Non-denominational is the way to go I think BUT

[candle glow]

Hmm, okay. I'm not against judgment, but I think it must be fair judgment. You talk about "breaking others down". I'm not totally against that, since Jesus talked about people falling on the stone (of his teachings) and being broken.

However, I think it takes some fairly sincere prompting to make sure that the breaking really does happen as a response to Jesus' teachings/love.

 

[xXMikHaelXx]

"Judge not and you will not be judged, do not condemn and you will not be condemned."

If you're going around breaking people down on behalf of Jesus then there is some major issue there. That is not your job as a Christian - that is the job of God.

Now, you can lovingly correct your brothers and sisters but make sure you're in a place to do so.

Now, we all have tempers and we can say things that end up breaking someone down but that should never be our intentions all the time and in those times we should try to control our emotion.

I guess I am saying - I'm not perfect I sometimes break someone down out of frustration - but I don't go around looking for people to break down on behalf of Jesus - like I said, not my job.

 

[candle glow]

Thanks for clarifying that, Mikhael. Sometimes I find it easy to understand you and sometimes I just don't know what the heck you are saying! ^.^

I think the "breaking" can (and probably should) happen quite naturally if we are genuinely representing the teachings of Jesus, and if the people are willing to hear what we have to say about obedience to Jesus.

I've experienced a lot of frustration with knowing how to present the teachings of Jesus in a way which will "break" people without crushing them. It's so difficult to do from the imperfect perspective of humanity!

I think I need a lot more practice with taking a genuine interest in people, personally, rather than depending so much on "the truth of the teachings". I think it's the dilemma of the pastor vs the teacher approach. The teacher just shoots out the truth for the sake of preaching the truth whereas the pastor is more likely to take an interest in the sinner's personal life and try to work through those problems more patiently.