Winning or Losing a City (pt. 4)
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I’m taking a step back from church to the bigger picture and asking ‘what is it with ‘the city‘?’ how is ‘the city’ treated as a concept in scripture?
I’ve been enjoying thinking about this with Jacques Ellul in his book ‘the meaning of the city‘
His argument is that the city as a concept has its roots in opposition to God. Man defining his own destiny and providing for his own security.
Cain of course is the first city builder you meet in the Bible (Genesis 4). He murders his brother and God declares he will be a restless wanderer in the land of Nod (=wandering) albeit under God’s protection from those who would try to kill him. The surprise is in Genesis 4:17: Cain was doing anything but wandering. instead he ”was then building a city’. This appears to be an expression of distrust in God’s word. He prefers the protection offered by stone walls rather than a promise from his maker. He prefers to define his own destiny rather than accept that that which God gives to him.
Cain in biblical thinking is the father of all city builders. His descendants later build the city par excellence (in the God-defying sense) – Babylon.
[Interestingly the Hebrews aren't associated with city building in their early history, except while they live in Egypt...kept in slavery making mud bricks for Pharaoh. Even the 'holy city' Jerusalem was taken from the pagan Jebusites by King David.]
It appears that ‘the city’ as a biblical/theological category starts as man’s attempt to defy God and takes on an existence all of its own. It’s the place where people can build for themselves a destiny and security such that it’s almost believable when they say to each other ‘God is dead’…
Can such an entity ever be ‘won’? I really cant see how. Sure God adopts a city- Jerusalem – the holy city but only for a time. Sure the end of time will be lived in a city – the new Jerusalem – but that will be fashioned and built by God. it ‘comes down from heaven’ (Revelation 21). Not even Jesus ‘wins’ a city. The light came into the world, but the world did not receive him (John 1:9-11 R(euben)SV). That’s a healthy check on unfounded optimism.
The city can’t be won…not as a city. It’s very nature and purpose is to oppose God and seduce its inhabitants to do the same. (I’m saying I don’t think the city can be redeemed as the city)
Still people, even crowds like Jesus prayed for, can be won. God by his gospel creates in every city communities who live in repentance and faith. They know that like every other thing which opposes God the city will not last. But they obey God’s strange call to keep on living in the city, praying for it and working for its good… all the while calling others to repentance and faith and the new Jerusalem with them.
My feeling is that these days cities are just the configuration we live in. Although cities do seem to be the places that earthly power and wealth cluster disproportionately to the number of people there.
Interesting too that inner-city areas seem to have a lot less % Christian than rural or outer suburban areas. This is the same for the big five cities of Australia.
Also interesting that a lot of churches these days have the word “city” in their name. 91 out of 1054 churches on my list of Aust Christian Churches have “City”, and there’s the Christian City Ch denom.
In the great commission “Make disciples of all nations”… nations (ethnos = people groups)… missiologists talk about people groups, and sometimes we can think of the people of a city as a people group, often smaller subsets of a city, like a smaller region, ethnic group or subculture.
Reply to Eric91 churches with city in their name? That is an interesting stat! Is that 1054 individual churches? (like Glen Osmond Baptists counts as 1?) If it is then almost 10% is pretty significant given whole denominations typically call their churches after the suburb or a saint…
I wonder whether city just as a word communicates ideas of power, progress, success and so on?
with ‘people groups’ that’s my point exactly…communities of faith and repentance rather than a Christian city.
Reply to reubenI’ve been listening in on what Tim Keller says about the church as “the city within the city” — the church is the locus of God’s life-giving work and so forms the new humanity, the true community in the midst of the world’s warped community. (This obviously builds on Augustine. Driscoll talks about it in Vintage Church too.) So this image is not so much of winning the city as renewing and transforming it from the inside out, in the way that Zion supersedes Babylon… Christ Church Hawthorn has taken this on as their mission too.
Reply to ArthurI haven’t seen what Keller says, but i’m not sure the church is ever identified as a ‘city’ in the Bible? And probably wouldn’t be given how ‘the city’ is conceived of…
But I get the idea – new humanity/true community are good (and better i think).
Also, can you think of anything that suggests we should renew or transform _the city_ as such?
Reply to reubenIsn’t it the church that’s the new/true city of Rev 21-22, “prepared as a bride beautifully dressed for her husband”, with the 12 tribes on its gates, temple-less because God himself lives there, with the tree of life restored?
Like you said, the city is certainly representative of human rebellion throughout the Bible, but rather than simply killing off the human city (Rev 18), God builds a new, holy city devoted to him. And God has already started building that city now.
I don’t know of any particular biblical imperatives to target the city especially, but I guess that’s not the point — the church is to be God’s renewing community wherever it finds itself.
Reply to ArthurThat’s where the church will be upon the heavenly city’s arrival.
The church leaves Babylon before her destruction (Revelation 18)
and enter the new Jerusalem where
‘There will be no more death or mourning or crying or pain … [at a future time when] … the old order of things has passed away.’ (Revelation 21.3)
I don’t think (but am happy to be persuaded) that similarity with Ephesians 5.27 means that since both church and city are figured as brides that they are the same thing. the point seems to be that Jesus cleanses them both. Maybe I missed your point though?
I guess i can see that the new jerusalem might not represent a destruction-then-replacement scenario but instead a transfiguration one. Then yes, God would have started to build it now. Could you convince me a bit further?
Reply to reubenAustralian Christian Churches = AOG in Australia. 91 of their ~1050 churches have city in the name, eg “Blue Mountains City Church”. 166 of them have ‘life’ and 171 have ‘centre’.
And while I’m at it, Sydney Anglicans have 29 St Johns (some with surnames), 27 St Pauls, 21 St Marks, 18 St Stephens, those four names accounting for over a quarter of the 350 on the list.
Also, the ‘city of churches’ tag for Adelaide prob originates from there being a stack of churches in the city centre and a relative lack of skyscrapers dwarfing them as in other cities. All up we have about 1 ch per 2000 ppl, which is prob similar in any city.
Oh, and the Lutherans have 77 St Johns
Reply to EricI’m not saying the city of God is purely identical with the church.
Like you say, the city of God is the place where the church belongs, the place where God is wholly present as King.
But this city is not just “a bride” but the bride of the Lamb (21:9). That is, this city is the one the Lamb died for. We can *also* say that this city is indeed the church.
I think it’s a bit of a mixed metaphor — it’s both-and rather than either-or. And there are further meanings: ‘City’ in the NBD also highlights the city as the physical new creation itself. But what unites all these representations is that this city is the locus of life and relationship with God, as seen in 21:3-4.
For that reason, I think it’s helpful to think of the church today as the now-and-not-yet city of God (without exhausting the term!).
(Btw, I see the NBD chastises us for making “church” synonymous with “people of God” — apparently “church” is the *activity* of the people of God..!)
Reply to ArthurYeah right, interesting…
I need to think more about how that connects with ‘the city’ as the present reality in which the church finds herself.
Another possible way of reasoning this is that Christ defeated his enemies at the cross (in Ephesians language) which would include whatever spiritual power stands behind the city. (note how cities normally have an ‘angel’ associated with them in Scripture). So Christs death would make city stuff ‘neutral’ in a sense…bringing with it the possibility of city building or renewing in service of Christ rather than implicitly siding with an opponent.
I’ll look into what Keller is on about (as he’s much smarter than me!)
I still want to emphasise the essentially anti-god stance of ‘the city’ conceptually and the importance of calling *people* to repentance and faith.
Reply to reubenThanks for clarifying. Looks like i might be at St. John’s out of mere statistical likelihood!
Reply to reubenhi reubs
Reply to psychodougiesorry been away from blogland for some time, a bit tardy with this, but thought it was worth asking, have you read Oliver ODonovan’s Common Objects of Love? i’m pretty sure it’s via augustine, and saying the city is formed around what they love; be it justice, superstars, sport, america, anti-america.
we need to ask what it is our cities love, and show how God fulfils that need.
i think
it’s been a while since i read it.
@Doug- no, but thanks for the pointer…sounds good!
Reply to reuben