"Risk Exposure" and the Church, Part 1

In our last post, we explored the contradiction between suburban values and the dangerous mission given to the church by our Leader. Clearly, the Lion of Judah never intended for his followers to be identified by suburban, consumeristic ideals such as convenience, comfort, and security.

Just as for any other living body, the church cannot truly thrive unless it is regularly exposed to risk, inconvenience, and danger. A simple look at the natural world shows that any organism must be exposed to such challenges to respond properly and adapt to challenges from outside. A closed, artificial environment that is built on the elimination of these dangers cannot prepare the organism for the challenges that are to come.

Take, for example, the modern medical phenomenon of childhood allergies. The prevalence of allergies has reached over 50% in American children over the last several years. Many hypotheses have been offered, but one of the most compelling arguments is the overimmunization of children. Many allergists argue that if a child’s immune system is never exposed to these illnesses but is always given external immunity, one can expect a high prevalence of allergies in those subjects. An immune system that has not learned to mount its own defenses cannot be expected to function properly. Contrast this phenomenon with children raised on a farm or with pets in the home, who have shown in repeated studies to have far less prevalence of allergy than other children without the same exposures. Similarly, fish that are sequestered in the artificial environment of a fish tank are very sensitive to any changes in their surroundings. If the pH of their tank changes or any contaminants are introduced, the result is predictable: the fish will die. The idea is clear: natural exposure of the immune system to challenges produces an immune system that responds properly. Danger, risk, and exposure are essential elements to any well functioning living system.

Though this argument may sound a bit technical, the point is quite simple: a living system will not deal properly to challenges if it is not exposed to dangers from time to time and learns how to respond appropriately. This is a basic fact of life that is no less true in the spiritual realm than in the biological realm. Church history clearly shows that the church has always been its strongest when its very life was at stake. When the church has faced persecution and hardship, it is only then that the church has lived up to its calling of “changing the landscape” of the surrounding culture. This was true during the Roman persecution of the first century, as well as it is true today for the persecuted church in China and the Islamic Middle East. As Alan Hirsch says, “Christianity is at its very best when it is on the more chaotic fringes. It is when church settles down, and moves away from the edge of chaos, that things go awry.”

In our next post, we will explore the implications of this fundamental concept of “risk exposure” for today’s American church.