Mary Baker Eddy wrote a wonderful article called “Love Your Enemies” (see Miscellaneous Writings 1883–1896, pp. 8–13). It has come to my aid so many times when I have been faced with hatred, jealousy, or condemnation from others in my workplace, from friends, or from within my own family. One sentence always stands out to me: “Simply count your enemy to be that which defiles, defaces, and dethrones the Christ-image that you should reflect” (p. 8). This sentence always reminds me that my enemy is never someone “out there” to be afraid of, but my own thoughts of resentment, animosity, and fear.
I had a beautiful demonstration of this while working in a very large furniture store in the state where I lived. One very busy day a co-worker asked me to help him out by taking a woman around to look at different living room furniture groupings. At the time, he was working with another customer who needed his full attention, and he had noticed that my customers had left. I was very happy to do this for him.
As I walked through the store showing the woman different styles of furniture, fabrics, and so forth, she kept degrading my suggestions and making unkind comments to me. It got so bad that I was ready to send her back to my co-worker. Although I had had enough of the way she was acting, and was getting very critical toward her, I knew I must love this woman no matter what.
