Wolves and Sheep

So, I have a thought about how we, the Church, deal with false teaching. It seems that we have a few options when false teaching comes out:
1. We can calmly confront the false teacher and try to bring him/her back into orthodoxy
2. We can vigorously and publicly confront it and correct it
3. We can ignore it
I am sure that there are more options, but I am just thinking of these three right now.

But let me ask this: Is there a time and place for each of these?

Let's think, for instance, about a pastor who begins to preach universalism. It seems, at least to me, that the Christian community should proceed with option #1, and confront him privately. If he repents, he could then publicly correct his own error. If he does not repent, then something would need to be done publicly so that the Christian community could be led. That would be option #2. In this scenario, option #3 does not seem adequate.

Does it ever seem adequate, however? Is there ever a time to simply ignore?

I want to suggest that there may be. And here is my reasoning.

Recently this book called "A New Earth" made a big splash because Oprah has promoted it. The book deals with self-awakening. It uses the Bible, and also a lot of Buddhism and other religious writings, to support the idea that each person must awake within, and that this awakening will bring about (for lack of a better description) the next great step in the evolution of mankind. I super-skimmed the book yesterday at Borders because it has been in the news and all over the book stores.
Now, let me ask a question: Is this book false teaching? Are Oprah and Eckhart Tolle false teachers?
Some of you may feel like this is a silly question. You are thinking, "Of course they are. What they teach is clearly false. In that sense, yes, they are certainly false teachers.
Let me ask another question: Should we rail against Oprah and Tolle from our pulpits? Again, some of you may think that we should, and I respect your opinion. Here is mine: Oprah and Tolle should not be the main targets of the Church correcting false teaching publicly. Why not? Because they are not claiming to be part of the Church. They are not claiming Christ. I am not saying that I am not alarmed at their teaching, or that I don't totally disagree with it. I am alarmed, and I do disagree. But then I think, "What do I expect? They aren't Christians. Why am I surprised?" Oprah and Tolle are not wolves in sheep's clothing. By that I am not saying that they are not wolves. I am simply saying that they aren't wearing sheep's clothing. It should not be hard for us to see them as wolves.
Why would we be surprised when unbelievers put forth a worldview that is contrary to the Christian worldview? This should be expected.
So, who should be the main target when the Church seeks to correct false teaching and false teachers? Well, it certainly seems to me that the target should be those who claim the name of Christ. These are the true false teachers. Tolle is saying that the church (and the apostle for that matter) have totally misunderstood Jesus' teaching. This puts him in the category of an overt non-Christian. Other people are teaching falsely, but claim to be orthodox. This is where the real problem is.
Now, some of you are going to say, "But Christians are being led astray by Oprah and Tolle." I am not unaware of this. This is a problem. But my question is, Whose fault is it if Christians are led astray by overtly non-Christian false teachers? I say that it is the fault of the Christian, and the fault of the Church. Oprah and Tolle will answer to God, and they have some culpability. But frankly, we should know better. If Christians are looking to Oprah for guidance, then the real problem is not Oprah. The real problem is us. Our message should not be: Oprah has gone off the deep end with this one. Our message should be, Why would you be listening to Oprah? She is not presenting a Christian worldview. If you are going to watch her show, watch with the recognition that she is not presenting reality at the Bible describes it to us.

So, should we warn Christians against this book and others like it? Sure. Especially if certain people seem to be straying toward these books. I just think we have a bigger problem than exposing individual books and people who present false teaching from outside the Church. Our bigger problem is to learn and teach how to discern and how to look in the right places for guidance.

Anyway, those are my thoughts. Feel free to let me know about yours.