What Is Wrong With Debating? 
 

by Aubrey Belue

That is a question I have heard “debated” for as long as I have tried to preach the gospel. Besides the obvious, that it has a “ bad name” among many brethren today, what is different from “contending,”, “arguing” and “disputing” – all of which are scriptural descriptions of appropriate interaction (when called for) between those who profess to share a “love of the truth”? 

Is it too confrontational? (It is hard to imagine being more “confrontational” than the spirit which is demanded when there are those “whose mouths must be stopped” because they are “vain talkers and deceivers” who “teach things they ought not” -- Titus 1:9-11)

Does it polarize the two “sides”? (How is that not a good thing, at least in the sense of clarifying the contrast between “light and darkness”; “Christ and Belial”; “righteousness and unrighteousness”? Scripturally, there ARE “two sides” and God (at least) wants no confusion between the two. We certainly don’t want to be seen as “standing on the other side”!) 

Does it “bring out the carnal spirit”? (I submit, you cannot “bring out” anything that is not already there! Is this not a reaction those who do not want the truth have to it when challenged with it? What was different regarding the message. or even the manner of delivery, which was delivered on Pentecost (Acts 2) from that given by Stephen to his audience (Acts 7)?—conversely, often it is only when such circumstances develop that a person’s potential for either good or bad spirit is exposed – 1 Cor 11:19)

Does it cast the “church of Christ” in a bad light? Brethren, that “train has done left the station”! Back as far as the New Testament, Christians were considered a “sect” and were universally stigmatized for “turning the world upside down”. 

I have been trying to preach and defend gospel truth for 65 years, and have not yet found a way to “contend” without contending; to “argue” without arguing, and “dispute” without disputing!
Without doubt, belligerence, haughtiness, or mean spiritedness happen – and leave a bad taste in our mouths.

But after all is said and done, if we DON’T advance “sound doctrine” both “in season and out of season” by all the means assigned to us, we leave a “gap in the wall”, and the devil will surely find it! 

I’ll tell you one thing debating does do – drawing up a precise difference between opposing views, and being held to a common standard of proof will make it harder for the “slick willies” among us to talk themselves out of the spiritual holes they have dug for themselves and the brethren! – and that might help explain why it is not their favorite thing.

 

Other Articles by Aubrey Belue

My Dreams Have Shrunk
A Hard Lesson to Learn
Get Thee Behind Me Satan
Two Visions of the Church
The Exculpatory Rule
It's Not How You Feel