Do I Really Believe in the Power of Love?

…love is as strong as death.

The Bible, Song of Solomon 8:6c, New international version

It’s easy to talk about the power of love, but do I live like I really believe it? 

When I read the following true story, it reminded me of the actual power of love. It both challenged and encouraged me to live more authentically from a place of love. I want to grow in responding to everyone with love, no matter the hatred they cast toward me. I hope this story gives you the strength to respond with love in your life. If you do, you’ll make a better world, and you’ll take another step toward Becoming Yourself. 

At a 1960 lunch counter sit-in protesting segregation in Arlington, Virginia, Quaker peace activist David Hartsough discovered God’s power in the power of nonviolence: 

“Love your enemies . . . do good to those who hate you.” 

I was meditating on those words when I heard a voice behind me say, “Get out of this store in two seconds, or I’m going to stab this through your heart.” I glanced behind me at a man with the most terrible look of hatred I had ever seen. His eyes blazed, his jaw quivered, and his shaking hand held a switchblade—about half an inch from my heart. . . .

I turned around and tried my best to smile. Looking him in the eye, I said to him, “Friend, do what you believe is right, and I will still try to love you.” Both his jaw and his hand dropped. Miraculously, he turned away and walked out of the store.

That was the most powerful experience of my twenty years of life. It confirmed my belief in the power of love, the power of goodness, the power of God working through us to overcome hatred and violence. I had a profound sense that nonviolence really works. At that moment, nonviolence became much more than a philosophical idea or a tactic that had once made a difference in Gandhi’s India. It became the way I wanted to relate to other human beings, a way of life, a way of working for change.

My response had touched something in my accuser. He had seen me as an enemy. But through my response, I believe I became a human being to him. The humanity in each of us touched.

David Hartsough with Joyce Hollyday, Waging Peace: Global Adventures of a Lifelong Activist (Oakland, CA: PM Press, 2014), 19, 20. As shared in the Oct 23, 2022 Daily Meditation from the Center for Action and Contemplation (cac.org).