Tolerance: The Good, the Bad, and the Ugly | Part 1

1:22 How are we to respond to a world that abides by this practice? If you have your Bible, turn to Matthew chapter 7, as Adrian Rogers gives insight on tolerance, the good, the bad, and the ugly. The new religion in America is tolerance. Tolerance. It used to be that the best-known verse was John 3.16, but no longer. The verse that people will quote to you almost more than any other verse is Matthew 7, 1, judge not that you be not judged. And today, the only sin in America is to call sin, sin. I'm going to be speaking today on this subject, tolerance, the good, the bad, and the ugly. Now, tolerance, as we learned it, as we grew up with it, is a good word. I'll call it the old tolerance. Let me tell you what Webster said that tolerance was and what tolerance is. Webster said to recognize and respect others' beliefs, practices, etc., without sharing them and to bear or put up with someone or something not especially liked.

2:48 That's what tolerance is, and that's a good virtue. The children were studying the Ten commandments. They said, now apply these boys and girls to living at home. What commandment would apply to living with brothers and sisters? A little boy lifted his hand and said, thou shalt not kill. The things at home we have to tolerate. We don't always like them. The things at work we have to tolerate. There are many things in society that we do not approve of, believe in, but we tolerate. There are many other kinds of beliefs that we do not share, but we tolerate, and we ought to tolerate. That is good tolerance. But there is a different kind of tolerance that's come today that has become the new religion in America. And it does not simply mean that we put up with, we bear, or we forbear. It is an uncritical tolerance that accepts all truth as equal. That is, you cannot say today, this is right and that is wrong. If you do that, you are intolerant. And to be intolerant is the great sin in America it a day. Now obviously we should respect all people and if we disagree with them we should live with them as much as possible peaceably. We must hold true to our faith.

4:24 I would not force my faith on anybody if I could and I couldn't if I would. I believe in absolute total freedom to choose in religious things. But there is an uncritical tolerance that our boys and girls are being taught in school and you need to understand this. this uncritical tolerance, listen, that accepts all truths as equal. There used to be a time when you preached and you would preach on the inerrancy of the Word of God or the virgin birth or the bodily resurrection. Someone would say, I don't agree with that. And you could argue. And you could discuss. And you could philosophize. And you can take the Word of God and other sources and go back and forth, trying to determine what is true and what is not true. But that's not so today.

5:19 If you were to tell somebody today, I believe in the virgin birth, I believe in the absolute sinless deity of the Lord Jesus Christ, I believe in His vicarious death upon the cross, today, with a new tolerance, you would not be argued with. they would say, that's wonderful. That's your truth. Now let me tell you my truth. And when you get down to it, there is no fixed standard for anybody's truth. All truths today are considered equal. Now, the old tolerance says that people have a right to their opinions. The new tolerance says all opinions are right. And so if you say Jesus Christ is the only way, you're in trouble. If you say that there is a fixed standard of right and wrong, then today you're going to be looked down as an ogre, a sinner, and intolerant.

6:28 The new tolerance says we're not merely to allow, listen, We're not merely to allow. We are to endorse all truths as morally equivalent. The new tolerance doesn't say we are to forbear. The new tolerance says we are to prove. And therefore your children and our children are being put into classes today, and I'm not exaggerating, sensitivity classes, where they're taught that sexual preference, one sexual preference, as over against another sexual preference, is just a matter of equality, and we're to prove all sexual preference. One form of marriage as over against another so-called form of marriage, for example, two people of the same sex.

7:25 All of these things are to be looked upon as morally equivalent. And we're taught now to accept under the guise of tolerance these things. Now let's look at the Word of God. Matthew chapter 7 verse 1. I told you that Matthew chapter 7 verse 1 is perhaps the most quoted verse today. And if you were to say this is right or this is wrong, someone would say, Jesus said. Thou shalt not judge. Well, let's read it. Read it in context. Judge not, that ye be not judged. For with what judgment ye judge, ye shall be judged. And with what measure ye meet, it shall be measured to you again. And why beholdest thou the mote that is in thy brother's eye, and considereth not the beam that is in thine own eye?

8:26 Or how wilt thou say to thy brother, Let me pull out the mote out of thine eye. And the mote here means like a speck of sawdust. And behold, a beam, that is a log, is in thine own eye, thou hypocrite. First cast out the beam out of thine own eye, and then thou shalt see clearly to cast the mote out of thy brother's eye. Give not that which is holy unto the dogs, neither cast ye your pearls before swine lest they trample them under their feet and turn again and rend you. The three words I want you to keep in your heart and in your mind as we study the word of God this morning. The first word is the word discriminate. The second is the word tolerate. And the last word is the word to examine.

9:23 So these three words, discrimination, toleration, examination, are the backbone, the spine of what I want to say today. As I talk to you about tolerance, the good, the bad, and the ugly. Now there should be, number one, there should be a time of discrimination. Now, discrimination has become an ugly word, but it's not always ugly. If you don't teach your children to discriminate, you have failed as a father or a mother. To discriminate means to see what is good and to see what is bad. So discrimination is simply evaluation, elimination, appropriation. I evaluate, this is good and this is bad.

10:20 I eliminate, I turn from that which is bad, I appropriate, I choose that which is good. Now people say that Jesus said we're not to judge. May I tell you frankly, clearly, plainly, that is not so. Jesus taught us to judge. Let me give you some scripture now where Jesus very clearly and very plainly teaches us to judge. John chapter 7 and verse 24, judge not according to the appearance, but judge righteous judgment. Don't tell me that Jesus said not to judge. He says judge righteous judgment. And then in Matthew chapter 7, this same chapter again, verses 15 and following.

11:18 Beware of false prophets, which come to you in sheep's clothing, but inwardly they are ravening wolves. Ye shall know them by their fruits. Do men gather grapes or thorns or figs or thistles? What's he saying? You can't gather grapes from thorns and figs from thistles. You just can't do that. Now what he is saying is you have to learn that there is a difference between right and wrong. In the same context where our Lord says, judge not that you be not judged, he said, don't give that which is holy to dogs.

12:02 Don't cast your pearls before swine. Sounds to me like you have to discriminate To find out where the dogs and the hogs are Who they are What they are The Bible clearly and plainly teaches discrimination Let me give you some verses outside of the context 1 Corinthians 2 verse 15 He that is spiritual Judgeth all things Are you spiritual? Then you're going to learn to judge all things. The word here, judge, comes from the word krino, and it has a number of different meanings. It can mean to separate. It can mean to choose. It can mean to select. It can mean to determine.

12:55 It can mean to condemn. And the meaning must be determined by the context. And so when the Bible says, He that is spiritual judges all things. The word here is He discerns. He understands. He sees through. He makes an evaluation. He makes a discrimination. He judges all things. 1 John 4, again the same idea, beloved, believe not every spirit, but try the spirits. Test the spirits. whether they are of God. Don't go around with pudding between your ears saying, well, I'm not going to say anything is right or anything is wrong because Jesus said not to judge. To the contrary, Jesus said, judge righteous judgment.

13:52 He that is spiritual judgeth all things. Now, you see, there's a difference between your personal evaluation of things and the Word of God. For example, if I were to say, from myself to kin, there is 15 feet right now. That would be about right, but it wouldn't be exact. But if I were to take a tape measure and measure from here to there and say it's 15 feet and 6 inches, then that's not an evaluation and a judgment that comes out of my own heart and mind. That is a measurement. Now, there's certain things that are right and there's certain things that are wrong. Now, listen to me very carefully. I know they're right and wrong because of God's yardstick, the Bible. It's not my own opinion.

14:48 Listen to me. Adultery is wrong because God says so. Fornication is wrong because God said so. Sodomy is wrong because God says so. Stealing is wrong because God says so. Lying is wrong because God says so. Drunkenness is wrong because God said so. we have God's ten commandments these are measurements today our world hates moral absolutes our world hates for anybody to say this is right and this is wrong and if you confront society with the kind of preaching I'm doing today people will call me and believe it or not they do, bigoted.

15:47 Can you imagine that? Sweet as I am. Bigoted, narrow, prejudicial, arrogant, self-centered, narrow-minded. That's what we'd be called. I'm telling you, ladies and gentlemen, we need to teach our boys and girls there is a right and there is a wrong. Now, some people call that kind of talk unloving. But contrary, to fail to lift up your voice like a trumpet and show my people their sin is unloving, put in your margin Leviticus 19 verse 17, listen, thou shall not hate thy brother in thine heart, rebuke thy neighbor, and not suffer sin upon him. Now what's he saying? He's saying that to rebuke sin is loving.

16:45 To fail to rebuke sin is hate. Love says that we must speak clearly. The preacher who loves is not the preacher who glosses over sin. The preacher who loves is one who speaks clearly. So the first point is simply this. There is a time where we have a discrimination. That is, we look at life and we discriminate according to the word of God. This is right and this is wrong. We make that discrimination and after that discrimination, then there's an appropriation. We choose that which is right. There is an elimination. We refuse that which is wrong. Now here, let's shift gears. And not only is there a time for discrimination, toleration, but there is a time for toleration. I'm talking about good old-fashioned toleration. Now, when our Lord here says, judge not, let you be not judged, He's talking about a person being intolerant of faults in other people.

17:54 He's not saying that we deny faults in other people. As a matter of fact, He said, once we get the log out of our own eye, we'll see more clearly how to get the speck out of our brother's eye. He's not saying there's no speck. He's not saying it doesn't need to be taken away. But what he is saying is you are forbidden, you are forbidden to exercise unmerciful, self-righteous condemnation of another person, hypocritical judgment, especially when you yourself are guilty of doing the same thing. Let me give you another verse that I think is a good commentary on Matthew 7 verse 1, also from the Gospels, Luke chapter 6, verses 36 and 37. Be ye therefore merciful, as your Father also is merciful. Judge not, and ye shall not be judged. Condemn not, and ye shall not be condemned.

18:51 Forgive, and ye shall be forgiven. Now this is simply an extrapolation of Matthew 7, verse 1. What he's saying is, if I have some problems, Notice the if. I do. I've got some big ones. I need your mercy. I need your help. I need your forgiveness. I need your love. I need your support. I don't need your judgment. I don't need your condemnation. That doesn't mean I expect you to say, oh, whatever you're doing is all right, if what I'm doing is not all right. if it is sin, you need to lovingly rebuke me, but you have no right to judge me. Number one, because you haven't got what it takes to judge me. I don't have what it takes to judge you.

19:44 Even the Father judgeth no man, but hath committed all judgment to the Son. When you judge other people without mercy, not whether or not what they're doing is right or wrong, But when you judge them in a condemning way, in an unmerciful way, what you're doing is usurping the rights and the proactives of the Lord Jesus Christ. And what you're also doing is you are acting like the devil. The Bible tells us that it is the devil who is the accuser of the brethren. Don't go around judging other people, condemning other people, examining their motive. There is no one big enough, no one just enough, no one loving enough to judge us but God himself. And surely the judge of all heaven and earth will do right.

20:44 Now why is it that we tend to have this merciless judgment? Why is it that we tend to be intolerable when we ought to tolerate other people lovingly? Well, one of the reasons, very frankly, is the sin that's in our own hearts and in our lives. That's what Jesus Christ is talking about here. He said, you're looking for a speck of sawdust in your brother's eye, and you've got a saw log in your own eye. You are a hypocrite. Now, why do we see fault in other people? It's a form of projection many times. Because of the sin that's in our own lives, we hope somehow to make ourselves better by condemning somebody else that if we pull them down, we've pulled ourselves up just a little bit.

21:38 And therefore, a person to see a speck of dust in somebody's eye has to be looking pretty close. Wouldn't you agree? Especially if he's got a saw log in his own eye. What he is seeing is what he is looking for, hoping to find. It's amazing what people find. You will get what you look for. You see, there are people who are just simply looking for a speck in somebody else's eye because they have a log in their own eye. And we need to examine ourselves. That's the reason the Lord tells us so much that we're to be merciful. Because we are the ones that...