There will be no Presidential debates this election year, but there will be debates aplenty. Already the airwaves are filled with claims, disclaimers, charges and rebuttals as one candidate after another stakes out the most desirable position available. Having taken a position, the defense of that position becomes the mission of the day. The listeners and observers will have to sift through it all to find where the truth ultimately resides.

John Wesley could have been an impressive politician had his loyalties not already been claimed. No doubt about it - Wesley was an argumentative person, a skilled debater, a prolific writer. Conrad Archer, a Wesley historian, tells us that at times he could be downright vicious in attacking some person he felt was "scurrilous and deserving of venom." Yet, for the most part he was conciliatory by nature. He was also logical to a fault and tied to the authority of Scripture completely. In most exchanges with critics he was usually convinced he was right, but willing to be shown where he was wrong.

On one occasion, Wesley accused his debating opponent of using aliases to appear to attack him from different fronts. "What, my good friend, again? [He wrote upon reading a new letter in the paper, signed by another name.] Only a little disguised with a new name and a few scraps of Latin? I hoped, indeed, you had been pretty well satisfied before, but since you desire to hear a little farther from me, I will add a few words and endeavour to set our little controversy in a still clearer light."

Wesley was never one to attack a person personally. Rather he attempted to stick to the issue at hand. He would not refer to his debate opponent as a heretic, though he was often called that himself. Once he had logically refuted a point, Wesley felt the case was closed. Reason was his primary tool, and, as he often pointed out, "any rational person should be able to discern right and wrong from a good logical presentation."

As the political debates warm up, may we be so led by "good logical presentations" that avoid personal attacks and focus clearly on the issues at hand.