Have you ever been torpedoed?
A torpedo is a stealth bomb beneath the surface. Stealthy unexpected, then boom. You’re talking about the economy and then;
“You’re a moron.”
“You’re an idiot.”
“Obviously, you’ve never read the Bible.”
These are just a few of the spiritual love notes I’ve received on Facebook.
I try not to answer in kind. Usually, I reply with something like:
“Making it personal and throwing insults won’t help anything, wouldn’t you agree?”
That’s my gentle nudge toward maturity—a Hail Mary pass for civil discourse. But let’s be honest: when people make it personal, finding the truth is rarely the objective. Winning is. Wounding is. Being loudest is. Something has convinced us, these are the scores that matter.
But the subject sinks into the deep abyss beneath what we really care about.
Could it be—we love something more than the truth, even if it costs us the truth itself?
Maybe we love being right.
Or feeling powerful.
Or getting the last word and walking away like we just won an Oscar for Best Smackdown.
Maybe telling ourselves, “I showed him,” fills a need inside.
Social media makes this easy. The veil of Facebook (and let’s be fair, Twitter/X and the comment section of any Christian YouTube video) has become the coliseum for passive-aggressive gladiators.
Truth isn’t the goal. Triumph is. Making it personal is the weapon of choice.
Try to stick to the topic, and you’ll often hear, “What are you afraid of?”—as if staying on subject were a red flag for cowardice.
It’s like punching someone in the mouth and walking away, thinking,
“Well, I sure shut him up.”
You did. But not with truth.
Isn’t that eerily similar to how they “shut Jesus up”?
Look around. Character assassination is the modern language of debate. Political campaigns specialize in it. Legal teams weaponize it. Even my five-year-old once called me a “poopy head” just to prove a point. (And he was wearing a Captain America costume at the time. Powerful combination.)
So here’s a radical thought:
What if we respected each other—even when we disagreed?
What if, in every confrontation about truth, we elevated the virtue of actually getting to the truth… above the vanity of winning?
What if I could say:
“I hadn’t thought of it that way.”
…without it feeling like the end of the world?
That would require humility. And love. And maybe even the Holy Spirit.
But what it wouldn’t require is insults, digs, or drive-by sarcasm.
So next time someone disagrees with you—online or otherwise—try not making it personal. Try staying with the issue. Try loving the truth enough to lose an argument and still walk away smiling.
Just don’t wear a cape while doing it. That look is already taken.