I believe that ministers -- in fact Churches -- require a special kind of tolerance in order for a Church to prosper. I once wrote up a list of things which were tolerated or accepted under my ministr(ies). Each of them happened for a reason, and always with explicit agreement of the Church Meeting which is the members. We agreed to tolerate:
• Communist party T-shirts
• People wearing drag
• Minor damage to property
• People ululating
• Children walking in the aisles
• Breast feeding in the pews
• Poor English
OBSERVATION: The last of these items applied to spiritual input in the Church. Ululating was a close call -- one reservation being its religious roots. A few things were not tolerated, for example drunkenness among churchgoers, hijacking services, or screaming children. All in all, the purpose of tolerance was the advancement of the gospel.
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