Tolerance is not Approval

Tolerance is a virtue that seems to be in short supply these days. There was a day when the defining issue was whether you were a Mac or a PC. The platform wars waged among an informed few while everyone else just shook their heads and got on with their lives. Today there are bold lines drawn between many people based on political views, nations of origin, scientific ideas, sexual habits, and even whether or not you recycle. Judging and ridiculing other people has become a national pastime, but there is no place for this among the people of God. We are to be a people of tolerance.

Don't get me wrong. Judgments need to be made. There is a path that leads to life and one that leads to destruction. There is right and wrong, good and evil, but our understanding of what is right and wrong comes from God and not our culture. Tolerance does not mean that we approve the wisdom of culture. Tolerance means we accept and love the people around us. Tolerance is the act of putting up with someone who is irritating or unpleasant. It is the act of putting up with and enduring hardship. As a disciple of Jesus, I am not tolerant for tolerance sake. I am tolerant so that I may minister to people who do not know yet know the love of God. The intolerance that draws lines between people is a barrier that hinders love and darkens the revelation of Christ in us.

There is one story that is repeated in all the synoptic gospels (Mat 9:9; Mark 2:14; Luke 5:27). Jesus call Levi, a tax collector, to follow him. Levi expresses his excitement and gratitude by inviting all of his friends to a party with Jesus. Jesus didn't correct him. He didn't tell Levi, "These are the wrong kind of people to be seen with." Instead, Jesus gladly went to the party. He wanted to meet Levi's friends. He wanted to get close enough to them that they might know him and find life.

The Pharisees saw this and confronted Jesus' disciples. They asked what Jesus was doing hanging out, partying with tax collectors and sinners. This was not the approved activity for a religious man. There were lines that needed to be drawn. People that should be judged rather than related to. Jesus' famous response was, "It is not the healthy who need a doctor, but the sick. I have not come to call the righteous, but sinners to repentance."

Jesus didn't accept or defend their ideas or their lifestyle. In fact, he was working to change these people's lives, but God's wisdom is that lives are changed by love, involvement, and by treating people with dignity. When we judge people and keep them at arms length, it means that we have no desire to see their lives changed for the better. Instead, we are communicating to all that we see others as irritants, problems, and pests.

It's a good thing that Jesus is tolerant because compared to him we are all losers. Christ didn't embrace me because I am such a prize. He embraced me because he loves me. That love has changed my life. Out of gratitude and by his power, my life has changed, and the changes are far from over. Jesus tolerated me, but he did not accept my sin. He forgave my sin at a high cost. He also called me to a life that was not possible until I acknowledged him as Lord. But none of that would have been possible if God hadn't loved me enough to send tolerant believers into my life to communicate God's love for me.

So each time I am tempted to dismiss someone because they are a Democrat, a Tea Party member, or a Republican - every time I am tempted to see someone who speaks with an accent or in another language as a problem - every time I am tempted to shrink from someone because they live a different lifestyle or follow a different belief - I try to ask myself whether I would have been out on the sidewalk with the Pharisees or in the party with Jesus? Am I willing to endure hardship so that someone might know truth and life? Or will I walk the same path of sin and failure as the world around me? I hope I always choose tolerance.