What Does Christian Tolerance Look Like?

Tolerance seems to be a hot-button word these days. I thought for this post I’d explore what it means and what Christian tolerance looks like.

Thought 1

Tolerance and tolerant seem to be such popular words in the media these days. Often they are used side by side with intolerance or intolerant. Religious views, treatment of women, and handling of cultural and international affairs have all been arenas where these words have been thrown around.

According to dictionary.com, some of the more common definitions of tolerance include:

• a fair, objective, and permissive attitude toward those whose opinions, beliefs, practices, racial or ethnic origins, etc., differ from one’s own; freedom from bigotry
• interest in and concern for ideas, opinions, practices, etc., foreign to one’s own; a liberal, undogmatic viewpoint
• the act or capacity of enduring; endurance

Thought 2

In light of all the hullabaloo surrounding tolerance, I was curious whether there were any Biblical examples.

The closest I came was the Jewish community of Berea as described in Acts 17:11–12, The Expanded Bible:

These people were more ·willing to listen [open-minded; fair-minded; noble in character] than the people in Thessalonica. The Bereans ·were eager to hear what Paul and Silas said [eagerly received the word/message] and ·studied [examined] the Scriptures every day to find out if these things were true [to confirm Paul’s teaching was in line with Scripture]. So, many of them believed, as well as ·many [not a few] ·important [prominent; socially high-standing] Greek women and men.

I also found a very strict standard of how to measure whether or not a message is true and good, according to Galatians 1:7–9, The Living Bible:

For there is no other way than the one we showed you; you are being fooled by those who twist and change the truth concerning Christ.

Let God’s curses fall on anyone, including myself, who preaches any other way to be saved than the one we told you about; yes, if an angel comes from heaven and preaches any other message, let him be forever cursed. I will say it again: if anyone preaches any other gospel than the one you welcomed, let God’s curse fall upon him.

Synthesis

Christian tolerance is based on genuine agape love for others. This love for others allows us to respect others enough to politely and actively hear what someone believes in order to understand who the person is and be able to work under the guidance of the Holy Spirit to identify and perform ministry.

That said, it is not absent-minded, open-armed embracing of all ideas as true and noble and worthy of implementation in our lives. Each and every idea should be studied, even scrutinized, against a well-researched translation of the Bible as God’s inspired Word because placing trust in anything other than Truth is a recipe for eternal disaster.