My INTOLERANT Jesus

Hey.. you know what? I can no longer TOLERATE you INTOLERANT Christians.  You HATE gays, and your neanderthal treatment of women and her right to.. 'choose'. You are all right winged, second ammendment nut jobs voting blindly Republican every election like one big line of lemmings heading off your political cliff. The only progressive thought in your life is considering a Progressive Insurance policy.

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Ok the above rambling is my paraphrase of your average 'progressive' thinking 'Secular Sam'. While I have overstated the views of Secular Sam, BUT the negative perception by the media and secular society is too real. 

This whole INTOLERANCE label is concerning me.  I agree when the heart and mind of the church becomes judgmental we are merely legalistic in our words and actions... living breathing CLANGING CYMBALS.  BUT when we truly love God, we naturally honor Him with obedience in our words and actions. Truth in Love where we do not force our faith on others, BUT in all our ways acknowledge him first. 

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So this all leads me to my INTOLERANT JESUS.  Of course Jesus healed the sick, the blind, the lame, and raised the dead. BUT he also lovingly told TRUTH to a compromised world. Jesus admonished his disciples, spoke frankly to the rich young ruler, and the woman at the well, and instructed Nicodemus he must be born again.  

Jesus also shared clearly the ONLY way to Heaven, "I am the way the truth and the life. No one comes to the Father except by me". John 14:6.  In all his words and actions Jesus was TRUTH IN LOVE.  The end result, the world rejected him and Jesus was crucified by basically the same people who were praising him just 5 days earlier.

Let me leave you with the words of my 'INTOLERANT JESUS' to his disciples in John 15:18-25  18 “If the world hates you, keep in mind that it hated me first. 19 If you belonged to the world, it would love you as its own. As it is, you do not belong to the world, but I have chosen you out of the world. That is why the world hates you. 20 Remember what I told you: ‘A servant is not greater than his master.’ If they persecuted me, they will persecute you also. If they obeyed my teaching, they will obey yours also. 21 They will treat you this way because of my name, for they do not know the one who sent me. 22 If I had not come and spoken to them, they would not be guilty of sin; but now they have no excuse for their sin.23 Whoever hates me hates my Father as well. 24 If I had not done among them the works no one else did, they would not be guilty of sin. As it is, they have seen, and yet they have hated both me and my Father. 25 But this is to fulfill what is written in their Law: ‘They hated me without reason.’

I pray we remember these words as encouragement to stand strong for TRUTH, but but but also to remember to be Truth in Love always.

Blessings

Jeff

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