By Ron Price

Several times in the Bible we are told how God wants us to treat our fellow sojourners on this planet. In three of the Gospels, we find Jesus teaching that we are to love our neighbors as we love ourselves. Paul reiterates this theme several times in his Epistles and adds that we are not to be jealous of, or quarrel with, each other (1 Cor 3:3). Elsewhere he admonishes us to “serve” one another, “submit” to one another, “forgive” one another—I think you get the drift. Though I cannot confirm, I once heard there are 51 “one anothers” in the New Testament.

Hopefully we can agree that how we treat others, believers or not, is important to our Lord. Yet doing unto others as we would have them do unto us is sometimes more easily said than done. All of us have moments when we are not so easy to get along with, times when others won’t be motivated to run for president of our fan club. Most of us also have people in our lives who pose a challenge to living out Christlikeness—people who have an uncanny way of getting under our skin.

If we’re honest we can admit that we have hurt others at times we really didn’t mean to. It’s a fact of life that people who are hurting will hurt others. When we’re not at our best, for whatever reason, others around us will likely be the first to know as we tend to take our frustration or pain out on them. This is well-articulated in the old song lyrics, “You always hurt the ones you love.”

Typically these situations do not occur because we are evil or have poor intentions. When we are hurting we are not as able to control our emotions, our actions, or our words as we might otherwise be.

Well, if that’s true for us, is it possibly also true for those who hurt or mistreat us? Is it possible that when others do us wrong they may not have intended to do so?

That’s where A.G.I. comes in—“Assume Good Intent.” When others hurt us we have two choices: we can react to their hostility or minister to their pain. By practicing A.G.I. we give the other person the benefit of the doubt, we assume that he or she needs our encouragement and support more than our condemnation. This can have a huge benefit when the offending party is a family member, a church member, or some other important person in your life.

Practicing A.G.I. might not always be easy, but please explain someday to Jesus, Paul, Peter, Joseph, or any other stalwart of the Bible that life—and doing the right thing—is supposed to be easy. I doubt you’ll get very far with that argument.

So let me close with an encouragement to frequently read and commit to memory the words of Philippians 2:1-5 that urge us to encourage and support each other. We should live this way not only for the benefit to others, but as the surest path to peace, joy and more satisfying relationships in life.

–Ron Price is a member of the RMC executive committee from Farmington, New Mexico.