When I was in college, Christ Jesus’ teachings began speaking to me in a big way. The divine fire behind them arrested my thought, highlighting the imperative importance of what God had given His Son for the salvation of mankind. Jesus said, “The words that I speak unto you, they are spirit, and they are life” (John 6:63). I glimpsed the inestimable value of teachings that are our very life. God was awakening in me a sincere desire to act on our Master’s commands. And as I studied and prayed to understand and apply Christian Science, including Jesus’ words and works, an opportunity arose to actually do what God requires of us. 

It happened when I was waiting for a commuter train. I was walking up and down the platform in tears, saying to God, Ask me to love anyone but her! I cannot love this woman. The woman was a coworker who seemed to have taken a dislike to me, so much so that I dreaded going to work each morning. She seemed to enjoy making life hard for me.

This situation had been going on for some time. Finally, feeling desperate, I had contacted a Christian Science practitioner for help. I told her my sad story. Expecting her to take my side in this, I couldn’t believe my ears when she asked, “Do you really want to be free?” “Didn’t you hear what I said?” I wanted to say to her. “You will have to love,” she continued. “There is no other way.”

Now, on the train platform, I thought about what she had said, and it became clear that I would actually have to love this coworker. I went over what Jesus says about loving others—that we must do good to them, and pray even for those who make life hard for us.

The needed change of thought about this woman wasn’t accomplished overnight. But eventually she and I became good friends, even occasionally going out to lunch together, and when the time came for her to retire, I realized I would miss her a lot. 

I’ve found that I cannot continue in the study and practice of Christian Science without coming to feel the same reverence for Jesus’ words that Mary Baker Eddy, the Discoverer and Founder of this religion, clearly felt. Among many statements regarding the paramount necessity of living these sacred teachings, she wrote, “Mortals must follow Jesus’ sayings and his demonstrations, which dominate the flesh” (Science and Health with Key to the Scriptures, p. 266).

Following the guidelines Jesus gave us for getting along with our fellow beings “dominate[s] the flesh” not only in terms of physical healing, but also by removing the pride, self-will, self-righteousness, resentment, and other devilish attitudes that make our lives miserable. This enables us to experience the divine healing God intends for mankind. The purpose of Jesus’ unequaled example was not merely to inspire us but to show us how to be free from every form of suffering. He promised, “He that believeth on me, the works that I do shall he do also” (John 14:12).

The purpose of Jesus’ example was not only to inspire us but to show us how to be free from every form of suffering.

Many people gain inspiration and comfort from thinking about the man Jesus. But even more important is to gain a workable understanding of the Christ-power he embodied. The inspired teachings of divine Science give us this understanding and explain how to overcome obstacles to health and well-being in the way Jesus did. They show that underlying Jesus’ words and deeds was eternal, divine law that we all can apply to meet our own and others’ needs.

On the basis of each individual’s eternal likeness to God, Jesus healed all types of troubles. His works vividly illustrated the fact that man as God created him has never fallen from his original, spiritual state of being—that nothing can interfere with our harmony and well-being because we are the reflection of divine Love, God. The Master healed pain, impairment, and apparently hopeless difficulties of every sort through this Christly understanding of divine law. Mrs. Eddy explains, “The Christlike understanding of scientific being and divine healing includes a perfect Principle and idea,—perfect God and perfect man,—as the basis of thought and demonstration” (Science and Health, p. 259).

Through prayer that understands God as the perfect, totally good Principle of the universe, and perceives man, each of us, as Jesus did—as God’s spiritual, whole, and perfect image—we, too, can experience a restoration of harmony. We can experience the genuine well-being that comes from knowing what we really are—the beloved sons and daughters of divine Love. And it makes no difference whether our problem is physical, financial, emotional, or moral. The healing and redeeming power behind Christ Jesus’ teachings is universal.

A friend of mine experienced this. A street child in a developing country from the age of seven, he had a rough start in life. After emigrating to the United States, he got into brawls, drank a lot, and was arrested several times. Then one day as he sat in jail, he noticed a copy of the New Testament someone had left there. His eyes lighted on some words of Jesus, and he could not stop thinking about them. When he got out of jail, he stopped drinking, got a job, and never got into trouble again. From then on, he said, he wanted to live his life the way Jesus taught and expected his followers to live. 

And he has, to an admirable degree. He is a hardworking, honest, wonderful man. I never would have guessed his background, but one Christmas he confided to my husband and me, “I’m not the man I used to be,” and told us his story. Jesus’ teachings literally fulfilled in him these words of Paul: “If any man be in Christ, he is a new creature: old things are passed away; behold, all things are become new” (II Corinthians 5:17).

As I’ve made a day-in, day-out effort to pay close attention to living by the teachings Jesus gave the world, I’ve come to feel more love for the man who spoke them. Jesus said, “If a man love me, he will keep my words: and my Father will love him, and we will come unto him, and make our abode with him” (John 14:23).

I can’t think of anything more wonderful—or needed!