The Eighth Commandment

I kid you not: This is one of the hardest commandments to keep! In a nutshell, this commandment tells us to assume the best of people, rather than jump to the worst or even the most-likely conclusion. It challenges us to try to understand others' actions in the best possible way, and to defend him or her from that perspective until the evidence forces us to come up with a new "kindest way" to explain things.

If you think this is going to make you look naïve in the eyes of your family, friends and co-workers: You're right! As a Christian, we don't get to look "wise in our own eyes." Our desire is to preserve a place for our neighbor to live and thrive, even when our neighbor is working really hard to disprove our charitable view of his or her behavior.

There is a limit to this, though, isn't there? We aren't called on to lie about our neighbor. If your co-worker, Bill, was arguing with you and your other co-worker, Mary, and Bill was saying things that are inappropriate and being a real jerk right before he stalks off, leaving you starting there with Mary, you do NOT say, "Wow! Bill is a really nice guy and he has a great way of putting things, don't you think?" No. You're best bet is probably not to talk about him behind his back at all! But if you say anything, the best thing to do is "put the best construction" on it: "I wonder what's going on in Bill's life right now that he's so tense? I mean, a lot of what he said was just plain mean. I hope things get better for him soon."

Now suppose Bill ALWAYS acts like that at work. Although you always have recourse to "I wonder what's happing in his life that makes him so tense," it gets harder and harder to ignore that Bill is basically an unpleasant person. But there's a big difference between saying: "Yeah, I have a hard time getting along with Bill, too. I wish he didn't have such a hard time playing nice with people" and "Yeah, Bill is a big jerk. I can't stand him. I wish he'd find a job someplace else." Do you see the difference?