If tolerance is your highest aim, then what do you no longer tolerate?

 

Tolerance sounds like such a good thing. And it can be in certain circumstances. The difficult thing with tolerance is that it can’t be your only objective. Tolerance just by itself will lead to nothing but a society without standards.

I’ve watched and paid attention to our society. I understand the idea of not judging people. But it’s gotten to the point that even judging a person’s actions has come to be verboten. (I’m sorry, I just felt like inserting some German in there. I took German in High School and I never get to use it. If you aren’t familiar with German, it just means forbidden.) Anyway, we seem to never fail to take something that’s good, within certain bounds, and take it to the point of being ridiculous. The prevailing theme seems to be that we tolerate almost anything but intolerance. And this all falls within the realm of, “You can do whatever you want as long as you aren’t hurting anyone else.” So, those seem to be the new standards of today. But if intolerance is no longer tolerated, that covers a broad spectrum of thoughts, actions, and behaviors. It’s scary to think of all the things that could involve. Tolerance with no bounds isn’t any kind of high ideal to try to achieve.

The thing is that people can use words like tolerance, they can say, “I’m tolerant”, and it sounds so morally superior. The fact of the matter is that people that say this kind of thing end up allowing all but the worst kinds of behavior with only one criteria in mind. And it’s the criteria that says, “It’s OK as long as it’s not hurting someone else.” So, they end up allowing the worst kind of moral behavior up until the point of hurting someone else. But what they don’t understand is that moral degradation won’t stop at the point of hurting other people. Once allowed, it will inevitably lead to its forgone conclusion: the complete dissolution of society. That’s the deceptive thing about evil. Once it’s allowed, if it’s not placed in check, it will slowly dissolve what moral fabric remains until there’s nothing left. That’s why you need a higher moral standard than what this criteria allows. We have boundaries for everything else in life. Why are people so easily convinced that boundaries apply to everything except moral behavior?

Many people think that outright evil acts are the worst kind of wrong. But toleration of evil can be the worst kind of wrong. There’s that saying that goes, “The only thing necessary for the triumph of evil is for good men to do nothing.” Our morals need guidelines just as much as my car needs lines on either side to direct me in the right direction. This is so basic, yet so easily overlooked. I wouldn’t tolerate a driver repeatedly crossing over those lines. So, we shouldn’t tolerate that in morals either. Evil needs to be expressly labelled as such. Otherwise, we can eventually begin to mistake evil for good.

…Let’s go deeper

Whether some in this world like to believe it or not, there is a moral right and wrong. Those things are clearly labelled and set out for us in the Bible. God determines and lets us plainly know what those things are. Just like any other civil law we follow, God has given us a law and guiding principles.
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AV Matthew 9:36: “But when he saw the multitudes, he was moved with compassion on them, because they fainted, and were scattered abroad, as sheep having no shepherd.” I never paid much attention to this in this verse before, but it says here that Jesus had compassion on the multitude because they were ‘as sheep having no shepherd’. If you think about it, that is something to be pitied. How do people know the right direction without someone to guide them? Without a set of moral principles, how do people keep from getting themselves into trouble? God’s laws are meant to keep us out of trouble. They are there because He loves us and not because He’s trying to keep something from us. And Jesus is the shepherd of our souls.

AV Isaiah 5:20: “Woe unto them that call evil good, and good evil; that put darkness for light, and light for darkness; that put bitter for sweet, and sweet for bitter!” The Bible talks about this happening in the last days. And this is much of what we are seeing today. The very idea of good is being turned on its head. The guiding principles have been removed, so now there’s no one to determine what’s what anymore. Many in this world are as sheep without a shepherd. But it’s because they don’t want a shepherd. They have rejected the Great Shepherd. And when you reject Him, there’s nothing left to guide you. You have no compass, because He is true north.

AV Psalms 32:8: “I will instruct thee and teach thee in the way which thou shalt go: I will guide thee with mine eye.” This is God’s word to us, if we will allow Him to do so. God will guide and direct us. Since He is good and in Him there is no darkness at all, we can rely and depend on His guidance. When we submit, I believe God will counsel and direct us, like a teacher in a class. So, when we start out on the straight and narrow path He will correct us and teach us when we get off track. He will keep His eye on us.
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AV John 16:13: “Howbeit when he, the Spirit of truth, is come, he will guide you into all truth: for he shall not speak of himself; but whatsoever he shall hear, [that] shall he speak: and he will shew you things to come.” The Holy Spirit guides and directs us into all truth. The only thing we will hear from the Holy Spirit is truth. Not only that, He will show us things we need to know. He will even show us things to come in the future and things we need to prepare for.

AV John 8:32: “And ye shall know the truth, and the truth shall make you free.” Once we know the truth we are made free. The reason is because evil puts you in bondage, but knowledge of truth is freeing. Evil is not the opposite of good. It is merely the absence of that which is good. That’s why morals degrade when that which is good is removed. That’s why we need Jesus. He’s wanting to be our Great Shepherd. But we have to allow Him to be. He wants us to give up control so that He can show us that He is the way, the truth, and the life.

AV Matthew 9:36: “But when he saw the multitudes, he was moved with compassion on them, because they fainted, and were scattered abroad, as sheep having no shepherd.”

AV Isaiah 5:20: “Woe unto them that call evil good, and good evil; that put darkness for light, and light for darkness; that put bitter for sweet, and sweet for bitter!”

AV Psalms 32:8: “I will instruct thee and teach thee in the way which thou shalt go: I will guide thee with mine eye.”

AV John 16:13: “Howbeit when he, the Spirit of truth, is come, he will guide you into all truth: for he shall not speak of himself; but whatsoever he shall hear, [that] shall he speak: and he will shew you things to come.”

AV John 8:32: “And ye shall know the truth, and the truth shall make you free.”

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