My Intolerant Jesus

Hey.. you know what? I can no longer TOLERATE you INTOLERANT Christians.  

You are un-WOKE, anti-LGBTQ right wingers who are Neanderthal in your treatment of women and her right to.. 'choose'. You are bible thumping, gun owning nut jobs voting blindly Republican every election like lemmings heading off a political cliff.

​The only progressive thought in your life is considering a Progressive Insurance policy.

Ok the above rambling is my 'semi' exaggeration of the average 'progressive' Joe Secular. While I have overstated the views of 'Joe', the negative perception in society and fueled by the media is very real. 

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This whole INTOLERANCE label is concerning me.  I agree when the heart and mind of the church becomes judgmental and become merely legalistic in our words and actions... living breathing CLANGING CYMBALS, 1 Cor 13:1.  

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, and preach His truth even when it is not popular. 
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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 Luke 18:18-23, the woman at the well John 4, and instructed Nicodemus he must be born again John 3.
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.  Without His love Jesus would just another false prophet clanging cymbal. The end result though was the world rejected Jesus and He 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.’

So kind of a reverse affirmation for us when we stand for God's Truth in the face of intolerant secular society to realize we will be hated.  YIKES! If we speak boldly the Bible teaching of SIN, and the need to REPENT then only can mankind find REAL TRUTH & SALVATION.  And again much of this world will hate us.  If the world likes us.. maybe we are wallflower Christians ineffective while blending in with the world.

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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