good points, both of you! just to clarify: this issue isn't between me and b; it's between me and another person who i assume i'm close to but then you enter into that discussion about motives and questioning what to them seems "okay" and to me seems like "sin." B was just standing up for the point that it's not exactly sin, just dancing really, really close to that line. RaJaR, I liked this statement: "At what point however do we take it upon ourselves to be heard as righteous? I dont think it is our responsibility to convince people of their fallenness so much as it is to point to tangible actions or sin and call it into question." Sometimes it seems I'm in danger of being stubborn and just saying "this is right so you should see it as right too." So, if we're called to be like Jesus, do we get to do stuff like saying, "Get behind me, Satan." I don't feel like I've ever been that direct (or that self-righteous), but maybe I have.... To illustrate this whole discussion, right now I'm listening to the Johnny Cash song "I hung my head." It talks about shame and wanting to be pulled out of a consequence to your own bad behavior but then realizing that God sometimes waits to deliver us from ourselves after we've already suffered.... That God's one mysterious dude.