How do we balance bold risk with wise safety? We don’t want to be foolishly daring, nor overly cautious, in our love to others. It’s a dilemma faced by an anonymous young woman. “Dear Pastor John, I am struggling to find balance with serving others. However, sometimes when I approach my wife about certain ideas to help others, she, and historically others (like my pastors and parents), have told me it might be unwise. Why is possibly risking your safety, financial comfort, and ease always considered unwise?
“For example, I met a lady and her two children. They are in a really rough temporary situation pertaining to housing and money. My first instinct is to invite them into our home, free of charge, for as long as they might need. However, my husband said he wants to pray about it, and needs to know more about who she is and her background before we trust her in our home. This is where I struggle. What is there to pray about? Why should I hesitate when I see someone in need, even if I don’t really know them? When does wisdom or safety undermine God-centered trust in our risk-taking?”
I have struggled with this question a lot over the years, partly because of where I live and partly because of trying to understand texts in the Bible. And I don’t want to give the impression that the Bible disregards a father’s calling to protect his family (1 Timothy 5:8), or a disciple’s obedience in fleeing from persecution (Matthew 10:23). But I am going to argue that the overwhelming thrust of the New Testament is that the disciples of Jesus incline from the heart toward meeting needs at the risk of loss more regularly — at least we ought to — than we incline toward staying safe and comfortable by neglecting risky helpfulness.
Or to put it another way, I don’t want to prescribe precisely when love calls for self-protection and when love calls for self-risk, but the burden of the New Testament is to infuse the faith and love that leans toward self-risk rather than toward self-protection. And I suspect the double reason for that is that, on the one hand, we are selfish by nature. And we need — I need, anyway — far more help to break free from that selfishness than I need help with living in sync with it.
And on the other hand, the second of the double reason for why the New Testament leans this way is that the glory of God shines much more brightly in the countercultural, counterintuitive risk-taking of God’s people for the sake of love than it shines in self-protection, which pretty much looks just like the way the unbelieving world would act. Why would they be impressed and give God glory for us acting just like them?
So, the way I would answer the question, “When does wisdom or safety undermine God-centered trust in our risk-taking?” is with these six tests.
watch out for part 2
