Such a debater never concedes a point, even when you have skewered him. As I say, he'd had this discussion before. The technique of such debaters is to keep changing the subject.

He said, "I see you have a Bible there." "Yes, sir."

"You know there's not a word in the Bible against slavery."

I said, "Are you serious?"

He said, "Give me one verse in all the Bible that says slavery is wrong."

What happened next took all of two or three seconds, but it seemed like a week. My mind was whirring trying to come up with just the right scripture. In college, I'd done a term paper for a Civil War history class on just this subject, on correspondence between two preachers, one in the north and one in the south.  I knew there is no text saying, "Thou shalt have no slaves." But the concept is opposed to everything the Lord Jesus taught.

The Lord who "came to set the captives free" (Luke 4:18) surely would not condone slave-holding among His followers.

While I was scrambling, trying to come up with an answer, the second fellow at the table turned and answered his friend.

He said, "How about 'Thou shalt love thy neighbor as thyself'?"

I pounded the table. "Great answer! Great answer!"

It was the perfect answer  (I was more than a little relieved).

When the antagonist tried to change the subject—such a person will never admit to any flaw in their thinking; ignorance and arrogance often go hand in hand—I said, "Sir, you'll have to excuse me. I have some reading I have to do."

I never read another word, but sat there thinking what a powerful thing had just happened here. A verse of Scripture, a truth the Lord Jesus called the second greatest commandment, found in Leviticus 19:18 and in Matthew 22:39, had just been taken off the mantle where I'd elevated it and then promptly forgotten about it, and dusted off and shown to be highly relevant to today's issues.

A few weeks later, when the sheriff of our parish in suburban New Orleans challenged me to come up with a scripture to justify my opposition to gambling casinos, I said, "Thou shalt love thy neighbor as thyself." He had no answer.

Someone has pointed out that cliches become cliches for good reason: They embody universal truths. Likewise, the widely known and well-loved texts of Scripture did not become such accidentally. They deserve the full treatment from the Lord's teachers and preachers, something many of us have not been giving them.

But these texts deserve to be treated carefully and lovingly. Lives hang in the balance.

Dr. Joe McKeever writes from the vantage point of more than 60 years as a disciple of Jesus, more than 50 years preaching His gospel, and more than 40 years of cartooning for every imaginable Christian publication.

For the original article, visit joemckeever.com.

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