In almost any activity, such as an athletic club, office team, ship crew or almost anywhere that a group of people are to work together as a team, care must be taken to ensure good teamwork. Every so often a team member is present who infects others with a complaining and negative attitude. He is known as a rotten apple because of his impact on the morale of the whole team. Such a person needs to be removed.

Christians are admonished not to keep company with evil and wicked people, unless some of that rub off on them. Paul wrote that Christians were not to keep company with sexually immoral people (1 Corinthians 5:9). He meant within the Church, but even in this world—although we cannot escape being with such people in the workplace or other areas—we ought to not spend a lot of time with them or try to befriend them. King Solomon seemed to have the best of intentions in obedience to God, but little by little the company of his pagan wives perverted his thinking. One rotten apple can spoil a barrel, so the apple needs to be removed or all the good apples need to leave. It is easier to remove the rotten apple.