have nothing to do with such people.”

Reflection: Paul lists the marks of the people of “the last days,” from “lovers of themselves” to “lovers of pleasure rather than lovers of God,” and ends with people who keep “a form of godliness but denying its power.” The command to Timothy is “Have nothing to do with such people.” Verse 6 describes them in the present tense as those who “worm their way into homes,” and verse 8 calls them teachers who “oppose the truth.”

2 John 1:10-11

“If anyone comes to you and does not bring this teaching, do not take them into your house or welcome them. Anyone who welcomes them shares in their wicked work.”

Reflection: The teaching in question is named in verse 7: deceivers “who do not acknowledge Jesus Christ as coming in the flesh.” The elder writes to “the lady chosen by God and to her children” (1:1) not to take such a teacher into the house or welcome them. The reason is given in verse 11: welcoming them is a share in their “wicked work.”