The ugly face of intolorance

They listened to him up to this statement, and then they raised their voices and said, “Away with such a fellow from the earth, for he should not be allowed to live!”  Acts 22:22

Intolerance is not new to our times...

In Acts 21, we see Paul journeying to Jerusalem. His friends had heard rumors of a plan to assault him when he arrived in Jerusalem so they begged Paul not to be stubborn and persist in going. But Paul wouldn’t budge. He asked “Why all this hysteria? Why do you insist on making a scene and making it even harder for me? You’re looking at this backward. The issue in Jerusalem is not what they do to me, whether arrest or murder, but what the Master Jesus does through my obedience. Can’t you see that?” 

Some Jews from around Ephesus spotted him in the Temple. At once they turned the place upside-down. They grabbed Paul and started yelling at the top of their lungs, “Help! You Israelites, help! This is the man who is going all over the world telling lies against us and our religion and this place. He’s even brought Greeks in here and defiled this holy place.” What had happened was that they had seen Paul and Trophimus, the Ephesian Greek, walking together in the city and had just assumed that he had also taken him to the Temple and shown him around.

Paul did his best to explain himself but the mob still wanted him dead. Not for committing any crimes but , for simply doing things they deemed unacceptable. They listened to him briefly, and then they raised their voices and said, “Away with such a fellow from the earth, for he should not be allowed to live!”

It was ugly then, it's ugly today...

We observe a lot of this intolerance. It is no more acceptable today than it was then. My reminder, for believers, is this: which side of this Biblical story would you prefer to have been on? Don't be fooled into believing that somehow the issues today are different. Refusal to join in the anarchy may make us unpopular but, as Paul said, "The issue in Jerusalem is not what they do to us, whether arrest or murder, but what the Master Jesus does through our obedience". 

Can’t you see that?” 

Live boldly out there today...