Some People Need To Be Shown The Door

I came across something on my Facebook page where a person was arguing that because ...

God is a God who loves everyone.

God is a God who forgives everyone.

God is a God who makes space for everyone in the “Kingdom”.

God is a God who saves a place for everyone at the table.

... That we need to do the same. 

"You should never close the door on anyone", they said, "because God never closed the door on you. You have an obligation to love everyone, to accept everyone, to make space for everyone in your life. This is the way of Christ - to include everyone, no matter what."

I used to think this way, too. My thought was that no matter what someone did or what someone said or how someone treated others, they always needed to be given another chance and they ought to never, ever be turned away.

Why?

Because people change; and since God gives me countless chances to get back up again after I slip, I need to do the same for everyone else.

The only problem with this line of thinking, though, is that I'm not God. 

Right? I mean, yes, God lets everyone in.

Yes, God loves everyone.

Yes, God forgives everyone.

Yes, God makes space for everyone.

Yes, God saves a place for everyone.

BUT.

I'm not God. Nor do I think it's healthy for me (or you) to have a God-complex whereby we try to make ourselves respond to the world as God responds to the world so that we can say that we've become "more like him". 

Because the reality is that ...

Some people are toxic.

Some people are little more than cement blocks that will forever weigh you down.

Some people will never bring out the best in you.

Some people want to be in your life for their sake, not yours.

Some people's presence in your life will make you less like God as opposed to more like God.

Yes.

To be more blunt, some people need to be released from your hands and placed into the hands of God so that God can do whatever God does without you having to carry the burden of trying to be a fully Divine Being that you aren’t equipped, wired, or meant to be.

God is God, you're not; and it's OK to resist the pressure from well-meaning Christians who try to force their own God-complex on you. 

The reality is that ...

You can love someone from a distance.

You can welcome them to the table even if you choose to sit on the other end of it. 

You can make space for them in the Kingdom even if you choose to set up shop on the other side of it. 

You can forgive someone without ever speaking to them again.

"Yeah, but that's not what God would do to you."

Well, then it's a good thing I'm not God. I'm a human being with a past, a present, and a future. I'm a person who has feelings and emotions and limits. I'm a person who is on a journey, learning what it means to be a human being and how to be my truest self. I'm an adult male who has a little boy living inside of him who is navigating through painful memories and strong emotions while wrestling with present circumstances that fill him with doubt and fear and anxiety. 

I'm Glenn Siepert, I'm not God.

And you are _____ _____, you're not God either.

Although everyone has a spot in God's Kingdom and although God turns no one away (that's what I believe, anyways), not everyone needs to have a spot in your life and some people who currently have a spot in it might need to be shown the door for a time ... or, sometimes, for good.

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