I am pro-tolerance! I would hate for America to return to an age of intolerance. Bigotry is awful! As is prejudice, hate, and narrowmindedness (if I could so use that word). Look at all the different people up above. They all smile. But they are all different. In general, there is nothing wrong with it. There must be tolerance if a society is to survive.
But my question is how does tolerance and the expression of faith work together. Jacob Jenkins (or J. Jacob Jenkins...you know that after writing a book one has to include a rarely used initial in order to bleed credibility) has a book that deals with seven lifeless sins. One of them is tolerance. He shares a dream that he later confesses was no real dream but the thought of it becoming true was surely a nightmare. (Stay with me now...)
In short, the hypothetical dream involved his death. But he was allowed to witness his own funeral and this was not the scary part. The scary part came when everyone who spoke about him referred to him being NICE. This was his nightmare. He woke in a sweat, not because he felt he was looking into the immediate future or that his wife was smiling or something. Rather, he could see that the path his life was on would only result in his close friends and his family referring to him as NICE! Only NICE! Not dangerous, risky, brave, or unpredictable. Just NICE! It reminded of me Dallas Willard's quote that "Jesus was more than just nice...he was brilliant."
It seems that Christians, especially here in America, have placed niceness upon such a pedestal that it has become the ultimate goal in life. What ever happened to the scandalous offense of the gospel? Does the gospel mess up people's life anymore? Maybe Stanley Hauerwas is right when he claims that "cynicism is a virtue." Haurewas even found it within himself to give a half compliment to the fundamentalist Southern Baptist preachers. He proclaimed once that although their meanness does not often resemble the love of Christ, at least the @*%# stand up for something.
My point is, and I follow Jenkins' line of thought, that we are all too afraid of offending another person. Congenial Christianity says, "Don't offend anyone...just tolerate." Toleration is surely Christian but is it possible that the type of toleration that has swept through out country now taking the sting out of the gospel. Has relativity consumed the country in such a way that it doesn't tolerate room for truth. (And now you free to ask..."But what issss truth?) John Stott said, "truth becomes hard if it is not softened by love; love becomes soft if it is not strengthened by truth." I remember when I merely mentioned this to a group of teenagers. They looked at me like I had horns coming out of my head when I brought up falling in love with Christ so much that they consider their beliefs to be special. Our interpretation of God is too safe. Our interpretation of Jesus' life is one of niceness. We must respect others faith, lifestyle, and creed but we need not throw away the scandalous nature of our own.
