Is Christianity Intolerant?
Written by J. Warner Wallace |
Friday, August 11, 2023
The concept (and the actual word) “acceptance” has been added to the definition in a way that subtly transforms the classic definition. This view promotes not that we must “endure” each other in the context of our disagreements, but that we must “accept” and embrace each other’s worldview as equally valuable and equally true.
There is growing cultural skepticism and criticism of all things “Christian”. At times like this, the issue of religious “tolerance” is sometimes raised and examined. Christians are often called intolerant, especially when examined under a new definition of tolerance that has emerged in our culture. How should we respond when people call us “intolerant” simply because we refuse to embrace a particular value or behavior?
First: Help People Understand “Classic” Tolerance
YourDictionary.com says that tolerance is “a tolerating or being tolerant, esp. of views, beliefs, practices, etc. of others that differ from one’s own”. And when asked what it is to tolerate something, the same source says that we ‘tolerate’ someone when we “recognize and respect (others’ beliefs, practices, etc.) without sharing them”. TheFreeDictionary.com says that ‘tolerating’ is “to put up with” or “endure” something.
Now did you notice something here? In order for ‘tolerance’ to exist and to be demonstrated, several things are required. Let’s take a look at the list of pre-requisites for ‘tolerance’:
1. Two or more people must exist
2. These folks must hold divergent views, beliefs or practices. In other words, they must DISAGREE.
3. These same folks must endure one another. In other words, they cannot eliminate each other even though they don’t embrace each other’s beliefs, but must instead find a way to peacefully co-exist.
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Lovers of Good
Pastors — and increasingly their churches with them — are to be doers of good, not mere self-proclaimed lovers, deceiving themselves. Genuinely loving the good leads them to dream up ideas, take fresh initiatives, and do good that benefits all, especially those of like faith.
An overseer, as God’s steward, must be . . . a lover of good. (Titus 1:7–8)
In times when the love of many grows cold, we will do well to pause over an overlooked Christian virtue that warms against the chill.
Not only is such a trait designed by Christ to be increasingly true of all Christians; it is required to serve in the church’s lead office.
To be clear, what Christ requires of his pastor-elders (1 Timothy 3:1–8; Titus 1:5–9) is not simply for qualification to enter the office. Rather, these virtues are the ongoing, daily graces needed to serve well in the office. Yet these too are the qualities Christ means to grant in growing measure to his whole church. Pastor-elders are examples to the flock (1 Peter 5:3). They not only labor at teaching and governing, to feed and lead the church, but they model, as a team, the Christian maturity toward which we hope all Christians will progress.
So, in days that seem embattled and divisive, it might be freshly helpful, if not convicting, to remember that Christians, with their pastors leading the way, are not to be known for circling wagons and battening down hatches. Rather, we are to be wide- and warm-hearted, maturely magnanimous, “lovers of good” (Greek philagothos), as Titus 1:8 obliges church leaders. That is the opposite of how Paul characterizes the last days in 2 Timothy 3:3: “not loving good” (aphilagathos).
What, then, might lead to, mark, and accompany such “lovers of good,” that we might discern whether we ourselves, and our leaders, embody what Christ designs?
1. Believe in good.
First, let it not go unsaid that those who love the good believe in good. In distressed days, such pastors and Christians still believe in good. They know their God — who is Goodness himself and the source and standard of all good — made this world and called it good. Good came first and is deeper than evil. And we know, in Christ, that whatever devastations evil has wrought, one day the sin and death which so pervade and pain us will be no more (Revelation 21:4), while good endures forever, as the one who is Good dwells with his people (Revelation 21:3).
Lovers of good believe that true good is older, deeper, and will outlive the bad. And even outside the church, in the darkest of places, still the light of good flashes for those with eyes to see. They believe it. And so too they look for it.
2. Look for good.
Those Christians who genuinely believe in good become the kind of people who are hopeful for good. Knowing Christ and his promises, they know that good is to come — it’s only a matter of time. They cannot long entertain cynicism, or stand to become Chicken Littles nervous that the sky is falling. Rather, they consider the present moment, with all its uncertainty, turbulence, and change, to be a great time to speak the gospel, press for conversion, plant churches, and pour fresh energy into global mission.
Philippians 4:8, addressed to the whole church, well captures what good pastor-elders model for their congregations in relation to their surrounding unbelieving society:
Whatever is true, whatever is honorable, whatever is just, whatever is pure, whatever is lovely, whatever is commendable, if there is any excellence, if there is anything worthy of praise, think about these things.
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Counseling for Normal Christians
When unsure of what to say, when perplexed and tongue-tied — we can still simply recite God’s own words, knowing that every syllable, rightly handled, holds spiritual power. Yes, caring for each other can be complex, but not so complex that ordinary believers cannot deeply minister to one another through humble Scripture-quoting and earnest prayer. The Bible’s words, not ours, are God-breathed, and sometimes the best counsel is a simple breathing of his breath.
A man in your small group asks you for counsel. For the last few weeks, he has suffered from debilitating back pain. He knows a broken body is an inescapable part of this fallen world, but he also wonders whether God is disciplining him for something. What does he need — a careful probing of the heart for sin, or an assurance that his suffering, though mysterious, is not in vain?
In your accountability group, a brother confesses to looking at pornography again. He says he’s struggling and fighting. He also seems ashamed. But he has seemed ashamed before, with little change. What does he need — a loving but firm warning, or another reminder that there is no condemnation in Christ?
A young woman you know has felt a gathering darkness over heart and mind. In her depression, she has begun to drift from Christian fellowship and other means of grace. She wonders aloud to you if she’s really a Christian. What does she need — an encouragement that God is with her, an exhortation to return to the church, a referral to a medical doctor, or all three?
“Admonish the idle, encourage the fainthearted, help the weak,” the apostle Paul tells us (1 Thessalonians 5:14). But sometimes the fainthearted seem idle and the idle seem fainthearted; sometimes the weak look willful and the willful look weak. If only people came with a sign on the forehead: “Admonishment needed”; “Encouragement, please”; “A little help will do.”
But they don’t. Instead, people come to us just as we come to others: compound and complex, confused and confusing. People are seas, with hearts hidden deep. And God calls us to be divers.
Water from the Deepest Sea
God really does call us, all of us, to discern the deep-down hearts of our brothers and sisters. No, we are not all pastors or professional counselors. But heart work and soul care do not belong to pastors and counselors alone. Paul wrote 1 Thessalonians 5:14 to the whole church, not just its leaders. Which means God calls all of us to admonish, to encourage, to help — and to discern when to do which. He calls all of us to counsel.
And if he calls us to counsel, he calls us to grow in counseling, which often begins with noticing our tendencies to counsel not so well. Perhaps you can relate to a few common faults I fall prey to, at least when left to myself.
Left to myself, I counsel quickly. I may give a show of good listening as you talk, but often I have already finished your sentences and am crafting my response. “Let every person be quick to hear, slow to speak,” James writes (James 1:19). But why should I slow my speech when I already know what to say? So I nod with polite impatience, forgo follow-up questions, and give the answer already waiting on my lips.
Left to myself, I also counsel superficially. “The purpose in a man’s heart is like deep water,” the wise man tells us (Proverbs 20:5), but my natural plumb line is short. Too often, I counsel in the shallows — addressing this behavior, developing a plan for that habit, while the heart still hides in the deeps.
And left to myself, I counsel lopsidedly. Comfort comes easily to my tongue; not so with correction. No doubt, our churches know some who correct others all too easily. Like Eliphaz the Temanite, they struggle to let words for the wind blow away (Job 6:26), but seize them, fix upon them, and fashion their rebuke. They speak confidently. They speak courageously. But like Eliphaz, they do not always speak “what is right” (Job 42:7).
But I usually fall off on the other side. The Puritan John Owen warned of counselors like me at my worst — counselors who “have good words in readiness for all comers,” no matter who the comer may be. We affirm; we encourage; we assure and console and uplift. We reflect a Jesus ever tender, rarely (or never) tough. Owen’s assessment of such counsel was not hopeful: “seldom useful, ofttimes pernicious” (Works of John Owen, 6:568).
So, we seek to grow. We seek to replace our common follies with the slow, deep, well-rounded wisdom of the Spirit. But how?
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Ephesians: Uniting All Things in Christ, Part 2
The unified God has united believers to himself, the church ought now walk worthy of its calling by pursuing a full-orbed unity. This unity does not require uniformity, but it presumes a diversity of opinions, personalities, social roles, and people groups. Because diversity naturally produces friction, the church ought to give particular attention to humble and patient purity, love, wisdom, and spiritual warfare in its pursuit of unity. This is the sort of walk worthy of the calling of the one God, who is Father, Son, and Spirit.
The first half of Ephesians lays out God’s plan for the fullness of time, to unite all things in Christ, things in heaven and things on earth (Eph 1:10). Paul’s doctrine of unity can be summarized in the shape of a capital “I” (in a font with bars across top and bottom). The top horizontal bar represents the unity God has with himself, among the persons of the Trinity. The vertical bar represents the unity between God and his people, brought about by grace through faith. The bottom horizontal bar represents the unity among God’s people that ought to result.
Having followed Paul’s argument in Ephesians 1-3 in the previous post, let’s now walk through Paul’s application of the doctrine of unity within the life of the church.
Diversity Shouldn’t Divide the Church
Paul transitions to application with the urging to walk in a manner worthy of the calling described in the first three chapters (Eph 4:1). And what exactly is a manner of life worthy of the call to unity, in light of God’s plan to unite all things in Christ? It requires humble, gentle, and patient forbearance toward fellow church members (Eph 4:2). Such character arises only from an eager commitment to maintain the unity of the Spirit in the bond of peace (Eph 4:3).
Paul roots the unity of the church, explicitly, to the unity of the Trinity (Eph 4:4-6), which includes a victorious Christ ascending to take his throne while dishing out good gifts to his people. Psalm 68, quoted in Eph 4:8, likens the ascension of the ark of the covenant into Jerusalem to the arrival of God’s glory-cloud on Sinai. And Paul capitalizes on the image to explain how Jesus, the true ark, has entered heaven, the true sanctuary. This king cares enough about the unity of his body that he provides the church with leaders tasked with equipping members to serve one another—all so the community can grow together to maturity, according to the image of Jesus himself (Eph 4:9-14). That theological truth plays out in real life as people speak the truth to one another with love and build up one another in love (Eph 4:15-16).
In short, Eph 4:1-16 teaches that every church member is not required to be the same thing, do the same thing, or think the same thing. It assumes that there are differences among people, requiring patience and loving speech toward one another. In other words, diversity shouldn’t divide the church. But sadly, it often does, so the rest of the letter tells us what to do about that. We must give attention to four key areas, each marked with a renewed exhortation to walk (or, in the last case, to stand — Eph 4:17, 5:1, 5:15, 6:10-13).
Four Areas With Potential for Divisive Behaviors
The first area that requires attention in pursuit of unity is purity (Eph 4:17-32). However, notice that the chief problem of impurity is that it makes people like those who are alienated from—not unified with—God (Eph 4:18). The opposite of building up others in love is to serve oneself in sensuality and greed (Eph 4:19). This is not how you learned Christ! (Eph 4:20). A pure life according to the truth in Jesus requires each church member to do three things with their divisive behaviors:Put off the old self, with its divisive and selfish desires (Eph 4:22).
Get a new way of thinking about how the calling to unity ought to drive your behavior (Eph 4:23).
Put on the new self, which is like God—fully unified with himself and with his body (Eph 4:24).Read More
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